ROBERT. (with eager interest) Then you were through a typhoon?
ANDREW. Yes—in the China sea. Had to run before it under bare poles for two days. I thought we were bound down for Davy Jones, sure. Never dreamed waves could get so big or the wind blow so hard. If it hadn’t been for Uncle Dick being such a good skipper we’d have gone to the sharks, all of us. As it was we came out minus a main top-mast and had to beat back to Hong-Kong for repairs. But I must have written you all this.
ROBERT. You never mentioned it.
ANDREW. Well, there was so much dirty work getting things ship-shape again I must have forgotten about it.
ROBERT. (looking at ANDREW—marveling) Forget a typhoon? (with a trace of scorn) You’re a strange combination, Andy. And is what you’ve told me all you remember about it?
ANDREW. Oh, I could give you your bellyful of details if I wanted to turn loose on you. It was all-wool-and-a-yard-wide-Hell, I’ll tell you. You ought to have been there. I remember thinking about you at the worst of it, and saying to myself: “This’d cure Rob of them ideas of his about the beautiful sea, if he could see it.” And it would have too, you bet! (He nods emphatically).
ROBERT. (dryly) The sea doesn’t seem to have impressed you very favorably.
ANDREW. I should say it didn’t! I’ll never set foot on a ship again if I can help it—except to carry me some place I can’t get to by train.
ROBERT. But you studied to become an officer!
ANDREW. Had to do something or I’d gone mad. The days were like years. (He laughs) And as for the East you used to rave about—well, you ought to see it, and smell it! One walk down one of their filthy narrow streets with the tropic sun beating on it would sicken you for life with the “wonder and mystery” you used to dream of.