“I’m very sorry,” began the mate, in a whisper.
“What?” enquired the skipper, fiercely.
“I’ve mislaid the key,” said the mate, grinning fiendishly, “an’, what’s more, I can’t think what I’ve done with it.”
At this intelligence, the remnants of the skipper’s temper vanished, and every bad word he had heard of, or read of, or dreamt of, floated from his hungry lips in frenzied whispers.
“I can’t hear what you say,” said the mate. “What?”
The prisoner was about to repeat his remarks with a few embellishments, when the mate stopped him with one little word. “Hist!” he said, quietly.
At the imminent risk of bursting, or going mad, the skipper stopped short, and the mate, addressing a remark to the cook, who was not present, went up on deck.
He found the key by tea-time, and, his triumph having made him generous, passed the skipper in a large hunk of the cold beef with his tea. The skipper took it and eyed him wanly, having found an empty stomach very conducive to accurate thinking.
“The next thing is to slip ashore at Wapping, Jack,” he said, after he had finished his meal; “the whar’ll be closed by the time we get there.”
“The watchman’s nearly sure to be asleep,” said Fraser, “and you can easily climb the gate. If he’s not, I must try and get him out of the way somehow.”
The skipper’s forebodings proved to be correct. It was past twelve by the time they reached Wapping, but the watchman was wide awake and, with much bustle, helped them to berth their craft. He received the news of the skipper’s untimely end with well-bred sorrow, and at once excited the wrath of the sensitive Joe by saying that he was not surprised.
“I ‘ad a warning,” he said solemnly, in reply to the indignant seaman. “Larst night exactly as Big Ben struck ten o’clock the gate-bell was pulled three times.”
“I’ve pulled it fifty times myself before now,” said Joe, scathingly, “and then had to climb over the gate and wake you up.”
“I went to the gate at once,” continued George, addressing himself to the cook; “sometimes when I’m shifting a barge, or doing any little job o’ that sort, I do ‘ave to keep a man waiting, and, if he’s drunk, two minutes seems like ages to ‘im.”
“You ought to know wot it seems like,” muttered Joe.
“When I got to the gate an’ opened it there was nobody there,” continued the watchman, impressively, “and while I was standing there I saw the bell-pull go up an’ down without ‘ands and the bell rung agin three times.”
The cook shivered. “Wasn’t you frightened, George?” he asked, sympathetically.
“I knew it was a warning,” continued the vivacious George. “W’y’e should come to me I don’t know. One thing is I think ‘e always ‘ad a bit of a fancy for me.”
“He ‘ad,” said Joe; “everybody wot sees you loves you, George. They can’t help theirselves.”
“And I ‘ave ‘ad them two ladies down agin asking for Mr. Robinson, and also for poor Cap’n Flower,” said the watchman; “they asked me some questions about ‘im, and I told ‘em the lies wot you told me to tell ‘em, Joe; p’r’aps that’s w’y I ‘ad the warning.”
Joe turned away with a growl and went below, and Tim and the cook after greedily waiting for some time to give the watchman’s imagination a further chance, followed his example. George left to himself took his old seat on the post at the end of the jetty, being, if the truth must be told, some-what alarmed by his own fertile inventions.
Three times did the mate, in response to the frenzied commands of the skipper, come stealthily up the companion-way and look at him. Time was passing and action of some kind was imperative.
“George,” he whispered, suddenly.
“Sir,” said the watchman.
“I want to speak to you,” said Fraser, mysteriously; “come down here.”
George rose carefully from his seat, and lowering himself gingerly on board, crept on tiptoe to the galley after the mate.
“Wait in here till I come back,” said the latter, in a thrilling whisper; “I’ve got something to show you. Don’t move, whatever happens.”
His tones were so fearful, and he put so much emphasis on the last sentence, that the watchman burst hurriedly out of the galley.
“I don’t like these mysteries,” he said, plainly.
“There’s no mystery,” said the mate, pushing him back again; “something I don’t want the crew to see, that’s all. You’re the only man I can trust.”
