“Oh yes; I felt that, sir. It went between us. But it’s no use to take no notice o’ misses.”
“Well?” I said; for one of the men behind me now touched my arm, and I found it was Bob Saunders.
“We’re getting dead down at the head, sir; hadn’t we better begin stowing aft?”
“Yes, yes, of course,” I said excitedly, and feeling annoyed that I had not thought of this myself.
“Then, if you’ll make the lads ease off to starboard and port, sir, we’ll soon pack a row of these here little bales between ’em. Or look here, sir! how would it be to bring ’em a bit amidships, and let us begin right astarn, and build up a sort o’ bulwark o’ bales? They could fire from behind it when we’d done.”
“Yes, capital!” I cried, once more annoyed with myself because I, a mere boy, had not the foresight of an experienced man.
“No, no,” I cried the next moment. “How could we get at the tiller?”
“You won’t want no tiller, sir; we can row aboard easy enough, once we get out o’ this fiddling little drain.”
“You are right, Saunders,” I said. “Go on.”