The ship’s dog had, however, made his escape from the wreck and found his way back again to Shoreby. He was now at Arblaster’s heels, and, suddenly sniffing and pricking his ears, he darted forward and began to bark furiously at the two sham friars.
His master unsteadily followed him.
“Hey, shipmates!” he cried. “Have ye ever a penny piece for a poor old shipman, clean destroyed by pirates? I am a man that would have paid for you both o’ Thursday morning; and now here I be o’ Saturday night, begging for a flagon of ale! Ask my man Tom, if ye misdoubt me. Seven pieces of good Gascon wine, a ship that was mine own, and was my father’s before me, a Blessed Mary of plane-tree wood and parcel-gilt, and thirteen pounds in gold and silver. Hey! what say ye? A man that fought the French too; for I have fought the French; I have cut more French throats upon the high seas than ever a man that sails out of Dartmouth. Come, a penny piece.”
Neither Dick nor Lawless durst answer him a word, lest he should recognise their voices; and they stood there as helpless as a ship ashore, not knowing where to turn nor what to hope.
“Are ye dumb, boy?” inquired the skipper.—“Mates,” he added, with a hiccup, “they be dumb. I like not this manner of discourtesy; for an a man be dumb, so be as he’s courteous, he will still speak when he was spoken to, methinks.”
By this time the sailor, Tom, who was a man of great personal strength, seemed to have conceived some suspicion of these two speechless figures; and, being soberer than his captain, stepped suddenly before him, took Lawless roughly by the shoulder, and asked him, with an oath, what ailed him that he held his tongue. To this the outlaw, thinking all was over, made answer by a wrestling feint that stretched the sailor on the sand, and, calling upon Dick to follow him, took to his heels among the lumber.
The affair passed in a second. Before Dick could run at all, Arblaster had him in his arms; Tom, crawling on his face, had caught him by one foot, and the third man had a drawn cutlass brandishing above his head.
It was not so much the danger, it was not so much the annoyance that now bowed down the spirits of young Shelton; it was the profound humiliation to have escaped Sir Daniel, convinced Lord Risingham, and now fall helpless into the hands of this old drunken sailor; and not merely helpless, but, as his conscience loudly told him when it was too late, actually guilty—actually the bankrupt debtor of the man whose ship he had stolen and lost.
“Bring me him back into the alehouse, till I see his face,” said Arblaster.
“Nay, nay,” returned Tom; “but let us first unload his wallet, lest the other lads cry share.”