“Where are you going, my joker?” said he. “You seem to be having a good time of it!”
“Jist goin’ a message fur the bosun,” stammered he. “He sent me to ax the gunner, sir, fur a copy o’ the mornin’ paper.”
“That’s a bouncer,” rejoined the ‘Jaunty,’ who, no doubt, was up to such tricks. “Why, you’re going away from the gunner’s cabin and not towards it, as you very well know. You just stop here and show these new boys how to clean up the mess-table.”
“Yes, sir,” replied the boy very humbly; and then a grin came over his face as he looked at the empty plates, like as the master-at-arms had done previously, asking demurely, “Shall I show ’em where to chuck the scraps, sir?”
“Yes, if you can find them,” answered the ‘Jaunty’ shortly. “It strikes me, Larrikins, you’ll soon be on short allowance yourself if you don’t keep a better hold on your tongue! Let me see these mess-tables all cleared up before I come back from the wardroom, or you’ll smell powder before Six Bells, I promise you, and shan’t go ashore to-day.”
This threat had the effect of sobering down our lively friend, who then put us in the way of what we were to do; and, all of us lending willing hands, we soon had the place as trim as it was before we had sat down to our dinners.
After this, taking the dirty plates back to the galley, we washed all of them up in a bucket of water and restored them to their proper racks, returning to the entry-port just as the master-at-arms came sauntering back along the deck from the officers’ quarters aft.
“Ha, done that job all right, I see,” said he in an approving tone. “Now, let me see what we can find for you, to keep your hands out of mischief. Corporal, have they told off any hands yet to clear the bilge?”
“Yes, sir,” replied one of the ship’s corporals who had just come up the forward hatchway from the lower deck. “I jest heered the bosun givin’ orders for a gang to go down on the orlop deck.”
“Then, take th’s lot of new boys with you and show them the way down. They’re almost enough to man the pumps all by themselves!”