This latter, who was a big strong man, and a sort of bully among his mates, shook his fist at Gaff, and said—
“Now, I’ll tell ye wot it is, Mister Toogood, if you go for to tell the cap’n wot we’ve bin a-talkin’ about, I’ll knock yer two daylights into one, so see that ye keep yer tongue in order.”
“What’s past is past,” said Gaff quietly; “but I tell ye plainly, that if you let your tongues go the same pace again in my hearin’, I’ll go aft and report ye. I’ll be no spy, but I give ye fair warnin’.”
At this the bully lost command of himself. Seizing an iron bar that lay on a chest close by, he rushed at Gaff with the evident intention of felling him. But the latter was on his guard. He was active and powerful too, besides being quite cool. Leaping nimbly aside, he avoided the bully’s onset, and at the same moment laid him flat on the deck with one blow of his fist.
“Sarves him right!”
“So it does!” exclaimed several of the men, who were not sorry to see one whom they disliked so roughly handled.
“Well, so it does sarve him right,” added one who had been a prominent speaker in the recent debates; “but hark’ee, friend,” he said, turning to Gaff with a scowl, “you can’t knock the whole crew down in that fashion. I advise ye, for your own sake, to mind what ye’re about.”
“I means to do so,” said Gaff; “I’ll stick to my dooty and to the cap’n.”
“Very good,” replied the other with a sneer, “then wotiver is the cap’n’s fate you’ll have the pleasure of sharin’ it with him.”
“Tumble up there! tumble up, an’ reef tops’ls!” roared the captain down the hatch at that moment.