“Yes, I suppose he would. How long is it since you left England?” “Very sorry, sir, but I don’t remember the date. The captain or the owner would know.” “Why, of course. Have you been stopping at many places since you quit the old sod?” “Running in here and there, sir.” “Lisbon, or Teneriffe, perhaps?” “Well, sir, I never had no head for them foreign places. They all look alike to me, sir. Plymouth, or Southampton, or Liverpool, sir, there’s some difference between them.” “So there is, so there is,” murmured Frowningshield, as the man respectfully withdrew. “You see,” said the captain, “even the stewards are on their guard.” “Oh, that’s the noncommittal nature of the English servant. I imagine Stranleigh is by way of being a swell. There’s something of that ‘You-be-damned’ air about him, in spite of his politeness, and the servants of such people know when they’re in a good place, and keep their mouths shut. Still, I can’t imagine a la-de-da chap like this, with a fashionable yacht, and a gang of gamekeepers, sent out to interfere with us. What can he do?” “The steel prow of that motor boat didn’t look fashionable,” growled the captain. “She could sink the _Rajah_, loaded down as she is, in about ten seconds, although she’d crumple herself up if she tried it, and as to what he can do, look at what he has already done. The tumbling of all that timber in the river may have been an accident, as he says, but I don’t believe it. It fitted the case of the mines too cursedly pat to suit me. He couldn’t have hit it off better, and at less cost to himself, if he had studied for a year.” “Yes, it does take a bit of explaining, doesn’t it? Still, there’s nothing to be done with his crew of landlubbers. He daren’t attack us; there are too many of us.” “I think you’ll change your opinion before the week is out, Mr. Frowningshield. See what he’s already done. He’s cleared the river, and the waterway from the ocean to the mine is open. I tell you what it is, Mr. Frowningshield; there’s been a miscalculation, and that man Schwartzbrod isn’t as clever as you thought he was.” “Why do you say that?” “Because, according to your story, it should have taken them a week or two to fit out another steamer, and by that time you expected to get the river protected, and erect a few forts. Now what has happened? Instead of that they have chartered the quickest yacht they could find in England, and they have cut in here ahead of us. This fellow’s smooth talk about founding a colony is all balderdash. They’ve been spying upon us ever since we came here. The other fellows in England have taken their time in fitting up a steamer, or perhaps two steamers, or perhaps three. This chap has cleared the channel for them, and any fine morning you may see three or four ships in the offing, carrying perhaps three or four hundred men. _Then_ what are you going to do?”