Bobby forgot his temporary elation of the night before, when he had succeeded in talking to Fred. It was all very well to talk of getting away, he thought, as the coarse rope slipped through his roughened fingers. Talk was all very well. But how were they going to do it?
His gloomy mood was not lightened any by the fact that Captain Garrish watched him and the other boys more closely than usual and Bobby even thought he caught a hint of suspicion in the captain’s hard eyes.
Could it be, thought Bobby, that in some way the skipper had got wind of that secret meeting the night before? There had seemed to be no one about, but then, in the darkness of the night, how had it been possible to make sure of that? The night, especially on shipboard, seems possessed of a thousand eyes.
Could it be, and the thought made him pause for a moment in his work, at which the captain barked a rough command at him, that the shadow he had seen close to the pilot house was no shadow at all, but a man, perhaps Captain Garrish himself, spying upon him?
He stole a glance at the latter and found the skipper’s fierce eyes fixed on him with that same suspicious glare. Bobby’s own eyes dropped to the deck, but his hands clenched angrily.
“I’ll show him—” he thought fiercely, as he fought for a firmer footing on the slippery deck. “I’ll show him whether he can look at me like that and get away with it!”
CHAPTER XV
STEALTHY AS SHADOWS
As the morning wore on, Bobby realized that his fear of discovery by Captain Garrish was unfounded. The man continued to watch the boys closely, but if he had known of that secret meeting between him and Fred, the captain would have done more than watch—of that Bobby was certain.
This certainty once more served to raise Bobby’s spirits and made him hope that they might succeed in outwitting the grim old skipper after all.