“There she is!” he cried suddenly, as a small schooner came into view from behind a big steamer. “Take me alongside.”
“Nice little thing she is too,” said the waterman, watching the other out of the corner of his eye as he bent to his oars. “Rides the water like a duck. Her cap’n knows a thing or two, I’ll bet.”
“He knows watermen’s fares,” replied the passenger coldly.
“Look out there!” cried a voice from the schooner, and the mate threw a line which the passenger skilfully caught.
The waterman ceased rowing, and, as his boat came alongside the schooner, held out his hand to his passenger, who had already commenced to scramble up the side, and demanded his fare. It was handed down to him.
“It’s all right, then,” said the fare, as he stood on the deck and closed his eyes to the painful language in which the waterman was addressing him. “Nobody been inquiring for me?”
“Not a soul,” said the mate. “What’s all the row about?”
“Well, you see, it’s this way,” said the master of the Frolic, dropping his voice. “I’ve been taking a little too much notice of a little craft down Battersea way—nice little thing, an’ she thought I was a single man, dy’e see?”
The mate sucked his teeth.
“She introduced me to her brother as a single man,” continued the skipper. “He asked me when the banns was to be put up, an’ I didn’t like to tell him I was a married man with a family.”