He was no
longer the acute, blustering, effusive Verity, who in one summer's
afternoon had secured a rich partner and forced an impecunious sailor
to throw away a worn-out ship. The insurance held good, of course, and
there simply _must_ be some sort of tidings of the _Andromeda_ to hand
before the end of September. Yet things had gone wrong, desperately
wrong, and he was quaking with the belief that there was worse in store.
He began to read his letters. They were mostly in the same vein, duns,
more or less active. His managing clerk entered.
"There's an offer of 5s. 6d. Cardiff to Bilbao and Bilbao to the Tyne
for the _Hellespont_. It is better than nothing. Shall we take it,
sir?"
The _Hellespont_ was the firm's other ship. She, too, was old and
running at a loss.
"Yes. Wot is it, coal or patent fuel?"
"Coal, with a return freight of ore."
"Wish it was dynamite, with fuses laid on."
The clerk grinned knowingly. Men grow callous when money tilts the
scale against human lives.
"There's no news of the _Andromeda_, and _her_ rate is all right," he
said.
David scowled at him.
"D--n the rate!" he cried. "I want to 'ear of the ship. Wot the----"
But his subordinate vanished. David read a few more letters. Some
were from the families of such of the _Andromeda's_ crew as lived in
South Shields, the Hartlepools, Whitby.
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