CHAPTER XVI.
AN EXCURSION TO KLAMPENBORG AND ELSINORE.
Peaks sat near the brig and read his book, which he had procured from the librarian in anticipation of a dull and heavy afternoon. Clyde sat in his cage, watching the boatswain. The book was evidently a very interesting one, for the reader hardly raised his eyes from it for a full hour, and then only to bestow a single glance upon the occupant of the ship’s prison. The volume was Peter Simple, and the boatswain relished the adventures of the hero. Once in a while his stalwart frame was shaken by an earthquake of laughter, for he had a certain sense of dignity which did not permit him to laugh outright all alone by himself, and so the shock was diffused through all his members, and his body quaked like that of a man in the incipient throes of a fever and ague fit. The magnanimous conduct of O’Brien, who flogged Peter for seasickness, simply because he loved him, proved to be almost too much for the settled plan of the boatswain, and it was with the utmost difficulty that he restrained an outbreak of laughter.
For a full quarter of an hour Clyde convinced himself that he was entirely satisfied with the situation. The brig was not a bad place, or, at least, it would not be, if the boatswain would only leave the steerage and allow the prisoner to be by himself. He wished very much to try the carpenter’s saw upon the slats of his prison. At the end of the second quarter of an hour, the Briton was slightly nervous; the close of the third found him rather impatient, and at the expiration of an hour, he was decidedly provoked with Peaks for staying where he was so long. When the stout sentinel glanced at him, he flattered himself with a transitory hope; but the boatswain only changed his position slightly, and still appeared to be as deeply absorbed as ever in the book.
Clyde was disgusted, and emphatically angry at the end of another half hour. The brig was a vile place, and putting a free-born Briton into such a den was the greatest indignity which had yet been offered to him. It was even worse than ordering him to be silent, or to go forward. It was an insult which required both redress and vengeance. He rose from his seat, and walked to the door of his prison, but with his gaze still fixed upon his jailer. He had come to the conclusion that, if he moved, Peaks would, at least, look at him; but that worthy did not raise his eyes from his book. Clyde took hold of the barred door and began to shake it, making considerable noise by the act. Peaks took no notice whatever of him, and it seemed just as though the boatswain intended to insult him by thus disregarding him. He shook the door again with more violence, but did not succeed in attracting the attention of his custodian. Then he began to kick the door. Making a run of the length of the brig, he threw himself against it with all the force he could, hoping to break it down; but he might as well have butted against the side of the ship. It yielded a little, and rattled a great deal; but it was too strong to be knocked down in any such manner.
The prisoner was boiling over with wrath, as much because Peaks did not notice him, as on account of the indignity of his confinement. He kicked, wrenched, and twisted at the door, till he had nearly exhausted his own strength, apparently without affecting that of the door. The boatswain still read, and still shook with suppressed laughter at the funny blunders and situations of Peter Simple. He had seen just such fellows as Clyde in the brig; had seen them behave just as the present prisoner did; and he had learned that it was better to let them have their own way till they were satisfied, for boys are always better satisfied when they solve such problems for themselves.
“I’m not going to stay in this place!” howled Clyde, when he had wasted all his powers upon the obstinate door.
“No?”
The boatswain happened to be at the end of a chapter in his book, and he closed the volume, uttering only the single negative participle, with the interrogative inflection, as he glanced at his charge in the brig.
“No, I’m not!” roared Clyde, rousing from his seat, upon which he had dropped in sheer exhaustion, and throwing himself desperately against the unyielding door. “I won’t stay in here any longer!”