“Dat is imposserbul,” answered Josh; “derefore I says it is n't true. I surposes you know dat what is imposserbul is n't true, Simon. Nobody can't be out yonder and down here at de same time. Dat is imposserble, Simon. But what I wants to intermate to you, will explain all dis difficulty; and it do show de raal super'ority of a coloured man over de white poperlation. Now, you mark my words, cook, and be full of admiration! Jack Tier came back along wid de Mexican gentle'em, in my anchor-watch, dis very night! You see, in de first place, ebbery t'ing come to pass in nigger's watch.”
Here the two dark-skinned worthies haw-haw'd to their heart's content; laughing very much as a magistrate or a minister of the gospel might be fancied to laugh, the first time he saw a clown at a circus. The merriment of a negro will have its course, in spite of ghosts, or of anything else; and neither the cook nor the steward dreamed of putting in another syllable, until their laugh was fairly and duly ended. Then the cook made his remarks.
“How Jack Tier comin' back explain der differculty, Josh?” asked Simon.
“Did n't Jack go away wid Miss Rose and de mate, in de boat dat got adrift, you know, in Jack's watch on deck?”
Here the negroes laughed again, their imaginations happening to picture to each, at the same instant, the mystification about the boat; Biddy having told Josh in confidence, the manner in which the party had returned to the brig, while he and Simon were asleep; which fact the steward had already communicated to the cook. To these two beings, of an order in nature different from all around them, and of a simplicity and of habits that scarce placed them on a level with the intelligence of the humblest white man, all these circumstances had a sort of mysterious connection, out of which peeped much the most conspicuously to their faculties, the absurdity of the captain's imagining that a boat had got adrift, which had, in truth, been taken away by human hands. Accordingly, they laughed it out; and when they had done laughing, they returned again to the matter before them with renewed interest in the subject.
“Well, how all dat explain dis differculty?” repeated Simon.
“In dis wery manner, cook,” returned the steward, with a little dignity in his manner. “Ebbery t'ing depend on understandin', I s'pose you know. If Mr. Mulford got taken off dat rock by Miss Rose and Jack Tier, wid de boat, and den dey comes here altogedder; and den Jack Tier, he get on board and tell Biddy all dis matter, and den Biddy tell Josh, and den Josh tell de cook—what for you surprise, you black debbil, one bit?”
“Dat all!” exclaimed Simon.
“Dat just all—dat ebbery bit of it, do n't I say.”
Here Simon burst into such a fit of loud laughter, that it induced Spike himself to shove aside the galley-door, and thrust his own frowning visage into the dark hole within, to inquire the cause.