“You can’t see none of dem officers,” the negro returned insolently. “Dey’re busy. You go down below, man, an’ sleep it off.”
He shrank back from the furious glare that Lang gave him, and turned away muttering. The surgeon looked up at the sacred upper decks, where no steerage passengers might go. He walked aft, glanced round to see that he was not watched, and climbed over the barrier cutting off the steerage deck. Some one shouted angrily after him, but he made a rush for the stairway leading above.
He heard some one running after him, but he almost made the top when a deck hand seized his leg from behind. He kicked violently back, releasing himself, heard an oath and tumble, and sprawled out on the upper deck, to be grasped immediately by another deck hand.
He tore away, ripping his already torn sleeve entirely off. A couple of ladies standing near cried out in alarm. The deck hand gripped him again, shoving him toward the stair, tussling and squirming desperately, and a group of passengers was running up, when the stateroom door at the top of the stair opened suddenly and a gold-laced officer emerged in an official rage.
“What the devil’s all this?”
Lang hoped for a second that it was the captain. At the next glance he saw that it was even better. He recognized the officer with almost a shriek of thanksgiving.
“Findlay!” he exclaimed wildly. “Thank the Lord! Don’t you know me?”
“No, I don’t!” the officer snapped. “What do you want?”
“Don’t you remember—last night—dinner—at Mrs. What’s-her-name’s place? Morrison—I argued with you how—how the tropics aren’t healthy?”
“God bless me!” Findlay ejaculated. “The doctor! Healthy?” He exploded into a roar of laughter. “Sure looks as if they ain’t healthy for you!”