“I haven’t a cent,” Darrin confessed.
But the proprietor of the little shop begged the young gentlemen to forget the little bit of small change that they owed him. This both Dan and Dave refused to do, promising to pay him the next time they came ashore.
No sooner did they step outside than they were confronted by a well-dressed, tall young man under thirty.
“I hope you’ll pardon me,” said this stranger, with a rather decided English accent, “but I couldn’t possibly help overhearing your conversation inside. For that reason I know that you have had the misfortune to be robbed of your money by Chinese thieves. Now—no offense intended, I assure you—could I be of any manner of use to you? Pembroke is my name, you know; Pembroke of Heathshire, England. I’m on my way around the world. Now, if between one gentlemen and two others, you know, I could be of any—”
The Englishman paused, as if embarrassed; it was plain that he was trying to offer a loan of money.
“I think I understand you, Mr. Pembroke,” Ensign Darrin replied, with a grateful smile. “It is extremely kind in you, but the robbery has left us embarrassed only for a moment. Both of us have funds deposited with the paymaster on board ship, and after we go aboard it is only a matter of asking for what we need.”
“You’re not annoyed, I trust,” murmured Pembroke apologetically.
“No; profoundly glad to find such faith in human nature as you have displayed,” smiled Ensign Darrin.
“Oh, I don’t trust the whole blooming human race,” declared Mr. Pembroke gravely. “I’m not such a simpleton as that. But I know that good old Uncle Sam’s officers are gentlemen, and between gentlemen, you know, there is and should be a lot of jolly confidence.”
In the easiest way in the world, Mr. Pembroke was now sauntering along with the two young Americans.