She shook her head, forcing a smile.
‘Perhaps Miss Jennings will join us later,’ said I, distrustful of his temper, and passing my hand through his arm, I got him on deck.
‘Laura is a sweet little woman,’ said he, pausing just outside the hatch to hammer at a tinder-box.
‘Ay, sweet, pretty, and good,’ said I.
‘You’re in love with her, I think, Charles.’
‘My dear Wilf, let us talk of this beautiful night,’ I exclaimed.
‘Why of a beautiful night in preference to a beautiful woman?’ cried he.
But I was determined to end this, so I called to a figure standing to leeward of the main boom, ‘Is that you, Finn?’
‘No, it’s me,’ answered Crimp’s surly note; ‘the capt’n’s a-laying down, but he’s guv orders to be aroused at four bells.’