“That?” said Sydney, smiling, as one who knows better smiles at the ignorant. “Why, Strake, that was the purser.”
“Poof!” ejaculated the boatswain, with a smothered laugh. “Who told you that, sir?”
“That midshipman who brought us off in the boat.”
“A flam, sir, a flam. He was making game of you. That’s the first luff.”
“What a shame!” thought Syd, and then he fell a thinking about the orders he gave him—not to quarrel with his messmates. “And I’m sure to quarrel as soon as I go down. No, I will not. He may say what he likes.”
“You speak, sir?” said the bo’sun.
“No, Strake, I was thinking.”
“Here, you’re wanted below, I think,” said one of the warrant officers, coming up and speaking to the ex-gardener.
“Who wants me?”
“That’s your boy, isn’t it, that you brought aboard?”