I.

'Leaf!' sniffed Pincher disconsolately. 'Wot's the good o' seven days' leaf ter a bloke wot ain't got no money?'

'No money!' exclaimed Billings, rather surprised. 'Why ain't yer got none? Thought yer wus one o' these 'ere chaps wot counted every penny.'

'I've bin spendin' a good bit lately one way an' another,' Martin explained, removing a half-used cigarette from the interior of his cap and lighting it.

Joshua grinned. He knew well enough that an ordinary seaman's pay of one shilling and threepence per diem, less various necessary personal expenses, did not go far when one was 'walking out' with a young lady.

Pincher loved his Emmeline very dearly, and Emmeline, she said, had come to love him; but he was bound to admit she was rather an expensive luxury. Moreover, he was far too proud to allow her to pay her share of their amusements when he was with her, which was pretty often. So, what with picture-palaces and visits to confectioners' shops, his eight-and-ninepence a week went nowhere. He had even been forced to borrow from his shipmates—always a difficult matter.

Then there had been the affair of the locket, over which Pincher felt he had been badly done. He had had his photograph taken, and had had it mounted in a rolled-gold ornament of chaste design for which he had paid the sum of seven shillings and sixpence, and this he had presented to Emmeline to be worn round her neck in place of the one which already hung there. He had imagined that this nine-carat gold case hid the features of some other admirer. It did nothing of the kind. Its interior, when he was allowed to investigate it personally, contained nothing but a faithful likeness of the girl's father—top-hat, side-whiskers, and all. Emmeline seemed rather amused. Pincher never quite got over it.

'Carn't yer get a hadvance o' money from th' paybob?'[ [22] Joshua suggested. "E ain't a bad old bloke so long as yer goes ter 'im wi' a yarn o' bein' desperate 'ard up, an' yer pore ole farther's 'ome bein' sold up, an' 'im an' yer ma an' the kids goin' ter th' work'ouse.'

'I've tried that,' Pincher answered glumly. 'Leastways, orl excep' the yarn wot yer said. 'E simply tells me I'm in debt ter the Crown 'cos o' clothes an' other gear wot I've bought, an' that 'e carn't do nothink.'

'I calls it a houtrage!' said Billings sympathetically, looking very solemn. 'The way they bleeds us pore matloes is enuf—enuf—I carn't think o' wot I wus goin' ter say,' he added lamely; 'but it's abart time somethin' wus done. S'welp me, it is!'

'An' abart time you pays back that two bob wot you borrowed off me,' Pincher chipped in, remembering the debt.

'Two bob!' cried Joshua, screwing up his face and trying hard to appear as if he didn't know what Pincher was driving at. 'Wot two bob?'

'Th' two bob I lends yer the night yer took Missis Figgins along ter th' pictures. You knows orl abart it.'

'Thought it wus a present ter me,' said the old sinner, unable to feign further forgetfulness, but affecting to be very grieved. 'A bit o' a return like fur me trubble in introjoocin' yer to th' gal. That's wot I thought it wus; strite I did.'

Pincher laughed, for Billings's dissimulation was so very palpable. 'Don't act so barmy,' he observed. 'Yer knows it wasn't. Yer don't 'ave me on like that.'

'But two bob ain't no good ter yer fur Christmas leaf,' protested the A.B., veering off on another tack.

'Carn't 'elp that. I wants it back.'

'Well, you shall 'ave it,' Joshua grumbled. 'But I calls it a dirty sort o' way ter treat a chap wot's done for you wot I 'ave.'

'Garn! don't act so wet, I tell yer.'

'Orl right! orl right! Don't go an' git rattled abart it,' said Billings resignedly. 'You shall 'ave yer money. You shall 'ave it if I 'as ter go without bacca fur a month; but where'd you be, I should like ter know, if yer 'adn't got a bloke like me ter look arter yer? Look wot I done fur yer since yer jined this ship! Bin yer sea-daddy, I 'ave, same as if you were my own son, an' yet yer treats me like this! Hingratitoode's wot I calls it. 'Orrible hingratitoode! Orl you young blokes is the same!' He sighed deeply, and regarded Pincher with a pained expression.

The latter seemed rather concerned. 'If yer looks on it like that, Billings, o' course I carn't'——

The A.B. waved an arm with a gesture of dissent. 'It's too late ter start talkin' now,' he observed sadly. 'Th' 'arm's done. You shall 'ave yer money, but you've gorn back on a pal, an' orl fur the sake o' two bob. Two bob! Wot is it?'

