Part 9 (1/2)

We've sailed together five years now, an' never 'ad what I could call a really nasty word.”

”Well, if you can think o' anything,” said the skipper, ”say so. This sort o' thing is worrying.”

”See how we get on at breakfast,” said the mate, as he lit his pipe. ”If that's as bad as this, we'll have a bit of a row to please 'em.”

Breakfast next morning was, if anything, worse, each lady directly inciting her lord to acts of open hostility. In this they were unsuccessful, but in the course of the morning the husbands arranged matters to their own satisfaction, and at the next meal the storm broke with violence.

”I don't wish to complain or hurt anybody's feelings,” said the skipper, after a side-wink at the mate, ”but if you could eat your wittles with a little less noise, George, I'd take it as a favour.”

”Would you?” said the mate, as his wife stiffened suddenly in her seat.

”Oh!”

Both belligerents, eyeing each other ferociously, tried hard to think of further insults.

”Like a pig,” continued the skipper grumblingly.

The mate hesitated so long for a crus.h.i.+ng rejoinder that his wife lost all patience and rose to her feet crimson with wrath.

”How dare you talk to my husband like that?” she demanded fiercely.

”George, come up on deck this instant!”

”I don't mind what he says,” said the mate, who had only just begun his dinner.

”You come away at once,” said his wife, pus.h.i.+ng his plate from him.

The mate got up with a sigh, and, meeting the look of horror-stricken commiseration in his captain's eye, returned it with one of impotent rage.

”Use a larger knife, cap'n,” he said savagely, ”You'll swallow that little 'un one of these days.”

The skipper, with the weapon in question gripped in his fist, turned round and stared at him in petrified amazement.

”If I wasn't the cap'n o' this s.h.i.+p, George,” he said huskily, ”an'

bound to set a good example to the men, I'd whop you for them words.”

”It's all for your good, Captain Bunnett,” said Mrs. Fillson mincingly.

”There was a poor old workhouse man I used to give a penny to some times, who would eat with his knife, and he choked himself with it.”

”Ay, he did that, and he hadn't got a mouth half the size o' yours,”

said the mate warningly.

”Cap'n or no cap'n, crew or no crew,” said the skipper in a suffocating voice, ”I can't stand this. Come up on deck, George, and repeat them words.”

”Before the mate could accept the invitation, he was dragged back by his wife, while at the same time Mrs. Bunnett, with a frantic scream, threw her arms round her husband's neck, and dared him to move.

”You wait till I get you ash.o.r.e, my lad,” said the skipper threateningly.

”I'll have to bring the s.h.i.+p home after I've done with you,” retorted the mate as he pa.s.sed up on deck with his wife.

During the afternoon the couples exchanged not a word, though the two husbands exchanged glances of fiery import, and later on, their spouses being below, gradually drew near to each other. The mate, however, had been thinking, and as they came together met his foe with a pleasant smile.