Читать книгу Spawn of the North - Barrett Willoughby - Страница 6

Table of Contents

As Dian speeded up her engine to continue her morning run, she regretted that she hadn't had time to provision the larder on the Golden Hind. She might then have cruised down as far as Green Waters, caught a few trout, and cooked one of her old-time breakfasts aboard. But no, she remembered suddenly: Eve Galliard—her self-invited guest—back home and probably awake now. Silken, lazy, perfumed Eve. 'She no more belongs here in Alaska than I belong in Timbuctoo!' thought Dian, her eyes moving over the serene, virgin wilderness.

But a guest is a guest, and thoughts of the waiting Eve, coupled with a vision of old Suey Woo padding about the big kitchen preparing a delectable breakfast, finally made Dian swing her cruiser back on the return course.

When she came in sight of the floating trap again, she espied a boat made fast to the frame. Through the binoculars the craft leaped close. She recognized it with a triumphant little grin—the insolent Who Cares out of commission with that rope wound round its propeller!

In a manner that reflected her father's own dashing way with a cruiser, she speeded toward the moored boat.

She swung in close and slowed down a few yards from the seiner. So far as she could see there was no one aboard. Then, as the Golden Hind came to a stop, she was startled to observe a head shoot up from the water off the stern of the Who Cares. Thick black hair dripped down over nose and eyes. Tight-shut teeth gripped a villainous-looking knife in a way she had never thought to see outside the illustrations in a pirate book. A couple of strong strokes, and the owner of the head was treading water beside a trap timber. He drove the knife into the log with a quick motion that lifted his body, and Dian saw the smoothly muscular back of an athlete, bare wet arms and shoulders glistening in the sun, bronzed neck and forearms. High up on the biceps of his right arm was tattooed a small flying gull.

Apparently he had not heard the muffled approach of the Golden Hind, for he made a movement to clamber up on the frame of the trap.

'Hello!' Dian sang out hastily.

He tossed his head to throw the hair back from his face, and, keeping one arm over the log, turned to regard her from a pair of cool, deliberate, deep-blue eyes.

'Hello!' he responded. There was both power and mockery in the curve of his lips, and, though Dian could detect no welcoming note in his voice, she liked its deep masculine quality. 'Where did you come from?'

'Oh, I just dropped in for a moment. I thought you might be in need of a tow.'

'A tow?' His air of interrogation was perfect. From his lowly position he flashed her an answering smile that showed firm white teeth. 'No. Thank you very much.' A faint, provocative amusement hid behind his words. 'I wasn't expecting company and—well, you find me just following the quaint old Alaskan custom of taking a morning dip.'

Dian was swept with the stinging warmth of embarrassment. For a second he convinced her that she had, in truth, blundered upon just that occasion. Then, nettled by the man's poise even while she admired it, she looked at him with a level, appraising glance she had inherited from Eagle Turlon. Meaningly her eyes traveled from his face to the thickened propeller glimmering under the stern of the Who Cares, and back again. A moment later she raised her chin with a low, rippling laugh of derision.

'Another quaint old Alaskan custom, I suppose—this gripping a hunting-knife in your teeth as you perform your ablutions. What do you do with it?' she asked with calculated sweetness. 'Use it instead of soap?'

Without giving him a chance to answer, she started her engine and in her most spectacular manner swung the Golden Hind on its homeward course.

As she left the trap behind, she found that the encounter had set her heart beating faster. There was something distinctly challenging about that dark young man. She knew now he was no inexperienced boatman. He had merely been careless, and in his masculine pride had not wanted her to know it. He was the kind who would have paddled the Who Cares to Ketchikan with his hands, if possible, rather than have a woman tow him in.

She didn't need to look back now to know that he was diving off the trap and coming up under the stern of his craft to cut the rope free.... Only an excellent swimmer could do that in these cold Northern fiords.... A wet, glistening figure flashing through the sunlight into the still, green water.... Strong.... Beautiful, too. Smooth-skinned, glowing with health. And that pale-blue flying gull on the point of his shoulder—something suggestive of travel in that; of far-away places ...

Men were mysterious, glamorous creatures.

Of a sudden the waterways, mountains, the cloud-piled azure sky, the whole Northern world, seemed inexplicably sunny and lyrical. She was aware that she was very young, buoyant, filled with the joy of life. Impulsively she lifted her face and raised one hand high as if to a benign and smiling friend. Then in a voice soft with a wonder and sincerity she said:

'Thank you, God!'