"The yacht?"
Jamie looked up at me.
"Ah, my leddy, ye'll pe makin' a fule o' Jamie wi' a glance like a
sun-sparkle on the sea! Jamie's no fule wi' the right sort, an' the
yacht is a shentleman, an' the shentleman's the yacht, for it's the
shentleman that pays whateffer."
Captain Derrick became keenly interested.
"The gentleman? The owner of the yacht, you mean?"
Jamie nodded--"Just that!"--and proceeded to count out his store of
new-laid eggs with great care as he placed them in the steward's basket.
"What's his name?"
"Ah, that's ower mickle learnin',"--said Jamie, with a cunning look--"I
canna say it rightly."
"Can you say it wrongly?" I suggested.
"I wadna!" he replied, and he lifted his eyes, which were dark and
piercing, to my face--"I daurna!"
"Is he such a very terrible gentleman, then?" enquired Captain Derrick,
jocosely.
Jamie's countenance was impenetrable.
"Ye'll pe seein' her for yourself whateffer,"--he said--"Ye'll no miss
her in the waters 'twixt here an' Skye."
He stooped and fumbled in his basket, presently bringing out of it a
small bunch of pink bell-heather,--the delicate waxen type of blossom
which is found only in mossy, marshy places.
"The shentleman wanted as much as I could find o' this,"--he said--"An'
he had it a' but this wee bittie. Will my leddy wear it for luck?"