“No, but I’ve seen the man who mastered Waters in that situation, and I saw a tomahawk and a knife thrown within an inch of his head.”
The young Englishman’s surprise increased every moment, and Frank thought by the way he looked at him that he was not quite prepared to believe all he heard. But Frank did not care for that. He was not trying to make himself important; he was only answering the clerk’s questions.
“Are you an officer of this vessel?” asked the latter, glancing at Frank’s suit of navy blue.
“I act as sailing master,” was the modest reply.
“What trade are you in?”
“No trade at all. This is a private yacht, and we have got thus far on our voyage around the world. Two of those young gentlemen you see there,” he added, directing the clerk’s attention toward the Club, who had withdrawn to the quarter-deck, “are nephews of the owner and captain.”
“I am delighted to hear it,” exclaimed the clerk, and it was evident that the schooner and her company arose in his estimation at once. At any rate, he dropped his patronizing air, and began to act and talk as if he considered Frank his equal. He no doubt thought that those who were able to travel around the world in their own vessel were deserving of respect, even though they were Americans. “I wish I had time to make their acquaintance,” he continued, “but here comes the commissioner’s boat, and I see your captain is just putting out from the quay. I hope to meet you again.”
Frank simply bowed. He could not say that he hoped so too, for he did not. He could see nothing to admire in a young man who seemed to think that only those who were wealthy were deserving of respect. Frank would have been still more disinclined to meet him again had he known the circumstances under which one of their meetings was to take place. This was by no means the end of his acquaintance with Mr. Fowler. It was only the beginning of it.
Frank now stepped to the side in readiness to hand the man-ropes to the occupants of the commissioner’s boat, which just then came up. There were four of them, and he was rather surprised at their appearance. Each wore a short blue blouse, confined at the waist by a black belt, a very juvenile-looking cap, and a broad, white shirt collar, which was turned down over their coats, making them look like so many overgrown boys. But the batons they carried in their hands, and the shields they wore on their breasts, proclaimed them to be policemen. And very careful members of the community they were, too; for without them the law-abiding inhabitants of the city would have had anything but a pleasant time of it, surrounded as they were by thousands of the worst characters that Great Britain could produce. They climbed to the deck one after the other, and the foremost informed Mr. Baldwin, who came forward to meet them, that they had been sent to look at the suspected men, and to take charge of them if they proved to be convicts. The mate accordingly gave the necessary orders to the master-at-arms, and presently the four prisoners came up under guard.
“Aw!” exclaimed the clerk, who had by this time recovered from the surprise into which he had been thrown by his conversation with Frank, “that one in irons is Waters, sure enough.”