The Lighted Match

More suggestive of a stowaway than a millionaire, thought Blanco the

following afternoon, when he had come over the side of the Isis and

sought out the owner of the yacht. Benton had turned hermit and

withdrawn to the most isolated space the vessel provided. It was really

not a deck at all--only a space between engine-room grating and

tarpaulined lifeboats on what was properly the cabin roof. Here, removed

from the burnished and ship-shape perfection of the yacht's appointment,

he lay carelessly shaven and more carelessly dressed.

The lazily undulating Mediterranean stretched unbroken save for the

yacht's stack, funnels and stanchions, in a sight-wide radius of blue.

Overhead the sky was serene. Here and there, in fitful humors, the sea

flowed in rifts of a different hue.

The sun was mellow and the breeze which purred softly in the cables

overhead came with the caressing breath that blows off the orange groves

of Southern Spain. Ahead lay all the invitation of the south of France;

of the Riviera's white cities and vivid countryside; of Monte Carlo's

casinos and Italy's villas. Beyond further horizons, waited the charm of

Greece, but the man lay on an old army blanket, clad in bagging flannels

and a blue army shirt open at the throat. His arms were crossed above

his eyes, and he was motionless, except that the fingers which gripped

his elbows sometimes clenched themselves and the bare throat above the

open collar occasionally worked spasmodically.

Blanco had come quietly, and his canvas shoes had made no sound. For a

time he did not announce himself. He was not sure that Benton was awake,

so he dropped noiselessly to the deck and sat with his hands clasped

about his knees, his eyes moodily measuring the rise and fall of the

glaringly white stanchions above and below the sky-line. At frequent

intervals they swept back to the other man, who still lay motionless. It

was late afternoon and the smoke-stack shadows pointed off in attenuated

lines to the bow while the sky, off behind the wake, brightened into the

colors of sunset. Finally Benton rose. The unexpected sight of Blanco

brought a start and an immediate masking of his face, but in the first

momentary glimpse the Andalusian caught a haggard distress which

frightened him.

"I didn't know you had come," said Benton quietly. "How long have you

been here?"

"I should say a half-hour, Señor," replied Manuel, casually rolling a

cigarette.

"Why didn't you rouse me? I'm not very amusing, but even I could have

relieved the dullness of sitting there like a marooned man on a

derelict."

"Dullness?" inquired the toreador with a lazy lift of the brows. "It

is ease, Señor, and ease is desirable--at sea."

The American sat cross-legged on the deck and held out his hand for a

cigarette. When he asked a question he spoke in matter-of-fact tones. He

even laughed, and the Andalusian chatted on in kind, but secretly and

narrowly he was watching the other, and when he had finished his

scrutiny he told himself that Benton had been indulging in the dangerous

pastime of brooding.