She remembered that she had lost her chance to clear herself of Sir Joseph Webling's guilt by keeping his secret. If she had gone to the British authorities with her first suspicion of Sir Joseph and Nicky Easton she would have escaped from sharing their guilt. She would have been branded as an informer, but only by the conspirators; and Sir Joseph himself and Lady Webling might have been saved from self-destruction. Now she was in the same situation almost exactly. Again she had only suspicion for her guide. But in England she had been a foreigner and Sir Joseph was her benefactor. Here she was in her own country, and she owed nothing to Jake Nuddle, who was a low brute, as ruthless to his wife as to his flag. It came to Mamise with a sharp suddenness that her one clear duty was to tell Davidge what she knew about Jake. It was not a pretty duty, but it was a definite. She resolved that the first thing she did in the morning would be to go to Davidge with what facts she had. The resolution brought her peace, and she sat down to her meager supper with a sense of pleasant righteousness. Mamise felt so redeemed that she took up a novel, lighted a cigarette, and sat down by her lamp to pass a well-earned evening of spinsterial respectability. Then the door opened and Abbie walked in. Abbie did not think it sisterly to knock. She paused to register her formal protest against Mamise's wicked addiction to tobacco. "I must say, Mamise, I do wisht you'd break yourself of that horbul habbut." Mamise laughed tolerantly. "You were cooking cabbage when I was at your house. Why can't I cook this vegetable?" "But I wa'n't cooking the cabbage in my face." "You were cooking it in mine. But let's not argue about botany or ethics." Abbie was not aware of mentioning either of those things, but she had other matters to discuss. She dropped into a chair, sighing: "Jake's went out to telephone, and I thought I'd just run over for a few words. You see, I--" "Where was Jake telephoning?" "I d'know. He's always long-distancin' somebody. But what I come for--" "Doesn't it ever occur to you to wonder?" "Long as it ain't some woman--or if it is, as long as it's long distance--why should I worry my head about it? The thing I wanted to speak of is--" "Didn't it rather make your blood run cold to hear Jake speak as he did of the lost ship?" "Oh, I'm so used to his rantin' it goes in one ear and out the other." "You'd better keep a little of it in your brain. I'm worried about your husband, even if you're not, Abbie dear." "What call you got to worry?" "I have a ghastly feeling that my brother-in-law is mixed up in the sinking of the _Clara_." "Don't be foolish!"