Frank glanced at his brother. He was beginning to suspect that Captain Royal was having some fun at their expense. The old man rattled on.
"The rhinoceros finally swam out to sea again and I was able to come down. I lived on that island for half a year, hoping that my warship would come back, but it never did. So I made myself a raft and loaded it up with water and fruit and finally sailed away. It took me more than a month of steady sailing before I finally reached land off the coast of South America. By jing, I was glad when I saw the Andes Mountains again. I landed at a port where there was a ship, and I'm swizzled if it wasn't my own boat."
"Your own boat!"
"Yes sir. I could hardly believe my eyes. So I come on board, and they were going to throw me off."
"Why?" asked Chet, in surprise.
"They didn't know me. You see, I hadn't been able to shave when I was on the island, and I'd grown a beard. So nobody knew me and they wouldn't believe me when I said I was their captain. But I told them to lend me a pair of scissors and a razor and I took off that beard and stepped out on deck, and by jing they all saluted me then, I can tell you. I made the quartermaster walk the plank and we all sailed back to San Francisco."
"That was quite an adventure," said Frank politely.
"Oh, I've had many things happen to me. I've been in a lot of battles, too. Of course, I've retired from the navy now, for there isn't the excitement nowadays."
"Were you in the Spanish-American war?" asked Chet.
"I was all through it from start to finish. I had a narrow escape during that war. I took my ship out one night off the Philippines to see if I could catch a Spanish warship that I'd heard was in the neighborhood, and we sighted her just about midnight, not half a mile away. So we pumped a couple of shots over her keel and she turned and went steaming away to the north. Well, I gave chase, but the Spaniard was fast and it was three hours before we came alongside. We were just going to board the ship when the steward came up to me and said some other boats were coming up. There was. Five of 'em. All Spanish."