“Life, Madam; but not of honour.”
“Gertrude, we can now retire to our cabin,” observed Mrs Wyllys, with an air of cold displeasure, in which disappointment was a good deal mingled with resentment at the trifling of which she believed herself the subject. The eye of Gertrude was no less averted and distant than that of her governess, while the tint that gave lustre to its beam was brighter, if not quite so resentful. As the two moved past the silent Wilder, each dropped a distant salute, and then our adventurer found himself the sole occupant of the quarter-deck. While his crew were busied in coiling ropes, and clearing the decks, their young Commander leaned his head on the taffrail, (that part of the vessel which the good relict of the Rear-Admiral had so strangely confounded with a very different object in the other end of the ship), remaining for many minutes in an attitude of deep abstraction. From this reverie he was at length aroused, by a sound like that produced by the lifting and falling of a light oar into the water. Believing himself about to be annoyed by visiters from the land, he raised his head, and cast a dissatisfied glance over the vessel’s side, to see who was approaching.
A light skiff, such as is commonly used by fishermen in the bays and shallow waters of America, was lying within ten feet of the ship, and in a position where it was necessary to take some little pains in order to observe it. It was occupied by a single man, whose back was towards the vessel, and who was apparently abroad on the ordinary business of the owner of such a boat.
“Are you in search of rudder-fish, my friend, that you hang so closely under my counter?” demanded Wilder. “The bay is said to be full of delicious bass, and other scaly gentlemen, that would far better repay your trouble.”
“He is well paid who gets the bite he baits for,” returned the other, turning his head, and exhibiting the cunning eye and chuckling countenance of old Bob Bunt, as Wilder’s recent and treacherous confederate had announced his name to be.
“How now! Dare you trust yourself with me, in five-fathom water, after the villanous trick you have seen fit”—
“Hist! noble Captain, hist!” interrupted Bob, holding up a finger, to repress the other’s animation, and intimating, by a sign, that their conference must be held in lower tones; “there is no need to call all hands to help us through a little chat. In what way have I fallen to leeward of your favour, Captain?”
“In what way, sirrah! Did you not receive money, to give such a character of this ship to the ladies as (you said yourself) would make them sooner pass the night in a churchyard, than trust foot on board her?”
“Something of the sort passed between us, Captain; but you forgot one half of the conditions, and I overlooked the other; and I need not tell so expert a navigator, that two halves make a whole. No wonder, therefore, that the affair dropt through between us.”
“How! Do you add falsehood to perfidy? What part of my engagement did I neglect?”