By that time we had reached the water and there, stepping into a splendid, eight-oared barge, I saw Sir Peter Hawkshaw. He caught sight of us at the same moment, and the change in Giles Vernon’s manner was what might have been expected. He was even more modest and deferential than I, as we advanced.
“Here you are!” pleasantly cried the admiral to me. “You ran away so fast t’other day, that I had no chance to give you any directions, and I scarcely expected you to turn up to-day. However, I shall now take you to the ship. Mr. Vernon, I have room for you.”
“Thank you, sir,” responded Giles very gratefully, “but I have a pressing engagement on shore—a matter of important business—” at which I saw the suspicion of a grin on the admiral’s homely old face. He said little to me until we were in the great cabin of the Ajax. For myself, I can only say that I was so awed by the beauty, the majesty, the splendor of one of the finest ships of the line in the world, that I was dumb with delight and amazement. Once in the cabin, the admiral asked me about my means and my outfit. I burst out with the whole story of what occurred in the haberdasher’s shop, at which Sir Peter looked very solemn, and lectured me upon the recklessness of my conduct in ordering things with no money to pay for them, and followed it up with an offer to fit me out handsomely. This I accepted with the utmost gratitude, and in a day or two I found myself established as one of his Majesty’s midshipmen in the cockpit of the Ajax, and I began to see life.
II
My introduction into the cockpit of the Ajax was pretty much that of every other reefer in his Majesty’s navy. I was, of course, told that I showed the most brazen presumption in daring to wish to enter the naval service; that I ought to be a choir boy at St. Paul’s; that haymaking was my profession by nature, to say nothing of an exchange of black eyes and bloody noses with every midshipman of my size in the cockpit. Through all this Giles Vernon was my chief tormentor and best friend. He proclaimed the fact of my drysalting ancestry, and when I imprudently reminded him that I was the grandson of a baronet, he gave me one kick for the drysalter and two for the baronet. He showed me a battered old cocked hat hung up on a nail in the steerage country.
“Do you see that hat, you young rapscallion?” he asked.
I replied that I did, and a shocking bad hat it was, too.
“That hat was once the property of that old pirate and buccaneer, Sir Peter Hawkshaw, Vice-Admiral of the White. It is named after him, and whenever his conduct displeases the junior officers on this ship,—which it generally does,—that hat, dear boy, is kicked and cursed as a proxy for your respected great-uncle. Now understand: your position in the cockpit is that of this hat. In fact, you will take the hat’s place,”—which I found to be true, and I was called to account every day for some part of the conduct of Admiral Hawkshaw, although I did not see him twice in the week.
Mr. Buxton, our first lieutenant, was a fine officer, and celebrated for licking midshipmen into shape; and if I learned my duty quickly, he, rather than I, deserves the credit.
My experience of other ships convinces me that the juniors in the Ajax were clever fellows; but Giles Vernon was undoubtedly the smartest officer among them and cock of the walk between decks. He had innumerable good qualities, but the beggarly virtue of prudence was not among them. He had, however, another virtue in a high degree,—a daring and invincible courage. That, and his smartness as an officer, made Mr. Buxton his friend, and caused many of his peccadilloes to be overlooked.