“Your good friend? Crayford! your liking for that man amazes me.”
Crayford laid his hand kindly on Frank’s shoulder. Of all the officers of the Sea-mew, Crayford’s favorite was Frank.
“Why should it amaze you?” he asked. “What opportunities have you had of judging? You and Wardour have always belonged to different ships. I have never seen you in Wardour’s society for five minutes together. How can you form a fair estimate of his character?”
“I take the general estimate of his character,” Frank answered. “He has got his nickname because he is the most unpopular man in his ship. Nobody likes him—there must be some reason for that.”
“There is only one reason for it,” Crayford rejoined. “Nobody understands Richard Wardour. I am not talking at random. Remember, I sailed from England with him in the Wanderer; and I was only transferred to the Sea-mew long after we were locked up in the ice. I was Richard Wardour’s companion on board ship for months, and I learned there to do him justice. Under all his outward defects, I tell you, there beats a great and generous heart. Suspend your opinion, my lad, until you know my friend as well as I do. No more of this now. Give me the dice and the box.”
Frank opened his locker. At the same moment the silence of the snowy waste outside was broken by a shouting of voices hailing the hut—“Sea-mew, ahoy!”
Chapter 8.
The sailor on watch opened the outer door. There, plodding over the ghastly white snow, were the officers of the Wanderer approaching the hut. There, scattered under the merciless black sky, were the crew, with the dogs and the sledges, waiting the word which was to start them on their perilous and doubtful journey.
Captain Helding of the Wanderer, accompanied by his officers, entered the hut, in high spirits at the prospect of a change. Behind them, lounging in slowly by himself, was a dark, sullen, heavy-browed man. He neither spoke, nor offered his hand to anybody: he was the one person present who seemed to be perfectly indifferent to the fate in store for him. This was the man whom his brother officers had nicknamed the Bear of the Expedition. In other words—Richard Wardour.