At 11:28, George Welterman lost his patience altogether. He came up to the bridge, where Ralph Peel was now in charge, and demanded, "Mr. Peel! We must now be on our way! Some of us have appointments to keep in New York!"
"We'll make up most of the time, sir," said Ralph. "Just at this moment we're searching for our first officer."
"Can't you understand that he's drowned?"
"It appears that way, sir, but we are simply carrying out a routine search, according to the rules."
"Well, damn the rules, Mr. Peel. That man has obviously been lost. An idiot could see that. We have to get under way."
Ralph Peel turned and looked George Welterman up and down. There was nothing tactful or compromising about Ralph when it came to dealing with obstreperous passengers; he saved all his hairy charm for pretty young heiresses and flirtatious dancers. Men passengers were nothing but a nuisance, to be carried for commercial reasons only.
"I am the second officer on this vessel, sir, and just at this moment I am in command."
"Get me Mr. Deacon," George ordered.
"I'm afraid you'll have to find him yourself, sir. I'm directing a search for a missing member of the crew."
"Get me Mr. Deacon, damn you!" George screamed at him. "Who the hell do you think you're talking to?"
Ralph was completely unimpressed. As Dick Charles said later, "He didn't even turn one of his sixteen million hairs." He simply said to George, "If you have any complaint, sir, the normal procedure is to write to the shipping line in Liverpool or New York. The normal procedure is not to shriek like a baboon."
George, furious as he was, realised that he wasn't going to get very far with Ralph. So he stormed along the boat deck to the lift, and descended, muttering and cursing to himself, to A deck, where he stalked down the corridor to Edgar's stateroom with such ferocity that several people turned to stare at him after he had passed them by. He beat on Edgar's door with his fist, and then pushed it open.
Edgar was sitting with Percy Fearson, urgently discussing who they were going to appoint in place of Sir Peregrine. As George Welterman came in, he stood up.
"George! You don't look too pleased with life."
"I am not," said George, throwing his straw skimmer across the room, and then planting his fists on his hips. "This ship has delayed long enough. I want you to order your officers to get her under way, and I mean now."
"As a matter of fact," said Percy Fearson, "we're searching for a missing crew member. We'll be under way in five or ten minutes."
"Do you think I don't know that?" George snapped back at him.
'But if we're going to move at all, we're going to have to make another thirteen miles at least by twelve o'clock, or you and I and Keys Shipping are in a whole lot of hot water."
"I don't understand," said Edgar.
"It's very simple," George told him. "I made a bet last night with Mark Beeney that this ship could make six hundred and thirty-five miles today, by noon. At least thirteen miles more. So far, she's covered just a few yards under six hundred and twenty-two."
Edgar put down the papers he was holding and stood up. "Am I hearing you correctly, George? You want us to abandon the search for Rudyard Philips because you have a bet?
George lifted his head defiantly. "It's not just an ordinary bet, Edgar. There's a great deal at stake. Keys Shipping included."
Percy Fearson glanced at Edgar anxiously.
"You've bet Keys Shipping?" asked Edgar.
"In a manner of speaking, yes. I've bet that if the Arcadia doesn't cover six hundred and thirty-five miles today, I'll withdraw my offer for Keys. In fact, I've guaranteed it."
"You can't gamble something like that!" Edgar exclaimed. "We already have draft agreements!"
George shrugged. "Agreements are only made to be broken. Why do think we have lawyers?"
"This is impossible," said Edgar. He was clearly very angry. "We have only a half-hour to make thirteen miles from a dead stop. We'll never do it. We don't even have enough steam up to reach full speed."
"Either you make up those thirteen miles, or everything's off," said George.
"You're talking through your hat," said Edgar. "You're just as committed to this sale as we are."
"Nonetheless, that was the bet I made."
"But of all the damn-fool things to do!" Edgar protested.
George went to the porthole and stared out at the ocean. The sunlight turned his face into a dusty white death mask. "Perhaps I wanted to lose. Perhaps I wanted to see you ruined. I don't think anything would give me greater pleasure than to see you buried at last under the collapsing pillars of your own worm-eaten empire."
"But everything we've arranged—"
George gave a slow, disinterested shrug. "You still have a lot to learn, don't you, Edgar, in spite of your sharp Anglo-Indian manners. You're a good man, though. Not quite in my class, but good. What you lack in spontaneity I believe you make up for in acumen."
Edgar glanced up at the clock. "I don't think there's any hope of us making thirteen miles by noon."
"Well... in that case the only way to protect the sale is for you to make no headway at all. Another passenger has put in a low-field bet of six hundred and ten; and it would be better for him to win, rather than Mark Beeney. With him, I have bet only five thousand pounds. I shall expect you to underwrite that sum personally, of course, if I lose it. But wouldn't you rather lose five thousand pounds than the whole of this deal?"
It was then that the deep throbbing of the ship's engines began to reverberate through the decks again.
"Well?" asked George.
Edgar said, "I can't delay her any longer; we'll never take the Blue Riband if I do. I've asked Mr. Peel to circle the area once more, and then we're going to be on our way," said Edgar.
"It depends which is the more important to you," said George.
Percy Fearson took his pipe out of the pocket of his Harris Tweed jacket and said, "This fairly turns my lights over, this does. I always said that I hadn't got the stomach for business, and believe me I don't. Not when it comes to dirty little squabbles like this. You bet the whole caboodle, did you, Mr Welterman? And now you come crying for help when it looks as if you're going to lose. By heck. That's all I can say. My old father would have taken his belt to you."
But Edgar said, "Quiet, Percy, We're not here to talk about the rights or the wrongs of it."
George went to the cocktail cabinet and helped himself to a large Coon Hollow bourbon. "You people should be running church outings," he said sourly, "not a luxury shipping line. Look at you. You're so much in debt your bank has to order red ink by the tanker. You're paddling around the middle of the Atlantic with a ship worth ten million pounds and a passenger list worth two hundred times that amount, and what are you doing? Looking for one man who was dumb enough to jump into the sea when he didn't even have to, and who must have drowned a half-hour ago."
The Cartier enamel dock on the wall of Edgar's stateroom said 11:32. Edgar put his hands into his pockets and then said, "We're going to continue to search for Mr. Philips for another ten minutes, George, and then we're going on. On this shipping line, human life comes before anything. Money, schedules, anything. If we lose the shipping line because we tried to find someone lost at sea, then that's the way it'll have to be."