"Wasn't appointed here, be damned! Didn't have the chance. Why, that ship of his isn't in the same class at all. The Trident can steer, anyway, and when we get things fixed up. . . . She has the hull of a fine ship. If only we could get a decent funnel on her. . . . Here, I'll try her at your nine and a half knots! I'll bet War Trumpet can't do a kick above nine!"
Be it noted that the convoy officers have the wavy gold lace of the R.N.R. for their rank stripes; plain half-inch ones of the Royal Navy might have had to let the convoy sail at nine, after all—not knowing the 'grip' of the 'last ship.'
EVENING: PLYMOUTH HOE
XIX
CONFERENCE
"A LAUNCH will be sent off at 3 p.m., S.T., to bring masters on shore for conference. You are requested to bring"--etc. So reads the notice, and p.m. finds the coxswain of the convoy office picket-boat steaming and backing from ship to ship, and making no secret of his disapproval of a scheme of things that keeps him waiting (tootling, perhaps, an impatient blast), while leisurely shipmasters give final orders to their mates at the gangways. ("That damned ship's cat in the chart-room again, sir!")