“Yes, sir.”
“Tut, tut, tut! and the heat was maddening. Terribly irritating, too; I felt excessively angry. I really—dear me, Mr Herrick, I’m afraid I spoke very unjustly to you, and—I—ought a captain to apologise to a midshipman?”
“I really don’t know, sir,” I said, feeling quite mollified by his tone.
“Well, I think I do,” he said, smiling. “Decidedly not. As Mr Reardon would say, it would be totally subversive of discipline. It couldn’t be done. But one gentleman can of course apologise to another, and I do so most heartily. My dear Mr Herrick, I beg your pardon for being so unjust.”
“Pray don’t say any more about it, sir,” I cried.
“Well, no, I will not. But all the same I am very sorry—as a gentleman—that I—as your superior officer—spoke to you as I did.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“And, dear me, my lad, you look terribly hot and exhausted. Let me prescribe, as Mr Price would say.”
He quickly placed a lump of ice in a tumbler, and, after pouring in a little sherry, filled it up with soda-water.
I grasped the glass, and drank with avidity the cool, refreshing draught to the last drop.