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A week later, Dan, in accordance with an engagement made with Mr. Howland when parting with him at the railroad station at Norfolk, whither the rescuing vessel had taken the shipwrecked party, called at the office of the Coastwise and West Indian Shipping Company in the Bowling Green Building and asked to see the president.
It was a large office, filled with clerks and all of them busy. The young man who received the caller's request looked at him sharply and shook his head.
"Mr. Rowland's engaged now," he said, "at a company meeting. If you'll call in an hour or two I'll find out if he will see you."
Dan drew from his pocket a card with a pencilled memorandum and glanced at it.
"He made an appointment with me for eleven o'clock to-day. So I guess I'll have to ask you to take in my card."
The clerk shrugged his shoulders and walked away. When he returned a few minutes later all signs of mistrust had vanished. Opening the gate with a sort of flourish he said:
"Mr. Howland says for you to come right in."
As Dan entered the president's office, Mr. Howland arose from a long, polished oaken table littered with papers, at which several men were seated, and advanced to meet him.
"Captain Merrithew," he said, "I am glad to see you again. And now," he added, the formalities of introducing Dan to the various officers of the company being completed, "I have gone into the matter of the men lost when the Fledgling sank and have sent a check for five thousand dollars to the wife of your engineer, Crampton, who I understand carried some life insurance, and a check for three thousand dollars to Welch's mother." His voice was crisp and business-like, but his manner intimated clearly the sympathy and gratitude which had dictated his gifts.
"Yes, sir, they are adequate," replied Dan, feelingly.
"I have sent checks to your mate, Mulhatton, who, I am informed, is still in the employ of the Phoenix Company, as well as that fellow Noonan and the steward; which brings us to you."
"Mr. Howland," said Dan, flushing, "I'm simply not—"
"Just a moment, if you please," interrupted Mr. Howland; "I assume you are qualified to navigate the ocean?"
"Yes," replied Dan, trembling slightly; "I've the best of broad ocean papers and seven harbor endorsements."
"That ought to be enough," smiled the vice-president, Mr. Horton, who seemed perfectly in touch with the trend of the situation.
"Yes," resumed Mr. Howland, "what I am getting at is this, Captain Merrithew. The Coastwise Transportation Company is looking for men like you. We want you with us, in short. As you probably know, we have a fleet consisting of steamers of various sizes, but all pretty much the same type; that is to say, seaworthy, comfortable, and well engined. We cannot place you in command of one of our newest vessels, of course. But there is the Tampico , the commander of which, Captain Harrison, we are to retire for age. She is a good boat, running to San Blanco, and she is fitted for passengers; so you will find opportunity to develop your social proclivities, if you have any to develop."
As Mr. Howland was talking the color had slowly departed from Dan's face, and now, as the president ceased speaking and regarded the young man, he spoke haltingly, with dry lips.
"Do I understand you to mean that you are going to make me Captain of the Tampico ?"
"You are to understand that we have," corrected Mr. Howland.
"Mr. Howland, gentlemen," said Dan, "I—I can't say anything except—thank you—I—" He hesitated, confusedly.
"There's nothing for you to say," interpolated the president, "except that you'll go down to the ship, which is loading at Pier 36, East River, and assume command. Captain Harrison will remain aboard for two or three trips to break you in to the trade." There was that in his voice which intimated the end of the interview, and Dan with a bow was turning to leave, when Mr. Howland uttered an exclamation.
"Oh, by the way," he said, "here is a note my daughter asked me to give you. It will explain itself, I think; and since you are now serving under the house flag of this company, I can say only that obedience to orders contained therein is imperative. We all obey orders from that source," and with a chuckle Mr. Rowland turned to his confreres and was speedily immersed in other important affairs of the company.
Dan did not open the envelope in the office. First of all he wanted fresh air. The quick, calm, business-like manner in which his promotion had taken place; the noiseless, well-ordered, automatic opening of another door leading to the future of his ambitions, so utterly at variance with preconceived ideas in this regard, had all but unnerved him. He had always held it as assured that some day he should walk his own bridge. But until a half-hour ago, this day seemed still to lie far ahead, a day to be attained, well, he could not say exactly how—but at least with a sort of metaphorical roaring of guns and waving of flags, and great spiritual exaltation.
