Sunk at Sea | Page 4

a dirty narrow street, near the harbour of the town, there stood a small public-house which was frequented chiefly by the sailors who chanced to be in the port, and by the squalid population in its immediate neighbourhood. Although small, the Red Lion Inn was superior in many respects to its surroundings. It was larger than the decayed buildings that propped it; cleaner than the locality that owned it; brighter and warmer than the homes of the lean crew on whom it fattened. It was a pretty, light, cheery, snug place of temptation, where men and women, and even children assembled at nights to waste their hard-earned cash and ruin their health. It was a place where the devil reigned, and where the work of murdering souls was carried on continually,-- nevertheless it was a "jolly" place. Many good songs were sung there, as well as bad ones; and many a rough grasp of hearty friendship was exchanged. Few people, going into the house for a few minutes, could have brought themselves to believe that it was such a very broad part of the road leading to destruction: but the landlord had some hazy notion on that point. He sat there day and night, and saw the destruction going on. He saw the blear-eyed, fuddled men that came to drown conscience in his stalls, and the slatternly women who came and went. Nevertheless he was a rosy, jocund fellow who appeared to have a good deal of the milk of human kindness about him, and would have looked on you with great surprise, if not scorn, had you told him that he had a hand in murdering souls. Yes! the Red Lion might have been appropriately styled the Roaring Lion, for it drove a roaring trade among the poor in that dirty little street near the harbour.
The gas was flaring with attractive brilliancy in the Red Lion when Will Osten entered it, and asked if Captain Dall was within.
"No, sir," answered the landlord; "he won't be here for half-an-hour yet."
"A pot of beer," said Will, entering one of the stalls, and sitting down opposite a tall, dark-countenanced man, who sat smoking moodily in a corner.
It was evident that our hero had not gone there to drink, for the beer remained untouched at his elbow, as he sat with his face buried in his hands.
The dark man in the corner eyed him steadily through the smoke which issued from his lips, but Will paid no attention to him. He was too deeply absorbed in his own reflections.
"A fine night, stranger," he said at length, in a slightly nasal tone.
Still Will remained absorbed, and it was not until the remark had been twice repeated that he looked up with a start.
"I beg pardon; did you speak?" he said. "Well, yes," drawled the dark man, puffing a long white cloud from his lips, "I did make an observation regardin' the weather. It looks fine, don't it?"
"It does," said Will.
"You're waitin' for Captain Dall, ain't you?"
"Why, how did you come to know that?" said Will.
"I didn't come to know it, I guessed it," said the dark man.
At that moment the door opened, and a short thick-set man, in a glazed hat and pea-jacket, with huge whiskers meeting under his chin, entered.
His eye at once fell upon the dark man, whom he saluted familiarly--"All ready, Mr Cupples?"
"All ready, sir," replied the other; "it's now more than half-flood; in three hours we can drop down the river with the first of the ebb, and if this breeze holds we'll be in blue water before noon to-morrow."
"Hallo, doctor, is that yourself?" said the captain, whose eye had for some moments rested on Will.
"It is," said the youth, extending his hand, which the other grasped and shook warmly.
"What! changed your mind--eh?"
"Yes, I'm going with you."
"The governor bein' agreeable?" inquired the captain.
Will shook his head.
"Hope there ain't bin a flare-up?" said the captain earnestly.
"Not exactly," said Will; "but he is displeased, and will not give his consent, so I have come away without it."
At this the jovial skipper, who was styled captain by courtesy, sat down and shook his head gravely, while he removed his hat and wiped the perspiration from his bald forehead.
"It's a bad business to run agin the wishes of one's parents," he said; "it seldom turns out well; couldn't you come round him nohow?"
"Impossible. He won't listen to reason."
"Ah, then, it's of no manner of use," said the captain, with a pitying sigh, "when a man won't listen to reason, what's the consequence? why he's unreasonable, which means bein' destitoot of that which raises him above the brutes that perish. Such bein' the case, give it up for a bad job, that's my advice. Come, I'll have a bottle o' ginger-beer, not bein' given to