Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/200

 mere presence there. He noticed the restlessness of her brooding eyes as she sank into the broken-armed steamer-chair that he placed for her. He wondered just where the thread of their old intercourse would be taken up again.

"Are you in communication with anything?" she asked, with an anxious glance at his apparatus. Her tone was tentative and non-committal; it left everything still unanswered.

"No," he said.

"You can't get anything?"

"Nothing whatever," he answered, "though I've been calling regularly, twice an hour."

"And not a message in two days?" she asked.

"Yesterday afternoon I picked up a few words from an Atlas liner, bound north. She seemed to be reporting distances. But I couldn't get enough power; my coils weren't strong enough to reach her."

The girl rose to her feet, and crossed the cabin and stood studying the faded map of the Caribbean on the closet door.

"But aren't there chances of still getting in communication?" she asked. "There are so many ships, nowadays, that carry wireless."

McKinnon rose and stood beside her, regarding the map.

"Yes, there are hundreds and hundreds of ships, but, on the other hand, there is so much