“And your flag?”
“Half-mast.”
“Half-mast––that’s it. I hope you’ll never have to fly a half-masted flag, Johnnie. But suppose you did see them, and they were in shoal water, say––and the shoals to looard, of course, and it blowing–––”
“I’d stand in and get them.”
“And it blowing hard––blowing hard, Johnnie?––and shoal––shoal water?”
“Why”––Johnnie was looking troubled––“why, I’d have to stand in just the same, wouldn’t I?”
“Your own men and you ask me, Johnnie-boy?”
“Why, of course I’d have to stand in and get them.”
“And if you got in so far you couldn’t get out––you got smothered, say?”