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This didn't satisfy the skipper, so he turned to the first mate, who had remained moodily aloof with Spokeshave at the end of the bridge. "Mr Fosset," he sang out abruptly, "what are the engines doing?" "About thirty revolutions, sir; half speed, as nearly as possible." "How much are we going altogether?" "Ten knots, with our sails," replied the other. "The wind is freshening, too."
"But you don't call Irving Shakespeare, Haldane, do ye?" "I don't know anything of the matter, old boy. I am not so well informed as you are concerning the dramatic world, Spokeshave. I know you're a regular authority or `toffer, if you like, on the subject.
"Well," he said to Mr Fosset, bringing himself up short in front of the rail on our approach, "how are matters getting on below badly, I'm afraid?" The first mate explained. Spokeshave, who was at the other end of the bridge, coming up to listen, as usual, to the conversation. "That's good news, indeed!" said the skipper on hearing how Stoddart had set to work to repair the damage.
"Yes, when you were lolling about in the waist below there, just now," put in my friend, Master Spokeshave, who had been pretending to look-out from his end of the bridge because he thought he ought to do so as Mr Fosset was there, although he really couldn't possibly see anything aft from that position on the port side, on account of the wheel-house and funnel, which were of course abaft the bridge, blocking the view.
It will do now for the low trees. Look here." He led me into the shed where the ladders hung, and showed me the broken ladder, neatly sawn off at the top, and thinned down a little, and trimmed off with a spokeshave, while a pot of lead-coloured paint and a brush stood by with which the old gentleman had been going over the freshly-cut wood. "My job," he said quietly. "Dry by to-morrow.
They make a purty couple, bedad! an' they do say she kapes him in order. Do ye rickolict what an argufyin' chap Spokeshave was aboard?" "I should think I did, indeed," replied I. "I think he was the most cantankerous little beast I ever came across in my life, either afloat or ashore!" "Faith, ye wouldn't say that same now, Dick," rejoined Garry with much earnestness.
It was impossible for Willie to see the hollow lip of the gouge, the straight lip of the chisel, or the same lip fitted with another lip, and so made into the mouth of the plane, the worm-like auger, or the critical spokeshave, the hammer which will have it so, or the humble bradawl which is its pioneer he could see none of them without longing to send his life into theirs, and set them doing in the world for was not this what their dumb looks seemed ever to implore?
At that moment we emerged on the open deck from under the back of the poop, where we had been losing our time and talking nonsense; and, looking towards the bridge forward, I saw Colonel Vereker, the very person about whom we had been speaking, standing by the side of the skipper. "O, Lor', Spokeshave, what a crammer!" I cried.
"I know of a capital mast." Dexter looked sulky. "It's part of an old boat-hook my father found floating in the river. I shall smooth it down with my knife if I can't borrow a spokeshave." "And what'll you do for a sail?" said Dexter, his interest in the expedition chasing away his anger. "Oh, I shall get a table-cloth or a sheet. Sheets make beautiful sails.
Mr. Chubbuck, accordingly, gave me thorough lessons in the mysteries of the plane, the spokeshave, the gouge, and the chisel, and finally presented me with a block of white pine eighteen inches long and nine wide, and I set to work on my sloop.
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