His demented gaze wandered from Joshua’s face to his knees, where it fixed itself.
“‘And He said,’” he muttered, “‘Lazarus, come forth!’ And they found the stone rolled away from the sepulchre. It’s come to it—a special occasion. One or the other of us. Boat, sir, yes. But I never done it. You ought to know—one, or the other of us.”
“Then the other, by all means,” said Joshua, caustic but interested. “My good man, we don’t want to separate you from your boat. If your presence is indispensable, why, we’ll put up with it.”
Rampick, I could have thought, went a shade more livid. His dry lips seemed to crackle under his hand as he passed the back of it over them. Yet, strangely enough, I did not believe him drunk. He seemed rather in that arid, aghast condition which, with such a man, bespeaks a temporary abstinence.
Suddenly he heaved himself upright, and began heavily to busy himself with preparations for launching his craft. We all lent a hand, and in another minute, with a slide and a jump, were on board and slipping easily over the shoreward swell.
Not then, when he had settled himself to his sculls, we being all seated in the stern, did he for a moment take his eyes off our visitor. Sympathetically, I shrunk under that concentrated stare; but Joshua bore it unruffled. Still, there was something in the atmosphere to freeze our loquacity. For a long time none of us spoke at all. There had not been air enough to fill a sail; and the monotonous bump and creak of the oars in the rowlocks beat a dreary accompaniment to our depression.
At length Harry essayed a little weak conciliation.
“Tide’ll hold for us to land and see the wreck, won’t it, Mr. Rampick?” he said.
His voice broke the spell, and to strange effect. The ex-smuggler did not answer him; but he suddenly ceased rowing, and, resting on his sculls, felt out with his foot, and kicked Joshua softly on the shins.
“What are you doing?” snapped the victim, jerking his insulted limbs under him. “What do you mean, man?”