“Are you coming, Captain?” he said, as he picked up his stick.
Anny caught her breath as she edged round behind the empty table.
Dick smiled sardonically.
“I shall follow,” he said.
Cip looked about him, and then smiled knowingly, and putting on his hat, went over to the door and out into the dark.
Black’erchief Dick waited until he had gone and then turned and faced Anny, who was watching him, fascinated. She felt that the time had come at last when she must shake him off for ever or else go with him.
She had not heard from Nan since Red had taken her message, and she remembered the old woman’s promise as the one gleam of hope on her horizon, and every moment she expected to see her hobble into the kitchen, but it was getting late, and Nan had not come.
Dick walked over to the table behind which she stood and seated himself upon it without speaking.
The desperate light crept into the girl’s eyes again and she began to laugh. At least she must keep him in as good a temper as possible. She realized that. So, dropping a curtsey, she came a little nearer and leaning over the table she asked him would he drink again. To her surprise he answered her very pleasantly that he would, and ordered rum.
Hal, who was still cleaning pewter, looked up from his work, and watched the little scene with a growing sense of despair.