"It sounds bad, but it does not spell disaster quite, because, don't you see? they might have lost their boat on the way out," retorted Miles, in a defiant tone, which meant that he did not intend to believe bad news until it was proved beyond a doubt.
"There was a water jar and a bag of biscuits tied to the thwarts," replied Oily Dave. "It's true there wasn't nothing of the jar but the handle, and the biscuits was pap, as was to be expected, but the signs wasn't wanting of what had been taking place, don't you see? If we'd found the boat with nothing in it we could have hoped that it had just been washed adrift, and, though we should have been anxious, there would have been room left for hope, which in common sense and reason there ain't now."
"There is always room for hope until we know," objected Miles. "Besides, Akimiski isn't the Twins by any means; why, they must be fifty miles away, if not more."
"Nearer seventy. But who is to say that they ever got so far as the Twins? If they'd run into any sign of walrus on Akimiski on the way out, they would stop there for certain, a bird in hand being worth two in a bush any day in the week, and though all is fish that comes to our net, it is walrus we're keenest on, as everyone knows. I've been to Mr. Selincourt with the news, and it has about corked him up, poor gentleman! But the young lady was worse still; she turned on me as spiteful as if I'd gone and drowned the Mary's crew myself."
There was a deeply injured note in Oily Dave's tone now. He evidently resented keenly the fact that his bad tidings had not received a more sympathetic hearing.
"Who was on the Mary?" asked Miles.
"The usual lot: Nick Jones, master, Stee Jenkin, Bobby Poole, and Mr. Ferrars. A perfect Jonah that man is, and disaster follows wherever he goes," said Oily Dave, with a melancholy shake of his head.
"What do you mean?" demanded Miles, with a stare of surprise.
"What I say," retorted Oily Dave. "Mr. Selincourt sent him to me as a lodger; the river came down in flood and tried to drown him, and spoiled my house something fearful. Then he gets caught in a tidehole, when out walking with his sweetheart, which Miss Selincourt is, I suppose, though it passes me why a young lady with dollars same as she has got don't look higher than a fisherman. But the thing that strikes me is that the man must have done something pretty bad, somewhere back behind, for the waters to be following him round like this."
"Look here! don't you think it is a pretty low-down thing to be taking a man's character away, directly there's a rumour going round that he is dead?" asked Miles stormily.