“Well, messmate,” said Harry Lang, “he arn’t here.”
Chapter Fifty.
Caesar finds the Key.
It was at the end of a desperate struggle, during which the brave little party of sailors had again and again driven their assailants back and repaired the defences of the two windows they held by dragging fresh pieces of furniture to their breastwork from other rooms, and they had now thrown themselves down, panting and exhausted, so as to recover what strength they could before another attack was made.
Nothing could have been better done, but as Tom May said, they wanted time.
“’Tain’t wittles and drink, Mr Murray, sir,” he said. “There’s been plenty o’ that, sir. I think we’ve all had too much. What we want is, as I says afore, time, sir, for it all to turn into strength.”
“Yes, Tom,” said the middy bitterly; “we are all completely exhausted—that is to say, you and all our brave fellows are.”
“Well, arn’t you too, sir? Seems to me as you’re much more zausted than we lads is.”