Goff nodded. "Didn't know how much 'r how little you wanted t'other folks to know. Had me locked up in a cabin on the starb'd side and I saw the yawl get off—and saw that it didn't get back. Maybe you can tell me what happened to that boat-load o' scamps?"
Van Dyck told our part in the happenings briefly, and the old Banksman chuckled delightedly.
"Good stroke o' business—catchin' 'em that way when they was all fagged out with swimmin',"—adding vindictively: "only you ought to 've knocked every single one on 'em in the head, when you had 'em. As it was——"
"Yes," said Van Dyck; "as it was?——"
"As it was, we clawed back here just afore day the next mornin', and with the seas putty near rollin' the yacht's rail under, Bassinette made out to get ashore with the gasoline launch when it was just about as much as any man's life was worth to try it. He fetched back five o' the seven men that went ashore in the yawl. You said two of 'em was drowned, didn't you?"
"They were," said I.
"This man Bassinette," Van Dyck broke in. "He is the cook you picked up in New York. Did you know anything about him when you shipped him?"
Goff shook his head. "Somethin' kind o' queer about that big lummux," he averred. "If I didn't know better, I'd 'most be willin' to go into court and swear he isn't the man I shipped in New York. Looks as much like him as two peas, but that's all. If we'd been anywheres to get rid o' him and pick up his double——"
"Wait," I interposed. "We laid up for a day at Gracias á Dios with a disabled propeller shaft. Didn't some of the men have shore leave that day?"