But now—a few short sentences, a handshake, and presto! Captain Merrithew, of the Coastwise line steamship Tampico , by your leave. The wonder of it all dazed him; yet withal he knew he had never before been so stirred to the very depths of his being. He was not yet in a position to estimate his good fortune in comprehensive terms. As a matter of fact, he did not try. One thought alone kept flaming through his brain—his age. Twenty-six, twenty-six; the numerals flew through his mind as though the years of his life were the most important elements in the situation.
By the time he reached the Battery sea-wall, he had somewhat adjusted his mental attitude, and, gazing with a degree of calmness over the waters of the bay toward the hills of Staten Island, he recalled the note from Miss Howland.
All along it had lain a pleasant substratum in his mind, and now as he tore open the envelope and read the contents, a peculiar, grim smile lighted his eyes for a second.
"DEAR CAPTAIN MERRITHEW:—Next Thursday we are going to have a reunion of the castaways at our house. It will be for dinner, and we have all agreed it will not be complete without the man who made this gathering possible.
"I am not going to let you make any excuse, for my dinner-party will have an empty space without you. It will be very informal. Father for several years has refused to wear evening dress at dinner, so none of the other men will. Now remember, I shall expect you on Thursday evening, at seven; you need not bother sending an acceptance.
"Very sincerely yours,
"VIRGINIA WALTON ROWLAND."
Virginia met her aunt at the foot of the stairs, and, slipping an arm about her waist, laughed nervously.
"Well, my dear, to-night we entertain the tug-boat hero. It's horrid to feel so, but do you know I wish I had suggested to father that we have the dinner on one of his vessels. Do you remember last Fall, what fun it was? I have the impression, don't you know, that things would be less strained than here. He would find the atmosphere more adaptable."
"He? Oh, the tugman," laughed her aunt. "I shouldn't worry if I were you."
"I'm not worrying about that," protested the girl; "but oh, I don't know—I hate to have the success of a dinner in the air, especially when you have a sort of reputation in that way, don't you know."
"Nonsense," replied the older woman, glancing admiringly at the tall, lithe girl in her white evening gown as she moved through the drawing-room to the dining-room, where the butler was adding the final deft fillips to a centrepiece of roses, in which a candy yacht was sinking.
"You see," said the girl, pointing to a dinner card bearing Merrithew's name, "I am going to place him between you and me. Will you—won't you arrange things so he'll take you in. No; never mind! I'll arrange that—you're always such a dear about such things, and you won't mind, will you?"
"Certainly not," smiled her aunt, "I shall ask him to tow me in."
They both laughed. Their understanding was perfect. Ever since the older woman had entered her brother's house, years before, to care for a motherless child, the bond of sympathy between the two had been of the strongest, and throughout she had remained the best friend and counsellor, if only because she was the wisest.
When Dan entered the Howlands' drawing-room all the guests had arrived. He accomplished this difficult feat, which is considered an art in fashionable schools, with easy grace and unconsciousness and received Virginia's welcome courteously.
He wore a well-fitting blue suit of conventional cut and neither his hands nor his feet seemed to bother him a bit. And yet among the men of the company he stood out in sharp contrast. Miss Howland marked this particularly when Oddington presented himself with an air of good-humored camaraderie,—he, the successful young lawyer, with a growing reputation as a man about town and the glamour which surrounds the most popular all-around man at his university still about him; a man who did well everything he tried to do, and able to give the impression that the things he could not do were not worth the attempt; whose every action, every word, every expression was marked with the undefinable stamp of the metropolis, and the various lessons it teaches. Merrithew, on the other hand, standing tall and broad-shouldered, looking about him as he talked, with quick, observant glances; a face weather-beaten, but not rough, a typical Anglo-Saxon fighting face, but kindly withal; certainly not truculent. Miss Howland had met young army and navy officers who had aroused in her similar impressions; she had, in fact, no difficulty in defining Merrithew's type. He was of the class which does strong things out of the beaten track; men who in the process of civilization have retained some of the wandering or combative or predatory instincts of earlier ages and have been set apart in the scheme of natural selection to fight battles, explore countries, kill wild beasts, navigate waters, to the end that a greater proportion of their fellow men may peaceably advance the interests of commerce, science, the arts, and, other affairs of a humdrum world.
