“I shall never take you on the sea again, my son,” said Mr. Dodson, with a very white face.
“He ought to be ducked,” was the opinion freely expressed by the others.
Mr. Benjamin Sparks took off his coat with a businesslike deliberation.
“Now then, you d——d lunatic,” he said, “we will have it out.”
“I—I d-don’t know how to fight,” stammered William Jordan, all of whose spirit had fled, “but you can throw me into the sea if you w-want to.”
“If we don’t get him away,” said the others apprehensively, “Ben Sparks will murder him.”
Whereupon Mr. James Dodson linked his arm through that of his singular companion.
“Come on, Luney,” he said, “I don’t want to have to give evidence before a coroner’s jury. What a lunatic you are! Whatever possessed you to do it? You have quite spoilt the day for everybody. I shall never bring you to Margate again.”
William Jordan and his mentor walked in dead silence in the direction of the town. But after they had gone some distance, William Jordan stopped abruptly and said, “I—I must go back to the sea. I—I cannot leave the sea. I—I will return to the railway station at a quarter-past six.”
“Promise me,” said his mentor earnestly, “that you will be up to no new mischief. I don’t know that you are fit to be left alone with the sea. It seems to get into your brain.”