“Master Lynton’s ghost, sir,” stammered the trembling sailors.
“Mr Lynton’s grandmother!” roared the captain, snatching up a coil of rope and flinging it to the bareheaded man in the boat, who caught it deftly as it opened out in rings. “Here, what do you mean by that cock-and-bull story, Dick Dellow?”
“Cock-and-bull?” stuttered the mate, scratching his head.
“Yes, cock-and-bull,” roared the captain. “Can’t you see he’s there, all alive, oh! in that canoe? Here, you, Tom Jinks, lay hold of this rope, and don’t stand making faces there like a jibbering idiot. Catch hold.”
“No, no,” faltered the great sailor; “it’s his—”
“Catch hold!” roared the captain; “if any man here says ghost to me, law or no law, I’ll rope’s-end him.”
The big sailor’s hands trembled as he took the rope, but before he had given it a pull one occupant of the canoe came scrambling on board with the other end of the rope in his hand, while the canoe, now lightened of half its load, glided astern, with the black paddling hard.
“There’s going to be a row,” whispered Brace merrily to his brother, as they stood there, feeling as though a great weight had been removed from their breasts. He was quite right, for before the supposed drowned man had taken a couple of steps the captain was at him.
“Here, you, sir,” he roared, “do you want to have sunstroke? Where’s your hat?”
“I dunno,” was the reply.