There is no need to describe Joshua's wedding, or to tell how some of the officers and a goodly proportion of the ship's company attended the ceremony, how Pincher performed his duties as 'best man,' and how the commander himself was prevailed upon to make a speech and to drink the health of the happy couple in grocers' port wine. It all went off like a house on fire; but at the tea-party afterwards Pincher seemed rather distracted.
''Ullo, chum!' the beaming bridegroom asked him, 'wot's up wi' yer? You've got a face on yer like a sea-boot.'
'I'm just thinkin' somethin',' Pincher explained.
'Thinkin' wot?' Joshua wanted to know. 'Wot an 'appy hoccasion this is, or wot?'
'No, 'ardly that.'
'Wot is it, then?'
'I wus thinkin' that now you've gorn an' married Missis Figgins you are Hemmeline's farther, ain't yer?'
'S'pose I am,' Billings assented, scratching his head, for the question had not occurred to him before. 'Leastways, 'er step-farther.'
'An' s'pose I marries Hemmeline, wot relation are yer to me?'
'You ain't arsked my leaf to court 'er,' Joshua pointed out. 'An' s'pose yer does, I don't know as 'ow I shall give my consent. These haffairs is important—see? I'll 'ave ter hinquire as ter yer prospex, an' suchlike. Supposin' yer wusn't respeccable?'