I nudged my friend.
“Well,” he muttered peevishly; “I’ve not said anything, have I? Rampick can look after himself.”
Joshua did not answer, and we went on—and in the same moment Rampick was gone.
But we saw him again when we came into view of the beach. He was down by the water, ostentatious with a boat, which lay stern on to the surf—the only man and the only craft handy in all the waste prospect.
Joshua stopped in admiration.
“A providence, it seems to me!” said he.
“We can’t go with him!” I muttered.
Our visitor looked at me in wonder.
“Why not?” he said.
How could I answer? That this seeming opportuneness was nothing more, as I was convinced, than a deliberate self-appropriation by this man of a scheme which he had overheard us discussing in the hall last night? And what then, save a confession on his part of a good trading instinct? I must find something better than that.