"'Oo brought yer 'ere, I'd like to know? And where'd yer be at this
moment if 'twasn't for me an' 'Dolph? In Glasson's black 'ole, that's
where yer'd be! An' now sittin' 'ere so 'igh-an'-mighty, an'
lecturin'!"
The boy's eyes had filled with tears.
"But I'm not--I'm not!" he protested. "Tilda!--"
"As if," she jerked out between two hard, dry sobs (Tilda, by the way,
never wept)--"as if I wasn' _sure_, after chasin' Bill all this way on
purpose, and 'im the best of men!"
Just at this moment there emerged from the after-companion of the
_Severn Belle_, immediately below them, a large head shaped like an
enormous pear--shaped, that is, as if designed to persuade an upward
passage through difficult hatchways, so narrow was the cranium and so
extremely full the jowl. It was followed by a short bull neck and a
heavy pair of shoulders in a shirt of dirty grey flannel; and having
emerged so far, the apparition paused for a look around. It was the
steersman of yesterday afternoon.
"'Ullo, below there!" Tilda hailed him.
"'Ullo yerself!" The man looked up and blinked. "W'y, if you ain't the
gel and boy?"
"Where's Bill?" she asked, cutting him short.
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