"Already!" exclaimed Devenish, dropping reserve in his astonishment.
"In the very first day's washing! They never began until to-day. That's what's keeping them up all night," added Jewson. "They've started looking ahead, you see. Let me fill up your pannikin, Captain Devenish. You don't get half a chance with Mr. Rackham, sir!"
Ralph Devenish was one who carried his liquor in a manner worthy of his blood. His worst friend had seldom seen him fuddled. He was so much the less proof against the deeper and more damning effects. His tongue did not slur a syllable that followed, but it ran away with him all the faster for that. It muttered degrading confidences; it snarled unscrupulous revenge; it revealed a man so different from the Ralph Devenish known of other men that it was as though the drink had gone to his heart instead of to his head.
"I will marry her! I swear I will! We were all but engaged before, and I'll marry her yet. He never shall. I'll see him in hell first—I'll send him there myself! An infernal snob out of the merchant service, and his infernal father's son all over! What's the matter with you, Jewson? What are you grinning at?"
"Only at the idea of you committing a crime, sir. A captain in the Grenadier Guards! Ho, ho, ho!" And the steward showed his horrible teeth again; but there was no mirth in the little black penetrating eyes that were fast to Ralph's.
"But I would!" he swore. "I mean to marry her, by hook or crook."
"You really do?" said Jewson, turning grave.
"Fair or foul!" cried Ralph, recklessly.
"It's all one in love and war," repeated the steward, with a shrug. "But if you mean what you say I'll tell you what to do."
"You will, will you? Well, let's have it."