expected to find the skipper
alone, and he was pretty sure that Carlsen had also expected this. The
drawn expression of her face, the strained faint smile with which she
greeted him, the hopeless look in her eyes, startled him.

"I wanted to see your father," he said in a low voice.

She told him to enter.

Captain Simms was lying in his bunk, apparently fully dressed, with the
exception of his shoes. His cheeks had sunken, dark hollows showed under
his closed eyes, the bones of his skull projected, and his flesh was the
color of clay. Rainey believed that he was in the presence of death
itself. He looked at the girl.

"He is in a stupor," she said. "He has been that way since last night,
following a collapse. I can barely find his pulse, but his breath shows
on this."

She produced a small mirror, little larger than a dollar, and held it
before her father's lips. When she took it away Rainey saw a trace of
moisture.

"Carlsen can not rouse him?" he asked.

"Can not--or will not," she answered in a voice that held a hard quality
for all its despondency. Rainey glanced at the door. It was shut.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked, speaking low.

She looked at him as if measuring his dependency.

"I don't know," she answered dully. "I wish I did. Father's illness
started with sciatica, through exposure to the cold and damp. It was
better during the time the _Karluk_ was in San Francisco though he had
some severe attacks. He said that Doctor Carlsen gave him relief. I know
that he did, for there were days at first when father had to stay in bed
from the pain. It was in his left leg, and then it showed in frightful
headaches, and he complained of pain about the heart. But he was bent on
the voyage, and Doctor Carlsen guaranteed he could pull him through.
But--lately--the doctor has seemed uncertain. He talks of perverted
nerve functions, and he has obtained a tremendous influence over father.

"You heard what he said when--the night he tried to shoot you? You see,
I am trusting you in all this, Mr. Rainey. I _must_ trust some one. If I
don't I can't stand it. I think I shall go mad sometimes. The doctor has
changed. It is as if he was a dual personality--like Jekyll and
Hyde--and now he is always Hyde. It is the gold that has turned his
brain, his whole behavior from what he was in California before father
returned and he learned of the island. He said last night that he could
save father or--or--that he wou