"Now then to make ourselves cozie," observed the captain, drawing his chair a little closer to Mrs. Curtis. "Pray, Mim, how d'ye feel your dear self this evening?—is it in good spirits ye are, Mim?"
"Thank you, captain," returned Mrs. Curtis, "I am quite well—but the least, least thing nervous. This strange kind of life we're leading——"
"Strange, Mim!" ejaculated the captain: "it's glor-r-ious!"
"Glorious, indeed!" cried Frank. "I only wish the Marquis of Shoreditch was here along with us—how he would enjoy himself!"
"You will permit me, Mim!" said the captain, grasping the bottle of whiskey, and addressing the lady in an insinuating manner.
"Now, really, captain—if I must take a very leetle drop——" began Mrs. Curtis, with a simper.
"Well, my dear madam, it shall be the leetlest dhrop in the wor-rld, and so wake that a baby of a month old might dhrink it and niver so much as thrip up as it walked across the room," exclaimed O'Blunderbuss, whose knowledge of the physical capacities of infants was evidently somewhat vague and limited. "There, Mim!" he added, placing before the lady a large tumbler, the contents of which were equal portions of spirit and water: "you may tell me I'm a Dutchman and unwor-rthy of ould Ireland, if that isn't the purtiest dhrink iver brewed for one of the fair six."
"You're very kind, captain," said Mrs. Curtis, in a mincing—simpering manner.
"It's you that's kind to say so, Mim," remarked the captain, placing his foot close to that of the lady, and ascertaining by the readiness with which she returned the pedal pressure, that the tender intimation he wished thereby to convey was by no means unwelcome.
Frank did not of course notice what was going on under the table, and the conversation progressed in the usual manner—the captain and Frank vieing with each other in telling the most monstrous lies, and the silent interchange of love's tokens continuing with increasing warmth between the gallant gentleman and the stout lady. Mrs. Curtis's spirits, however, seemed to require a more than ordinary amount of stimulant on this occasion: she declared herself to be "very low," although she contrived to laugh a great deal at the captain's lively sallies and marvellous stories;—but as the clock struck midnight and she rose to retire to her chamber, she found that the three glasses of toddy which she had been persuaded to imbibe, had somewhat unsettled the gravity of her equilibrium. The captain sprang from his seat to open the parlour-door for her; and as he bade her "good night," she pressed his hand with a degree of tenderness which, as novel-writers say, spoke volumes.