There was an appreciative roar, and Wilson winced as "Old Pop" Markle whispered:
"Don't mind that Peter Haines. He's got a heart as soft as mush. It's only their skylarkin', sonny. Hit 'em back. That's what they like."
But the victim had lost all self-confidence, and now he was beginning to feel dizzy and forlorn. The smell of food, the heat, and the jerky plunging of the cabin were overwhelming. He staggered to his bunk and crept in. This was the last blow, that on top of his false pretences he should be laid low before the eyes of this hostile crowd. He knew not what happened, until hours after he awoke from a semi-stupor to find "Old Pop" Markle sponging his face with cold water and calling in his ear:
"There's a steamer coming up from the east'ard. Brace up and get on deck. It's a pretty sight."
The boy clambered through the companionway as the boat-keeper touched a match to an oil-soaked bunch of waste in a wire cage at the end of his torch. The schooner and the near-by sea were bathed in a yellow glare. Out in the darkness a blue Coston light glowed a response. Some one shouted: "On deck for the skiff," and five minutes later the boat-crew was pulling off in the night to the waiting steamer, with a pilot in the stern-sheets.
"There goes your friend, Peter Haines," chuckled "Pop" Markle. "I knowed you'd take it hard if I didn't give you a chance to say good-bye to him. He won't pester you no more this cruise."
The wind blew some of the cobwebs from poor Wilson's muddled head, and he felt refreshed. Soon the pelting spray drove him below deck and he curled up on a locker, watching the poker game from which youth and inexperience barred him. And what was more cutting, he was not even asked to play.
"It would be like taking pennies from a blind child," callously commented the strapping McCall who had welcomed him aboard. But the white-haired patriarch of them all did not join the game, and he said cheerily to Wilson:
"You're too young and I'm too old to be wastin' our wages in them pursuits, ain't we, sonny? There's an old lady and a cottage at Lewes that takes care of my rake-off. And instid of raisin' the limit, I raise vegetubbles for my fun."
Wilson opened his bruised heart and told the old pilot the story of his venture, and felt relieved that his masquerade had been thrown away. "Pop" Markle's blue eyes twinkled: