The two men with the ladder, and the steward with the cigars, appeared simultaneously; and, pocketing the weeds, the skipper proceeded to the gangway to supervise the rigging of the ladder. As he did so, Leslie felt something being thrust surreptitiously into his hand. It felt like a folded piece of paper, and he calmly pocketed it, glancing casually about him as he did so. The steward was the only man near him, and he was shuffling off nimbly on his way back to his pantry.
Leslie took his time paddling ashore, and when at length the pair landed on the beach the sun had passed the meridian.
“Now, Captain,” said Dick, “where would you like to go in the first place?”
Turnbull stood and looked about him admiringly. “Why,” he exclaimed, “this here hisland is a real beautiful place, and no mistake. Dash my wig! why, a man might do a sight worse than settle here for the rest of his natural, eh?”
“Ay,” answered Leslie, indifferently; “I have often thought so myself. Indeed it is quite on the cards that I may return here some day, with a few seeds and an outfit of gardeners’ tools. As you say, a man might do worse. By the way, perhaps it will be as well to get lunch before we start out on our ramble. Will you come up to my tent? You will find it a very comfortable little shanty. I must apologise for the fare that I shall be obliged to offer you, but I have lived on tinned meat and fish ever since I have been here; and I have caught no fish to-day.”
“Well, I must say as you’ve managed to make yourself pretty tidy comfortable,” observed Leslie’s guest as he entered the tent and stared about him in astonishment; “picters, fancy lamps, tables and chairs with swagger cloths and jigmarees upon ’em, and a brass-mounted bedstead and beddin’ fit for a king! They’re a blame sight better quarters than you’ll find aboard the Minerva, and so I tell ye.”
Leslie laughed lightly. “What does that matter?” he demanded. “True, I am fond of comfort, and always make a point of getting it where I can; but I can rough it with anybody when it becomes necessary.”
Dick was obliged to leave his guest alone in the tent for a short time while he looked after the preparations for luncheon; and he had little doubt that during his absence the man would without scruple peer and pry into the other compartments of the tent. But to this contingency he was quite indifferent, for he had foreseen and forestalled it, before going off to the barque, by carefully gathering up and stowing away such few traces of a woman’s presence as Flora had left behind her. That Turnbull had followed the natural propensity of men of his stamp was made clear immediately upon Dick’s return, for, quite unabashed, the fellow remarked—
“I say, mister, you’re doin’ the thing in style here, and no mistake. I’ve been havin’ a look round this here tent of yourn while you’ve been away, and I see as you’ve acshully got a pianner in the next room. And where’s your shipmate gone to?”
“My shipmate?” repeated Leslie, staring blankly at him.