“Sure, an’ it’s a way we have in the ould counthry,” said Charley, putting on the brogue so easily that it seemed natural to him—which indeed it was, as he was born not twenty miles from Cork, in the neighbourhood of which is situated the far-famed “Blarney stone,” that is supposed to endow those who kiss it with the “gift of the gab;” and Charley must have “osculated it,” as a Yankee would say, to some purpose.
“Be jabers, thin, ye spalpeen,” laughed Tom—who had got out of his grumpy state quickly enough; for his disposition was almost as light-hearted as that of his friend, and it was only the heat and the confinement on board ship when in harbour that had previously oppressed his spirits—“let us look smart, and be off. Here’s that fellow Tompkins just coming up the side, and I don’t want any more of his company than I can help! Tell him we’re going by the captain’s permission, Charley. I don’t want to say a word to him after that row this morning. You are still on speaking terms with him, and I’m not. And while you are settling matters with the old sneak, I’ll get the dinghy ready, and fetch up the bottle of brandy I promised that jolly old Turk at the coffee-shop.”
“You’d better water it a bit, Tom,” said Charley, as the other was diving down the companion-stairs. “It’s awfully strong; and you know Mohammedans are not accustomed to it.”
“Not a drop of it, my boy,” replied he, disappearing for a moment from view, and his voice receding in the distance. “I promised the old infidel that he should have the real stuff, and I’ll let him see that a giaour can keep his word.”
In a second or two he came up again, the bottle, however, concealed in the pocket of his reefer of light blue serge. And hauling in the painter of the boat, which was floating astern, while Charley was still confabulating with the second officer, who had come on board in the meantime, he sat himself down in her, and waited patiently till his chum had done with the obnoxious Mr Tompkins, who seemed to have a good deal to say, and that of a not very pleasant character. “Bother the chap!” said Charley, when he was at length released, and, shinning down a rope, sat down in the stern-sheets of the dinghy, as Tom Aldridge took up the sculls and shoved off from the ship. “He’s got as much to say as Noah’s great-grandmother. And the gist of it all, fault-finding, of course.”
“What can you expect from a pig, eh?” said Tom, philosophically, when the boat was well clear of the Muscadine, setting to work leisurely and pulling to shore, while Charley reclined at his ease on the cushions which he had taken the trouble to fix up for himself, and—did nothing, as usual.
It was the general sort of “division of labour” amongst them.
However, they were fast friends, and, as Tom didn’t complain, nobody else has any right to find fault.
“A grunt, I suppose,” replied Charley, in answer to Tom’s conundrum. “At least, from a Welsh pig, like Tompkins. An Irish one, bedad! would have better manners.”
“Bravo, Charley!” exclaimed Tom, bursting out into a laugh in which his companion as heartily joined. “You stick to your country, at all events, which is more than can be said for our leek-eating friend. He always wishes to deny that he belongs to the land of the Cymri and hails from Swansea, as he does. The sneak! I’m sure a decent Welshman would be ashamed to own him. But, don’t let us worry ourselves any longer about Tompkins; it’s bad enough to have him with us on board, without lugging him ashore, too; hang him!”