“Then bring them aboard, Mr. Fielding. I wish to proceed.”
“Get your clothes,” said I to the little man, “and come along.”
He stopped in his circling walk and looked at the fellow he called Bobby; then, as if influenced by the same thought, they both cast their eyes over the schooner, first staring up at the broken topmast, then at the bowsprit, then running their gaze over the decks.
“Have you sounded the well?” cried the little man to me.
“No, I have not,” I answered.
He flew to the pumps; his feet twinkled as he fled. I never witnessed such activity; it seemed impossible in a man who had been suffering from a fortnight of black hole. He pounced upon the sounding-rod, dropped the bar down the well, whipped it up, looked at it, uttered a gull-like cry, flung the iron down, and was with us in a jiffey.
“Bobby,” he exclaimed, “nut dust aint in it with her.”
“Don’t I know her for a corker?” responded Bobby. “Froth and pop when it blows, and a dead marine at heart.”
“Bobby, what d’ye think?” said the raw-eyed little man, questioning his mate as though the suggestion had been made.
The man looked round the sea, looked up aloft, and answered: