The man who had stirred in his hammock rolled over on to his back, stretched his arms and then sat up, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. 'Wot, drinking again, Emilio?' he said to the Italian. 'Gawd! don't yer never stop drinkin'?' He peered down at the bottle. 'Cognac, eh? Where did you get that? Bet yer've ripped open one of them cases.'
The Italian smiled. 'You like a drink, Ruppy?'
'Don't mind if I do,' the bos'n grinned. 'But Gawd 'elp yer if the skipper finds yer bin at the cargo. Mulligan ain't pertic'lar wot 'e does ter blokes that get in 'is 'air. All right. I know you're pretty quick with that knife o' yours. But 'e got a gun, ain't 'e?'
The Italian's bald skull cracked in a grin that showed the white gleam of his perfect teeth. 'Signer Mulligan, he is on deck, yes? He not come down here. The stink, it is too much for him.' And he laughed silently.
'Well, it's your funeral, mate.' Ruppy swung his legs out of the hammock and slid to the floor. He buttoned his jersey into his trousers and pressed both hands into his belly as though thrusting his guts into place. He suffered from hernia — that was why he was called Ruppy. He was thin and scrawny with the face of a turtle and an Adam's apple that moved up and down in his scraggy neck as he swallowed. A two days' growth of sparse, grey stubble grew out of the seamed dirt of chin and neck. He brought out an enamel mug and filled it half full from the bottle. 'Well, 'ere's to the bleedin' perisher wot pays through the nose fer short measure on them cases.' He wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his jersey and looked down at me, swaying gently to the motion of the ship. 'S'ppose you're trying to get up enough courage ter go ashore, eh?' The sneer was unconcealed. 'Why the hell didn't yer stay in Italy? That's where your sort belong. All right. I know why yer shipped a't o' Naples. You had ter, that's why. Soon as there weren't no British Army, the Ities got nasty an' turned on yer. Don't blame 'em, niever. Runnin' away — reckon that's all you ever done.'
Anger surged up in me again, drumming at my temples. I banged my glass down and jumped to my feet. He was such an insignificant, wizened little object. What right had he to sneer at me? I felt my hand clench. With one blow I could smash him against the steel of the bulkhead.
That's right — go on, 'it me.' His watery eyes peered up at me. 'Go on,' he cried again, "it me, why don't yer? Ain't yer even got the guts ter do that?' he sneered as I lowered my fist. 'No — afraid of Mulligan. That's what it is. You've always bin afraid o' something, ain't yer?'
'What do you know about what makes men afraid?' I cried.
'As much as most men,' he snapped back. 'I did me time in the Army, didn't I? Three years before the war and then Dunkirk and fru the desert to Alamein. Wasn't my fault, was it, that I got a rupture an' they slung me out?'
'Sure you done your time,' I said.