"That's no way for a barrow-knight to talk to 'is admirin' skipper," said Stump. "But I s'pose, now, it sounds queer to 'ave me a-callin' you Sir Richard, w'en, as like as not, I might be dammin' your eyes as second mate?"
Royson tried to escape, in his hurry he did not notice a bulky letter which lay on the top of one of his leather trunks. Stump called him back.
"You're missin' your mail, Sir Richard," he said, and Dick, perforce, returned. Oddly enough, the letter covered the initials "R. K." painted on the portmanteau. Turning a deaf ear to Stump's further pleasantries, he opened the envelope. A scrawl on a sheet of thin continental note-paper contained the brief statement that, "by inadvertence," von Kerber had "detained the enclosed letters and cablegrams." The enclosures, which were from Mr. Forbes, bore out the accuracy of Mrs. Haxton's revelations. He was, in very truth, the twenty-seventh baronet of his line, sole owner of Orme Castle and its dependencies, and befitted, by rank, descent, and estate, to take a social position of no mean order.
For an instant he forgot his surroundings. He recalled the stately old house and its beautiful park as he had last seen it, with all its glories rejuvenated by the money that was pouring in to the coffers of his detested relative. And now that malign old man was at rest, after a tardy admission of the grievous evil he had wrought to his brother's wife and son. Well, peace be to his crooked bones! Dick could have wished him safely in Paradise if the wish would restore to life his beloved mother. And she, dear soul—though he had forgotten her last night—perhaps her gentle spirit was shielding him as he stood with his back to the rock and faced the vicious swarm of Arabs in the darkness.
Then Stump's gruff accents broke in on his dreaming.
"Is it O.K., Sir Richard?" he asked. "Them's the papers von Kerber held up, I reckon? Have ye got a clean bill?"
Royson stooped and grasped Stump's shoulder.
"When we reach England, skipper," he said, "you and Tagg, and Mrs. Stump, too, for that matter, must come and see my place in the North. An' I'll tell ye wot," he went on, with fair mimicry of Stump's voice and manner, "you'll all 'ave the time of your lives, sink me, if you don't!"
Stump glared up at him. No man had ever before dared to reproduce that hoarse growl for his edification, and the effect was electrical. It might be likened to the influence exercised on a bull by the bellow of a rival. He took breath for a mighty effort—and Royson fled.
Be sure that Irene, though vastly occupied with work which von Kerber had performed hitherto—those small but troublesome items appertaining to the daily life of a large encampment—had an eye to watch for Dick's reappearance. She hailed him joyfully: