"D'ye reckon he can tie it safe and proper, seeing he bean't no more a parson?" asked Jack.
"Never you fear," says Bill; "once a parson always a parson, as I've heard tell. 'Tis no matter he's a swab and a tosspot like you and me, only worse, and fit for nothing but a Newgate galley; he'll read the words o' the book, if so be he's sober enough to see 'em (though to be sure his talk is always most pious when he's drunk), and they'll be lawful man and wife, same as if they'd bin spliced by the Pope of Rome himself."
This wrought me into a very fever of apprehension. I could only guess who Parson Jim might be; the buccaneers gathered all manner of strange recruits; it was enough that there was talk of a marriage, and I was sick with dread lest after all I should be too late. And when at last I heard the welcome rustle below me, the first words I spoke through the tube were an anxious inquiry for Lucy's welfare.
"Missy lots better now, sah," replied the negro, and with the vanity of youth I inferred that she was better for the knowledge that I was near.
"Is Mr. Cludde at the house?" I asked.
"No, sah; Massa Cludde gone yesterday."
That was good news, at any rate, for I supposed him to have returned to Spanish Town, perhaps to make preparations for his wedding, and it must be four or five days at earliest before he could be back.
"And when is Mistress Lucy's birthday?" I asked.
"Missy's bufday Friday, Massa, but oughter be Fursday."
"What do you mean?"