“But how do you explain it?” he asked.
“I can’t explain it,” said I.
Mamie wagged her head ominously.
“But, Great Cæsar’s ghost, the money was offered!” cried Jim. “It won’t do, Loudon; it’s nonsense on the face of it! I don’t say but what you and Nares did your best; I’m sure, of course, you did; but I do say you got fooled. I say the stuff is in that ship to-day, and I say I mean to get it.”
“There is nothing in the ship, I tell you, but old wood and iron!” said I.
“You’ll see,” said Jim. “Next time I go myself. I’ll take Mamie for the trip: Longhurst won’t refuse me the expense of a schooner. You wait till I get the searching of her.”
“But you can’t search her!” cried I. “She’s burned!”
“Burned!” cried Mamie, starting a little from the attitude of quiescent capacity in which she had hitherto sat to hear me, her hands folded in her lap.
There was an appreciable pause.