“Guess you’ll have to get off and push the Nettie B. before you can beat those Gloucestermen, Nat,” she said, teasing him.
“Say, I’ve heard about all I want to hear about 119 that!” he snarled, suddenly losing control of himself as they walked back to the little cabin. The girl looked at him in hurt amazement. Never in all her life had a man spoken to her in such a tone. It was inconceivable that the man she was going to marry could address her so, if he even pretended to love her.
“Possibly you have,” she returned, not without a touch of asperity; “but you know as well as I do that you will have to deal with a Gloucester-built schooner before you are through with this voyage.”
In her efforts to placate him she had touched upon his sorest spot. His defeat by the American fishermen had been hard for his pride.
“I suppose you mean that crooked Schofield’s boat?” he flashed back, his face darkening.
“What do you mean by that?”
They were below now in her father’s little cabin, and she turned upon him with flashing eyes.
“Just what I said,” he returned sullenly.
“You say things then that have no foundation in fact,” she retorted vigorously. “You have no right to say a thing like that about Code Schofield.”
“I haven’t, eh?” he sneered, furious. “Since when have you been takin’ his side against me? No facts, eh? I’ll show him an’ you an’ everybody else whether there’s any foundation in fact! What do 120 you suppose the insurance company is after him for if he isn’t a crook?”