"Instructions," commented Mr. Powell. "That was all right. Very likely;
but they would be such instructions as, I thought to myself, no ship's
officer perhaps had ever been given before. It made me feel a little
sick to think what they would be dealing with, probably. But there!
Everything that happens on board ship on the high seas has got to be
dealt with somehow. There are no special people to fly to for
assistance. And there I was with that old man left in my charge. When
he noticed me looking at him he started to shuffle again athwart the
saloon. He kept his hands rammed in his pockets, he was as stiff-backed
as ever, only his head hung down. After a bit he says in his gentle soft
tone: "Did you see it?"
There were in Powell's head no special words to fit the horror of his
feelings. So he said--he had to say something, "Good God! What were you
thinking of, Mr. Smith, to try to . . . " And then he left off. He
dared not utter the awful word poison. Mr. Smith stopped his prowl.
"Think! What do you know of thinking. I don't think. There is
something in my head that thinks. The thoughts in men, it's like being
drunk with liquor or--You can't stop them. A man who thinks will think
anything. No! But have you seen it. Have you?"
"I tell you I have! I am certain!" said Powell forcibly. "I was looking
at you all the time. You've done something to the drink in that glass."
Then Powell lost his breath somehow. Mr. Smith looked at him curiously,
with mistrust.
"My good young man, I don't know what you are talking about. I ask
you--have you seen? Who would have believed it? with her arms round his
neck. When! Oh! Ha! Ha! You did see! Didn't you? It wasn't a
delusion--was it? Her arms round . . . But I have never wholly trusted
her."
"Then I flew out at him, said Mr. Powell. I told him he was jolly lucky
to have fallen upon Captain Anthony. A man in a million. He started
again shuffling to and fro. "You too," he said mournfully, keeping his
eyes down. "Eh? Wonderful man? But have you a notion who I am? Listen!
I have been the Great Mr. de Barral. So they printed it in the papers
while they were getting up a conspiracy. And I have been doing time. And
now I am brought low." His voice died down to a mere breath. "Brought
low."