For a moment the Scoutmaster was nonplussed. Obviously the enraged individual was a lunatic and possibly a dangerous one. The situation had to be handled delicately. The best thing to do, he decided, was to humour the man. Fortunately the crew had taken their cue from their Scoutmaster and had refrained from roaring with laughter.
“I am sorry, sir,” said Mr. Grant. “I failed to recognise you.”
“That’s no excuse,” stormed the man. “You’ve failed to pay proper respect to your commanding officer, sir! Consider yourself under arrest!”
“Very good, sir,” replied the Scoutmaster.
The while he was working out a very difficult problem. If the intruder were as fierce as he looked—and in spite of his age he was active and muscular—he was a positive danger. Perhaps before the united efforts of the Sea Scouts could place him under restraint he might inflict severe injuries on some of them. Handicapped by his injured hand, Mr. Grant realised that he could do little from a physical point of view.
On the other hand, he could not continue to temporise indefinitely. If Mr. Pendennis could be communicated with, without exciting the man’s suspicions, something might be done, for the Cornish Scoutmaster was a huge, hefty fellow with no small reputation as a wrestler in a county where wrestling as a sport holds a high position.
Just then the madman noticed that his boat was adrift. He had neglected to make fast the painter, and owing to his strange behaviour the Sea Scouts had not given the boat a thought. Already the little sailing craft, with her sails still out, was drifting to lee’ard.
“Quartermaster of the Watch!” shouted the intruder. “Who gave you orders to take my barge from the——”
He paused abruptly. In his disordered brain was a faint realisation that there was no accommodation ladder to this craft. Its absence puzzled him.
Suddenly he grasped Carline by the shoulder and hurled him overboard. It was done so swiftly and unexpectedly that no one had time to raise even a finger to attempt to prevent it; but the next instant Brandon and Craddock threw themselves upon the madman.