“What’s the row here?” he asked.
“We are crippled and adrift,” I answered. “I am no sailor, and there is a lady aboard.”
The girl stood at my side as the man listened to my story, the lividness of dawn in the east just touching his coarse face. His little eyes shifted from her to me incessantly, and when I had finished he gave an irritating laugh, for which I could have knocked him down with a good grace.
“Blowed away, hey!” he said, expectorating over the rail and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “D’ye mean ye hadn’t sense enough to know when a cable’s bent an’ when it’s onbent? Wall, ’tain’t no business o’ mine. Want to get aboard o’ us, hey? Yer green, fer a fact, an’ I’ll be frank with ye. If ye leaves the sloop she’ll be derelict, an’ I can pull her in an’ claim salvage. That’s the law. Course I’ll take ye aboard if ye want, but ye had better bide here an’ give me a hundred dollars fer a tow to New Haven. I got a date there an’ can’t do better fer ye.”
“Where are we now?” I asked.
“Sum’ers off the Thimbles.”
I well knew that I was being taken advantage of, but a slight pressure on my arm from the hand of Miss Edith told me it was no time for bargaining, so, after a deal of backing and going ahead, we found ourselves under way behind the tug, I still at the helm to prove that the sloop had not been deserted.
Safe thus far I felt relieved, but, the first difficulty passed, the remaining and greater phase of the situation reasserted itself. For a long time neither the girl nor I spoke, and I fancied her face was more deeply anxious in its expression than I had yet seen it. The light broadened; the shore showed faintly against a clear sky, and the stars grew pale and disappeared. Probably two hours more would get us into harbor, and the subject of our adventure and our probable reception home, even a plan for future movements, had not been touched upon. Something must be said, but in my intense interest my brain went all adrift and my intended delicacy was lost in my first blundering speech.
“You are looking tired, Miss Edith, but your last sleep was more restful than your first.”
It was man-like stupidity. Her face flushed hotly as she turned it away, but presently she looked at me and said: