A young sailor was on duty at the door of the Marconi-room, standing sentinel, with rifle and fixed bayonet. It was evident that he had not been prepared for warlike uses, and his expression also was a fixed one, full of woe. His mates, passing, grinned at him openly; small cabin-boys and junior stewards peeped round corners and jeered at him, beseeching him not to let his bayonet go off. Like Casabianca, he stood at his post, but without enthusiasm.
“It would be interesting to see him if any one tried to get in to the wireless,” said Jim. “I’m sure he wouldn’t run away, but he’d be much more likely to damage himself than the intruder with that toothpick of his; I don’t believe he ever handled one before.”
“Who would want to get in, anyhow?” Wally inquired, lazily.
“No one, that I know of,” Jim answered. “It would bore most people stiff to be kept in the Marconi-room for ten minutes. Still, they can’t make rules for one ship alone, and there may be Germans on board any ship, able to use the instrument. I suppose if we were on a crowded boat, with a few suspects with foreign accents scattered among the passengers, we’d think all the precautions highly desirable; it’s only because we’re on this peaceful old tub that they seem unnecessary.”
“I wouldn’t mind their having sentries all over the ship, if they wanted to—but I’m beginning to feel I would chance any number of Germans for the sake of fresh air!” said Norah, ruefully. “It’s bad enough to have your cabin shut up from dusk until you’re in bed—but at least you don’t stay in it. The rest of the ship just gets stifling.”
“You see,” said Wally, “if you shut up a ship, you shut so many assorted smells into her—engine-rooms, cooks’ galley, saloon, cabins, and people, with a sort of top-dressing of new paint, hot oil, and wash-up water. Then the gentle aroma of tallow, from the holds, works up through the lot. Then you don’t breathe any more.”
“You wish you didn’t, at any rate,” responded Norah, laughing.
“It beats me, how some of the passengers seem to thrive on it,” Jim remarked. “Look how they sit in the lounge at night, half of ’em smoking, and every chink shut up, and play bridge. I’ve come to the conclusion that they’re made of sterner stuff than we are.”
“Well, we can’t help it—it’s because we live in the open all the year round. A stuffy house is bad enough, but a stuffy ship—ugh!” Norah grimaced, with expression, if not with elegance. “Let’s be thankful we can live on deck most of the time; it’s always lovely there.”
“This is where you hail me as your benefactor, by the way,” Jim observed. “The little cabin next yours is empty; I’ve arranged with your steward for you to use it as a dressing-room in the evenings, and then you needn’t have a light in your own cabin at all—and the port needn’t be shut.”