He rose and leaned on his arms against a port sill and stared at the stars
until they began to fade, until the sea and the sky became like the pearls
he would soon be seeking. A string of glass beads, bringing about all
these events!
At dawn he went down to the deck for a bit of exercise before he turned
in. When he beheld Dennison sound asleep in the chair, his mouth slightly
open, his bare feet standing out conspicuously on the foot rest, a
bantering, mocking smile twisted the corners of Cunningham's lips.
Noiselessly he settled himself in the adjacent chair, and cynically hoping
that Dennison would be first to wake he fell asleep.
The Wanderer's deck toilet was begun and consummated between six and
six-thirty, except in rainy weather. Hose, mops, and holystone, until the
teak looked as if it had just left the Rangoon sawmills; then the brass,
every knob and piping, every latch and hinge and port loop. The care given
the yacht since leaving the Yang-tse might be well called ingratiating.
Never was a crew more eager to enact each duty to the utmost--with mighty
good reason.
But when they came upon Dennison and Cunningham, asleep side by side, they
drew round the spot, dumfounded. But their befuddlement was only a tithe
of that which struck Cleigh an hour later. It was his habit to take a
short constitutional before breakfast; and when he beheld the two, asleep
in adjoining chairs, the fact suggesting that they had come to some
friendly understanding, he stopped in his tracks, as they say, never more
astonished in all his days.
For as long as five minutes he remained motionless, the fine, rugged face
of his son on one side and the amazing beauty of Cunningham's on the
other. But in the morning light, in repose, Cunningham's face was tinged
with age and sadness. There was, however, no grain of pity in Cleigh's
heart. Cunningham had made his bed of horsehair; let him twist and writhe
upon it.
But the two of them together, sleeping as peacefully as babes! Dennison
had one arm flung behind his head. It gave Cleigh a shock, for he
recognized the posture. As a lad Dennison had slept that way. Cunningham's
withered leg was folded under his sound one.
What had happened? Cleigh shook his head; he could not make it out.
Moreover, he could not wake either and demand the solution to the puzzle.
He could not put his hand on his son's shoulder, and he would not put it
on Cunningham's. Pride on one side and distaste on the other. But the two
of them together!