He closed the door and coughed, and a figure which had been lurking on the companion-ladder, slipped hastily on deck and clambered noiselessly onto the jetty. The mate clambered up beside it, and hurrying with it to the gate helped it over, and with much satisfaction heard it alight on the other side.
“Good-night, Jack,” said Flower. “Don’t forget to look after Poppy.”
“Good-night,” said the mate. “Write as soon as you’re fixed.”
He walked back leisurely to the schooner and stood in some perplexity, eyeing the galley which contained the devoted George. He stood for so long that his victim lost all patience, and, sliding back the door, peered out and discovered him.
“Have you got it?” he asked, softly.
“No,” replied Fraser; “there isn’t anything. I was only making a fool of you, George. Good-night.”
He walked aft, and stood at the companion watching the outraged George as he came slowly out of the galley and stared about him.
“Good-night, George,” he repeated.
The watchman made no reply to the greeting, but, breathing heavily, resumed his old seat on the post; and, folding his arms across his panting bosom, looked down with majestic scorn upon the schooner and all its contents. Long after the satisfied mate had forgotten the incident in sleep, he sat there striving to digest the insult of which he had been the victim, and to consider a painful and fitting retribution.
CHAPTER IX
The mate awoke next morning to a full sense of the unpleasant task before him, and, after irritably giving orders for the removal of the tarpaulin from the skylight, a substitution of the ingenious cook’s for the drawn blinds ashore, sat down to a solitary breakfast and the composition of a telegram to Captain Barber. The first, a beautiful piece of prose, of which the key-note was resignation, contained two shillings’ worth of sympathy and fourpence-halfpenny worth of religion. It was too expensive as it stood, and boiled down, he was surprised to find that it became unfeeling to the verge of flippancy. Ultimately he embodied it in a letter, which he preceded by a telegram, breaking the sad news in as gentle a form as could be managed for one-and-three.
The best part of the day was spent in relating the sad end of Captain Fred Flower to various enquirers. The deceased gentleman was a popular favourite, and clerks from the office and brother skippers came down in little knots to learn the full particulars, and to compare the accident with others in their experience. It reminded one skipper, who invariably took to drink when his feelings were touched, of the death of a little nephew from whooping-cough, and he was so moved over a picture he drew of the meeting of the two, that it took four men to get him off the schooner without violence.
The mate sat for some time after tea striving to summon up sufficient courage for his journey to Poplar, and wondering whether it wouldn’t perhaps be better to communicate the news by letter. He even went so far as to get the writing materials ready, and then, remembering his promise to the skipper, put them away again and prepared for his visit. The crew who were on deck eyed him stolidly as he departed, and Joe made a remark to the cook, which that worthy drowned in a loud and troublesome cough.
The Wheeler family were at home when he arrived, and received him with some surprise, Mrs. Wheeler, who was in her usual place on the sofa, shook hands with him in a genteel fashion, and calling his attention to a somewhat loudly attired young man of unpleasant appearance, who was making a late tea, introduced him as her son Bob.
“Is Miss Tyrell in?” enquired Fraser, shaking his head as Mr. Wheeler dusted a small Wheeler off a chair and offered it to him.
“She’s upstairs,” said Emma Wheeler; “shall I go and fetch her?”
“No, I’ll go up to her,” said the mate quietly. “I think I’d better see her alone. I’ve got rather bad news for her.”
“About the captain?” enquired Mrs. Wheeler, sharply.
“Yes,” said Fraser, turning somewhat red. “Very bad news.”
He fixed his eyes on the ground, and, in a spasmodic fashion, made perfect by practice, recited the disaster.
“Pore feller,” said Mrs. Wheeler, when he had finished. “Pore feller, and cut down suddenly like that. I s’pose he ‘adn’t made any preparation for it?”
“Not a bit,” said the mate, starting, “quite unprepared.”
“You didn’t jump over after him?” suggested Miss Wheeler, softly.
“I did not,” said the mate, firmly; whereupon Miss Wheeler, who was fond of penny romance, sighed and shook her head.
