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"Nonsense, boy; you'd better go below!" said the first mate brusquely, while Spokeshave sniggered and whispered something to the lamp-trimmer and man at the wheel that made them both laugh out right. "There's something wrong with you to-night, Haldane, for you seem quite off your chump, so you'd better go below and sleep it off. There's no ship near us, I tell you!
Accordingly he fitted the interior of one of them with a couple of seats one in the middle for himself, and the other near the "stern" for Miss Trevor's accommodation; secured to each side a stout cleat in a suitable position, and suitably bored for the reception of a pair of rowlocks; and a length of three-inch planking sawn down the middle and shaped with a spokeshave into a pair of paddles completed the equipment of what turned out to be a very serviceable and handy boat.
I've never had occasion to doubt your word before during the years you've sailed with me, my boy, and I am not going to doubt it now." So saying, Captain Applegarth, putting his arm on my shoulder, faced round towards the first mate and Spokeshave, as if challenging them both to question my veracity after this testimony on his part in my favour.
We were all sorry to part with Garry even for the short period that would elapse before he would rejoin the old barquey, for he was the life of all us aboard; but the same regret was not felt for Master Spokeshave when we saw him go over the side to accompany the Irishman, the skipper having so decreed, as his assistant navigator, the damage to his nose not necessarily affecting his "taking the sun," though it might interfere with the little beggar's altitudes of another character.
"Quite so, sir, just what we all think, sir," chimed in Master Spokeshave, putting in his oar. "Not a soul here on the bridge, sir, observed anything of any ship of any sort, leastways one flying a signal of distress, such as Dick Haldane said he saw."
"I can't, sir," yelled the man in desperation a fresh hand who had come on duty to relieve Atkins at six bells. "The steam steering gear has broken-down, sir, and I can't make her move." "By Jingo, that's a bad job," cried the skipper, but he was not long at a nonplus. "Run aft, Haldane, and you too, Spokeshave. Loosen the bunt of the mizzen-trysail and haul at the clew.
"I saw you, my joker, star-gazing down there, instead of coming up here to relieve me at the proper time! I believe you only sang out about the ship to cover your laziness and take a rise out of us!" "I did nothing of the sort, Mr Spokeshave," I answered indignantly, for the little beast sniggered away and grinned at Mr Fosset as if he had said something uncommonly smart at my expense.
For, at that very moment, when the first mate and Spokeshave and the helmsman and lamp-trimmer, standing on the bridge beside me, one and all said they could see nothing, I declare to you I saw not only the ship and the figures on her deck, but I noticed that the girl on the poop waved a scarf or handkerchief, as if imploring our assistance; and, at the same time, the dog near her bounded up against the bulwarks, and I can solemnly assert from the evidence of my ears that I heard the animal distinctly bark, giving out that joyous sort of bark with which a well- dispositioned dog invariably greets a friend of his master or mistress.
How did you get this, eh?" "Faith, sor, the ould moon looked so moighty plisint that night that I took a lunar or two, jist to divart mesilf with, when Spokeshave wint below and there was nobody lift to poke fun at, sure!" "A very useful sort of amusement," said the skipper drily. "And I see, too, you've put in the distance we've run, by dead reckoning, as about another fifty miles or so?"
Through the clumsiness of Mr Spokeshave, who had charge of our signal department and showed his cleverness by hoisting the very numbers of the flags giving the skipper's reply, that, though our engines were temporarily broken-down, they were fast being repaired, the captain of the man-of-war could not understand him; and so, fearing the worst, ranged up under our stern to see what help he could render, in what he evidently considered, from Spokeshave's "hoist," to be a pressing emergency.
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