The wineglasses had already been filled too frequently for me, and, pleading business, I had spread out a coast chart on the other end of the cabin table and was studying it, this by way of removing myself from a conversation which I saw was not to end with trading or slave-running.
This Rimmle was one of those who held Captain Blaise for a sort of idol. I had seen dozens of the kind before. Great hours for them when they could sit in with the famous Captain Blaise, and so now, with the agent bound to talk of the West Coast trade, lawful and otherwise, Captain Blaise was making but slow headway.
I was thinking of stepping up on deck to stretch my legs, when the conversation took a sudden shift. "Captain"—Rimmle put the question hesitatingly—"I thought I had seen the last of you. May I ask what lured you back?"
Captain Blaise had decanted another bottle and was viewing the rich-colored bubbles as he held the carafe up against the light. Such little things afforded him keen pleasure. He set the carafe down—softly—only [pg 124] to ask by way of reply: "Rimmle, what is it always brings men back?"
Rimmle laid his head to one side and nodded shrewdly. "As far as my experience goes, Captain, it is one of three things."
"And which of the three is my failing?" Captain Blaise was absently filling their glasses.
"M-m—It cannot be money—you never cared for that. You who have made fortunes and spent them as fast as you made them—no, it cannot be money. And then your newly acquired property in the States—"
"My newly acquired—What of that?"
"Why, the rumor is out that you fell heir to a great estate in the States—on the banks of the Mississippi or the Ohio, or some outlandish name of a river in the States."
"Oh, a rumor! Go on."