"My place is on this quarter-deck, sir. If you've got anything to say to
me, say it!" He began to pace again.
Bradish caught step, after a scuff or two.
"I hope you're going to take this thing right, Captain Downs. It may
sound queer to you at first," he stammered.
"Well, well, well, tell it to me--tell it! Then I will let you know
whether it sounds queer or not."
"I brought another passenger on board with me. She is locked in a
stateroom."
Old Mull stopped his patrol with a jerk. "She?" he demanded. "You mean
to tell me you've got a woman aboard here?"
"We're engaged--we want to get married. So she came along--"
"Then why in tophet didn't ye go get married? You don't think this is a
parsonage, do you?"
"There were reasons why we couldn't get married ashore. You have to have
licenses, and questions are asked, and we were afraid it would be found
out before we could arrange it."
"So this is an elopement, hey?"
"Well, the young lady's father has foolish ideas about a husband for his
daughter, and she doesn't agree with him."
"Who is her father?"
"I don't intend to tell you, sir. That hasn't anything to do with the
matter."
Captain Downs looked his passenger up and down with great disfavor. "And
what's your general idea in loading yourselves onto me in this fashion?"
"You have the right, as captain of a ship outside the three-mile limit,
to marry folks in an emergency."
"I ain't sure that I've got any such right, and I ain't at all certain
about the emergency, Mr. Bradish. I ain't going to stick my head into a
scrape."
"But there can't be any scrape for you. You simply exercise your right
and marry us and enter it in your log and give us a paper. It will be
enough of a marriage so that we can't be separated."
"Want to hold a hand you can bluff her father with, hey? I don't approve
of any such tactics in matrimony."
"I wouldn't be doing this if there were any other safe way for us,"
protested Bradish, earnestly. "I'm no cheap fellow. I hold down a good
job, sir. But the trouble is I work for her father--and you know how it
always is in a case like that. He can't see me!"
"Rich, eh?"