st nine we must push off at once."

"But what about you?" exclaimed Tommy. "You can't come! He's seen you,
you know, at the hut."

"What does it matter?" I objected. "If he didn't recognize me as the
chap who sent him the note at Parelli's, we can easily fake up some
explanation. Tell him I'm a new member of the Athenians, and that you
happened to run across me and brought me down to help work the boat.
There's no reason one shouldn't be a yachtsman and a photographer
too."

I spoke lightly, but as a matter of fact I was some way from
trusting Tommy's judgment implicitly with regard to Latimer's
straightforwardness about the restaurant incident, and also about
his visit to the hut. All the same, I was quite determined to go to
Sheppey. Things had come to a point now when there was nothing to be
gained by over-caution. Either Latimer had recognized me or else he
hadn't. In the first event, he knew already that Tommy had been trying
to deceive him, and that the mythical artist person was none other
than myself. If that were so, I felt it was best to take the bull by
the horns, and try to find out exactly what part he suspected me of
playing. I had at least saved his life, and although we live in an
ungrateful world, he seemed bound to be more or less prejudiced in my
favour.

Apart from these considerations, Tommy would certainly want some help
in working the _Betty_. He knew his job well enough, but with a haze
on the river and the twilight drawing in rapidly, the mouth of the
Thames is no place for single-handed sailing--especially when you're
in a hurry.

Tommy evidently recognized this, for he raised no further objections.

"Very well," he said, with a rather reckless laugh. "We're gambling a
bit, but that's the fault of the cards. Up with the anchor, Neil, and
let's get a move on her."

I hauled in the chain, and then jumped up to attend to the sails,
which I had just let down loosely on deck, in my hurry to put off in
the dinghy. After a couple of unsuccessful efforts and two or three
very successful oaths, Tommy persuaded the engine to start, and we
throbbed off slowly down the creek--now quite a respectable estuary of
tidal water.

I sat back in the well with a laugh. "I never expected a second trip
tonight," I said. "I'm beginning to feel rather like the captain of a
penny steamer."

Tommy, who was combining the important duties of steering and lighting
a pipe, looked up from his labours.

"The Lyn