'Let's 'ave it, then,' said Pincher, holding out a tentative hand.

''Ave it! Yer don't reely want it, do yer?'

'Course I do.'

'I'll give it yer afore I goes on leaf.'

'I wants it now,' Pincher persisted, remembering Joshua's extremely short memory.

'D' you think I ain't honest?' the latter demanded. ''Cos, if yer do, jest say th' word, an' see wot yer gits!'

'I never sez you wasn't honest; but I wants me money back!'

Billings saw that further argument was useless, sighed once more, replaced his pipe in his mouth, fumbled under his jumper, and produced a leather purse from the money-belt round his waist. Its contents chinked opulently; but, shielding it from Pincher's wistful gaze, he extracted a shilling and two sixpenny-pieces and handed them across. 'There ye are!' he grunted. 'Don't git sayin' as 'ow I doesn't pay me debts.'

'Yer pays 'em a bit be'ind time,' Pincher retorted with some truth, secreting the coins on his own person.

Joshua laughed in quite a friendly way. 'Tizzy-snatcher!' he growled, with his eyes twinkling.

But Pincher was bitterly disappointed about the leave. The men were to be sent away for seven days, one party being at home for Christmas and the other for the New Year. His watch were to start the following day; but, beyond the two shillings he had just obtained from Billings, he literally had not a penny to pay his train fare home. He could get the usual third-class return ticket from Weymouth to London, and from there on to his home, for the single fare; but even that would cost him the best part of a sovereign. He had tried hard to induce the fleet paymaster to give him an advance of pay, but that harassed officer, pointing out that Pincher was already in debt to the Crown, firmly declined to do so. Then Martin had endeavoured to borrow money from his shipmates; but they, though sympathetic, wanted every penny they could lay their hands on for their own purposes. He then thought of writing to his people for the necessary sum, but abandoned the idea, because he knew well enough that they, on their very limited income, always had great difficulty in making both ends meet. Christmas, moreover, was always an expensive time, and there were three younger Martins to be considered.

It was really rather galling, and he half-regretted having spent all his money on Emmeline. Since joining the service he had been home on leave before, of course, but not as an ordinary seaman of a first-class battleship, and he was well aware that as such he would be a person of some importance in the village. The blacksmith's son, Tom Sellon, had left Caxton a mere country yokel to join the army. The winter previous, as a strapping, full-fledged private of one of his Majesty's line regiments, he had come home on a few days' furlough resplendent in a wonderful red tunic. His arrival created no small stir, for Caxton lay in the heart of the Midlands, and its inhabitants were unused to the pomp and circumstance of war. Sellon, moreover, thought a great deal of himself. According to him, Great Britain was inhabited by two classes of people, those who were in the army and those who were not, and he treated all 'civvies,' as he called them, with kindly tolerance. He stood treat in a lordly sort of way at the 'Flying Swan,' and condescended to drink what beer the village magnates offered him in return for this hospitality. He was not averse to being friendly with their pretty daughters either. In short, a scarlet tunic and an air of self-assurance had worked wonders, for before he donned the red coat Tom had been a mere nonentity. Now he was a personage, with a capital P, and had even pretended to be rather diffident about accepting half-a-sovereign which the squire, who had known him since childhood, pressed into his palm one Sunday after church.

Now Pincher, who knew little of the army, cordially despised soldiers in his heart of hearts. He longed to cut out Tom Sellon, but this cursed lack of money at the critical moment had upset all his plans. He could have wept from sheer vexation, for there seemed no alternative to spending Christmas on board.

But it so happened that the railway company wished to know the number of men proceeding by rail the next morning, and at 'Quarters' that afternoon Tickle ordered all the men of the starboard watch of his division to fall in on the right. Pincher went with them.

'Are any of you men not going away by rail to-morrow morning?' the officer asked.

Four hands went up at once.

'Why aren't you going?' Tickle asked the first man.

'Spendin' the leaf in Weymouth, sir.'

'And you?' to the next.

'I lives in Dorchester, sir. Goin' on by a later train.'

'Ain't takin' th' leaf, sir,' said the third.

'Why not?'

'Nowhere to go, sir.'

'Have you no parents, or relations, or any one else you can go and stay with?'

