Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/251

 "I'm going to send," was his reply. "I'll fight it out with him. Ganley can't dictate to the high seas of the world."

Even in anarchy and outlawry, he felt, there had to be some final substratum of reason. And Ganley had fallen back on nothing but brute force.

"Why couldn't I go to the captain?" she pleaded.

"That's worse than useless. He's drunk. And we'll only get him against us, for he'd order us to keep out of the mess. He'd fight shy of entangling alliances. He'd forbid me to send, for he's got his ship to clear from that port."

"But the Princeton would be his protection, as well as ours."

"That's true—but the man's brain is too brandy-soaked to understand such a situation. We've got to act ourselves, and on our own hook."

He told her, briefly, the way to the engine-room. Then he switched off his light, unlocked his door, and glanced out to see that the way was clear.

Yet he waited at that open door with his revolver in his hand, every moment of the time until she had crossed to the stair-head, until she had passed quietly down the brass-plated steps,