“No!”
“Then what do you want?” exclaimed Penelly sharply.
“You!”
“What is it, then, my good fellow?” said Penelly, speaking now in a haughty tone, for the man’s way was rude and offensive.
“I want to know something,” said Zekle.
“Then why don’t you go to somebody else?”
“’Cause you know best what I want to know.”
“Speak out, then, quickly, for I am busy,” said Penelly, who, while in an ordinary way ready enough to chat and laugh with the fishermen, was at times, on the strength of his father’s position as a boat-owner, disposed to treat them as several degrees lower in social standing.
“Busy, eh?” said Zekle scornfully. “I dessay you are; but you mus’n’t be too busy to talk to me.”
“What do you mean?” said Penelly hotly. “How dare you speak to me in that insolent way?”