"I don't," said the boy. "I said I'd try and act like a man."
"Then why don't yer hack like a man?" cried the sailor. "You're a-gettin' on: some o' these days you'll be skipper of a big craft o' your own, and you promised I should be your bo'sun; and here you goes and hacks like that. Why! big as I am, I wouldn't go an' hurt a little thing like this, for a golden king's crown.—Would I, my pretty?"
"No, 'Jack,'" said Dot seriously; "I'm sure you wouldn't. And it's very cruel of Bob."
"That's right, my dear; so it is; and I just tell him if he don't stick to his word like a young gent should, him and me ain't going to be messmates no more."
The Skipper's conscience was very busy again, but, he wouldn't show his trouble, and, he tried to turn it off by saying rapidly—
"Won't do so any more—won't do so any more," three times.
"Don't sound to me as if you was sorry," growled the man. "I heered what your father says to you, and he knows, and he's the finest gentleman in all Her Majesty's Service. On'y wish I'd got such a father."
"What nonsense, 'Jack'!" cried the Skipper; "why! you're too big, isn't he, Dot?"
"Yes," said the girl, "he does seem to be very big to have a father."
"Well, I ain't a wery little un, am I, my pretty?" said the sailor, chuckling. "But, you allus mind, and do what your father tells you, Master Bob."