“Of course it may,” said Pleasant; “and then they ship again and get more. And the best thing for ’em, too, to ship again as soon as ever they can be brought to it. They’re never so well off as when they’re afloat.”
“I’ll tell you why I ask,” pursued the visitor, looking up from the fire. “I was once beset that way myself, and left for dead.”
“No?” said Pleasant. “Where did it happen?”
“It happened,” returned the man, with a ruminative air, as he drew his right hand across his chin, and dipped the other in the pocket of his rough outer coat, “it happened somewhere about here as I reckon. I don’t think it can have been a mile from here.”
“Were you drunk?” asked Pleasant.
“I was muddled, but not with fair drinking. I had not been drinking, you understand. A mouthful did it.”
Pleasant with a grave look shook her head; importing that she understood the process, but decidedly disapproved.
“Fair trade is one thing,” said she, “but that’s another. No one has a right to carry on with Jack in that way.”
“The sentiment does you credit,” returned the man, with a grim smile; and added, in a mutter, “the more so, as I believe it’s not your father’s.—Yes, I had a bad time of it, that time. I lost everything, and had a sharp struggle for my life, weak as I was.”
“Did you get the parties punished?” asked Pleasant.
“A tremendous punishment followed,” said the man, more seriously; “but it was not of my bringing about.”
“Of whose, then?” asked Pleasant.