“There’s that pore gal upstairs,” said Mrs. Wheeler, sorrowfully, “all innocent and happy, probably expecting him to come to-night and take her out. Emma’d better go up and break it to ‘er.”
“I will,” said Fraser, shortly.
“Better to let a woman do it,” said Mrs. Wheeler. “When our little Jemmy smashed his finger we sent Emma down to break it to his father and bring ‘im ‘ome. It was ever so long before she let you know the truth, wasn’t it, father?”
“Made me think all sorts of things with her mysteries,” said the dutiful Mr. Wheeler, in triumphant corroboration. “First of all she made me think you was dead; then I thought you was all dead—give me such a turn they ‘ad to give me brandy to bring me round. When I found out it was only Jemmy’s finger, I was nearly off my ‘ed with joy.”
“I’ll go and tell her,” interrupted Mr. Bob Wheeler, delicately, using the inside edge of the table-cloth as a serviette. “I can do it better than Emma can. What she wants is comforting; Emma would go and snivel all over her.”
Mrs. Wheeler, raising her head from the sofa, regarded the speaker with looks of tender admiration, and the young man, after a lengthy glance in the small pier-glass ornamented with coloured paper, which stood on the mantel-piece, walked to the door.
“You needn’t trouble,” said Fraser, slowly; “I’m going to tell her.”
Mrs. Wheeler’s dull eyes snapped sharply. “She’s our lodger,” she said, aggressively.
“Yes, but I’m going to tell her,” rejoined the mate; “the skipper told me to.”
A startled silence was broken by Mr. Wheeler’s chair, which fell noisily.
“I mean,” stammered Fraser, meeting the perturbed gaze of the dock-foreman, “that he told me once if anything happened to him that I was to break the news to Miss Tyrell. It’s been such a shock to me I hardly know what I am saying.”
“Yes, you’ll go and frighten her,” said Bob Wheeler, endeavouring to push past him.
The mate blocked the doorway.
“Are you going to try to prevent me going out of a room in my own house?” blustered the young man.
“Of course not,” said Fraser, and, giving way, ascended the stairs before him. Mr. Wheeler, junior, after a moment’s hesitation, turned back and, muttering threats under his breath, returned to the parlour.
Miss Tyrell, who was sitting by the window reading, rose upon the mate’s entrance, and, observing that he was alone, evinced a little surprise as she shook hands with him. It was the one thing necessary to complete his discomfiture, and he stood before her in a state of guilty confusion.
“Cap’n Flower couldn’t come,” he stammered.
The girl said nothing, but with her dark eyes fixed upon his flushed face waited for him to continue.
“It’s his misfortune that he couldn’t come,” continued Fraser, jerkily.
“Business, I suppose?” said the girl, after another wait. “Won’t you sit down?”
“Bad business,” replied Fraser. He sat down, and fancied he saw the way clear before him.
“You’ve left him on the Foam, I suppose?” said Poppy, seeing that she was expected to speak.
“No; farther back than that,” was the response.
“Seabridge?” queried the girl, with an air of indifference.
Fraser regarded her with an expression of studied sadness. “Not so far back as that,” he said, softly.
Miss Tyrell manifested a slight restlessness. “Is it a sort of riddle?” she demanded.
“No, it’s a tale,” replied Fraser, not without a secret admiration of his unsuspected powers of breaking bad news; “a tale with a bad ending.”
The girl misunderstood him. “If you mean that Captain Flower doesn’t want to come here, and sent you to say so—” she began, with dignity.
“He can’t come,” interrupted the mate, hastily.
“Did he send you to tell me?” she asked
Fraser shook his head mournfully. “He can’t come,” he said, in a low voice; “he had a bad foot—night before last he was standing on the ship’s side—when he lost his hold—”
He broke off and eyed the girl nervously, “and fell overboard,” he concluded.
Poppy Tyrell gave a faint cry and, springing to her feet, stood with her hand on the back of her chair regarding him. “Poor fellow,” she said, softly—“poor fellow.”
She sat down again by the open window and nervously plucked at the leaves of a geranium. Her face was white and her dark eyes pitiful and tender. Fraser, watching her, cursed his resourceful skipper and hated himself.
