‘The young scowbanker don’t recall,’ he exclaimed. ‘He believes—a curse on his believes!—that the captain spoke of four hundred feet. Was that it, sir?’
‘I remember enough to make sure that it was not four hundred feet,’ I answered.
He picked up the glass and levelled it at the island.
‘Which of them clumps of trees was it that the capt’n talked to ye about?’ he asked whilst he looked.
‘He did not describe any particular clump. It was to be found by measuring so many paces from the edge of the water of the lagoon yonder, the pillar bearing something west, but what I can’t tell you. I treated the story as a madman’s dream, and dismissed all the particulars of it from my mind.’
‘We’ll have to try all them clumps, then, that’s all,’ said he, with a hard face and a voice at once sharp and coarse with ill-subdued temper. ‘We’ll get the money, though it comes to having to dig up the whole island. And now, sir, there’s nothen to stop us—the boat’s ready—if you’ll be pleased to come along.’
‘I can be of no good to you,’ I exclaimed with an involuntary recoil; ‘you have hands enough to dig. I’ll stop here.’
‘No, if you please; we shall want you,’ he said, with a stare of dogged determination.
‘I must not be left alone, Mr. Lush,’ cried Miss Temple, with a painful expression of fear in her bloodless face. ‘If Mr. Dugdale goes, I must accompany him.’
‘No, mem. You’re safe enough here. We must have Mr. Dugdale along with us to show us what to do. For Lord’s sake, no arguments, sir! The impatience of the men’ll be forcing them to taking you up in their arms and lifting you over the side, if you keep ’em waiting.’