Miss Tyrell assented gravely, and stood there waiting.
It is probable that two members at least of the family would have been gratified by the disappearance of the caller then and there, but that Mr. Wheeler, a man of great density and no tact whatever, came bustling out into the passage, and having shaken hands in a hearty fashion, told him to put his hat on a nail and come in.
“No news of the cap’n, I suppose?” he asked, solemnly, after Fraser was comfortably seated.
“Not a word,” was the reply.
The dock-foreman sighed and shook his head as he reflected on the instability of human affairs. “There’s no certainty about anything,” he said, slowly. “Only yesterday I was walking down the Commercial Road, and I slipped orf the curb into the road before you could say Jack Robinson.”
“Nearly run over?” queried Fraser.
Mr. Wheeler shook his head. “No,” he said, quietly.
“Well, what of it?” enquired his son.
“It might just as well have been the edge of the dock as the curb; that’s what I mean,” said Mr. Wheeler, with a gravity befitting his narrow escape.
“I’m alwis telling you not to walk on the edge, father,” said his wife, uneasily.