He was the most contrary, malicious, waspish elf that could well be imagined. If he could not find an opportunity for stinging and teasing with his ill-natured sarcasms and remarks, he buzzed around his victims like an irritated musquito, whose shrill notes of defiance and antagonism are as bad as its bite. The more Flora saw of Mr. Lootie the less she wished to see of him; but she could not come upon the deck without his pestering her with his company, and annoying her with observations on his fellow-passengers, which were as unjust as they were cruel.
It was in vain that she turned her back upon him, and gave him curt ungracious answers, often affecting not to hear him at all. The little snuff-coloured man was too much at heart a sneak, with all his impudence, to be readily shook off.
It was only when Oscar, who had attached himself to Mrs. Lyndsay and her child, accompanied her to the deck, that Mr. Lootie kept his distance. The fierce terrier had only to draw up his lip and show his ivories, hissing through them a short ominous snarl, and the brown dwarf retreated with a growl and a curse into his boat.
I am sorry to say that Flora actually fostered the deadly enmity which existed between Oscar and the recreant distiller, which seemed the more unjustifiable, as there was a positive personal likeness between the biped and the quadruped. They had the same short, pert contour of face, the same petulant curl of the nostrils, the same fiery red flash in the small yellow brown eyes, and the very same method of snarling and showing off their white malicious-looking teeth. The very colour of Oscar's low rough coat was nearly the same as the scanty beard and hair of his inveterate foe. Could Oscar have spoken with a human tongue, he would have declared himself very little flattered by the resemblance; for rough as he was, he was an honest dog, and loved honesty in others. There was only one mental feature common to both—their capacity to hate and to annoy those they disliked.
Occasionally the little brown man indulged in a fit of mirth. When retreating under the shade of his ark of safety, the boat, he would sing in a low bow-wow tone some ditty only known to himself, the upper notes of which resembled a series of continued snarls. Oscar would then stop just in front of him, and snarl in return, till the patience of the musician was utterly exhausted, and he would rush out of his hiding-place, and pursue his hairy foe round the deck with a cudgel, uttering unmistakeable curses at every blow.
These skirmishes were nuts for old Boreas to crack, who putting his arms akimbo, would encourage the pugnacity of his dog with loud cries:
"At him, Oscar!—at him! Give it him strong, my boy!" to the no small indignation of Mr. Lootie, who would retire, muttering to himself—
"I don't know which is the greatest brute of the two, you or your cur!"
"My dog is a good physiognomist; he knows best," would be the rejoinder; and the war would recommence with greater fury than ever.
Mr. Lootie was not the only mysterious passenger on board the brig Anne. There was another, who made his appearance among the steerage passengers the moment the vessel was out of sight of land, to the astonishment of old Boreas and his crew—a young, handsome, dare-devil sort of a chap, who might have numbered six-and-twenty years, who called himself Stephen Corrie. He made his débût upon deck as suddenly and as unexpectedly as if he had fallen from the stars, and possessed the power of rendering himself visible or invisible at will.