Her gaze was still fixed on me. I felt embarrassed. I don't know why. Girls often stare at me. I suppose it's because I'm more than usually big. That seems to attract them. It had caused me a lot of trouble in Italy. But somehow this was different. It was as though she couldn't believe her eyes.
Almost reluctantly it seemed she turned to my companion.
'You know what your father said — I mean about the attic room not being used.'
'I don't care what he said,' Manack snapped. 'If it's the only room, use it.'
I was conscious of the girl's gaze as I followed Captain Manack out into a damp-chilled corridor. Our footsteps sounded loud on the stone floor. Manack set the lamp down on a table and opened a door. I followed him into the room I had looked into from the window.
And then I stopped. Standing by the fire, a drink in his hand, was Mulligan. Our eyes met at the same moment and he stiffened suddenly with his drink halfway to his lips and his mouth slightly open. Then his hand slid to his hip pocket. He held it there, his body tensed.
Manack went straight over to the desk. This the man you brought over from Italy?' he asked Mulligan.
'Yes.' Mulligan's eyes never left my face.
Without looking round Captain Manack sat down in his chair and began unscrewing the lighter. I remained standing by the door. Two thoughts were chasing themselves through my mind. The first was that I didn't want to be mixed up with anything that Mulligan was mixed up in. The second was that I wanted to get back the money he had stolen from me. Between the desire to beat it and the desire to get my money back, I stood like a dummy. 'This fellow's joining us,' Manack said. 'He's a miner.' He had the base of the lighter unscrewed now and was fishing inside it with a pin. Beside him lay a copy of the evening paper. It was folded so that the story of the abandoned revenue cutter was uppermost. I could read the headlines from where I stood. He extracted a screw of paper from the lighter and smoothed it out on the desk.
I suddenly decided that I didn't want anything to do with this set-up. Manack was mixed up with Dave and the death of the revenue men. And Mulligan was in his employ. Hadn't I seen him paying out money to the man? And Mulligan was a crook — a liquor-running French bastard. But, by God, before I left I'd have my money back. He wouldn't get away with that. With a hundred and fifty quid I'd be all right. I'd get myself a passage to Canada.