“It iss fery strange that we should foregather this mornin’, Mr Mabberly,” said the skipper, after greeting the young men; “for Shames an’ me was jist speakin’ aboot ye. We will be thinkin’ that it iss foolishness for hum an’ me to be stoppin’ here wastin’ our time when we ought to be at oor work.”
“Nonsense, Captain,” said Mabberly; “surely you don’t think that taking a holiday in a pleasant place like this is wasting time. Besides, I don’t consider you free from your engagement to me. You were hired for the trip, and that includes land as well as water, so I won’t give you your discharge till you have had a long rest, and recruited yourselves after the shock to your nervous systems occasioned by the wreck and the swim to shore!”
A grim smile played on the skipper’s iron features when reference was made to his nerves, and a flicker of some sort illumined the wooden visage of McGregor.
“You are fery kind, sir,” returned the skipper; “but we don’t like to be receivin’ pay for doin’ nothin’. You see, neither Shames nor me cares much for fushin’ in the burns, or goin’ after the deer, an’ there’s no chance o’ raisin’ the yat from the pottom o’ the sea, so, if you hev no objection, sir, we will be goin’ by the steamer that arrives to-morrow. I thought I would speak to you to-day, for we will hev to start early in the mornin’, before you’re up, for it iss a long way we’ll hev to go. Iss it not so, Shames?”
“Oo, ay,” replied the seaman, with more than ever of the nasal twang; “it iss a coot many miles to where the poat comes in—so the poy Tonal’ wass tellin’ me, what-ë-ver.”
Mabberly tried to persuade the men to remain a little longer, but they were obdurate, so he let them go, knowing well that his father, who was a wealthy merchant and shipowner, would see to the interests of the men who had suffered in his son’s service.
As they retraced their steps to the house the skipper gave Giles Jackman some significant glances, which induced him to fall behind the others.
“You want to speak with me privately, I think, skipper?”
“Yes, sir, I do,” replied the seaman, with some embarrassment. “But it iss not fery easy nor pleesant to do so. A man does not like to speak of another man’s failin’s, you see, but as I am goin’ away I’m obleeged to do it. You will hev noticed, sir, that Ivor Tonalson iss raither fond of his tram?”
“I’m afraid that I have observed that—poor fellow.”