He worked his turn at the pump, then made up his mind to risk no further delay, but to search the ship’s cabins.  She was in one of them, he believed; frightened she must be, possibly ill.  He had done all that the furthest stretch of duty could demand in assistance to the ship.  He would find Agatha Redmond at any cost, if she were aboard the Jeanne D’Arc.  Again he thought to himself that he was glad he was there.  Whatever purpose her enemies had, he alone was on her side, he alone could do something to save her.

It was now long past midnight, but not pitch dark either on deck or on the sea.  The electric lights had gone out long before, but lanterns had been swung here and there from the deck fixtures.  As Jimmy came up, he thought the men were preparing to lower the boats, but when he asked about it in his difficult French, the sailor shook his head.  There were more people about than he supposed the yacht carried:  several seamen, three or four other men, and a fat woman sitting apathetically on a pile of rope.  He went from group to group, and from end to end of the yacht, looking for one woman’s face and figure.  He saw Monsieur Chatelard, examining one of the boats.  He ran down the saloon stairway, determined to search the cabins before he gave up his quest.  One moment he prayed that the words of Chatelard might be true, and that she had never been aboard the yacht; the next moment he prayed he might find her behind the next closed door.

As James searched below deck, a house palatial disclosed itself, even in the dim light of the little lanterns.  Cabins roomy and comfortable, furnishings of exquisite taste, all the paraphernalia of the cultured and the rich were there.  Some of the cabin doors were standing open, and none was locked.  Jimmy beat on them, called from room to room, finding nothing.  Every human occupant was gone.  Sick at heart, he again rushed on deck.  Was he mistaken, after all?  Or had they hidden her in some secret part of the ship where he could not find her?

When Jimmy got back to the deck he saw that the groups had gathered on the port side.  Sharp orders were being given.  He crowded to the railing, straining his eyes to see, and found that they were transferring the ship’s company to the boats, A rope ladder swung from the deck to a boat beneath, which bobbed like a cork beside, the big, plunging yacht.  Two people were in the boat, a sailor standing at the bow, and a large muffled figure of a woman sitting in the stern.  Jimmy at once knew her to be the apathetic fat woman he had seen a few minutes before on deck.  His eye searched the company crowded about the top of the rope ladder, and suddenly his heart leaped.  There she was, at the edge of the deck, waiting for the captain to give the word for her to descend to the boat below.  As Jimmy’s eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, he saw her more and more plainly:  a pale face framed in a dark hood, a tall, cloaked figure waiting calmly to obey the word from the superior officer.