“Precisely what I’ve been wanting to do for the last five minutes,” replied the youth, with astonishing coolness. “Just wait until I have collected my scanty belongings and your request will be complied with.”
“Well, I never——” ejaculated the Patrol Leader.
“Don’t distress yourself,” continued the boy. “Wait until I am in a position to offer an explanation. My limbs, I find, are somewhat cramped.”
With the utmost deliberation the stowaway emerged and stood upright in the cockpit with the Sea Scouts still too astonished to say much, hemming him in on three sides.
He was a pale-faced, sharp-featured lad of medium height and sparely built. The most noticeable feature about him was a high and prominent forehead. He was dressed in a tightly fitting suit of grey tweed and an Eton collar, his thin, bony wrists projecting quite three inches beyond his coat sleeves. Under one arm he held a schoolboy’s satchel, from which protruded a glass-stoppered bottle.
“You hid yourself on board?” began Brandon.
“Your surmise is a perfectly correct one,” agreed this remarkable youth, with a grave smile. “In the circumstances I had no option. Had I asked to be allowed to accompany you, my request would have been refused. As it is, I’m here.”
“A stowaway!” exclaimed the Patrol Leader. “You deserve a booting.”
The boy made a deprecatory movement with his hand.
“Believe me, it isn’t done,” he rejoined. “Personal violence to stowaways is, I take it, an obsolete practice that has shared the same fate as walking the plank and keel-hauling. At least, I hope I am not misinformed. . . . I say, what a jolly little pup!”