The chief engineer, Garrity, replied dourly with, "Did ye think I'd be leavin' my post in midflight, Captain Hanson?"
And the black gang foreman merely said, "Very well, sir!"
Lancelot Biggs was still muttering to himself. I was beginning to get worried about Biggs. He had a bad case of water on the brain, apparently.
He kept saying, "Nile? Red? Saar?"
Cap Hanson had finished his calls. Anyway, that's what he thought. Thaxton thought differently.
"If you don't mind, Captain," he reminded him. "Give the same message to the chief steward. We don't want any mess-boys or waiters interrupting our little tête-à-tête. Too many cooks, you know—" And he grinned.
"Ha!" growled the skipper. "Ha! I'd gladly laugh at your funeral, Thaxton."
But he called the mess hall, and the voice of our Cockney steward, Doug Enderby, drifted back over the audio cheerfully.
"Aye, sir! Stay put, sir? Right as ryne!"
Then we all jumped. Because a great shout broke from the scrawny throat of Lancelot Biggs.