n
the bridge to watch and boil with indignation. He nodded, and she followed
him to the hatch, where he sat down.

Dennison saw his father's hands strain on the bridge rail, the presage of
a gathering storm. He intervened by a rough seizure of Cleigh's arm.

"Listen to me, Father! Not a word of reproach out of you when she comes
up--God bless her! Anything in pain! It's her way, and I'll not have her
reproached. God alone knows what the beggar saved her from last night! If
you utter a word I'll cash that twenty thousand--it's mine now--and you'll
never see either of us after Manila!"

Cleigh gently disengaged his arm.

"Sonny, you've got a man's voice under your shirt these days. All right.
Run down and give the new crew the once-over, and see if they have a
wireless man among them."

* * * * *

Sunset--a scarlet horizon and an old-rose sea. For a little while longer
the trio on the bridge could discern a diminishing black speck off to the
southeast. The _Wanderer_ was boring along a point north of east, Manila
way. The speck soon lost its blackness and became violet, and then
magically the streaked horizon rose up behind the speck and obliterated
it.

"The poor benighted thing!" said Jane. "God didn't mean that he should be
this kind of a man."

"Does any of us know what God wants of us?" asked Cleigh, bitterly.

"He wants men like you who pretend to the world that they're
granite-hearted when they're not. Ever since we started, Denny, I've been
trying to recall where I'd seen your father before; and it came a little
while ago. I saw him only once--a broken child he'd brought to the
hospital to be mended. I happened to be passing through the children's
ward for some reason. He called himself Jones or Brown or Smith--I forget.
But they told me afterward that he brought on an average of four children
a month, and paid all expenses until they were ready to go forth, if not
cured at least greatly bettered. He told the chief that if anybody ever
followed him he would never come back. Your father's a hypocrite, Denny."

"So that's where I saw you?" said Cleigh, ruminatively. He expanded a
little. He wanted the respect and admiration of this young woman--his
son's wife-to-be. "Don't weave any golden halo for me," he added, dryly.
"After Denny packed up and hiked it came back rather hard that I hadn't
paid much attention to his childhood. It was a kind of penance."

"But