CHAPTER XXI
Another two days had passed, during which the _Nadine_, insteadof swirling through the water at twenty knots, had been waddlingthrough it like a lame duck at eight.
Adelaide had professed the utmost wonder and concern at the accident,and Miss Chrysie, who now knew rather more than she did, watched herwith unwinking steadiness from the time she came on deck in themorning till the time she retired with her aunt at night. Madame deBourbon herself was completely in the dark as to everything that wastaking place, and simply looked upon the breakdown of the port engineas one of the ordinary accidents of seafaring.
Adelaide had not slept for an hour continuously since she had seen theguns being mounted. That had convinced her that Hardress, whosesuspicion she dreaded more than anything else, already suspectedsomething. Williams had kept faith, and had been detected, thanks tothe extraordinary precautions that had been taken in the engine-room,precautions which, so her instinct told her, could not possibly havebeen taken unless some design against the safety of the yacht had beeneither discovered or very strongly suspected.
Still, as she told herself when she was lying awake in her berth thenight after the breakdown, to a certain extent, the plot hadsucceeded. Williams had done the work he was paid to do, and the_Nadine_ had come down from her greyhound speed to the limping crawlof a wounded hare. The _Vlodoya_ would certainly overtake hernow--but, then, those guns!
She knew that the _Vlodoya_ was prepared to fight if necessary, and sowas the _Nadine_, and, now that the question of speed had beendisposed of, it would be a question of guns. But, after all, gunswould not be of much use without men to fire them or officers todirect the operations. Manifestly the time had come for her to playher part in the great game whose prize was to be, for her the man sheloved, and for her allies the lordship of earth.
The next day just before lunch she was strolling up and down the deckwith Hardress and Lady Olive, talking about all that they were goingto do when they got to Halifax, and she had turned the conversationupon Canadian and American hotels and the difference between Americanand European cooking, when she said:
"Ah, Monsieur le Viscomte, that reminds me. Will you allow me to giveyou and also your poor men who have been working so hard at the brokenengine a little treat?"
"With the greatest of pleasure, my dear marquise," said Hardress. "Andwhat is it to be?"
"Oh, it is nothing very much," replied Adelaide, in her lightest andgayest tone; "it is only that my aunt happened to mention last nightthat she had found in her secretaire the authentic recipe of apunch--what do you call it?--a punch of wines and liqueurs which theyused to drink at the suppers at Versailles and the Trianon in the daysof the Grand Monarque. Louis himself drank it, and so did that otherunhappy ancestor and his queen----"
"Who," laughed Lady Olive, "is at present reincarnate on board the_Nadine_. I suppose you mean then to make up a punch some nightafter this recipe; that would be delightful, if we only have theproper ingredients on board."
"Oh, they are very simple," replied Adelaide; "it is certain that youwill have them, indeed it seems from the recipe that the excellence ofthe punch does not depend so much on the variety of the ingredients asthe proportions and the skill in making it."
"Very well," said Hardress, "as long as we've got the things on board,that is settled; and both ends of the ship shall drink to-night in thepunch _a le Grand Monarque_, to the health of his latest and fairestdescendant. M'Niven and his men really have been working like so manyniggers at that engine, and they've done splendidly. In fact, CaptainBurgess tells me we shall be ready for full speed ahead by daybreakto-morrow."
"Ah," said Adelaide in her soul, "then it is all the more necessarythat we should have the punch _a le Grand Monarque_," and she went onaloud, "Well then, Monsieur le Viscomte, that is arranged. If you willtell your steward, your maitre d'hotel, as we call him on Frenchships, to provide me with the ingredients, I will make it thisafternoon, and we will take it after dinner, eh?"
"Yes," said Lady Olive, "and I think, Shafto, under the circumstances,you might invite Captain Burgess and Mr M'Niven to dine with us."
