"Well," he said, "Mr. Jefferson does the straight thing, an' he fed us well. That is, as well as he could, considering everything."
Jacinta smiled at Muriel. "You will notice the answer. He is a man!" Then she held out a strip of crinkly paper. "That will make you almost a month to the good, and if you do everything you can to make things easier for the man who wants to get the Cumbria off, there will probably be another waiting for you when you come back again."
The man, who took the crinkly paper, gazed at it in astonishment, and then made a little sign of comprehension. "Thank you kindly, miss, but which one am I to look after special? You see, there's two of them."
Jacinta was apparently not quite herself that night, for the swift colour flickered into her face, and stayed there a moment.
"Both," she said decisively. "Still, you are never to tell anybody about that note."
The man once more gazed at her with such evident bewilderment that Muriel broke into a little half-audible laugh. Then he grinned suddenly, and touched his battered cap.
"Well, we'll make it—both," he said.
They went up the companion, and left him apparently chuckling, but Jacinta appeared far from pleased when she got into the waiting boat.
"That was to have gone to England for a hat and one or two things I really can't do without—though I shall probably have to now," she said. "Oh, aren't they stupid sometimes—I felt I could have shaken him."
In the meanwhile the man in the fireman's serge went back to Macallister's room.