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"`Silly! `vulgar! You very small fragment of impudence," rejoined Larkyns, highly delighted at being thus successful in "pulling my leg" and making me angry, "I'll have you keel-hauled for speaking so disrespectfully to your superior officer, sir. Beg my pardon instantly, or "
Larkyns were exhausted, it was necessary to dress for the very quiet party. Some hours afterwards, Mr. Verdant Green was standing in a room filled with smoke and noise, leaning rather heavily against the table. His friends had first tempted him with a cigar; then, as his first smoke produced the strange effects common in these cases, they had induced him to take a little strong punch as a remedy.
This, the Spanish captain said was quite true, for he had seen the grave himself and the little church erected to their memory, a statement that quite delighted our friend Larkyns, as he was able to throw it in the teeth of Mr Stormcock as soon as he heard it, in refutation of the base calumny of the latter in asserting that he had invented the yarn he told us at mess.
He had been brought up entirely by his mother and a maiden aunt. Happily, Mr. Larkyns, the rector of Manor Green, the charming Warwickshire village of which the Greens had been squires from time immemorial, convinced his mother that Verdant needed the society of young men of his own age. Mr.
Glancing upward, my head being just clear of the water, which I trod to keep myself in an erect position, holding on, though, all the while, "like grim death," to the rope, of which I had taken a turn round my wrist, I saw Larkyns, the ringleader of the frolic, leaning out over the port sill as pale as a ghost.
"Say `lie' if you like; I know you mean it," rejoined Larkyns, in no way put out by the rude insinuation and continuing his narrative quite composedly. "But, you're wrong in this case, old Stormy, for `faix it's no lie I'm telling you now, as the doctor's Irish marine would say. It's the plain, unadulterated truth. I had the tale from a Portuguese monk at Funchal."
"You young ruffian!" he exclaimed as he knocked me down, his passion getting the better both of his scholastic judgment and academical dignity, and he would probably have proceeded to further extremities had not Tom Larkyns started up.
"Oh, Vernon, look, look!" cried Larkyns, as the gloomy night with its overhanging pall of smoke from the endless bombardment, which had been going on ever since mid-day, was lit up by a crimson glow that enabled us to see every detail of what took place and even recognise the features of some of our officers. "See how they are mowed down not a man of them will come back alive!"
"Hey!" exclaimed Mr Stormcock, a bit puzzled at this. "What do you mean?" "I don't mean a dry nurse, you know, old chappie, though you said, you were `dry' just now," replied Larkyns, laughing at his own joke. "Nor do I mean a wet 'un. No, old chappie, I mean a wetter-un, do you twig?"
The whole school, my new friend told me, was a sham, for, instead of there being some dozen of masters, as stated in the prospectus sent to Uncle George, there were only two besides "The Doctor" Mr Smallpage, the mathematical master, called by the boys "Smiley," on the lucus a non lucendo principle, I suppose, because his face ever bore an expression of gravity; and Monsieur Achile Phelan, professor of foreign languages and dancing, christened by Tom Larkyns "The Cobbler," on account of his teaching a certain number of extra-paying pupils how to "heel and toe."
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