"Certainly," replied her brother, "that's a capital idea, Olive. Wewill--in fact, we'll have Mr Vernon, too: he's worked just as hard asanyone else, and it can be arranged for the second officer to takecharge of the bridge during dinner. And so, ma'm'selle," he went on,turning to the marquise, "if you will take the trouble, you may brewus two bowls, one for the cabin and a bigger one for the other end ofthe ship, and the steward shall put the whole of the ship's liquidstores at your disposal."
"Monsieur le Viscomte, I could desire nothing better," she replied,with her most dazzling smile, and more meanings than one.
The subject of the punch was mentioned during lunch, and during theafternoon Miss Chrysie got her father up into the bows, and, after aswift look round to see if anyone was within hearing distance, said:
"Poppa, are you going to take any of that punch to-night?"
"Why, certainly, Chrysie. Why not? What's the matter?"
"It may be matter or no matter," she replied, "but I'm not, and Iguess it would be healthier for you not to. I'm more than ever certainthat that Frenchwoman is in it. Yes; it's all very well looking likethat, poppa, but--you think I hate this woman because she's in lovewith the viscount. Well, I suppose I do; and there'll most likely betrouble between us sometime soon; but I haven't quite lost all mysenses because I happen to be in love with a man that another womanwants to get. Don't you see, we're going to have that punch just a fewhours before we get the engines right and that other boat is to catchus?"
"But, great sakes, Chrysie, you don't mean the marquise is going topoison us?"
"It won't be poison," answered Chrysie, very curtly, "because sheknows that he'll drink it. I guess some drug's a good deal morelikely--something that'll make everybody at both ends of the shippretty sleepy and stupid when the time for a fight comes around. Yousee, that's just the natural sequence to the plot to cripple theengine. Anyhow, that's what I think it is."
"Well, if it's as bad as that," said her father, "why not warn theviscount?"
"That wouldn't do much good," she replied, more curtly than before."You see, I'd have to make a definite accusation against her, and I'venothing to go on except what he'd call mere suspicion and we calllogical deduction. I'd give her a tremendous handle against me,especially with him; and if she had any suspicion that I suspectedher--why, she might call me down pretty badly by not putting anythingin the stuff at all. No, poppa, under the circumstances, we can't doanything except not drink that punch. I'm going to have a headacheto-night and stop in my berth. You have some of your gastric troubleand drink hot milk or something of that sort: and if you get a show Ithink you might, as matters are coming to a head pretty quickly, justgive a hint to Captain Burgess and Mr M'Niven to drink as little ofthat punch as they politely can."
"Well, Chrysie," replied her father, "you've been right so far, but Ido hope you're wrong this time. It's a pretty large order, you know,drugging the whole ship's company."
"Yes; and a Frenchwoman with a lot to win is playing a game for prettybig dollars. Of course, there may be nothing in it at all, and I maybe quite wrong, but I think this punch of hers has come along at thewrong time, and we can't take any risks. There's one thing, she'llhave to drink some of it herself, and that old aunt of hers too.Still, she's pretty useless, and doesn't matter; but if anything doesreally happen, poppa, you'd better go straight and shake the viscountup. I'll have the steward make some pretty strong coffee to-night forme, and I'll keep it hot and you can give it him; and if the doctorisn't dead, too, with the stuff, get a drop of prussic acid from him.That'll bring him round."
"It strikes me, Chrysie," said her father, looking down admiringly onher flushed and animated face, "as though you're getting ready to runthis ship in case of trouble."
"It's just that, poppa," she said, with an impatient little tap of herfoot on the deck; "that is, of course, with y
ou. I don't say it'saltogether disinterested, because it isn't; but I'd do that and a lotmore to keep to windward of that Frenchwoman, and she knows it. Youcan work your gun and I can work a Maxim, so if there's only the twoof us, we can do something with that Russian ship. And now I guesswe'd better go to the other end and show how friendly we can be withour enemies."
"Chrysie," said her father, with a very tender note in a voice whichcould be as hard as the ring of steel, "I don't want you to be a bitdifferent to what you are, but if you'd been a man you'd have been agreat one."
"I'd sooner be a good woman and get what I want than be the biggestman on earth," laughed Chrysie. "When a woman gets all she wants shedoesn't want to envy big men anything."
