Marian gently hinted at unseaworthiness; but at this the good captain laughed quite unceremoniously. ‘Go down!’ he cried—‘go down, indeed! I’d like to see the hurricane that’d send the _Severn_ spinning to the bottom. No, no; we may get hurricanes, of course—though this isn’t the month for them. The rhyme says: “June—too soon; July—stand by; Au-gust—you must; September—remember; October—all over.” Still, in the course of nature we’re likely enough to have some ugly weather—a capful of wind or so, I mean—nothing to speak of, for a ship of her tonnage. But I’ll bet you a bottle of champagne the hurricane’s not alive that’ll ever send the _Severn_ to the bottom, and I’ll pay it you (if I lose) at the first port the lifeboat puts into after the accident.—Dynamite! clockwork! that’s all gammon, my dear ma’am, that is! The ship’s as good a ship as ever sailed the Bay o’ Biscay, and there’s nothing aboard her more explosive than the bottle of champagne I hope you’ll drink this evening for dinner.’ ‘Then we can’t be put out?’ Nora asked, with her most beseeching smile. ‘My dear lady, not if I knew you were the Queen of England. Once we’re off, we’re off in earnest, and nothing on earth can ever stop us till we get safely across to St Thomas—the hand of God, the perils of the sea, and the Queen’s enemies alone excepted,’ the captain added, quoting with a smile the stereotyped formula of the bills of lading. ‘What do you think the telegram means, then?’ Nora asked again, a little relieved by this confident assurance. The captain once more hummed and hawed, and bit his nails, and looked very awkward. ‘Well,’ he said slowly, after a minute’s internal debate, ‘perhaps—perhaps the niggers over yonder may be getting troublesome, you know; and your family may think it an inopportune time for you or Mr and Mrs Hawthorn to visit the colony.—All right, Jones, I’m coming in a minute.—You must excuse me, ladies. In sight of land, a cap’n ought always to be at his post on the bridge. See you at dinner.—Good-morning, good-morning.’ ‘It seems to me, Edward,’ Marian said, as he retreated opportunely, ‘the captain knows a good deal more about it than he wants to tell us. He was trying to hide something from us; I’m quite sure he was.—Aren’t you, Nora? I do hope there’s nothing wrong with the steamer or the machinery!’ ‘I didn’t notice anything peculiar about him myself,’ Edward answered, with a little hesitation. ‘However, it’s certainly very singular. But as we’ve got to go on, we may as well go on as confidently as possible, and think as little as we can about it. The mystery will all be cleared up as soon as we get across to Trinidad.’ ‘If we ever get there!’ Nora said, half-jesting, and half in earnest.