‘So you think,’ sneered Rodley. ‘Now, then, to the other matter. Four years ago, you were a poor man.’
‘So I am now,’ retorted the captain.
‘O no; you’re very well off; your private bank is safe enough.’
The captain fidgeted uneasily in his chair at this.
‘You see, I know more than you think,’ said Rodley; and bending over and speaking in a lower tone of voice, he added: ‘Is it not a little curious that you should have come into your fortune about the same time that the Fancy Lass was wrecked about a hundred yards from your house?’
The poor old captain’s amazement and perplexity culminated here in a start which sent his pipe flying from his hand. ‘Why, how do you know? Who told you?’ gasped the old man. ‘Not a soul escaped from her.’
Jasper Rodley looked searchingly at him for a moment, and said: ‘Perhaps not. That’s got nothing to do with what we are talking about.’
‘And the boat went to pieces,’ added the captain.
‘You’re almost as well up in the subject as I am,’ said Rodley. ‘But she was wrecked on Sherringham Shoal, and went to pieces on the Locket Rock.’
‘Well?’ asked the captain.