'I'm an orphing, sir,' the man rather flummoxed him by replying. 'I'd rather stay aboard the ship than go an' see me old uncle wot lives in Peckham, sir. 'E's married agen, sir, an' 'is wife keeps a fried-fish shop.'

Tickle smiled and passed on. 'And what about you?' he queried, coming to Martin.

'Ain't got no money, sir.'

'Have you been to the paymaster for an advance?'

'Yessir.'

'What did he say?'

'Said I was in debt, sir.'

'How much does it cost you to get home?'

'Best part of a quid—sovereign, I means, sir.'

Tickle thought for a minute, nodded, numbered those men who were going, and then dismissed them.

Pincher thought nothing more of the conversation, but that evening he was told to go to the ship's office.

'Is your name Martin?' asked an assistant-paymaster when he arrived.

'Yessir.'

'You want some money to go on leave with, eh?'

'Yessir, please,' said the ordinary seaman, feeling hopeful.

'We can let you have thirty shillings. Is that enough?'

'Yessir,' Pincher exclaimed, his eyes glistening.

'Are you willing to pay it back at the rate of three shillings a month?'

'Yessir.'

'All right. Sign that receipt.'

Pincher, astounded at his good fortune, hurriedly scrawled his name, was handed a golden sovereign and ten shillings in silver, and left the office with a satisfied grin all over his face and the coins jingling in his hand. He was so pleased at his good luck that he didn't stop to consider where the money came from. All he cared about was that he had got it, and that he could go home and cut out Tom Sellon, after all.

As a matter of fact, it was Tickle himself who had acted the part of a nautical fairy godmother. He had noticed that Pincher seemed very unhappy, and had guessed the reason, and at first thought of lending him the money outright. Thirty shillings more or less meant nothing to him. But then, remembering that Martin would probably refuse the loan from feelings of pride, he hit upon a better plan; so he went to the fleet paymaster, handed him the money, and requested him to pay it over to Pincher as if it were an official advance.

'My dear Tickle,' protested Cashley, 'you'll never get it back! The boy's already in debt to the Crown, and his pay's only one-and-three a day!'

'Let him pay it back at the rate of three bob a month, sir,' suggested the lieutenant. 'I'm not particular. He looks so damned miserable at not being able to get away on leave that I must do something. Don't tell him it comes from me, though. He won't take it if he knows that.'

'All right. I'll see to it,' the fleet paymaster acquiesced, smiling. 'I suppose,' he asked jokingly, 'you wouldn't lend a poor old buffer like me twenty or thirty pounds to buy the wife a turkey and a plum-pudding?'

'I'd watch it, sir!' Tickle laughed. 'What about that new car you bought a fortnight ago?'

'That's why I want to borrow from you,' Cashley grinned. 'However, I'll fix Martin's money up for you, though I must say I think you're a tender-hearted fool, Tickle. You'll be badly had one of these days.'

Tickle merely smiled. The prospect did not alarm him.

So the next morning, at seven-thirty, Pincher, arrayed in his best clothes, left the ship with a sweet smile and a little bundle of necessaries done up in a blue-striped handkerchief. An hour later he was sitting in a third-class carriage on his way to London, munching a doubtful-looking sausage-roll, and listening to a slightly intoxicated sailor next to him, who insisted on giving the company what he called 'a little moosic.' It consisted of a few fragmentary remarks in a deep-bass rumble about the perils of a sailor's life, sudden hiccups as full stops, and frequent gurgling noises and sounds of enjoyment as the songster upended a quart bottle of Bass's light dinner ale, and applied the business end to his mouth. He eventually finished the song and the bottle at the same time, and, shying the latter playfully through the open window, volunteered to fight the whole carriage. This pleasure being denied him, he solemnly kissed the company all round, and then went comfortably off to sleep with his mouth wide open, his head resting affectionately on Pincher's shoulder, and his feet on the opposite man's lap. Thus he remained until they arrived at Waterloo, where, on disembarking, he never noticed that one of his carriage-mates, by the skilful use of a burnt cork, had decorated his upper lip with a large black moustache.

History does not relate if he arrived home in this condition, for, after vainly endeavouring to induce various laughing porters and the amused guard of the train to 'come an' 'ave a wet, ole dear!' and then, when they refused, wanting to show there was no ill-feeling by exchanging headgear, he was last seen proceeding at three and a quarter knots on rather an erratic course towards the nearest refreshment-room.

But Pincher got home safe and sound without any difficulties of this kind, and by four o'clock was in the bosom of his admiring family.