“What part!” returned the pretended fisherman, leisurely drawing in a line, which the quick eye of Wilder saw, though abundantly provided with lead at the end, was destitute of the equally material implement—the hook; “What part, Captain! No less a particular than the second guinea.”
“It was to have been the reward of a service done, and not an earnest, like its fellow, to induce you to undertake the duty.”
“Ah! you have helped me to the very word I wanted. I fancied it was not in earnest, like the one I got, and so I left the job half finished.”
“Half finished, scoundrel! you never commenced what you swore so stoutly to perform.”
“Now are you on as wrong a course, my Master, as if you steered due east to get to the Pole. I religiously performed one half my undertaking; and, you will acknowledge, I was only half paid.”
“You would find it difficult to prove that you even did that little.”
“Let us look into the log. I enlisted to walk up the hill as far as the dwelling of the good Admiral’s widow, and there to make certain alterations in my sentiments, which it is not necessary to speak of between us.”
“Which you did not make; but, on the contrary, which you thwarted, by telling an exactly contradictory tale.”
“True.”
“True! knave?—Were justice done you, an acquaintance with a rope’s end would be a merited reward.”