“When do you sail?” interrupts Mr. Hurst, speaking to Lieutenant Parker. Mr. Hurst would shift conversation to less perilous ground. As a mover of the ball, he is in sort host to the officers, as well as to Planter Paul Jones, and for the white credit of the town desires a peaceful evening. “I hear,” he concludes, “that your sloop is for a cruise off the French coast.”
“She and the fleet she belongs to,” responds Lieutenant Parker, utterance somewhat blurred, “will remain on this station while a word of rebel talk continues.”
“Now, instead of keeping you here,” breaks in Planter Paul Jones, vivaciously, “to hector peaceful colonies, if I were your king I should send you to wrest Cape Good Hope from the Dutch.”
“Cape Good Hope from the Dutch?”
“Or the Isles of France and Bourbon from the French—lying, as they do, like lions in the pathway to our Indian possessions. If I were your king, I say, those would be the tasks I’d set you.”
“And why do you say ‘your king?’ Is he not also your king?”
“Why, sir, I might be pleasantly willing,” observes Planter Paul Jones airily, “to give you my share in King George. In any event, I do not propose that you shall examine into my allegiance. And I say again that, if I were your king, sir, I’d find you better English work to do than an irritating and foolish patrol of these coasts.”
“You spoke of the Americans striking a blow,” says Lieutenant Parker, who is gifted of that pertinacity of memory common to half-drunken men; “you spoke but a moment back of the Americans striking a blow, and a heavy one.”
“Ay, sir! a blow—given provocation.”
Lieutenant Parker wags his head with an air of sagacity both bibulous and supercilious. He smiles victoriously, as a fortunate comparison bobs up to his mind.