“Syndikit,” said Dick.
“The syndikit is me and the cook, then,” said Sam. “Give us your ’and, cook.”
In this informal way the “Captain Gething Search Company” was founded, and the syndicate, thinking that they had a good thing, began to hold aloof from their fellows, and to confer darkly in remote corners. They expended a shilling on a popular detective story entitled, “On the Trail,” and an element of adventure was imported into their lives which brightened them considerably.
The following day the skipper spent hard at work with the cargo, bustling about with feverish energy as the afternoon wore on and left him to imagine his rival tête-à-tête with Annis. After tea a reaction set in, and, bit by bit the mate, by means of timely sympathy, learnt all that there was to know. Henry, without a display of anything, except, perhaps, silence, learnt it too.
“It’s in your favor that it’s your own craft,” said the mate; “you can go where you like. If you find the father, she might chuck the other feller.”
“That isn’t my object in finding him,” said the skipper. “I just want to find him to oblige her.”
He set off the following afternoon followed by the stealthy glances of the crew, who had heard something from Henry, and, first getting his beard trimmed at a barber’s, walked along to call on Mrs. Gething. She was in, and pleased to see him, and hearing that his crew were also searching, supplied him with another photograph of the missing captain.
“Miss Gething well?” inquired the skipper as, after accepting an invitation to a cup of tea, he noticed that she only laid for two.
“Oh, yes; she’s gone to London,” said Mrs. Gething. “She’s got friends there, you know.”
“Mr. Glover,” said the skipper to himself with dismal intuition. “I met a friend here the day before yesterday,” he said aloud.