‘And of course you know how to find the longitude by lunar observations?’
‘Pray excuse me, Captain Braine,’ said I; ‘but what, may I inquire, is your motive in asking these questions?’
He eyed me fixedly for some moments, and then silently nodded his head three or four times. Miss Temple seemed to shrink slightly as she watched him.
‘Mr. Dugdale,’ said he very slowly, ‘on your giving me to understand that you had sarved aboard an Indiaman, I was willing to receive you and the lady aboard my ship. When you came aboard, you told me that you understood navigation. Didn’t ye?’
I felt the blood in my cheek as I answered: ‘I have some recollection of speaking to that effect.’
‘Then why d’ye want to go and try to make out now that ye know nothing about it?’
‘I am trying to do nothing of the kind,’ said I, assuming an air of dignity and resentment, though I feared it was good for very little. ‘You have questioned me, sir, and now I ask you a question. I have a right to an answer, seeing how you expect that I should rapidly and fluently reply to you.’
‘I’ll be talking to you afore long,’ he said, bestowing another succession of dark mysterious nods upon me.
‘Captain Braine,’ cried Miss Temple, breaking with an air of consternation out of the cold, contemptuous resentment that had made marble of her face, ‘you have rescued us from a condition of dreadful distress, and I have your promise that you will not lose an opportunity to transfer us to the first ship you meet that is homeward bound, providing we do not shortly fall in with the Countess Ida.’
‘I ha’n’t broke my promise yet, have I?’ he replied, rounding slowly upon her and staring.