“It’s a terrible thing for his friends,” said Poppy, at length. “And for you,” said Fraser, respectfully.
“I am very grieved,” said Poppy, quietly; “very shocked and very grieved.”
“I have got strong hopes that he may have got picked up,” said Fraser, cheerfully; “very strong hopes, I threw him a life-belt, and though we got the boat out and pulled about, we couldn’t find either of them. I shouldn’t be at all surprised if he has been picked up by some vessel outward bound. Stranger things have happened.”
The girl shook her head. “You didn’t go overboard after him?” she asked, quietly.
“I did not,” said the mate, who was somewhat tired of this tactless question; “I had to stand by the ship, and besides, he was a much better swimmer than I am—I did the best I could.”
Miss Tyrell bowed her head in answer. “Yes,” she said, softly.
“If there’s anything I can do,” said Fraser, awkwardly, “or be of use to you in any way, I hope you’ll let me know—Flower told me you were all alone, and—”
He broke off suddenly as he saw the girl’s lips quiver. “I was very fond of my father,” she said, in extenuation of this weakness.
“I suppose you’ve got some relatives?” said Fraser.
The girl shook her head.
“No cousins?” said Fraser, staring. He had twenty-three himself.
“I have some in New Zealand,” said Poppy, considering. “If I could, I think I should go out there.”
“And give up your business here?” enquired the mate, anxiously.
“It gave me up,” said Poppy, with a little tremulous laugh. “I had a week’s pay instead of notice the day before yesterday. If you know anybody who wants a clerk who spells ‘impatient’ with a ‘y’ and is off-hand when they are told of it, you might let me know.”
The mate stared at her blankly. This was a far more serious case than Captain Flower’s. “What are you going to do?” he asked.
“Try for another berth,” was the reply.
“But if you don’t get it?”
“I shall get it sooner or later,” said the girl.
“But suppose you don’t get one for a long time?” suggested Fraser.
“I must wait till I do,” said the girl, quietly.
“You see,” continued the mate, twisting his hands, “it might be a long job, and I—I was wondering—what you would do in the meantime. I was wondering whether you could hold out.”
“Hold out?” repeated Miss Tyrell, very coldly.
“Whether you’ve got enough money,” blurted the mate.
Miss Tyrell turned upon him a face in which there was now no lack of colour. “That is my business,” she said, stiffly.
“Mine, too,” said Fraser, gazing steadily at the pretty picture of indignation before him. “I was Flower’s friend as well as his mate, and you are only a girl.” The indignation became impatience. “Little more than a child,” he murmured, scrutinising her.
“I am quite big enough to mind my own business,” said Poppy, reverting to chilly politeness.
“I wish you would promise me you won’t leave here or do anything until I have seen you again,’’ said Fraser, who was anxious to consult his captain on this new phase of affairs.
“Certainly not,” said Miss Tyrell, rising and standing by her chair, “and thank you for calling.”
Fraser rubbed his chin helplessly.
“Thank you for calling,” repeated the girl, still standing.
“That is telling me to go, I suppose?” said, Fraser, looking at her frankly. “I wish I knew how to talk to you. When I think of you being here all alone, without friends and without employment, it seems wrong for me to go and leave you here.”
Miss Tyrell gave a faint gasp and glanced anxiously at the door. Fraser hesitated a moment, and then rose to his feet.
“If I hear anything more, may I come and tell you?” he asked.
“Yes,” said Poppy, “or write; perhaps it would be better to write; I might not be at home. Goodbye.”
The mate shook hands, and, blundering down the stairs, shouted good-night to a segment of the Wheeler family visible through the half-open door, and passed out into the street. He walked for some time rapidly, gradually slowing down as he collected his thoughts.
“Flower’s a fool,” he said, bitterly; “and, as for me, I don’t know what I am. It’s so long since I told the truth I forget what it’s like, and I’d sooner tell lies in a church than tell them to her.”
