“Come, this is tempting,” said Mr Temple. “I’m half disposed to come too.”
“Do, father,” cried Dick, catching his hand. “Oh, do come.”
“No, my boy, I have some important business on hand. There, go and enjoy yourselves. You’re going, Will?” he said quietly.
“Yes, sir, if uncle can spare me, and Josh too.”
“That’s right; take care of my boys—that is, if your uncle can spare you.”
“Oh yes, oh yes! They can go. They don’t sail for the pilchard ground till sundown.”
Arthur was hunted out of his nest, and as soon as he knew of the object in view he displayed plenty of eagerness. The sight of the cutter-rigged smack lying with her bowsprit pointing to the wind, and her white mainsail flapping and quivering in the breeze, which seemed to send mimic waves chasing each other along it from mast to edge, while the jib lay all of a heap waiting to be hoisted, being one that would have roused the most phlegmatic to a desire to have a cruise, and see some of the wonders of the deep dredged up.
The master of the trawler gave the boys a hearty reception, his bronzed face expanding into a smile as he held Dick’s hand in his great hard brown heavy paw.
“So you’ve come a-trawling, have you, my lad? Well, I’m glad to see you, and you too, sir,” he added, shaking hands with Arthur in turn. “Going to stop aboard, lads?” he said in a kind of chant to Will and Josh.
“Ay, we’re going to stop,” said the latter; so the master of the trawler sent one of his own crew ashore with Uncle Abram’s boat, telling the man he could stay.