“I haven’t seen Mr Juniper Graves to-day,” said the former.
“To tell you the truth,” answered Frank, “he and I have been having a few words together.”
“I’m not sorry for it,” remarked the captain drily; “nothing serious, however, I hope.”
“Nothing very, perhaps; but the matter’s simply this: I’ve been fool enough to play cards with him for rather high stakes lately, and I fancy that I’ve detected my man peeping over my cards, and using a little sleight of hand in his shuffling too.”
“I’ll be bound he has,” remarked the other.
“If he’d been a poor man,” added Frank, “I could have excused it; but the fellow’s got a whole fortune in nuggets and notes stowed about him. He’s a sort of walking ‘Crocus,’ as he told me once, when he wasn’t over sober,—meaning ‘Croesus,’ of course.”
“And so you’ve given him a little of your mind, I suppose.”
“Yes; and it’s wounded my gentleman’s dignity considerably; so there he is below, hugging his gold, and comforting himself in his own way, which isn’t much in your line or Jacob’s, captain, and I wish it wasn’t in mine.”
“In other words,” said Captain Merryweather, “he’s pretty nearly drunk by this time.”
“You’re somewhere about right,” was the reply. Immediately after this short dialogue the captain proceeded to give the orders for tacking in a stentorian voice, as the wind was high.