“What do you wish, for to-night?” she asked coldly.

“A good many things, my supper most of all, for I’ve had nothing but a mouthful of biscuit all day.  But I shall have to wait for that till I get back to Seal Cove, and then I shall have to cook it myself, for that swell lodger of mine ain’t no good about a house,” said Oily Dave, with a shake of his head.

Katherine put her hand to her throat with a quick movement, to check a hysterical desire for laughter.  She and Mrs. Burton had both marvelled that day at the exceeding handiness displayed by Jervis Ferrars.  He had made the bed for the stricken head of the house as deftly as a woman might have done, and had helped in the kitchen at supper time as if he had been getting meals regularly for the last two or three years; but of this she was not disposed to speak, and waited in silence for Oily Dave to state his requirements.

“I want some canned tomatoes.  Have you got any?”

“We have plenty of two-pound tins, but we are sold out of the smaller ones,” she answered, then made a mental note that in future she would buy all small tins, because they sold so much more easily.

“That’s a nuisance, but I suppose I’ll have to put up with it,” he said, with a sigh and another shake of his head.  “Fact is, I want to take home a relish for supper.  My lodger don’t take to simple food such as we are used to in these parts.  It is a downright swell tuck-in he looks to get, same as you might expect to have in one of the Montreal hotels.”

Again Katherine wanted to laugh, but checked the impulse resolutely, and asked:  “Is the flood at Seal Cove as bad as ever, or has the barrier given way at the mouth of the river?”

“I didn’t know there was a flood!” announced Oily Dave, with an air of innocence which sat awkwardly upon him, it was so palpably put on for the occasion.  “Fact is, I’ve been off all day on the cliffs along the bay shore, looking for signs of walrus and seal on the ice floes.  Then when it got near sunset I just struck inland, so as to call here on my way home.  Who told you there was a flood?”

“I saw it,” she answered quietly.

“I hope my lodger is all right,” said the old hypocrite, with an air of concern.  “That house of mine ain’t well situated for floods, as most folks know.  If I’d got the time and the money I’d move it up beside Stee Jenkin’s hut, which is really in a bootiful situation.”

“I wonder you have not done it before,” said Katherine, as she went up the steps and fetched the tin of tomatoes from the top shelf.

“Ah, there are a good many things that get left undone for want of time and money!” remarked Oily Dave.  “But I’m afraid Mr. Selincourt has made a big mistake in sending that languid swell of a Mr. Ferrars here to boss the fishing.  A reg’lar drawing-room party he is and no mistake.  Gives himself as many airs as a turkey-cock in springtime, and seems to think all the rest of the world was created on purpose to black his boots.”