“You are in my employ, every one of you!” he shouted. “Find my boy!”
“It’s almost dark, sir, and you yourself are badly in need of attention.”
“What, you will abandon him?” shouted the magnate.
The unfortunate mate looked sorely puzzled.
“It would be useless to look for him now, sir,” he said. “To-morrow, perhaps, by daylight.”
“Don’t worry, sir. He’ll turn up all right,” said Mr. Brown consolingly.
“Oh, if I could only think so!” burst out the man of millions. “But to think of my boy, my Tom, out on this desolate sea! Lost in an open boat! How shall I ever face his mother?”
“He’ll be all right, sir,” was all that the mate could repeat.
“If we don’t pick them up, some other ship will,” added Jack.
It was a hard lesson that Mr. Jukes was learning. He was finding out that money cannot buy everything. All his millions were as dross to him at that moment.
“How can I face my friends?” he muttered presently. “I am saved and Tom is gone! How can I explain to his mother? Oh, if it had only been me in his place!”
“You boy! You, whom I tried to help! Why are you here and my boy gone? How is it you are safe and sound, and my son is lost?”
“I’m as sorry as I can be, Mr. Jukes,” said Jack. “If there was anything I could do, I’d do it gladly, and you know it.”
“Bah-h-h-h-h!” was the contemptuous reply.
“I’d stay out here a week, sir,” he said, “if that would do any good.”
But the half-crazed man only snarled at him and sat silent, till the welcome sight of the _Ajax’s_ rockets and flares showed them that they were nearing the ship.
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The _Ajax_ was almost ready to proceed when the boat joined her. The repairs had been made with even more success than the captain had dared to hope.
When, therefore, Mr. Jukes informed him tremulously that he was not to leave the vicinity till they found some trace of Tom Jukes, he did not receive the orders with the best grace in the world. But, of course, there was nothing for it but to obey.
Perhaps, too, the captain, who was a father himself, felt a sort of sympathy for Mr. Jukes, although he did not believe for an instant that Tom was in any danger.
Mr. Jukes passed a sorry night, and the next morning, haggard and gray, he was up and about early. He came up to where Jack was leaning against the rail.