“I glanced at Captain Strong. He was deathly pale and one hand was feeling nervously over the breast of his silk shirt. Then, after a long breath, he turned and smiled at me.
“The assumption of personal unconcern was so marked that I felt any remark of mine would have been an impertinence. But I could not help wondering what Captain Strong wore underneath his shirt.
“He paid the native waiter for our drinks and rose from the table without another word. We turned our steps toward the quay. The skipper was absorbed in thoughts I could not penetrate, but I noticed that the muscles of his jaw stood out upon his face and the heavy brows frowned over his eyes. Evidently the tone of his meditations was combative.
“Whatever they were, there was no hint of their purport in his voice as he turned to me.
“‘Come and have supper aft with me to-night, Mr. Williamson,’ he said, carelessly. ‘I meant to have invited you to dinner in town but that restaurant was really too depressing.’
“I thanked him, secretly astonished at the invitation. Captain Strong never compromised his dignity by sitting at table with his officers. He ate alone, in the beautifully fitted saloon under the poop. At the time, I wondered whether he had some reason for preferring my company to his customary solitude. But his manner expressed merely the courtesy of a superior wishing to give pleasure to a young officer.
“We had arrived on the quay and I was looking over the crowd of vociferating boatmen with a view to selecting a sampan for our return to the ship, when a sudden cry from the captain startled me.
“‘Look! Good heavens! look!--Don’t you see?’ With one hand he gripped me tightly by the shoulder, with the other he pointed to the _Mary Gleeson_ anchored in mid-stream. ‘Look! _The yellow jack!_’
“I gazed with him across to the ship and to my horrified astonishment saw that dreaded yellow flag which denotes the presence of yellow fever fluttering in the evening breeze. Shocked and alarmed, I asked myself who was the victim. There was no sickness among the ship’s company when we went ashore. But I knew well enough the swiftness of death in these latitudes.
“‘Quick! Get a sampan!’ ordered the captain.
“Privately, I doubted whether any boatman would venture into the tainted neighbourhood of a ship with yellow fever on board, and I was agreeably surprised to find that my only difficulty was to choose among the swarm that offered themselves. I could only conclude that they did not understand the meaning of the emblem. A moment or two later we were being propelled swiftly across the stream, our eyes fixed upon that fatal flag. The second officer stood at the top of the ladder to greet us as we climbed on board.