"There's a cyclone cellar for you, Florrie, below the water line. If we're fired upon jump down, and don't come up until called, or until water comes in."
Then he went to his room for the extra store of cartridges he had secreted, but found them gone. Angrily returning to Florrie, he asked for her supply; and she, too, searched, and found nothing. But both their weapons were fully loaded.
"Well," he said, philosophically, as they returned to the deck, "they only guaranteed us the privilege of carrying arms. I suppose they feel justified from their standpoint."
But on deck they found something to take their minds temporarily off the loss. Sampson, red in the face, was vociferating down the engine-room hatch.
"Come up here," he said, loudly and defiantly. "Come up here and prove it, if you think you're a better man than I am. Come up and square yourself, you flannel-mouthed mick."
The "flannel-mouthed mick," in the person of Riley, white of face rather than red, but with eyes blazing and mouth set in an ugly grin, climbed up.
It was a short fight—the blows delivered by Sampson, the parrying done by Riley—and ended with a crashing swing on Riley's jaw that sent him to the deck, not to rise for a few moments.
"Had enough?" asked Sampson, triumphantly. "Had enough, you imitation of an ash cat? Oh, I guess you have. Think it out."
He turned and met Jenkins, who had run aft from the bridge.
"Now, Sampson, this'll be enough of this."