“Feelin' better?” he asked.
“Ye—aye, aye, sir.”
“Humph! Want to smoke again. Pipe right there on the thwart.”
“No, thank you, sir.”
It was some time before anything more was said. Josiah was gazing at the yellow sand-cliffs that, on every tack, grew nearer. At length the Captain again addressed him.
“Perez ever tell you 'bout our fust v'yage? Never did, hey? Well, I will. Him and me run away to sea together, you know.”
And then Captain Eri began a tale that caused the cold shivers to chase themselves from Josiah's big toe to the longest hair on his head. It was the story of two boys who ran away and shipped aboard an Australian sailing packet, and contained more first-class horrors than any one of his beloved dime novels. As a finishing touch the narrator turned back the grizzled hair on his forehead and showed a three-inch scar, souvenir of a first mate and a belaying pin. He rolled up his flannel shirtsleeve and displayed a slightly misshapen left arm, broken by a kick from a drunken captain and badly set by the same individual.
“Now,” he said in conclusion, “I cal'late you think I was pretty hard on you this mornin', but what do you figger that you'd have got if you talked to a mate the way you done to me?”
“Don't know. S'pose I'd have been killed,—sir.”
“Well, you would, mighty nigh, and that's a fact. Now, I'll tell you somethin' else. You wanted to enlist in the Navy, I understand. You couldn't git in the Navy, anyway, you're too young, but s'pose you could, what then? You'd never git any higher 'n a petty officer, 'cause you don't know enough. The only way to git into the Navy is to go through Annapolis, and git an education. I tell you, education counts. Me and Perez would have been somethin' more 'n cheap fishin' and coastin' skippers if we'd had an education; don't forgit that.”