‘No.’ The man again shook his head.
‘What did you do here when you were here before?’ asked Pleasant. ‘For I don’t remember you.’
‘It’s not at all likely you should. I only stood at the door, one night—on the lower step there—while a shipmate of mine looked in to speak to your father. I remember the place well.’ Looking very curiously round it.
‘Might that have been long ago?’
‘Ay, a goodish bit ago. When I came off my last voyage.’
‘Then you have not been to sea lately?’
‘No. Been in the sick bay since then, and been employed ashore.’
‘Then, to be sure, that accounts for your hands.’
The man with a keen look, a quick smile, and a change of manner, caught her up. ‘You’re a good observer. Yes. That accounts for my hands.’
Pleasant was somewhat disquieted by his look, and returned it suspiciously. Not only was his change of manner, though very sudden, quite collected, but his former manner, which he resumed, had a certain suppressed confidence and sense of power in it that were half threatening.