Part 8 (1/2)
”I never could see anything in young wimmen,” said the boatswain, musingly. ”Silly things, most of 'em. Always thinking about their looks; especially them as haven't got none.”
He took up the empty gla.s.s and toyed with it thoughtfully.
”It's no good waiting,” said Rosa; ”you won't get no more beer; not if you stay here all night.”
”So long!” said the boatswain, still playing with the gla.s.s. ”So long! I know one or two that'll 'ave a fit pretty near when I tell 'em about you sitting on your 'air.”
He put up his left arm instinctively, but Miss Jelks by a supreme effort maintained her calmness. Her eyes and colour were beyond her control, but her voice remained steady.
”So long!” she said, quietly. She took the gla.s.s from him and smiled.
”If you like to wait a moment, I'll get you a little drop more,” she said, graciously.
”Here's luck!” said Mr. Walters, as she returned with the gla.s.s. He drank it slowly and then, wiping his lips with the back of his hand, stood regarding her critically.
”Well, so long!” he said again, and, before the astonished maiden could resist, placed a huge arm about her neck and kissed her.
”You do that again, if you dare!” she gasped, indignantly, as she broke loose and confronted him. ”The idea!”
”I don't want to do it agin,” said the boatswain. ”I've 'ad a gla.s.s of ale, and you've 'ad a kiss. Now we're quits.”
He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand again and walked off with the air of a man who has just discharged an obligation. He went out the back way, and Rosa, to whom this sort of man was an absolutely new experience, stood gazing after him dumbly. Recovering herself, she followed him to the gate, and, with a countenance on which amazement still lingered, stood watching his tall figure up the road.
CHAPTER VI
WORK!” said Mr. Robert Vyner, severely, as he reclined in a deck-chair on the p.o.o.p of the Indian Chief and surveyed his surroundings through half-closed eyes. ”Work! It's no good sitting here idling while the world's work awaits my attention.”
Captain Trimblett, who was in a similar posture a yard away, a.s.sented.
He also added that there was ”nothing like it.”
”There's no play without work,” continued Mr. Vyner, in a spirit of self-admonition.
The captain a.s.sented again. ”You said something about work half an hour ago,” he remarked.
”And I meant it,” said Mr. Vyner; ”only in unconscious imitation I dozed off. What I really want is for somebody to take my legs, somebody else my shoulders, and waft me gently ash.o.r.e.”
”I had a cook o' mine put ash.o.r.e like that once,” said Captain Trimblett, in a reminiscent voice; ”only I don't know that I would have called it 'wafting,' and, so far as my memory goes, he didn't either. He had a lot to say about it, too.”
Mr. Vyner, with a noisy yawn, struggled out of his chair and stood adjusting his collar and waistcoat.
”If I couldn't be a chrysalis,” he said, slowly, as he looked down at the rec.u.mbent figure of the captain, ”do you know what I would like to be?”
”I've had a very hard day's work,” said the other, defensively, as he struggled into a sitting posture-”very hard. And I was awake half the night with the toothache.”
”That isn't an answer to my question,” said Mr. Vyner, gently. ”But never mind; try and get a little sleep now; try and check that feverish desire for work, which is slowly, very, very slowly, wearing you to skin and bone. Think how grieved the firm would be if the toothache carried you off one night. Why not go below and turn in now? It's nearly five o'clock.”
”Couldn't sleep if I did,” replied the captain, gravely. ”Besides, I've got somebody coming aboard to have tea with me this afternoon.”