And with that they went aft and subsided into deck-chairs in a sort ofirregular circle, in which Lord Orrel was fast asleep, Madame deBourbon rapidly subsiding, and the marquise and Lady Olive making apretence of reading with drooping eyelids.
The punch _a le Grand Monarque_ was a great success that eveningafter dinner. It was delicious; and every one regretted that thepresident's attack of gastritis and Miss Chrysie's headache preventedthem from sharing in its delights.
The marquise brewed a little pot of her aunt's special Russian tea forthem, which the president declined with many apologies, and which MissChrysie, after accepting a cup from the hands of Felice, emptied outof the port-hole as soon as her ladyship's lady had left the cabin.
Captain Burgess and the chief had taken the president's hint almost asthough they expected it, and the Scotsman had said significantly:
"I'm obliged to you, Mr Vandel, though I hope there's nothing in yoursuspicions; still, this is no time for us to be drinking foreign mixeddrinks when I've got to keep my eyes open, looking, as you may say,out of both sides of my head. A drop of good old Scotch whisky is asgood nourishment as a man can need. What I'm thinking about is themen. We can't forbid them to take it without either insulting hislordship or telling him all the suspicions, which, you say, can't betold him."
"No," added the captain; "but I'll see they have a pretty good shakingup at four o'clock, and the cook shall have plenty of strong coffeeready in case of accidents."
But for all that, the accident happened, almost, if not quite as wellas the originator of it could have hoped. By eleven o'clock everyonewho had drunk even a single glass of the marquise's punch, includingherself and Madame de Bourbon, were dead asleep. Even the captain andthe chief engineer, who had taken somewhat drastic measures tocounteract the possible effects, did not wake until daybreak, and eventhen, strong as they were, they were both mentally and physicallyincapable for the time being of attending to the work of the ship. Thesailors and engine-room hands, who had indulged rather more freely,were all sleeping like logs when the watch was called at four in themorning, and nothing could wake them until Mr Vernon, the chiefofficer, who never under any circumstances drank anything strongerthan coffee, and who therefore escaped the general paralysis, with thehelp of the president and the two quartermasters, who had beenforbidden to touch anything in the way of liquor during the night,brought them up on deck and turned the hose on them. This revived themajority of them sufficiently to enable them to drink a copiousallowance of strong coffee, after which they were very ill, and thenmuch better.
The captain and the chief engineer were then carried to bathrooms andtreated in somewhat the same fashion, after which they were taken backto their rooms and given a good stiff brandy-and-soda.
"Ay, man!" said the chief engineer, as he began to get back his gripon things, "whatever was in that stuff it was deadly. No more of yourforeign drinks for me. After that, good Scotch whisky is going to begood enough for me. It's a mercy she didn't poison the whole ship'screw. Captain, if there's any of the men anything like fit for dutyyou might give them a good strong tot, and let's get to work on thatshaft. There's just the bearings and the thrust-blocks to adjust andoil, and then we'll be ready for full speed ahead in three hours."
"I'm afraid that would be a bit too late, sir," said Miss Chrysie, whohad been sweeping the eastern horizon with her glasses. "Look yonder,"she went on; "there's a steamer down yonder steaming for all she'sworth, and I reckon she's a lot more likely to be the _Vlodoya_ thanan east-bound liner."
The chief took the glasses she offered him, and had a long look at thecloud of smoke that was rising from the ship.
"I'm afraid you're right, miss," he said, handing the glasses back."That's no liner; she's not half big enough; she's a yacht. Still, herstern chase is a long one, even if we are like a seal with oneflipper, and we may be ready for her even yet."
"I think we shall be able to dodge him, Miss Vandel," said thecaptain, who had just come out of his room, still looking pale andsomewhat dazed. "Put every possible hand on to the shaft, M'Niven.Steam's up, and we can start the moment you're ready."
"And," added the president, "I'll see to the guns. If that's the_Vlodoya_ they're not going to overtake us before we are ready."
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