"She looks like it, master," cried Tom. "Why her face be terrifying. Where be her bright sperrits, and her sparkling eyes? Don't you make a mistake about it, master. We don't take on about losing her, none of us, and we'd half bust every old gun on the place and raise such a girt bonfire as would set the country alight, if she was going to wed the man of her choice. But this gay fly-golding ladybird chap fro' London! Ah, master, you be doing wrong, and that be what we all say." "You, Tom Croftly," roared the founder, angrily, as he writhed beneath the lash of his man's words, "how dare you speak to me like that?" "Cause it be right," said Croftly, stoutly. "Haven't she and the captain been like two lovers ever since they was little children, and sent my heart in my mouth to see 'em playing so nigh the edge of the race?" "I will not listen to such insolence," cried the founder. "You, Tom Croftly, come for your wage on Saturday night, and give up the cottage the week after." "And maybe you'll put William Goodley in my place, eh?" said the foreman. "Maybe I shall," cried the founder. "You ungrateful rascal!" "Nay," said the foreman, "you need not trouble yourself, mas' Bill Goodley would not step into my shoes, nor another man in the place. And, just to show as I beant ungrateful as you say, I'll stop on." "Stop on!" roared the founder. "Ay, stop on. Haven't you just took another good order? Haven't you got all that 'ood ready for the colliers; and haven't you just got in a shipload of sulphur and Chinese salt? Lookye here, mas', you don't know, I s'pose, that if I left here every man and boy would go as well. No, master, we beant ungrateful, none of us; but we don't like to see our young mistress sold, and him as should have had her thrown over." "And pray who is that?" cried the founder. "Captain Culverin, mas'; that be the man she meant to have." "A wild adventurer--a man who murdered that wretch Churr." "Nay, master, there beant a man of us here who thinks that he did," said the workman, sturdily; "and if Captain Gil was here you wouldn't say it to he." "I am here, Tom Croftly," said Gil, stepping into the big powder-shed, "and I thank you and your fellows for your good opinion. But take no notice of this. Master Cobbe here does not believe what he said." "But I do," cried the founder, furiously. "Tom Croftly," said Gil, quietly, but with a flush in his cheek, "go, and leave me with Master Cobbe here. I want to talk with him." "All right, captain!" said the workman. "Bah!" he added to himself, "if he be'd the lad I thought him, he'd make no more ado but upset the whole of this London trade, and carry young mistress off. I would." "Now, Gil Carr," cried the founder, as soon as they were alone. "We've done our business. You've delivered all your cargo that I want, and you've been paid your money. Wouldn't it have been more decent if you had kept away?"