CHAPTER X
He looked expectantly on the cabin table for a letter upon his return to the ship, but was disappointed, and the only letter yielded by the post next morning came from Captain Barber. It was couched in terms of great resignation, and after bemoaning the unfortunate skipper’s untimely demise in language of great strength, wound up with a little Scripture and asked the mate to act as master and sail the schooner home.
“You’ll act as mate, Ben, to take her back,” said the new skipper, thrusting the letter in his pocket.
“Aye, aye, sir,” said Ben, with a side glance at Joe, “but I’ll keep for’ard, if you don’t mind.”
“As you please,” said Fraser, staring.
“And you’re master, I s’pose?” said Joe, turning to Fraser.
Fraser, whose manner had already effected the little change rendered necessary by his promotion from mate to master, nodded curtly, and the crew, after another exchange of looks, resumed their work without a word. Their behaviour all day was docile, not to say lamb-like, and it was not until evening that the new skipper found it necessary to enforce his authority.
The exciting cause of the unpleasantness was Mr. William Green, a slim, furtive-eyed young man, whom Fraser took on in the afternoon to fill the vacancy caused by Ben’s promotion. He had not been on board half an hour before trouble arose from his attempt to introduce the manners of the drawing-room into the forecastle.
“Mr. Will-yum Green,” repeated Joe, when the new arrival had introduced himself; “well, you’ll be Bill ‘ere.”
“I don’t see why, if I call you Mr. Smith, you shouldn’t call me Mr. Green,” said the other.
“Call me wot?” enquired Joe, sternly; “you let me ‘ear you callin’ me mister anythink, that’s all; you let me ‘ear you.”
“I’m sure the cook ‘ere don’t mind me callin’ ‘im Mr. Fisher,” said the new seaman.
“Cert’nly not,” said the gratified cook; “only my name’s Disher.”
The newcomer apologised with an urbanity that rendered Joe and old Ben speechless. They gazed at each other in silent consternation, and then Ben rose.
“We don’t want no misters ‘ere,” he said, curtly, “an’ wot’s more, we won’t ‘ave ‘em. That chap’s name’s Bob, but we calls ‘im Slushy. If it’s good enough for us, it’s good enough for a ordinary seaman wot’s got an A. B. discharge by mistake. Let me ‘ear you call ‘im Slushy. Go on now.”
“I’ve no call to address ‘im at all just now,” said Mr. Green, loftily.
“You call ‘im Slushy,” roared Joe, advancing upon him; “call ‘im Slushy till I tell you to stop.”
“Slushy,” said Mr. Green, sullenly, and avoiding the pained gaze of the cook; “Slushy, Slushy, Slushy, Slushy, Sl–”
“That’ll do,” said the cook, rising, with a scowl. “You don’t want to make a song abart it.”
Joe, content with his victory, resumed his seat on the locker and exchanged a reassuring glance with Ben; Mr. Green, with a deprecatory glance at the cook, sat down and offered him a pipe of tobacco.
“Been to sea long?” enquired the cook, accepting it
“Not long,” said the other, speaking very distinctly.
“I was brought up for something quite different. I’m just doing this till something better turns up. I find it very difficult to be a gentleman at sea.”
The cook, with an eye on Joe, ventured on a gentle murmur of sympathy, and said that he had experienced the same thing.
“I ‘ad money,” continued Mr. Green, musingly, “and I run through it; then I ‘ad more money, and I run through that.”
“Ben,” said Joe, suddenly, “pass me over that boot o’ yours.”
“Wha’ for?” enquired Ben, who had just taken it off.
“To chuck at that swab there,” said the indignant seaman.
Ben passed it over without a word, and his irritated friend, taking careful aim, launched it at Mr. Green and caught him on the side of the head with it. Pain standing the latter in lieu of courage, he snatched it up and returned it, and the next moment the whole forecastle was punching somebody else’s head, while Tim, in a state of fearful joy, peered down on it from his bunk.
