“Sir,” said he, casting looks of yearning upon the Captain’s bottle, “I beg to report that we have searched everywhere to no effect.”
“But, burn me,” exclaimed the Captain, “the rascal must be here! You saw him enter that door, we all saw him, and he’s had no time to win clear ... besides, the place is surrounded.”
“Nevertheless, sir,” answered Ensign Page, still eyeing the bottle thirstily, “there’s never a sign of him high nor low.”
“And I say he’s here somewhere, hid. Where ha’ you looked?”
“In all the usual places, sir.”
“Then go search the unusual places!”
“Sir?”
“I say,” fumed the Captain, “that the rogue must be here somewhere, and if he’s here, here he shall be found.... Go, find him, sir!”
The young Ensign saluted the bottle and departed. So was a new series of thumps and bangs and tramplings alow and aloft, what time the autocratic Captain Panter sipped his wine and glared at the occupants of the settle who seemed so very much at their ease; and, as the wine grew low, his choler rose correspondingly. He viewed Sir Hector’s shabby garments, Sir John’s plain attire, and setting them down as persons of no condition, treated them as such.
“Sunstroke!” he snarled. “Sunstroke, begad! ’Tis very evident ye’re aiding and abetting this rascally smuggler—both o’ ye! Could I but be assured o’ this, I’d march ye to prison, aye, I would, by Jove! B’gad, but you may be arrant smugglers yourselves—you’ve the cursed, sly look of ’t.”