"Did you know Thomas Matson of his majesty's ship Spit-Fire?" asked the lieutenant.
"Tom Matson!" cried Fernando. "Indeed I did sir, and do still! and there is not a man in the British navy I am prouder of knowing." Of course he had never heard of Thomas Matson until this moment.
"You don't say, sir?" said the lieutenant in astonishment. "Has he any chance of promotion, sir?"
"Promotion!" cried Fernando, in well-feigned astonishment. "Why, have you not heard that he is already in command of a ship? You cannot possibly have heard from him lately, or you would have known that!"
"That's true, sir; I have not heard from him since he quitted the Black Cloud in the South, I think they said for his health; but how did he get the step?"
"Why, as to the promotion, that was remarkable enough," said Fernando, quaffing off a tumbler of champagne to aid his inventive faculties; but Fernando, despite his native shrewdness and wonderful inventive powers, was liable to get into trouble. He knew as little about a ship as a landlubber might be supposed to know, and his companion saw at once that he would make a mess of the story, so he came to his rescue by informing the assembly that a fine vocalist at the other end of the room was going to sing, and asked that the story be deferred until after the song. They all hurried away save Fernando, who, overcome by too deep potations, sank upon a sofa temporarily unconscious.
He was roused from his stupor by his companion shaking him and saying:
"Fernando, me boy, it's a divil's own mess ye are makin' of this! Wake up and get out!"
He roused himself and looked about. The room they were in was a small apartment off the great saloon, and through the half-open folding-door, he could see that the festivities still continued. The music and gay forms of dancers reminded him where he was.
"Fernando, we've played this game jist as long as we can, successfully; we had better go."