“In you?”

“No, worse than that.  My heart is already scarred all over; no fresh wound would hurt.”

“In the doctor?”

“Yes and no.  He has never asked the truth and
I have never told him.”

“Who, then?”

“In little Ellen.  Let us keep that one flower untouched.”

The captain rested his head in his hand, and for some minutes made no answer.  Ellen was the apple of his eye.

“But if Bart insists?”

“He won’t insist when he sees Lucy.  She is no more the woman that he loved and wronged than I am.  He would not know her if he met her outside this house.”

“What shall I do?”

“Nothing.  Let matters take their course.  If he is the man you think he is he will never break the silence.”

“And you will suffer on—­and the doctor?”

Jane bowed her head and the tears sprang to her eyes.

“Yes, always; there is nothing else to do.”

CHLPTER XX

THE UNDERTOW

Within the month a second letter was handed to the captain by Tod, now regularly installed as postman.  It was in answer to one of Captain Holt’s which he had directed to the expected steamer and which had met the exile on his arrival.  It was dated “Amboy,” began “My dear father,” and was signed “Your affectionate son, Barton.”

This conveyed the welcome intelligence—­welcome to the father—­that the writer would be detained a few days in Amboy inspecting the new machinery, after which he would take passage for Barnegat by the Polly Walters, Farguson’s weekly packet.  Then these lines followed:  “It will be the happiest day of my life when I can come into the inlet at high tide and see my home in the distance.”

Again the captain sought Jane.

She was still at the hospital, nursing some shipwrecked men—­three with internal injuries—­who had been brought in from Forked River Station, the crew having rescued them the week before.  Two of the regular attendants were worn out with the constant nursing, and so Jane continued her vigils.

She had kept at her work—­turning neither to the right nor to the left, doing her duty with the bravery and patience of a soldier on the firing-line, knowing that any moment some stray bullet might end her usefulness.  She would not dodge, nor would she cower; the danger was no greater than others she had faced, and no precaution, she knew, could save her.  Her lips were still sealed, and would be to the end; some tongue other than her own must betray her sister and her trust.  In the meantime she would wait and bear bravely whatever was sent to her.

Jane was alone when the captain entered, the doctor having left the room to begin his morning inspection.  She was in her gray-cotton nursing-dress, her head bound about with a white kerchief.  The pathos of her face and the limp, tired movement of her figure would have been instantly apparent to a man less absorbed in his own affairs than the captain.