“Well, did ever you see a young ’ooman cry enough to fill a bucket, let alone a boat? I pretty nigh wanted one of them tarpaulins. Just lost her Daddy, the old man said to me. But he told me not to speak of it; no more I did. But I found out arterwards all about it. Seems she come from Molesey, though I took her t’other side.”
“From Molesey? I know a good many of the people there. The only man who died there this summer, to my knowledge, was an old bachelor by the name of Powell. What was this young woman’s name?
“Watson, or Wilson, I won’t be certain which. Never mind; I dare say she’s all right by now. The more they takes on at first, the sooner they gets shut.”
“But you took her on our side of the river, as you said. Did you go to fetch her? What day was it? What was she like? Who sent you for her? Where did you land her? How came you—”
“Look here, Mr. What’s your name. You hires my boat, and you hires me to row; but not to go on about other people’s business.”
“But it may be my own business, Philip Moggs. And you may get into desperate trouble, by refusing to tell me all you know of it.”
“Not a bit feared of that,” the old man answered; “I’ve a-knowed hundreds get into trouble with too much clacking, but never one the other way.”
He shut up his mouth, and looked like an old villain of a horse I had seen at Sam Henderson’s, who had pits above his eyes, and ears that stuck back like a gun-cock, and a nose that was as wiry as a twisted toasting-folk. This was a man who would whistle on his own nails to warm them, but not to warn another man from going down a weir-pool.
“Well,” I said, “never mind; I don’t suppose it matters”—for I was able to master my manners now, after three months of endurance; “only somebody has a bit of money upon something; and you might cut in for it, if you gave a hand. But I’ll be bound you know nothing about it, after all. You fellows, who are always on the water, dream all sorts of stuff, just as I did this afternoon.”
“Then, Mister, I’ll just keep my dreaming to myself. I did hear of something queer down your way. But least said, soonest mended. Time to be shoving off again.”