“We’ll talk your affair over another time. What I want at present is, to help this poor young Vangilt to escape. He says, that if once clear, the smugglers would put him on the other side of the water. Now, it appears to me that it would be very easy for him to get out of the ship unperceived, if he were dressed in woman’s clothes, so many women are going and coming all day long.”
“Very true, sir, especially on pay-day, when nobody keeps any look-out at all. I see now, you want some of Mary’s clothes for him; they would fit very well.”
“Exactly; and I think that, as her uncle had been a smuggler, we might go and consult him as to his escape over the water. Vangilt will pay 100 pounds with pleasure—he told me so. That will be an introduction for you as well as for me to the old fellow.”
“I think we had better let the old fellow suppose it’s a woman—don’t you, sir? But what shall we call ourselves?”
“Why, I will be a sort of agent for ships, an you shall be a captain.”
“A captain! Mr Keene.”
“Yes; a captain, who has had a ship, and expects another. Why, you were a captain of the fore-top before you were rated coxswain.”
“Well, sir, I must consult Mary and her mother, and then I’ll let you know: they will come this afternoon. Perhaps in helping Mr Vangilt, I may help myself.”
That night Bob Cross told me that Mary and her mother were quite willing to assist, and that they thought it would be a very good introduction to old Waghorn: that we must expect some religious scruples at first, but we must persevere, and they had no doubt that the old man would contrive to get the young man over to Cherbourg, or some other place on the other side; that we had better call on him in the evening, and they would be out of the way.
As soon as the work was over for the day, Bob Cross and I obtained leave, and set off for Mr Waghorn’s house. We were met by Mary and her mother, who pointed it out to us, and then continued their walk. We went to the door, and found the old man smoking his pipe.