Victory, rendered cheap and easy by reason of the purblindness of the frantic cook, who was trying to persuade Mr. Green to raise his face from the floor so that he could punch it for him, remained with Joe and Ben, who, in reply to the angry shouts of the skipper from above, pointed silently to the combatants. Explanations, all different and all ready to be sworn to if desired, ensued, and Fraser, after curtly reminding Ben of his new position and requesting him to keep order, walked away.
A silence broken only by the general compliments of the much gratified Tim, followed his departure, although another outbreak nearly occurred owing to the cook supplying raw meat for Mr. Green’s eye and refusing it for Joe’s. It was the lack of consideration and feeling that affected Joe, not for the want of the beef, that little difficulty being easily surmounted by taking Mr. Green’s. The tumult was just beginning again, when it was arrested by the sound of angry voices above. Tim, followed by Joe, sprang up the ladder, and the couple with their heads at the opening listened with appreciative enjoyment to a wordy duel between Mrs. Tipping and daughter and the watchman.
“Call me a liar, then,” said old George, in bereaved accents.
“I have,” said Mrs. Tipping.
“Only you’re so used to it you don’t notice it,” remarked her daughter, scathingly.
“I tell you he’s drownded,” said the watchman, raising his voice; “if you don’t believe me, go and ask Mr. Fraser. He’s skipper in his place now.”
He waved his hand in the direction of Fraser, who, having heard the noise, was coming on deck to see the cause of it. Mrs. Tipping, compressing her lips, got on board, followed by her daughter, and marching up to him eyed him severely.
“I wonder you can look us in the face after the trick you served us the other night,” she said, fiercely.
“You brought it on yourselves,” said Fraser, calmly. “You wouldn’t go away, you know. You can’t always be coming here worrying.”
“We shall come whenever we choose,” said Mrs. Tipping. “In the first place, we want to see Mr. Robinson; anyway we intend to see Captain Flower, so you can save that fat old man the trouble of telling us lies about him.”
“Captain Flower fell overboard night before last, if that’s what you mean,” said Fraser, gravely.
“I never saw such a man in all my life,” exclaimed Mrs. Tipping, wrathfully. “You’re a perfect—what’s the man’s name in the Scriptures?” she asked, turning to her daughter.
Miss Tipping, shaking her head despondently, requested her parent not to worry her.
“Well, it doesn’t signify. I shall wait here till he comes,” said Mrs. Tipping.
“What, Ananias?” cried Fraser, forgetting himself.
Mrs. Tipping, scorning to reply, stood for some time gazing thoughtfully about her. Then, in compliance with her whispered instructions, her daughter crossed to the side and, brushing aside the outstretched hand of the watchman, reached the jetty and walked into the office. Two of the clerks were still working there, and she came back hastily to her mother with the story of the captain’s death unmistakably confirmed.
Mrs. Tipping, loath to accept defeat, stood for some time in consideration. “What had Captain Flower to do with Mr. Robinson?” she asked at length, turning to Fraser.
“Can’t say,” was the reply.
“Have you ever seen Mr. Robinson?” enquired the girl.
“I saw him one night,” said the other, after some deliberation. “Rather good-looking man, bright blue eyes, good teeth, and a jolly laugh.”
“Are you likely to see him again?” enquired Miss Tipping, nodding in confirmation of these details.
“Not now poor Flower’s gone,” replied Fraser. “I fancy we shipped some cases of rifles for him one night. The night you first came. I don’t know what it all was about, but he struck me as being rather a secretive sort of man.”
“He was that,” sighed Miss Tipping, shaking her head.
“I heard him say that night,” said the mate, forgetful of his recent longings after truth, “that he was off abroad. He said that something was spoiling his life, I remember, but that duty came first.”
“There, do you hear that, mother?” said Miss Tipping.
“Yes, I hear,” said the other, with an aggressive sniff, as she moved slowly to the side. “But I’m not satisfied that the captain is dead. They’d tell us anything. You’ve not seen the last of me, young man, I can tell you.”
“I hope not,” said Fraser, cordially. “Any time the ship’s up in London and you care to come down, I shall be pleased to see you.”
