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She'd been a fine ship in her time, her cabin bein' fitted up most beautiful wi' lookin' glasses and white-and-gold panels, velvet cushions to the lockers, and a big table o' solid mahogany, to say nothin' of a most handsome sideboard wi' silver-plated fittin' up agin' the fore bulkhead.
Then he heard a shuffle of feet and the captain's voice "All right. Coming." He leaned his back against the bulkhead as you see a drunken man sometimes propped up against a wall, half doubled up. In that attitude the captain found him, when he came out, pulling the door to after him quickly. At once Anthony let his eyes run all over the cabin.
However, the matter which just then most concerned me was the liquor that I was in search of, that I might a little stay my stomach with it against the hunger that was tormenting me; and so I ransacked the lockers that ran across the stern of the ship and across a part of the bulkhead forward, in the faint hope that I might come upon another supply but my search was a vain one, two of the lockers having only some mouldy clothing in them, and all the rest being filled with arms.
The old-fashioned arrangement of iron bars called the "bilboes" was fastened to the bulkhead at the bow end of the alleyway. It had two or three sets of iron shackles chained to it and into the smallest pair of these, meant for the wrists of a grown victim, he locked an ankle of each of the boys. "Ye'll stay there a while, till we sail again," Herriot remarked as he departed.
Now the state-room in which your father and mother slept was on the other side of the cabin bulkhead, and the straining and rolling of the vessel had opened the chinks between the planks, so that I could see a great deal of what was done in the state-room, and could hear every word almost that was spoken by them.
From time to time I murmured to him: "Go steady" "Take it easy, Ransome" and received a quick glance in reply. When we had done all we could do to make things safe, he disappeared into his galley. Some time afterward, going forward for a look round, I caught sight of him through the open door. He sat upright on the locker in front of the stove, with his head leaning back against the bulkhead.
A fatal accident occurred as our ship was clearing the harbor. Peter Jackson, "B" Company, venturing too far out on the bulkhead, was washed overboard. There was a heavy sea running at the time, and poor Jackson was soon lost sight of; there was no chance of saving him. Lieutenant Rolph was appointed adjutant, and the writer orderly room clerk. It was October and the weather was beautiful.
Smith had taken up a book and pretended to read, while Barkins sat back on a locker with his hands in his pockets, and his lips thrust out and screwed as if he were whistling, but no sound came, and he stared hard at the bulkhead facing him.
At one end of the place was seen the barricade, hiding the invalids; while notwithstanding the crowd in front of it was a clear area, which the fear of contagion had left open. "That bulkhead must come down," cried the mate, in a voice that rose above the din. "Take hold of it, boys."
The little low-ceiled cabin below was rather larger than a hearse, and as dark as a vault. It had two coffins on each side I mean two bunks. A small table, capable of accommodating three persons at dinner, stood against the forward bulkhead, and over it hung the dingiest whale oil lantern that ever peopled the obscurity of a dungeon with ghostly shapes. The floor room unoccupied was not extensive.
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