“I was never at sea, sir,” replied I.
“Not a sailor! How comes it, then, you can row so well?”
“I learned to row in fresh water, sir.”
“What are you? How came you to be here to-night?”
“By merest chance, sir. I had no money to pay for a bed. I have neither home nor friends. I have lived, by holding horses, and running errands, in the streets.”
“Picking pockets occasionally, I suppose, too, when regular business was dull!”
“Never!” said I, indignantly.
“Don't be shocked, my fine fellow,” said he, jeeringly; “better men than ever you 'll be have done a little that way. I have made some lighter this evening myself, for the matter of that!”
This confession, if very frank, was not very reassuring; and so I made no answer, but rowed away with all my might.
“Well!” said he, after a pause, “luck has befriended me twice to-night; and sending you to sleep under that wall was not the worst turn of the two. Ship your oars there, boy, and let us see if you are as handy a surgeon as you are a sailor! Try and bind up these wounded fingers of mine, for they begin to smart with the cold night air.”