“Oh yes; that was only one of his fits. They come and go.”
“And how’s Mr Burgess?”
“Pretty well right again. Come up. Have the glass. You can see another island astern, one of the little ones, and I think we are going to have one of these lovely tropic sunsets, same as we had last night when you wouldn’t come and see it.”
“How can a fellow situated as I am care for sunsets?”
“Just in the same way as he can care for sunrises if he’s awake early enough. Oh, do pitch all that up! It has all gone by. But I see how it is. You think that you made a mistake, and that everybody will be ready to laugh at you.”
“And so they will,” cried Fitz passionately. “I can never show my face on deck again.”
“Ha, ha!” laughed Poole. “Well, you are a rum chap, fancying a thing like that. Why, my father’s too much of a gentleman ever to notice it again, and I’m sure old grumpy Burgess wouldn’t, from what he said to me when I was telling him all about it afterwards.”
“What!” cried Fitz, flashing out. “You went down tale-bearing to the mate like that?”
“There you go again! I didn’t go tale-bearing. He’d heard about it from one of the men, and next time I took him his quinine he began questioning me.”
“And what did he say?” cried Fitz fiercely.