"I suppose, now, she'd look higher than Ben?"
I told her that, so far as I knew, Miss Plinlimmon had no desire to marry.
"She'd look higher, with her gifts, you may take my word for it." But a furrow lingered for some time on Mrs. Pengelly's brow, and (I think) a doubt in her mind that she had been too precipitate.
The meal over, she composed herself to slumber; and Mr. Pengelly and I spent the afternoon together on deck, where he smoked many pipes while I scanned the shore for signs of pursuit. But no: the tide rose and still the foreshore remained deserted. Above us the ferry plied lazily, and at whiles I could hear the voices of the passengers. Nothing, even to my strained ears, spoke of excitement; and yet, in the great town beyond the hill, murder had been done and men were searching for me. So the day dragged by.
Towards evening, as the vessel beneath us fleeted and the deck resumed its level, Mr. Pengelly began to uncover the mainsail. I asked him if he expected any crew aboard? For surely, thought I, he could not work this ketch of forty tons or so single-handed.
He shook his head. "There was a boy, but I paid him off. Sarah takes the helm from this night forth. You wouldn't believe it, but she can swig upon a rope too: and as for pulling an oar—" He went on to tell me that she had been rowing a pair of paddles when his eye first lit on her: and I gathered that the courtship had been conducted on these waters under the gaze of Saltash, the male in one boat pursuing, the female eluding him in another, for long indomitable, but at length gracefully surrendering.
My handiness with the ropes, when I volunteered to help in hoisting sail, surprised and even perplexed him. "But I thought you was a chimney-sweeper?" he insisted. I told him then of my voyages with Mr. Trapp, yet without completely reassuring him. Hitherto he had taken me on my own warrant, and Ben's, without a trace of suspicion: but henceforth I caught him eyeing me furtively from time to time, and overheard him muttering as he went about his preparations.
As he had promised, when the time came for hauling up our small anchor, Mrs. Pengelly emerged from the companion hatch like a geni from a bottle. She bore two large hunches of saffron cake and handed one to each of us before moving aft to uncover the wheel.