“Nonsense!” exclaimed his British cousin. “We are to get you out of this in some way.”
“How are you to get me out of it? That’s the question,” replied Gregory. “It is not so easy a thing as you seem to imagine.”
“I don’t know just how: I had not considered that. We can’t very well make the plan till we see the situation.”
“There is no situation about it, Phil. After the vessel comes to anchor, I shall be sent on board of the Josephine, and that will be the end of it.”
“Don’t croak, Dave!” protested Sir Philip, with some impatience in his manner. “The health officer will have to see you and Clinch when he visits the ship, just as they do in those bloody ports up the Mediterranean, where I spent my last vacation. After that, we can fix things all right.”
“I don’t believe you can,” added Gregory dubiously. “If we wait till that time, it will be all up with me.”
“Not at all! I will tell you just how I will do it now, for I am beginning to get an idea,” continued the Briton. “You are about my size, and don’t look very unlike me. I shall pretend I have an ague, or a cold in the head, or something of that kind. After I have said good-by to the ladies and others, I will conceal myself in some part of the vessel. Then you will put on my mackintosh, cap, and muffler. You will cover your face, so that they will not know it is not I, and get into the boat, which we will have at the steps of the gangway beforehand. It shall be a shore-boat, and no one will know any thing about the little trick.”
Sir Philip Grayner rubbed his hands as though he was delighted with the ingenuity of the plan he had devised, and he thought it was very “clever.”
“What will you do?” asked Gregory, who thought the plan might work.
“When you have had time to put yourself into a safe place, I will show myself. Of course they will be surprised to see me; and I shall be obliged to confess that I have played a bit of a Yankee trick upon them.”