MacRae followed Betty Gower across the room to her father. She turned.
Her quick eyes had picked out the insignia of rank on MacRae's uniform.

"Papa," she said. "Captain--" she hesitated.

"MacRae," he supplied.

"Captain MacRae wishes to see you."

MacRae wished no conventionalities. He did not want to be introduced, to
be shaken by the hand, to have Gower play host. He forestalled all this,
if indeed it threatened.

"I have just arrived home on leave," he said briefly. "I find my father
desperately ill in our house at the Cove. You have a very fast and able
cruiser. Would you care to put her at my disposal so that I may take my
father to Vancouver? I think that is his only chance."

Gower had risen. He was not an imposing man. At his first glimpse of
MacRae's face, the pink-patched eye, the uniform, he flushed
slightly,--recalling that afternoon.

"I'm sorry," he said. "You'd be welcome to the _Arrow_ if she were here.
But I sent her to Nanaimo an hour after she landed us. Are you Donald
MacRae's boy?"

"Yes," MacRae said. "Thank you. That's all."

He had said his say and got his answer. He turned to go. Betty Gower put