“Go; do what I bid you.” said Edgar, in a tone that did not brook delay.
The attendant vanished and speedily returned with the desired piece of waste.
Edgar at once rubbed it over his face and became so piebald and hideous that both the attendants laughed.
Not heeding them, and only half sure of the completeness of the disguise, Edgar issued boldly from his cabin, and walked with heavy tread towards the place where he had to sit down to have the helmet screwed on.
A loud roar of laughter greeted him.
“Why, you’ve been kissing the funnel,” exclaimed one of the mates.
“That’ll do me no harm,” growled Edgar, stooping to catch hold of the air-tube, and making an excuse for sidling and backing towards his seat.
“Oh! What a fright! And such a figure!” exclaimed Lintie; “come round, let us try to get a nearer view of him.”
She dragged the laughing Aileen with her, for she was an impulsive little woman; but at whatever opening in the crowd she and her friend presented themselves, they were sure to find the diver’s ridiculously broad and now inelegant back turned towards them.
“Plague on him!” she exclaimed, for she was an impatient little woman, just then, “I don’t believe he’s got a front at all! Come round again—quick.”