"Then I'll wish you good-day, monsieur. I must try elsewhere," and I dropped into my seat and pulled away down the little roadstead.
Monsieur Torode was still leaning over the wall, and watching me fixedly, when I turned the corner of the outer ridge of rocks and crept away through the mazy channels towards Peter Port. When I got farther out, and could get an occasional glimpse of the rampart, he was still leaning on it and was still staring out at me just as I had left him.
CHAPTER XVII
HOW I WENT OUT WITH JOHN OZANNE
There was no difficulty in finding John Ozanne. I made out his burly figure and red-whiskered face on the harbour wall before I had passed Castle Cornet, and heard his big voice good-humouredly roaring to the men at work in the rigging of a large schooner that lay alongside.
He greeted me with great goodwill.
"Why, surely, Phil," he said very heartily, in reply to my request. "It's not your grandfather's boy I would be refusing, and it's a small boat that won't take in one more. What does the old man say to your going?"
"He's willing, or I wouldn't be here."