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The old groceryman was down on his knees, with a wet cloth, swabbing up something from the floor with one hand, while he held his nose with the other, his back toward the door, when suddenly the door opened with a bank, striking the old man in the back, knocking him over and landing him with his head in a basket of strictly fresh eggs, breaking at least a dozen of them, and filling the air with an odor that was unmistakable; and the bad boy followed the door into the grocery.
I found afterwards that the long months of the voyage had not been entirely taken up with the cooking of bacon and the swabbing of decks; there had been long stretches of tedium beguiled by talk on most things under heaven, and aided by her swift and jealous intelligence her mental horizon had broadened prodigiously through constant association with a cultivated man. . . . When I reached the point in my story where Jaffery gave up the Persian expedition, she gripped the arms of her chair, and her lips worked in their familiar quiver.
The three men were working sturdily, and it would have been difficult to recognize in them, with their grimy faces and soiled duck uniforms, a doctor, a bank cashier, and a man-about-town well known in New York City. Near the forward hatch, industriously swabbing the deck, was a black-haired youth whose father helps to control some of the largest moves on 'Change.
Chop-stick Charlie was the name Blood had christened the coolie who acted as steward and cabin hand. He called him now, and out of the opium-tinctured gloom of the fo'c'sle Charlie appeared, received his orders and led them to the lazaret. None of the crew had shown the slightest emotion on seeing Blood take over command of the schooner and Ginnell swabbing decks.
He went to the cupboard, and got out his marine glass and took a long look at the stranger. "What do you make her out?" asked Tom. "There are men on deck, some swabbing out the roundhouse. One of them is lolling at the wheel. She flies the British flag." "Do you, perhaps, make out the name?" asked the Marquis.
At midnight, as at noon, they were at their posts. In the darkness, dusky figures could be seen swinging the sponge-staff, swabbing the cannon, driving home the charge. In the starlight, the moonlight, or the gloom lit by the red glare, those figures, resembling phantoms, were seen marshalled behind the breastworks to repel the coming assault.
While Biddy was trying to get her kitchen in order and light a fire, Janet and Mary, with pails and mops, assisted by their cousins, were busily employed in "swabbing decks," as their father called it, and hanging up the wet bedding to dry.
Each man did that which seemed to him expedient for the safety of the ship. The Croonah was fully equipped for fine weather for cleaning brasses and swabbing decks and bending awnings; but for bad weather notably for a cyclone she was perilously undermanned. Half of the native crew were paralysed by fear, many were killed, others drowned from a mere incapacity to hold on.
I should have been very miserable had not Marah made me work with the men, hauling the ropes, swabbing down the decks, scrubbing the paintwork, and even bearing a hand at the tiller. The work kept me from thinking. Towards the end of the passage, when the weather had grown brighter and hotter, I began to wonder how much further we were going.
And the others agreed to treat Dan Baxter in the same manner. But the boys were not so considerate, and Tom laughed outright when he caught sight of Baxter swabbing up some dirt on the rear deck. This made the bully's passion arise on the instant and he caught up his bucket as if to throw it at Tom's head. "Don't you dare, Baxter!" cried Tom. "If you do we'll have a red-hot war."
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