United States or Cameroon ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
"Some ships are worth less afloat than ashore, an' she's one of 'em," he grinned. "You want a match. 'Ere you are!" Whether Coke was wishful to deny or admit the Andromeda's shortcomings even the ship herself might have protested against the horror of a long "e" in the penultimate syllable of her name the other man's rapid proffer of a light stopped him.
"Are you one of the Andromeda's men?" asked Carmela, speaking in the clear and accurate English used by her father. It was well for Watts that the tree prevented him from falling backwards.
"Oh, please be more positive than that. You send a cold shiver down my back." "Several members of the Andromeda's crew also indulged in a prolonged siesta," he said. "I assure you it was almost out of the question to divide the sleepers into snorers and non-snorers." A man will talk harmless nonsense of that sort when he is at his wit's end to wriggle out of a perplexing situation.
But let the name of some puppet politician hailing from São Paulo be mentioned, and his eyes would flash with angry recognition; yet the Andromeda's small contingent achieved more than a whole army of conspirators.
There was no hiding the desperate character of the coming adventure. The Andromeda's crew did not attempt to minimize it. The choice offered lay only in the manner of their death. As to the prospect of ultimate escape, they hardly gave it a thought.
And that is what I have been doing ever since, Iris breaking down barriers, smashing them, whether they were flesh and blood or nature's own obstacles, so that I might not lose you. Give you up! Not while I live! Why, you yourself dragged me away from certain death when I was lying unconscious on the Andromeda's deck.
"Begob, that's wan for the skipper," he crowed; then some of the others grinned, and the Andromeda's little company stood four-square again to the winds of adversity. Having blundered into prominence, the second mate was quick to see that he must hammer home the facts, though in more serious vein. "Bring us to the island, Senhor De Sylva," he said, "and we will make a fight of it.
So Dickey contented himself by listening to Coke's Homeric account of the Andromeda's wrecking, and if he interposed an occasional question, and thus drew the girl's sweet voice into the talk, it was invariably germane to the strange history of the ship and her human freight. Coke's narrative was picturesque and lurid.
Never did shipowner behave more queerly when faced by a disaster of like magnitude, involving, as did the Andromeda's loss, not only political issues of prime importance, but also the death of a near relative. They refused the proffered refreshment, not without some show of indignation. Verity swallowed a large dose of neat spirit.
Word Of The Day