"But you don't mean me to sleep in your cabin, sir?" I exclaimed. "I'm quite ready to sleep in a hammock, like the rest of the crew."
"That's part of my responsibility," he replied, shaking his finger at me; "so there's an end on 't. Jeremy Miles has always prided himself on being a man of his word, and sink me if I fail to carry out this matter to the satisfaction of my principles."
Thus I found myself installed in the Captain's cabin of the brig Golden Hope, which was more than I expected and more than I deserved.
"Sixty men we carry," remarked the Captain. "None too many, but the most we can reasonably afford. Most of them have been shipmates with me in times past, and I'll warrant they'll be a tough nut for any man to crack, be he Turk, Algerine, or buccaneer. It does my heart good to see them do the cutlass drill, or man the ordnance. Our master gunner, Master Silas Touchstone, has seen much service 'gainst the Dutch, and, forsooth, he's a tower of strength to the brig. Would you could have seen them when we beat to quarters on our way down channel."
"Were you attacked?" I asked eagerly.
"Nay, 'twas but practice, yet 'tis what we must accustom ourselves to, for I doubt not that we shall smell powder in real earnest ere we see Poole once again."
Just then 'Enery, who, I discovered, was the bos'n, knocked at the cabin door and reported that the wind was freshening considerably, whereat Captain Jeremy hastened on deck.
Having finished my meal, I bethought me that I ought to go on deck also, and tying a scarf round my head in place of a hat, I ran up the ladder and gained the poop.
The wind was howling through the rigging and driving the spray in white showers across our weather bow, while ahead and as far to larboard as the eye could reach regular combers, with crested tops, showed how the surface of the sea had changed during the last hour.
On our starboard hand a wide expanse of milk-white foam betokened the presence of the dreaded Race of Portland, the bluff headland that gives it its name being plainly visible over our lee bow.