The time seemed very long before the rattle and rumble of the stones on the trap-door struck upon Archy’s listening ear, but at last, after he had convinced himself that he might have worked two or three hours longer, there it was, and then came the rattle of the bolts and the sharp sound of the lock. Directly afterwards there was a soft glare, the lanthorn appeared like some creature of light swaying and floating towards him in the darkness till it stopped close by, and Ram’s now familiar voice exclaimed,—
“Hullo there! Getting hungry?”
“Yes,” said Archy, in a voice he wished to sound surly and obstinate, but which in spite of his wishes had a cheerful ring, which affected Ram, who began to laugh and chatter.
“Nice to be you,” he said. “Get all the good things, you do. Fried fish to-day, and pork pie. I say, midshipman, you have got into good quarters, you have.”
Archy tried to seem sulky.
“Oh, you needn’t talk without you like, but they didn’t feed you up aboard ship like you’re getting it now, I know; salt beef, then salt pork, and hard biscuits. Why, it’s like fattening up one of our pigs for Christmas. I say, you are quiet. Haven’t been at one of them little kegs, have you? Oh, very well; if you don’t like to talk, I can’t make you.”
“Are you going to let me out of this place?” said the midshipman, so as to keep up the idea of his longing to be set free, and chase any suspicions of his having discovered a way out.
“When I get orders, Mr Orsifer, and not before. I aren’t skipper, no more nor you are.”
“Another piece of insolence,” thought the prisoner. “Oh, how I will pay him out for this by and by!”
“Aren’t you going to peck?”