Chapter Thirty Three.
Tom Tully acts as Guide.
Lieutenant Lipscombe’s eye had grown rapidly better, and his temper rapidly worse. He had grumbled at Chips for being so long over his task of repairing the deck and hatchway, and Chips had responded by leaving off to sharpen his tools, after which he had diligently set traps to catch his superior officer, who never went near the carpenter without running risks of laming himself by treading upon nails half buried in the deck, or being knocked down by pieces of wood delicately poised upon one end so that the slightest touch would send them over with a crash.
Chips never trod upon the upright nails, cut himself against the tools, or touched the pieces of wood or planks to make them fall. He moved about slowly, like a bear, and somehow seemed to be charmed; but it was different with the lieutenant: he never went near to grumble without putting his foot straight upon the first upright clout-nail, or leaning his arm or hand upon some ticklishly-balanced piece of plank. The consequences were that he was several times a good deal hurt, and then Chips seemed exceedingly sorry, and said he was.
But the lieutenant forgot his little accidents next day, and went straight to the carpenter, bullied him again, and after bearing it for awhile Chips’s adze would become so blunt that he was obliged to go off to the grindstone, where he would stop for a couple of hours, a good deal of which time was spent in oiling the spindle before he began.
At last, though he was obliged to finish his task, and after waiting for the deck to be done as the time when he would go straight into harbour and report Hilary’s desertion, as he persisted in calling it, Lieutenant Lipscombe concluded that he would not go, but give the young officer a chance to come back.
Meanwhile he had cruised about, chased and boarded vessels without there being the slightest necessity, put in at one or two places where he heard rumours that the Young Pretender was expected to land off the coast somewhere close at hand, heard the report contradicted at the next place he touched at, and then went cruising up and down once more.
One day he chased and boarded a lugger that bore despatches from France to certain emissaries in England; but the lieutenant did not find the despatches, only some dried fish, which he captured and had conveyed on board the cutter.
His men grumbled, and said that Master Leigh ought to be found, and there was some talk of petitioning the lieutenant to form another expedition in search of the missing man; but the lieutenant had no intention of going ashore in the dark to get his men knocked about by invisible foes without the prospect of a grand haul of prize-money at the end; so he turned a deaf ear to all suggestions for such a proceeding, and kept on cruising up and down.