Oddington took Miss Howland in. At the last moment her father had telephoned from the office he would be late and not to wait for him. This necessitated a hasty rearrangement of the dinner cards; and Mrs. Van Vleck was further disturbed by the butler, who was batting his eyes fiercely at the cringing second man, token that something had occurred, or more probably had been about to occur, to mar that service which was his pride.
Dan, therefore, who sat at her right, finding relief from the rapid-fire conversation which she had directed at him, obviously with intention to put him at his ease, found time to glance up and down the table. There were perhaps a dozen persons, and he recognized most of them as members of the Veiled Ladye's party. Reginald Wotherspoon, upon dry land once more, out of danger, sure of himself, was bantering one of the girls across the table, in the dry, masterful tone of one who fancies he understands women; and the rest were laughing at the confused indignation which marked her replies.
Dan recalled this girl. She had been especially cool aboard the yacht; and certain pictures of Wotherspoon flashing through his mind, an amused smile lighted his eyes for an instant. Miss Howland, who at the moment had turned from Oddington, caught the smile, and following his gaze, instinctively divined the cause. She was not annoyed. On the contrary, she was pleased, for it indicated to her that Dan was perfectly at ease, and she noted, moreover, that he was dealing with the various courses with a greater degree of savoir faire , so to speak, than she had thought probable. She dismissed forthwith all fears she had entertained regarding Wotherspoon's prediction that "among the features of the dinner would be a lifelike imitation of a towboat skipper swallowing his knife."
He followed Mrs. Van Vleck's leads in conversation, and once responded with crisp cleverness to a gay remark addressed to him by a girl across the table. But he seemed to take it for granted that Miss Howland would be occupied with Oddington; and in fact he had spoken to her but once, and then to thank her when she pushed a dish of almonds toward him.
The girl had noted a similar tendency of late on the part of other men, but had thought of it only in as far as it had impressed upon her the fact that she and Ralph had grown to understand each other rather well and were very good friends. She had arrived at that age where she had begun to feel that perhaps, after all, this might be what the world called love and that women who attributed to the word emotions deeper, more absorbing, more thrilling, were mere sentimentalists, who derived their plans and ideas from a world of dreams or from fiction both classical and popular; or else they were women of deeper feeling than she knew herself to be.
It was all a problem. She had reason to feel that a time was approaching when Oddington might reasonably expect a clearer, better-defined relation. Whether she would be willing to grant this was another matter. It was possible she might; it was possible she might not. She did not know. It was a situation which perplexed if it did not inspire her, which interested if it did not thrill.
And yet now Dan's tacit aloofness piqued her. She admitted she did not understand him at all. Here was a man, a tugboat captain, of course a product of the water front; primarily, no doubt, a dock-rat, and yet a man who had not tangled himself in the use of his forks, who spoke in even, well-modulated tones, and looked like a gentleman. Miss Howland was not snobbish in these thoughts. She had never been a snob; she was simply considering facts. And she did not want him to be aloof.
"Captain Merrithew," she said in a tone designed to draw him and the others into general conversation, "Ralph—Mr. Oddington, has been saying things again about my favorite cousin Percy Walton."
Ignoring the polite chorus of mild expostulation, Miss Howland turned to Dan, speaking with great vivacity.
"Percy, you know, was educated to win football games for Yale, and at the last moment went to Princeton. But he did not play there, because Uncle Horace, his father, in a fit of disgust, made him go to work." She glanced smilingly at Oddington. "Mr. Oddington and Mr. Wotherspoon say he was proselyted by Princeton. We've had more fights about it—"
"Well, he was proselyted," laughed Oddington, "stolen from us bodily."
"Wasn't it some time ago?" asked Dan.
"Why, that's just the point," said Mrs. Van Vleck. "It was at least five or six years ago. I am afraid Ralph and Reggie will never be able to realize they are not undergraduates."
Oddington smiled.
"Oh, I don't know," he said. "At all events, it keeps us young. As for Walton, I'd be ashamed to own him for a cousin," winking at Dan. "Why, Merrithew, all his family had been Yale from great-grandfather down."
