“Yes, with that part of the deck blown up and a dozen or so of wretched mutilated creatures lying about shrieking for help. Well, Dale, I dare say there is one of the bags somewhere about the cabins, but I don’t think you could use it.”
“Well, now you talk like that, I don’t think I should like to,” I said.
“I am sure you would not, boy. You and I could not fight that way. We must have a better way than that.”
We lay there trying to think out some plan for the rest of that day, sometimes talking to ourselves, sometimes with Mr Preddle joining in; but for the most part he could talk about nothing else but his own troubles, and about his fish, which he was sure were dying off rapidly, for no one, he said, could attend to them like he would himself.
“Unless it was you, Dale,” he whispered apologetically. “You certainly did seem to understand them almost as well as I did myself. Ah, I’d give almost anything to be out there attending to the poor little things, but I could not go at the cost that was proposed.”
He sighed very deeply, drew back, and the little hole was darkened directly after, for Mr Preddle had lain down to meditate upon the sufferings of his fish, and when I peeped through at him a few minutes later he was still meditating with his eyes shut and his mouth open, while a peculiar sound came at regular intervals from between his lips.
Mr Frewen looked at me inquiringly as I turned round.
“Sound asleep,” I whispered.
“Poor Mr Preddle,” said Mr Frewen, “he is a very good amiable fellow, but I think that you and I must make our plans, Dale, and call upon him to help when all is ready.”
I nodded, for I thought so too, and after listening for a few moments at the door, we came to the conclusion that there was nothing to mind about the sentries, so we proceeded to make our examination of our prison in a more determined way.