“Without me, hell!”
O’Brien turned from him savagely, darted forward to the engine-driver and cursed the other hands into the cars. Douglas winked at Sard. “Chief officer’s perk,” he said. “All the same, we’d better hop it.”
The nearest car to them was the last in the train, and empty but for some tarpaulins and rolls of slickers. Douglas helped Sard into it, hove his wet things after him, and was starting to heave himself in, when the train started. A man less strong in the arms would have been pitched headlong, but Douglas clambered into the car, made a warm corner for Sard, covered him up and sat beside him.
“Ambitious swab, that terrier,” he said. “How are you feeling?”
“Very grateful to you,” Sard said, “for without you, things would have gone hard with me. Who are you? Aren’t you Castleton? Weren’t you once C.P.F.?”
“Yes. I used to be Castleton, C.P.F. I was a year senior to you,” Douglas said. “You wouldn’t remember me, for that reason; but I remembered you. You see, I’ve got a memory which can’t forget. I often wish it could.”
“I remember you now, of course,” Sard said. “But when were you on board the Pathfinder?”
“Never.”
“But how did you know about Captain Cary’s mole; and the cat, and the monkey-winches?”
“Three days ago I passed under the Pathfinder’s stern, as I went ashore to see my girl. I saw a man with a mole on his chin doing hygrometer at the taffrail. I knew it must be the captain. It couldn’t have been anybody else. The cat was fooling about on deck and the old man called it Nibbins. As for the monkey-winches on the fiferail, you were clearing a boat with one of them. I thought it a dam’ fine little contrivance.”