"Ha-ha-ha!" said Captain Thomassen Valvick, with an air of inspiration. "I tell you, maybe. Maybe it is like de horse."
"What horse?" asked Morgan.
Captain Valvick uttered one of his amiable snorts and bent his big shoulders. Even though the deck was rolling and pitching in a way that made the deck-chairs slide into each other, he stood upright without difficulty. His long sandy-reddish face was etched out in wrinkles of enjoyment, and behind very small gilt-rimmed spectacles his pale-blue eyes had an almost unholy twinkle. He wrinkled them up; he snorted again, hoarsely, through his sandy moustache, pulled down his large tweed cap over one ear, and made a massive gesture that would have been as heavy as a smaller man's blow.
"Ha-ha-HA!" thundered Captain Valvick. "Ay tell you. In my country, in Norway, we haff a custom. When you wont to make a horse stop, you say, 'Whoa!' But we don't. We say, "Brubublubluoooo-bl-oooo!' "
Shaking his jowls and lifting his head like Tarzan over a fresh kill, Captain Valvick here uttered the most extraordinary noise Morgan had ever heard. It cannot be reproduced into phonetic sounds, and so loses its beauty and poignancy. It was something like the noise of water running out of a bath-tub, but rising on a triumphant note like a battle-cry, and trembling on in shadings of defective drains and broken water-pipes; as though Mr. Paul White-man (say) had built a symphony round it, and come out strongly with his horns and strings.
"Bru-bloo-bulooooluloo-buloooooo!" crowed Captain Valvick, starting low with his shakings of head and jowl, and then rearing up his head at the climax.
"Isn't that a lot of trouble?" inquired Morgan.
"Oh, no! Ay do it easy," scoffed the other, nodding complacently. "But ay was going to tell you, de first time I try it on a English-speaking 'orse, de 'orse didn't understand me. Ay tell you how it was. At dat time, when I was young, I was courting a girl who lived in Vermont, where it always snow like Norway. So ay t'ink ay take her out for a sleigh-ride, all nice and fine. I hire de best horse and sleigh dey got, I tell de girl to be ready at two o'clock in de afternoon, and I come for her. So of course I want to make a good impression on my girl, and I come dashing up de road to her house, and I see her standing on de porch, waiting for me. So ay t'ink it be fine t'ing to make de grand entrance, and ay say, 'Brubu-bluooo-bloo!' fine and strong to de 'orse so ay can turn in de gates. But he don't stop. And ay t'ink, 'Coroosh! What is wrong wit' de goddam 'orse?' " Here Captain Valvick made a dramatic gesture, "So I shout, 'Brubu-bloooo-bloooo!' and lean over de footboard and say it again. And dis time de 'orse turn its head round to look at me. But it don't stop, you bet. It keep right on going, straight past de house where de girl is standing, and it only gallop faster when I keep saying, 'Brubu-blubluoooo-bl-oooo!' And my girl open her eyes at me and look fonny, but de 'orse fly straight on up de road; and all I can do is stand up in de sleigh and keep taking off my hat and bowing to her w'ile all de time ay go farder and farder away from her; and still ay am doing dat we'en we go round a bend and ay can't see her no more… "
All this was recited with much pantomime and urging the reins of an imaginary horse. With an expiring sigh Captain Valvick shook his head in a melancholy fashion, and then twinkled benevolently.
"Ay could never get dat girl to go out again. Ha-ha-ha!"