“Good morning, Miss Emily. Happy to see you here. Couldn’t tell where you’d run to, till old Bosley told me. Been looking for you in every place along the coast. Venture back to Ryde in the ‘Dido’? Come, now, you never yet have been on board, and I got her on purpose”—he was, I verily believe, going to say “for you,” but he lost confidence, and finished with a smirking giggle—“to take young ladies out, you know.”
Harcourt felt inclined to throw the little abomination into the water.
“Thank you,” said Miss Manners; “I prefer returning by the steamer.”
“Oh, dear, now that is—but I’m going to see your guardian, Miss, and may I take a letter to him just to say you’re well?” asked Mr Ribbons; “he’ll not be pleased if I don’t.”
“I prefer writing by the post,” answered Emily, now really becoming annoyed at his pertinacity.
“You won’t come and take a sail with me, then?” he continued; “you and your friends, I mean.”
She shook her head and bowed.
“Well, then, if you won’t, I’m off,” he exclaimed, with a look of reproach, and, striking his forehead, he turned round and tumbled into his boat.
We watched him on board his vessel, and the first thing he did was to set to and beat his boy; he then dived down below and returned with a swimming belt, or rather jacket, on, which he immediately began to fill with air, till he looked like a balloon or a Chinese tumbler. The “Dido,” then got under way; but her crew were apparently drunk, for she first very nearly ran right on to the quay, and then foul of a boat which was conveying a band of musicians across the river.
A most amusing scene ensued, Ribbons abused the musicians, who had nothing at all to do with it, and they retorted on him, trying to fend off the vessel with their trombones, trumpets, and cornopeans. At one time they seemed inclined to jump on board and take forcible possession of the “Dido,” but they thought better of it, and when they got clear they put forth such a discordant blast of derision, finishing like a peal of laughter, that all the spectators on shore could not help joining them, and I wonder the little man ever had courage again to set his foot in Cowes.