Part 115

“He has telephoned,” explained Mayo. “Those are the boys! There's hope for us!”

There was more than hope--there was rescue after some hours of dreary and anxious waiting.

The life-boat came frothing down the sea from the distant inlet, and they were lifted on board by strong arms.

And then Alma Marston gave Mayo the strangest look he had ever received from a woman's eyes. But her lips grew white and her eyes closed, and she lapsed into unconsciousness while he folded a blanket about her.

“You must have had quite a job of it, managing a woman through this scrape,” suggested the captain of the crew.

“It's just the other way,” declared Mayo. “I'm giving her credit for saving the whole of us.”

“How's that?”

“I might find it a little hard to make you understand, captain. Let it stand as I have said it.”

XXV ~ A GIRL AND HER DEBT OF HONOR

Says she, “You lime-juice sailor, Now see me home you may.” But when we reached her cottage door She unto me did say-- And a-way, you santee, My dear Annie! O you New York girls, Can't you dance the polka! --Walking Down the Broadway.

Mayo was promptly informed that Captain Downs and the crew of the Alden were safe.

“He caught our flare, got his motor to working, and made the inlet by a lucky stab,” explained the coast-station captain. “But he didn't reckon he'd ever see you folks again. How did it happen he didn't tell me there was a woman aboard?”

“You'll have to ask him.”

“Who is she?”

“You'll have to ask him that, too. I'm only a sailor.”

The captain looked him over with considerable suspicion: His shirt was torn and his white skin was revealed. The drenching by rain and spray had played havoc with his disguise; most of the coloring had been washed away.

“Have you got anything special to say about yourself?”

“No, sir.”

The captain turned his back on his men and leaned close to Mayo. “They have had your picture in the paper this week,” he said. “You're the captain they are wanting in that Montana case. They're after you. I've got to report on this thing, you understand!”

“Very well, captain.”

“But I reckon we'll talk it all over after we get to the station,” said the master, kindly. “There may be something in it that I don't understand.”

“There's considerable in it that I don't understand myself, just now, but I'm going to find out,” declared Captain Mayo.

They placed Ahpa Marston in the care of the station captain's wife as soon as they were safely on shore in the inlet. Fortunate chance had sent the woman to the station that day on a visit to her husband.

Captain Downs, fed and warmed, watched the new arrivals eat beside the kitchen stove and listened to the story Mayo had for him.

The bedraggled cat lapped milk, protected from the resentful jealousy of the station's regular feline attaché by the one-eyed cook.

And afterward, closeted with Captain Downs and the station captain, Mayo went over his case.

“I must say you seem to be pretty hard and fast ashore in mighty sloppy water,” commented the coastguard captain. “It isn't my especial business--but what do you propose to do?”

“Go to New York and take what they're going to hand me, I suppose. I ought to have stayed there and faced the music. I have put myself in bad by running away. But I was rattled.”