“However you put it, old man,” he said at last, “we’re all in a pretty bad hole.”

“All!” cried Mr. Trevor, indignantly.

“Yes, all,” asserted Mr. Cooke, with composure.  “There are the police, and here is Allen as good as run down.  If they find him when they get abroad, you don’t suppose they’ll swallow anything you have to say about trying to deliver him over.  No, sir, you’ll be bagged and fined along with the rest of us.  And I’d be damned sorry to see it, if I do say it; and I blame myself freely for it, old man.  Now you take my advice and keep your mouth shut, and I’ll take care of you.  I’ve got a place for Allen.”

During this somewhat remarkable speech Mr. Trevor, as it were, blew hot and cold by turns.  Although its delivery was inconsiderate, its logic was undeniable, and the senator sat down again on the locker, and was silent.  But I marked that off and on his fingers would open and shut convulsively.

Time alone would disclose what was to happen to us; in the interval there was nothing to do but wait.  We had reached the stage where anxiety begins to take the place of excitement, and we shifted restlessly from spot to spot and looked at the tug.  She was ploughing along after us, and to such good purpose that presently I began to catch the white of the seas along her bows, and the bright red with which her pipe was tipped.  Farrar alone seemed to take but slight interest in her.  More than once I glanced at him as he stood under me, but his eye was on the shuddering leach of the sail.  Then I leaned over.

“What do you think of it?” I asked.

“I told you this morning Drew would have handcuffs on him before night,” he replied, without raising his head.

“Hang your joking, Farrar; I know more than you about it.”

“Then what’s the use of asking me?”

“Don’t you see that I’m ruined if we’re caught?” I demanded, a little warmly.

“No, I don’t see it,” he replied.  “You don’t suppose I think you fool enough to risk this comedy if the man were guilty, do you?  I don’t believe all that rubbish about his being the criminal’s double, either.  That’s something the girls got up for your benefit.”

I ignored this piece of brutality.

“But I’m ruined anyway.”

“How?”

I explained shortly what I thought our friend, O’Meara, would do under the circumstances.  An inference sufficed Farrar.

“Why didn’t you say something about this before?” he asked gravely.  “I would have put into Far Harbor.”

“Because I didn’t think of it,” I confessed.

Farrar pulled down the corners of his mouth with trying not to smile.

“Miss Thorn is a woman of brains,” he remarked gently; “I respect her.”

I wondered by what mysterious train of reasoning he had arrived at this conclusion.  He said nothing for a while, but toyed with the spokes of the wheel, keeping the wind in the sail with undue nicety.