"Go on," said the other, grimly.
"Nice, bright young fellows," concluded the captain, hastily; "he got on very well, I believe."
"After he left you, I suppose?" said Mr. Vyner, smoothly.
"Yes," said the innocent captain. He caught a glance of the other's face and ruminated. "After I had broken him of his silly habits," he added.
He walked along smiling, and, raising his cap with a flourish, beamed in a fatherly manner on a girl who was just passing. Robert replaced his hat and glanced over his left shoulder.
"Who is that?" he inquired. "I saw her the other day; her face seems familiar to me."
"Joan Hartley," replied the captain. "Nathaniel Hartley's daughter. To my mind, the best and prettiest girl in Salthaven."
"Eh?" said the other, staring. "Hartley's daughter? Why, I should have thought—"
The best and prettiest girl in Salthaven
"Yes, sir?" said Captain Trimblett, after a pause.
"Nothing," concluded Robert, lamely. "She doesn't look like it; that's all."
"She's got his nose," maintained the captain, with the obstinate air of a man prepared to go to the stake for his opinions. "Like as two peas their noses are; you'd know them for father and daughter anywhere by that alone."
Mr. Vyner assented absently. He was wondering where the daughter of the chief clerk got her high looks from.
"Very clever girl," continued the captain. "She got a scholarship and went to college, and then, when her poor mother died, Hartley was so lonely that she gave it all up and came home to keep house for him."
"Quite a blue-stocking," suggested Robert.
"There's nothing of the blue-stocking about her," said the captain, warmly. "In fact, I shouldn't be surprised if she became engaged soon."
Mr. Vyner became interested. "Oh!" he said, with an instinctive glance over his left shoulder.
Captain Trimblett nodded sagely. "Young fellow of the name of Saunders," he said slowly.
"Oh!" said the other again.
"You might have seen him at Wilson's, the ship-broker's," pursued the captain. "Bert Saunders his name is. Rather a dressy youngster, perhaps. Generally wears a pink shirt and a very high stand-up collar—one o' those collars that you have to get used to."
Mr. Vyner nodded.
"He's not good enough for her," said the captain, shaking his head. "But then, nobody is. Looked at that way it's all right."
"You seem to take a great interest in it," said Robert.
"He came to me with his troubles," said Captain Trimblett, bunching up his gray beard in his hand reflectively. "Leastways, he made a remark or two which I took up. Acting under my advice he is taking up gardening."
Mr. Vyner glanced at him in mystification.
"Hartley is a great gardener," explained the other with a satisfied smile. "What is the result? He can go there when he likes, so to speak. No awkwardness or anything of that sort. He can turn up there bold as brass to borrow a trowel, and take three or four hours doing it."
"You're a danger to society," said Robert, shaking his head.
"People ought to marry while they're young," said the captain. "If they don't, like as not they're crazy to marry in their old age. There's my landlord here at Tranquil Vale, fifty-two next birthday, and over his ears in love. He has got it about as bad as a man can have it."
"And the lady?" inquired Robert.
"She's all right," said the captain. He lowered his voice confidentially. "It's Peter's sister, that's the trouble. He's afraid to let her know. All we can do is to drop a little hint here and a little hint there, so as to prepare her for the news when it's broken to her."
"Is she married?" inquired Robert, pausing as they reached the office.
"No," said Captain Trimblett; "widow."
Mr. Vyner gave a low whistle. "When do you sail, cap'n?" he inquired, in a voice oily with solicitude.
"Soon as my engine-room repairs are finished, I suppose," said the other, staring.
"And you—you are giving her hints about courtship and marriage?" inquired Mr. Vyner, in tones of carefully-modulated surprise.
"She's a sensible woman," said the captain, reddening, "and she's no more likely to marry again than I am."
"Just what I was thinking," said Mr. Vyner.
He shook his head, and, apparently deep in thought, turned and walked slowly up the stairs. He was pleased to notice as he reached the first landing that the captain was still standing where he had left him, staring up the stairs.
CHAPTER III
IN a somewhat ruffled state of mind Captain Trimblett pursued his way toward Tranquil Vale, a row of neat cottages situated about a mile and a half from the town, and inhabited principally by retired mariners. The gardens, which ran down to the river, boasted a particularly fine strain of flag-staffs; battered figure-heads in swan-like attitudes lent a pleasing touch of colour, and old boats sawn in halves made convenient arbours in which to sit and watch the passing pageant of the sea.
At No. 5 the captain paused to pass a perfectly dry boot over a scraper of huge dimensions which guarded the entrance, and, opening the door, finished off on the mat. Mrs. Susanna Chinnery, who was setting tea, looked up at his entrance, and then looked at the clock.
"Kettle's just on the boil," she remarked.
"Your kettle always is," said the captain, taking a chair—"when it's time for it to be, I mean," he added, hastily, as Mrs. Chinnery showed signs of correcting him.
"It's as easy to be punctual as otherwise," said Mrs. Chinnery; "easier, if people did but know it."
"So it is," murmured the captain, and sat gazing, with a sudden wooden expression, at a picture opposite of the eruption of Vesuvius.
"Peter's late again," said Mrs. Chinnery, in tones of hopeless resignation.
"Business, perhaps," suggested Captain Trimblett, still intent on Vesuvius.
"For years and years you could have set the clock by him," continued Mrs. Chinnery, bustling out to the kitchen and bustling back again with the kettle; "now I never know when to expect him. He was late yesterday."
Captain Trimblett cleared his throat. "He saw a man nearly run over," he reminded her.
"Yes; but how long would that take him?" retorted Mrs. Chinnery. "If the man had been run over I could have understood it."
The captain murmured something about shock.
"On Friday he was thirty-three minutes late," continued the other.
"Friday," said the faithful captain. "Friday he stopped to listen to a man playing the bagpipes—a Scotchman."
"That was Thursday," said Mrs. Chinnery.
The captain affected to ponder. "So it was," he said, heartily. "What a memory you have got! Of course, Friday he walked back to the office for his pipe."
"Well, we won't wait for him," said Mrs. Chinnery, taking the head of the table and making the tea. "If he can't come in to time he must put up with his tea being cold. That's the way we were brought up."
"A very good way, too," said the captain. He put a radish into his mouth and, munching slowly, fell to gazing at Vesuvius again. It was not until he had passed his cup up for the second time that a short, red-faced man came quickly into the room and, taking a chair from its place against the wall, brought it to the table and took a seat opposite the captain.
"Late again, Peter," said his sister.
"Been listening to a man playing the cornet," said Mr. Truefitt, briefly.
Captain Trimblett, taking the largest radish he could find, pushed it into his mouth and sat gazing at