CHAPTER XVIII. A SKIPPER.
Luttrell had just made up his mind that he would inform the American visitor he would receive him, when Harry entered, leading the stranger by the hand. “That’s papa,” said the boy, and retired.
“I hope I see you in very good health, Sir,” said Mr. Dodge, advancing boldly, and shaking Luttrell’s hand in a hearty, vigorous manner. “You live in a pretty lonesome spot here, and as the man said to the whip-snake in the spout, ‘You ain’t easy to get at.’”
“Perhaps that was one of the reasons that led me to choose it, Sir,” said Luttrell, stiffly, “and had you got my note, you’d have seen that I never intended you should incur the inconvenience of coming to it.”
“Well, Sir, it warn’t pleasant; I’ll tell no lie, it warn’t pleasant! I’m a seafearin’ man, Sir, and I’ve been one all my life; but such a harbour to get out of, and such a port to get into, and such a craft to do it in, I never seed in all my born days.”
“You compel me to repeat my regrets, Sir. I am, indeed, sincerely sorry for your fruitless journey.”
“Well, it warn’t all time lost—we picked up that crew, and that lad of yours. He’s a fine ‘buoy,’ Sir; I know ‘buoys’ well, and I say it again, he’ll be a smart man.”
Luttrell bowed a cold and haughty acknowledgment.
“He ain’t a bit like you, not a bit; there’s no pride, no stand off about him; he’s a raal frank, straight-ahead one. I seed it before he was well aboard. It was all I could do to keep him from swimming after his cap—a darned old sealskin thing it was—but he said it was his best one, and he’d not get another in a hurry.”
“His frankness deserved all your praise, Sir, it went to the extent of exposing his father’s poverty.”