At this Jack stood upright at “attention” and saluted the captain. Each knew what that meant. It was Jack’s way of thanking the captain, who knew him perfectly well, for not betraying him.
“There is one thing, though, my conscience would require me to do if I should meet Bell,” continued Captain Forrester. “It is to land him here where he can be watched, that he can’t get away to enlist in the rebel navy, army, or marine corps. If King George can’t have his services, the rebels sha’n’t.”
Jack’s face was a study in its intense disappointment, but in a little while he seemed to submit to the inevitable.
“Well, sir,” he said, “Jack’s pretty old now—goin’ on to sixty—and he ain’t wuth his salt, excep’ as a foremast man on a man-o’-war. So neither King George nor Ameriky ain’t losin’ much. He’d ’a’ liked to jine the navy, but as for the marines, poor Jack Bell wouldn’t trust hisself with them murderin’ marines.”
“The Jack Bell I know always hated the marines,” said Captain Forrester with a smile.
“I reckon he do still,” calmly remarked Jack. “And as for fightin’ on dry land—why, sir, he’d git so tired runnin’ about he never could do no fightin’. Landsmen instid o’ fightin’ at close quarters fights over forty or fifty acres and does more walkin’ than fightin’, I’m thinkin’.”
“Well, then,” said Captain Forrester, “to leave Jack Bell and come to your own affairs. When I land you to-morrow morning I shall ask the authorities to give you the run of the town of Newport, but not to let you go outside. I think I can contrive it through the admiral, who is my friend. And how about this youngster here?”
“That brat, axin’ your parding, sir, is the son o’ the Widow Stubbs at Newport—a excellent woman, and a good hand at book-larnin’, as well as at the spinnin’ wheel. Her husband was killed in one o’ the fust scrimmages o’ the war, and this ’ere brat, he run away to jine the ’Merican navy and was took on the Betsey along with me. I knowed his mother well, and I’ve kinder kep’ my eye on the young one. He is a right handy sort o’ boy, and he can sing a lot o’ chunes I’ve larned him. He can sing all the old songs and two or three ‘Tid re I’s’ I’ve set him.”
“Pipe up, youngster,” said the captain; “I’d like to hear one of the old songs again. Give me ‘When the Wind at Night Whistles o’er the Deep.’”
Little Dicky Stubbs looked scared to death. His mouth came open, but no sound issued. Jack Bell, giving him a nudge that nearly broke his ribs, whispered:—