"It must be the smell of kippers. Frankly, I can't stand them. The stink hangs about all morning, till one feels one is breathing as well as eating kippers."
"They have an unholy smell," Jack agreed, wondering when the fellow would move on, or whether his inopportune presence was to be taken as a warning not to put his mad intention into effect. He was superstitious enough to believe in omens.
"I rather like bumlas, do you?" was the next remark.
"I don't know—oh, yes, I think they are topping."
"Sort of jelly-substance, and when fried crisp, the last word!"
"Oh, damn!" said Jack aching for him to go.
"What's that?" the man asked, protruding an ear forward. "The wind makes a devil of a noise in these ropes——"
Someone called him off for quoits, and Jack started to tune up his nerves again for the plunge.
Children ran between him and the line of chairs he faced. He could see Joyce Meredith listening idly while the ship's doctor talked to her. At that moment the subaltern took Kitty's hand in his to examine a ring she was wearing,—an heirloom, with a story,—and this gave the final stimulus to Jack's sporting resolve. He was seen suddenly to lose his balance, throw out his arms, and disappear over the side.
On the instant there was wild confusion. Chairs were flung back, children shrieked, women fell fainting on the deck. Someone had shouted, "Man overboard!" which was taken up vociferously in every key by, at least, a hundred throats, and in less than a minute the engines were silent, the vessel moving only with its headway. Then, with a blast of steam, they were reversed. Meanwhile, the after part of the hurricane deck, and the poop of the second saloon, were packed with eager souls scanning the surface of the water in the hope of catching sight of their unfortunate fellow-passenger.