The four men looked askance at me with a certain coolness, and there was a pause.
I was sixteen and had recently been confirmed. People have told me that at that time I had a guileless and innocent appearance.
The pause, however, was not long. A few swallows from the glasses, a few puffs at the cigars, and the exchange of opinions was once more in full swing. A peculiar circumstance struck me, though: all the stories that were told I had already heard innumerable times, and for my part I found them comparatively flat. Smutty stories may, as is well known, be divided into two chief groups, one of which concentrates itself mostly about digestive processes and circumstances related to them, whereas, on the contrary, the other, which stands incomparably higher in degree, has preferably to do with woman. I and my schoolmates had long since left the former group behind us; I was therefore the more surprised to hear these mature gentlemen give it their liveliest interest, while the other, much more appealing group was passed over in silence. I did not understand it. Could this possibly be out of any undue consideration for me? I need not say to what extent the suspicion of such a thing provoked me. The lively tone of the cabin had affected me and made me venturesome, so that I resolved to put an end to this childishness.
“Look here, uncle,” I burst out quite impulsively during a silence after a story which was so harmless that even the clergyman guffawed at it, “don’t you remember the story the captain told day before yesterday?”
“Uncle” was the company director, who was a friend of my father.
I continued undismayed: “That was the choicest I’ve heard in all my days. Couldn’t you please tell it?”
Four pairs of astonished eyes were directed upon me, and a painful silence set in. I already regretted my rash courage.
The company director broke the ice with a skittish little chuckle, which was but a faint echo of the thunder he had allowed to roll out a couple of days before when the captain had told the story.
“Tee-hee!—yes, that wasn’t so bad——”
He then began to tell it. It was very highly seasoned and had to do with woman.