Sail Ho! | Page 6

upon me. "Why do you leave your ropes about like that?"
"John, dear!"
Only those two words, spoken in a gentle reproachful tone, and the young lady turned to me and smiled.
"Thank you," she said; "my brother has been very ill, and is weak yet."
"Lena," he cried, "don't parade it before everybody;" but as he turned his eyes with an irritable look to the lady and encountered hers, a change came over him, and he clung to my arm, which he had thrust away.
"Thank you," he said. "Give me a hand to the side there. My legs are shaky yet." Then with a smile which made his thin yellow face light up, and gave him something the look of his sister, as he glanced at my uniform--"You're not the captain, are you? Ah, that's better," he sighed, as he leaned his arms on the bulwark, and drew a deep breath. "Thank you. Just wait till we've been a month at sea, and I'll race you all through the rigging."
"All right," I said, "you shall. My father says there's nothing like a sea trip when you've been ill. He took me in his yacht after I had had fever."
"And you got well in no time, didn't you?"
I nodded, as I looked at his wasted figure, and noted his eager, anxious way.
"There, Lena, hear that," he said quickly. "I told you so." Then turning to me again--"Come and sit near us in the cabin; I shan't be so nasty and snappish when I've had my breakfast."
He laughed in a forced way, and promising that I would if I could, I drew back to leave the brother and sister together, for Walters gave my jacket a twitch.
"I say, I shall never get you round the ship," he said, in an ill-used tone. "Now look here," he began, "this is the saloon-deck, that's the mizzen-mast, and come along here and I'll show you the binnacle."
"Why, I know all these," I said, laughing merrily. "Come, I'll box the compass with you."
"Tuppens as you can't do it right, young gent," said a rough-looking elderly sailor, who was coiling down the rope which had nearly overset the sick passenger.
"You keep your place, sir, and speak when you're spoken to," said Walters, sharply.
"Certeny, sir. Beg pardon, sir, of course. Here, you Neb Dumlow, and you Barney Blane," cried the man to a couple of his fellows, who were busy tightening the tarpaulin over a boat which swung from the davits.
The two men, whose lower jaws were working ox-fashion as they ruminated over their tobacco, left off and faced round; the first addressed, a big, ugly fellow, with a terrific squint which made his eyes look as if they were trying to join each other under the Roman nose, held a tarry hand up to his ear and growled--
"What say, mate?"
"These here's our two noo orficers, and you've got to be wery 'spectful when you speaks."
"Look here, young man," said Walters, haughtily, "I've been to sea before, and know a thing or two. If you give me any of your cheek I'll report you to the first mate. Come on, Dale."
He turned away, and the bluff-looking sailor winked at me solemnly as I followed, and muttered the words, "Oh my!"
"Nothing like keeping the sailors in their places," continued Walters, "and--"
"Morning," said a handsome, keen-looking man of about thirty.
"Morning, sir."
"Our two new middies, eh? Well, shall you want me to-morrow?"
He looked at me as he spoke.
"Want you, sir!" I replied. "Are you one of the mates?"
"Every man's mate when he's on his back," was the laughing reply. "I'm the doctor."
"Oh!" I cried, catching his meaning, "I hope not, sir, unless it's very rough, but I think I can stand it."
"So do a good many folks," he continued. "Morning."
This was to a big, heavy-looking gentleman of about eight-and-twenty, who came up just then and shook hands with the doctor, holding on to him it seemed to me in a weak, helpless, amiable fashion, as if he was so glad he had found a friend that he didn't like to let go.
"Good--good-morning, doctor," he said, and as he spoke, I felt as if I must laugh, for his voice was a regular high-pitched squeak, and it sounded so queer coming from a big, stoutish, smooth-faced man of six feet high.
Walters looked at me with a grin.
"Oh, here's a Tommy soft," he whispered.
"Don't," I said with my eyes, as I screwed up my face quite firmly.
"I'm so glad I met you, as every one is so strange, and I don't like to question the servants--I mean the stewards--because they are all so busy. How long will it be to breakfast?"
"Quite half-an-hour," said the doctor, smiling, as he looked at his watch. "Hungry?"
"Oh no; I wanted to know if there would be time to see to