Filhiol set his teeth in a grimace of hate against the figure at work out there under the big elm.
“I’ve probably done my share of evil in this world,” thought he, “but I could wipe it all out with one supremely good action. If I could put an end to _you_—”
All unconscious, Hal continued at his work. As he wrote, he smiled a little. The smile was sinister and hard.
Dinner brought the four men together: Filhiol glum and dour, Hal in his most charming mood, the captain expansive with new-found happiness, and old Ezra bubbling with aphorisms.
Silent and brooding, Filhiol turned the situation in his mind, asking himself a hundred times what he could do to avert catastrophe impending.
Decision, after dinner, crystallized into action. First of all the doctor interviewed Ezra in the galley, and from him extracted a binding promise to make no mention before Captain Briggs, of anything concerning Malay life, or books, or curses, or whatever.
“I can’t explain now, Ezra,” said he, “but it’s most important. As a physician, I prohibit your speaking of these matters here. You understand?”
“Yes, sir. I dunno’s I’m over an’ above keen to obey you, sir, but ef it’s fer the cap’n’s good, that’s enough fer me.”
“It _is_ for the captain’s good, decidedly!” affirmed the doctor, and left old Ezra to think it over. One source of danger, he now felt confident, had been dammed up.
Ezra was still thinking it over when the captain told him to harness Sea Lawyer for a drive to Endicutt. In spite of the fine, drifting rain that had set in, Briggs was determined to go, for until McLaughlin’s claim and the college bill had been settled, the money he had taken from the safe for that purpose was burning in his pocket. He insisted on going quite alone, despite protests from Filhiol and Ezra. Even though all the sunlight had died from the darkening sky, it seemed still shining in the old man’s eyes as he drove off to pay the hard-saved money that now—so he believed—would put Hal on the upward road once more.
“Hal,” said the doctor, when the old captain had slowly jogged out of sight, “I’ve got a few words to say to you, out on the porch. Give me five minutes, please?”
“Why, surest thing you know! Just let me get my pipe, and I’ll be with you.”