n with
feeling, and once she surprised herself by finding her eyes wet when
she had finished telling Henry about showing Alan the picture of his
father. Henry listened intently, eating slowly. When she stopped, he
appeared to be considering something.

"That's all he told you about himself?" he inquired.

"Yes."

"And all you told him?"

"He asked me some things about the lakes and about the _Miwaka_, which
was lost so long ago--he said he'd found some reference to that and
wanted to know whether it was a ship. I told him about it and about
the Drum which made people think that the crew were not all lost."

"About the Drum! What made you speak of that?" The irritation in his
tone startled her and she looked quickly up at him. "I mean," he
offered, "why did you drag in a crazy superstition like that? You
don't believe in the Drum, Connie!"

"It would be so interesting if some one really had been saved and if
the Drum had told the truth, that sometimes I think I'd like to believe
in it. Wouldn't you, Henry?"

"No," he said abruptly. "No!" Then quickly:

"It's plain enough you like him," he remarked.

She reflected seriously. "Yes, I do; though I hadn't thought of it
just that way, because I was thinking most about the position he was in
and about--Mr. Corvet. But I do like him."

"So do I," Spearman said with a seeming heartiness that pleased her.
He broke a piece of bread upon the tablecloth and his big, well-shaped
fingers began to roll it into little balls. "At least I should like
him, Connie, if I had the sort of privilege you have to think whether I
liked or disliked him. I've had to consider him from another point of
view--whether I could trust him or must distrust him."

"Distrust?" Constance bent toward him impulsively in her surprise.
"Distrust him? In relation to what? Why?"

"In relation to Corvet, Sherrill, and Spearman, Connie--the company
that involves your interests and your father's and mine and the
interests of many other people--small stockholders who have no
influence in its management, and whose interests I have to look after
for them. A good many of them, you know, are our own men--our old
skippers and mates and families of men who have died in our service and
who left their savings in stock in our ships."

"I don't understand, Henry."

"I've had to think of Conrad this morning in the same way as I've had
to think of Ben Corvet of recent years--as a threat against t