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Updated: June 19, 2025
I knew, while I uttered it, that my speech was abominably ill-conditioned; that Captain Branscome had, in fact, been holding out the olive-branch, and that in common decency I ought to have caught at it. In short, I felt my boyish temper going from bad to worse, and yet, somehow, that I could not apply the brake to it. "Why, confound the boy!" ejaculated Mr. Rogers. "What ever bee has stung him?"
" Sir, I answered, 'I beg your pardon for coming thus unannounced, but my name is Branscome, and I had once the honour to be shipmate with you on board the Londonderry transport. "For a while he continued to stare at me in his blind way. "'Yes, he said slowly, at length; 'yes; I remember your voice, sir. But what in the name of wonder brings you to my garden just now?
"The Captain," exclaimed Mr. Rogers, "has been tendering us his resignation." "Why?" "Mr. Rogers misunderstands me, ma'am," said Captain Branscome. "I merely said that, so far as we have agreed as yet, My authority ceases an soon as we cast anchor. If you choose to re elect me, I shall not say 'No' though not coveting the honour; but I can only say 'Yes' upon a condition." "Name it, please."
Mrs. Branscome received him impassively at the appointed time. David saw that he was expected to speak to the point, and a growing scorn for his own insistence urged him to the same course. He plunged abruptly into his subject and his manner showed him in the rough, more particularly to himself. "What I came back to ask you is just this.
Stimcoe to be kind enough to advance the fare if your pocket-money will not suffice." "And I doubt if there's two shillings in the house!" commented Mrs. Stimcoe, candid for once, "and God knows what I can pawn!" Captain Branscome plunged his hand into his pocket and drew out a guinea.
You're something of an eccentric yourself, Jack. You had better join the picnic." "I ought to warn you, ma'am," said Captain Branscome gravely, "that although the West India route has been fairly well protected for some months now, there is a certain amount of risk from American privateers." "The Americans are a chivalrous nation, I have always heard."
By the same measurement the crosses covered, each way, from half a mile to three-quarters. Moreover, each had patently been dashed in with two hurried strokes of the pen and without any pretence of accuracy. "Without bearings of some sort," said Miss Belcher, "these marks are merely ridiculous." "You may well say so, ma'am," Captain Branscome answered, but inattentively.
Captain Branscome who, to the knowledge of both of us, never had a shilling in his pocket stood there nervously proffering me a guinea! Mrs. Stimcoe, having begged Captain Branscome to take watch for a while over the invalid, and having helped me to pack a few clothes in a handbag, herself accompanied me to the coach-office, where we found the Royal Mail on the point of starting.
Yet it needed no examination to tell me that the eyeglasses were Captain Branscome's. I recognized the delicate cable pattern of their gold rims, glinting in the sunlight. I recognized the ring and the frayed scrap of black ribbon attached to it. I remembered the guinea with which Captain Branscome had paid my fare on the coach. I remembered Miss Plinlimmon's account of the stolen cashbox.
But to this I could give no answer, except that it was a piece of gold, and in size perhaps a trifle smaller than a guinea. "That's a pity, lad. The coin might have helped us. You're sure now that you can't remember? It hadn't a couple of pillars engraved on it, for instance?" I shook my head. I had taken no particular heed of the stamp on the coin. Captain Branscome sighed his disappointment.
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