“They’re new washed since he wore them,” said Tyler. “Slip ’em on over your what’s his names and come along and lend me a hand in the galley—can you cook?”
“You bet!” said Ratcliffe.
Eased in his mind as to the Dryad, the boy in him rose to this little adventure, delightful after weeks of routine and twenty years of ordered life and high respectability. He had caravaned, yachted in a small way, fancied that he had at all events touched the fringe of the Free Life—he had never been near it. These sea gipsies in their grubby old boat were It! A grim suspicion that these remains of the Tyler family sailed sometimes pretty close to the law and that their sea pickings were, to put it mildly, various did not detract in the least from their charm. He guessed instinctively they were not rogues of a bad sort. The lantern-jawed Satan had not the face of a saint. There were indications in it indeed of the possibility of a devilish temper no less than a desperate daring, but not a trace of meanness. Jude was astonishingly and patently honest, while old man Tyler, whose presence seemed still to linger on in this floating caravan, had evident titles, of a sort, to respect.
He was helping to fry fish over the oil-stove in the little galley when Jude returned with the information, delivered through the shouting of the frying pan, that everything was all right, and the message had been delivered to a “guy” in a white coat who was hanging his fat head over the starboard rail of the Dryad; that he had told her to mind his paint; that she had told him not to drop his teeth overboard, and he had “sassed” her back; that the Dryad was a dandy ship, but would be a lot dandier if she were hove up on some beach convenient for pickin’ her.
Then she started to make the coffee over an auxiliary stove, mixing her industry with criticisms of the cookery and instructions as to how fish should be fried.
“Jude does the cookin’ mostly,” said Tyler, “and we’d have hot rolls only we were under sail last night and she hadn’t time to set the dough. We’ll have to make out with ship’s bread.”
Considering the condition of Jude’s grubby hands, Ratcliffe wasn’t sorry.