Page:Claire Ambler (1928).djvu/47

 as an adjunct to moonlight and a banjo. Upon its bows, in gold letters, twinkled the unromantic name, Peanut, never intended for salty incrustations; but salt already dimmed the gold leaf, that morning, when the Peanut spanked itself through the harbour mouth and fantastically stood out to sea. The breeze was from the east, and Nelson knew that Platter Thomas would take the Caliph—the Reek and Thomas motorboat—straight into the breeze, because thus the consequent splashing would be more impressive to a passenger. This was the canoeist's unhesitating cynical conviction, and therefore, desiring to prove to Claire his utter indifference to herself, he paddled straight into the wind and was two miles off shore before the Caliph came in sight.

Of course he expected to show her more than his indifference; he meant her to see a greater man than either of the owners of the Caliph. And here a little mystery is reached. It is difficult to understand why he felt that going to sea in a fourteen-foot canoe proved his indifference to her in particular; though his thought that the voyage would show her his superiority to Platter and Bill is more comprehensible. If she admired daring, his position, compared to that of people in a forty-foot vessel, was admirably peril-