Mrs. Tipping, heated with the climb, received this courtesy with coldness, and having enquired concerning the fate of Captain Flower of six different people, and verified their accounts from the landlord of the public-house at the corner, to whom she introduced herself with much aplomb as being in the profession, went home with her daughter, in whom depression, in its most chronic form, had settled in the form of unfilial disrespect.
Two hours later the Foam got under way, and, after some heated language owing to the watchman mistaking Mr. Green’s urbanity for sarcasm, sailed slowly down the river. The hands were unusually quiet, but their behaviour passed unnoticed by the new skipper, who was too perturbed by the falsehoods he had told and those he was about to tell to take much heed of anything that was passing.
“I thought you said you preferred to keep for-’ard?” he said to Ben, as that worthy disturbed his meditations next morning by bustling into the cabin and taking his seat at the breakfast table.
“I’ve changed my mind; the men don’t know their place,” said the mate, shortly.
Fraser raised his eyebrows.
“Forget who I am,” said Ben, gruffly. “I was never one to take much count of such things, but when it comes to being patted on the back by an A. B., it’s time to remind ‘em.”
“Did they do that?” said Fraser, in a voice of horror.
“Joe did,” said Ben. “‘E won’t do it ag’in, I don’t think. I didn’t say anything, but I think ‘e knows my feelings.”
“There’s your berth,” said Fraser, indicating it with a nod.
Ben grunted in reply, and being disinclined for conversation, busied himself with the meal, and as soon as he had finished went up on deck.
“Wot yer been down there for, Bennie?” asked Joe, severely, as he appeared; “your tea’s all cold.”
“I’ve ‘ad my breakfast with the skipper,” said Ben, shortly.
“You was always fond of your stummick, Bennie,” said Joe, shaking his head, sorrowfully. “I don’t think much of a man wot leaves his old mates for a bit o’ bacon.”
The new mate turned away from him haughtily, “Tim,” he said, sharply.
“Yes, Ben,” said the youth. “Why, wot’s the matter? Wot are you looking like that for? Ain’t you well?” “Wot did you call me?” demanded the new mate.
“I didn’t call you anything,” said the startled Tim.
“Let me ‘ear you call me Ben ag’in and you’ll hear of it,” said the other, sharply. “Go and clean the brasswork.”
The youth strolled off, gasping, with an envious glance at the cook, who, standing just inside the galley, cheerfully flaunted a saucepan he was cleaning, as though defying the mate to find him any work to do.
“Bill,” said the mate.
“Sir,” said the polite seaman.
“Help Joe scrub paintwork,” was the reply.
“Me!” broke in the indignant Joe.
“Scrub—Look ‘ere, Ben.”
“Pore old Joe,” said the cook, who had not forgiven him for the previous night’s affair. “Pore old Joe.”
“Don’t stand gaping about,” commanded the new mate. “Liven up there.”
“It don’t want cleaning. I won’t do it,” said Joe, fiercely.
“I’ve give my orders,” said the new mate, severely; “if they ain’t attended to, or if I ‘ear any more about not doing ‘em, you’ll hear of it. The idea o’ telling me you won’t do it. The idea o’ setting such an example to the young ‘uns. The idea—Wot are you making that face for?”
“I’ve got the earache,” retorted Joe, with bitter sarcasm.
“I thought you would ‘ave, Joe,” said the vengeful cook, retiring behind a huge frying-pan, “when I ‘eard you singing this morning.”
Fraser, coming on deck, was just in time to see a really creditable imitation of a famous sculpture as represented by Joe, Tim, and Ben, but his criticism was so sharp and destructive that the group at once broke and never re-formed. Indeed, with a common foe in the person of Ben, the crew adjusted their own differences, and by the time Seabridge was in sight were united by all the fearful obligations of a secret society of which Joe was the perpetual president.
Captain Barber, with as much mourning as he could muster at such short notice, was waiting on the quay. His weather-beaten face was not quite so ruddy as usual, and Fraser, with a strong sense of shame, fancied, as the old man clambered aboard the schooner, that his movements were slower than of yore.
“This is a dreadful business, Jack,” he said, giving him a hearty grip, when at length he stood aboard the schooner.