“Well, no. Perhaps it has, but I didn’t see it at the time.”
“Of course not,” said the captain, “and if I had been thinking of Beamish’s I should never have said such a stupid thing.”
“Why, what do you mean?” said Wyndham, puzzled.
“Why, this. In all our talks you never once mentioned Beamish’s. You concluded what I suspected you of was this, and I concluded that the scrape you were confessing was the one I suspected you of.”
“What do you suspect me of, then?” inquired Wyndham, “if it wasn’t that?”
“I’m ashamed to say,” said the captain, “I suspected you of having cut the lines of Parrett’s rudder at the boat-race.”
Wyndham, in the shock of this announcement, broke out into an almost hysterical laugh.
“Suspected me of cutting the rudder-lines!” he gasped.
“Yes,” said Riddell, sorrowfully. “I’m ashamed to say it.”
“Why, however could you?” exclaimed the boy, in strange bewilderment.