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Updated: May 31, 2025
He found Halvard already at the sand's edge, waiting uneasily with the tender, and they crossed the broken water to where the Gar's cabin flung out a remote, peaceful light. The sailor immediately set about his familiar, homely tasks, while Woolfolk made a minute inspection of the ketch's rigging.
"Which of you must be punished for this trick as ringleader?" he asked. "I, my lord, if any one must be," frankly avowed Bywater. "We should have let him out at ten o'clock. We never meant to keep him there all night. If I am punished, I hope your lordship will be so kind as allow it to be put down to your own account, not to Ketch's. I should not like it to be thought that I caught it for him.
Gerald, who really was not cognizant of it in any way, listened eagerly, making his own comments, and enjoying beyond everything the account of Ketch's fast in the supper department. Both he and Tom exploded with mirth; and Tod, who said nothing, but listened with his hands in his pockets, dancing first on one leg, then on the other, nearly laughed himself into fits.
"Well, baronet," exclaimed Folliard pretty loudly, "here's an exchange! from the altar to the halter; from the matrimonial noose to honest Jack Ketch's and a devilish good escape it would be to many unfortunate wretches in this same world." "Oh, Mr. Folliard," said the baronet, "is not this miserable? What will become of me?"
He fully expected the boys would be gathered somewhere round it, not a hundred miles from old Ketch's lodge. But he could not come upon them anywhere. The lodge was closed, was dark and silent, showing every probability that its master had retired for the night to sleep away his discomfiture. The cloisters were closed, and the Boundaries lay calm in the moonlight, undisturbed by a single footstep.
Tom had no resource left; and, very unwillingly, Ketch's details were drawn from him, bit by bit. The sham invitation, the disappointment touching the tripe and onions, the missing the cloister keys when he reached home, and the finding them outside the west door. "Did he enter the cloisters and examine them?" said the master, speaking hastily.
"He's he's dead!" she exclaimed, between her racking inspirations. She pointed to the floor of the cockpit, and there, sliding grotesquely with the motion of the seaway, was Poul Halvard. An arm was flung out, as if in ward against the ketch's side, but it crumpled, the body hit heavily, a hand seemed to clutch at the boards it had so often and thoroughly swabbed; but without avail.
Besides, it might be raither awkward, sir, to do Jack Ketch's dooty without the benefit of judge, jury, witnesses, or clergy." Edwin released his hold at once, and Thomson raised himself in the seat, clenching his teeth and fists as he did so. He was one of those savage creatures who, when roused, appear to go mad, and become utterly regardless of consequences.
Such a thing as a run on the delicacy had occurred more than once, to Ketch's certain knowledge, and tardy customers had been sent away disappointed, to wait in longing anticipations for the next tripe night. He went into a cold perspiration at the bare idea. And where was old Jenkins, all this time, that he had not come in? And where was Joe?
Ketch's legs were on the point of taking a dance of ecstasy. A minute or two, and the group formed the centre of the upper part of the room. Yorke supported the great boy whose back was bared, while the daunted faces and eager eyes were strained eagerly from around.
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