"There; you hear him, Captain Merrithew," cried Miss Howland; "don't you think that's a horrid way to talk?"
Dan smiled, tapping lightly on the table with his fingers.
"I don't believe he was stolen," he said slowly, as though not quite certain whether he ought to venture an opinion. "Whether he was or not, I don't believe he'd ever have made the Yale team or the Princeton eleven either."
Virginia started in her chair and glanced at him swiftly.
"Indeed!" she said, flushing. "You don't mean to say—what do you know about Percy Walton?"
"Now you're in for it, Merrithew," grinned Oddington. "What do you know about Walton?"
Dan picked up his dinner card and spun it between his thumb and forefinger for a few seconds, and then with a slight smile replied:
"Why, not a great deal. Next to nothing, personally." He paused a moment, and then glancing down at the table added, "I was captain of the eleven on which Walton played at Exeter."
* * * * * *
After the guests had gone, Virginia, her father, and Mrs. Van Vleck sat for a few minutes in a small apartment between the drawing and dining rooms. The girl's eyes were bright.
"Well, father, I actually believe you could have knocked me down with a feather to-night."
Mr. Howland drew his cigar-cutter from his pocket and slowly inserted the end of a perfecto.
"I suppose you refer to Merrithew."
"Certainly," said Mrs. Van Vleck; "why in the world didn't you tell us, Horace?"
"Yes, why didn't you?" The girl had arisen and approached her father's chair. "You might have known, father dear, that both Aunt Helen and I lay awake nights wondering whether he would bring a boat-hook or a sou'wester to the dinner, and do—oh, all sorts of outlandish things, making us the joke of the season. And to think—a football captain in Percy's class at prep school, quiet, easy-mannered—"
Mr. Howland snapped the end from his cigar and placed the cutter in his pocket.
"Are you quite through, Virginia?" he said.
"Quite," replied the girl, who thereupon disproved her assertion by beginning where she had left off. "And I do believe you knew all the time and were simply teasing us."
"That is not exactly true," smiled her father. "Of course I looked him up a bit before offering him the command of the Tampico . He comes from near New Bedford. You know my mother's family lived there."
The girl nodded. "Yes? Go on."
Mr. Howland lighted a match and held it burning for a while before applying it to his cigar.
"You know," he said, "there are no better people in the world than some of those New England seafaring families. The Merrithews, I believe, were very substantial.₀ So you see where your supposed wharf-rat acquired the manner which you marked in him, and his good English, and—and well, whatever else you marked."
"What is he going to do now?" asked Mrs. Van Vleck. "Oh, of course, the Tampico . Is he qualified to be a captain?"
"Why, naturally; I haven't the slightest doubt of it. But Harrison will stay with the ship for two or three more trips to break him in thoroughly. Both companies by whom he was employed while in tugboat work speak of him in the highest terms. It's all rather a departure. But I feel I owe it to Merrithew; and besides, I have an idea he is the sort of man we want. This West Indian trade is not all beer and skittles."
"It is very interesting," said Virginia, stifling a yawn. "I hope to see something more of him; he's a new sort and worth studying. And—oh, father, is there any chance that we'll have that house-party at our San Blanco estate next Spring? I mean—of course you've promised that. What I meant was, will we go on the Tampico ? Now don't smile, father; you have said a dozen times you were through with steam yachts."
"I'm not smiling," said Mr. Howland. "It is quite possible we'll go down on the Tampico —unless Merrithew manages to sink her in the meantime."
"Bully," cried the girl. "Good-night.₀ I think," she said, speaking slowly over her shoulder—"I think we had a very successful partee." She paused and looked doubtfully at her father. "The only difficulty is that, now we know he is not hopelessly impossible in one way, we have to face the fact that he is all the more impossible in others."
"Yes," said her aunt, laughing, "as an interesting social freak we might have used him; but as an ordinary, well-behaved steamship captain—" Mrs. Van Vleck shrugged her shoulders expressively and raised her eyebrows.
"Well," said the girl, "he'll be eminently eligible for the Captain's table of the Tampico . Somehow I wish he had done something unusual to-night. I had developed all sorts of strange fancies concerning him."
Now, as a matter of fact, she did not wish that at all.