"I don't think it is: what is sauce for goose is sauce for gander. You will take the wheel, Mr. Cornwood. Forward, there! Heave up the anchor."
As soon as the anchor was atrip, I rang the bell to go ahead.
CHAPTER XXI.
A VISIT TO ORANGE PARK.
Cornwood was slow to move, after I directed him to take the wheel. I saw that he was not yet in the pilot-house, when I rang the bell to go ahead. I directed the mate with Ben and Landy to prevent any of the party in the boat from coming on board, and hastened to the pilot-house. But before I reached the door Cornwood was at the wheel. He threw it over, and met the boat with the helm when she began to make headway. I was not quite sure that he did not intend to rebel; but I was ready to send him ashore the instant he did so in word or deed. My suspicions began to gather weight again. He had evidently delayed the steamer until the arrival of the boat containing Captain Boomsby and the husband of the stewardess.
I could easily fancy that the pilot was at the bottom of all the proceedings to delay or prevent the departure of the boat. The attachment was to prevent her going at all; the claim for the stewardess was to help along the matter. It seemed to me that some heavy reward had been promised to Cornwood for his services, or he would not endanger the liberal wages he was paid for his services on board of the Sylvania. But I knew nothing about the matter, and it was useless to conjecture what he was driving at.
The steamer was headed up the river, and we had actually begun our long-talked-of trip. Cornwood steered the boat as well as usual, but he was moody and silent. If he was ugly and bent on mischief, the worst he could do, as I understood the matter, was to run the steamer aground. This would not be a very serious calamity, and could involve no worse consequences than a loss of time. I was not alarmed at anything he might do while we were sailing up the river. I seated myself at the side of the wheel, and allowed things to take their course, as, in New Jersey, when it rains, they let it rain. But if Cornwood was angry, he cooled off in the course of half an hour, and remarked that it was a delightful day for the start. I was not obstinate on this point, and I agreed with him.
"I don't think you treated me quite fairly, Captain Garningham, in the affairs of poor Griff and his wife," said he, when the steamer was off Mulberry Grove.
"Didn't treat you fairly!" I exclaimed, astonished at this new phase of the argument. "Do I treat you unfairly because I won't have a man with murder in his heart on board? Do I treat you unfairly because his wife refuses to leave her place?"