“So I have.”
“And where’s your hands?”
“I’ve got them.”
“In your pocket?”
“Oh, close up!” said Harman. “I never did see such a chap as you for wearin’ blinkers; can’t you see the end of your nose in front of you? Well, if you can’t, I can. However, I’ll tell you the whole of the business later when I’ve turned it round some more in my head. What I’m after now is grub. Here’s a dollar, and I’m off to Billy Sheehan’s; you come along with me—a dollar’s enough for two—and you can raise your objections after you’ve got a beefsteak inside of you. Maybe you’ll see clearer then.”
The Captain said no more, but followed Harman. Far better educated than the latter, he had come to recognise that Harman, despite his real and childlike simplicity in various ways, had a mind quicker than most men’s. He would often have gone without a meal during that wandering partnership which had lasted for nearly a year but for Harman’s ingenuity and power of resource.
At Sheehan’s they had good beefsteak and real coffee.
“Now,” said Harman, when they had finished, “if you’re ready to listen to reason, I’ll tell you the lay I’m on. Ginnell wants two hands. I’m goin’ to offer myself for one, and you are goin’ to be the other.”
“I beg your pardon,” said Blood. “You mean to say I’m to sign on in that chap’s shark boat. Is that your meaning?”
“I said nuthin’ about signin’ on in shark boats. I said we two has got to get out of here in Ginnell’s tub. Once outside the Gate we’re all right.”