The Perspirashun was Running off me like Water and my Arms Ached like Mad. Nini—she had said I might call her Nini the Evening Before—Nini Could not See ennything was Wrong, but I knew we were being Carried Out to Sea at About 100 miles an Hour and it Kept Getting Darker. N.B.—Of course, I did Not Care For myself, but I Kept Thinking of Nini. She said the Poetry of the illimittible Oshan made Her Trill like a Smitten Lute, and I said, “Does it?� and Kept Slogging Away against the Tide without making 1 Not in 1,000 Hours, as the Signals in Coes Roads kept getting Smaller. Then a Southampton Liner came Rushing out of the Dark. I Saw Both her Port and Starboard Litse as I Turned my Head, so she must have been Coming Straight down on Us. You may Suppose I had Fits, thinking of Mrs. Clanarthur, and I would have tried to Shout, but I Had Lost my Wind completely.
“How pretty,� said Nini—Mrs. Clanarthur I mean—“that must be the Campania for New York from Southampton.� And she went on Gassing about the Beauty of the Seen without an Idea that we might be cut in 2 Next Minute. But we got off. The liner swerved to port and went by us lighted up like a sea Alhambra, all her deckse crowded with People and her Band Playing ‘The Merry Widow,’ and Clanarthur lost his chance of being a Merry Widower. But she passed so jolly close to us that a lot of Wash slopped in, and Nini screamed and called out, “You silly boy, it’s all your Fault!� which I like, considering the sittuation. And She Pulled her White Evening Wrap round her and said, “Let’s get back to the yacht; it’s shockingly cold and the sea is getting abominably Rough!� And then I had to own up what a jolly Hat we were in, and that we had been steddily Drifting Out to Sea for Some time Past.
What price me? I felt small enough to get into a cricket-ball case already, but I felt something worse when Mrs. Clanarthur Boxed my Ears. She said I was a Little Idiot, and that she had been culpably Reckless to alow Me to Take Her on the Water, and what would Freddy say? Freddy is Captain Clanarthur. So I said I would stand up to Him with or without Gloves, Fight Him with Rivolverse across a necktie if he liked, and that He could Divorse Her afterwardse and then she could marry me, and everything would be jolly well settled all Round, as she Had Told me He was aborrent to Her only the night before when she kissed me under the Aft Awning three Times—which she Had Done, though she called me an untruthful little Retch for saying so, and then she had Histericks, and then what Uncle Podmore calls the Mallady of the Wave came on, and I had to ship the oars and Hold Her Up, and she was Awfully Bad. Mother on the Turbean xing to Boulogne was Nothing To it. I am not Joking When I Tell You that We Drifted About in That beestly Dinghy all night at the immanent Risk of Being Run Down by anything from a Tramp Steamer to a Government Crooser, and if the Tide Had Not Turned, which it did at 4 o’clock in the Morning, we should be as dead now as Two People can be.
O crumbs, when I looked at Nini, who After jawing at me till she was Tired Had Gone to sleep with Her Head on my Shoulder! By the Glimmaring Light of Dawn she Looked as Old as Aunt Honoria, and not Half as Nice. Her Swagger Evening Gown and Mantal were Ruined with Seawater, and one Long Tale of her Lovely Hair was Washing about in the Bilje at the Bottom of the Dinghy, we had shipped such a lot in the Night. Her Forhead and one Eye were nearly Hidden by a Top Piece with curls that had come off, though there was lots of Hair underneath it, and she was Perfectly Blue with Cold and Fright.
I thought she must have been Pretty Old when she Married Captain Clanarthur after all, and when I Remembered how mad I had been about Her, and how I wanted to Snipe Clanarthur and Marry Her, I felt awfully sick at having been such an unlimited ass.
She woke up and called me some more Names and then a Pilot cutter came along bound for Portsmouth Pier, and I Haled the Pilot and He agreed to take us back to Cowes Road for £1. And they Hawled us on Board because we were too jolly stiff to clime up the cutter’s side and we Got back to the Yacht in Time for Breakfast.
You may guess if the men of the Party chaffed me Before how frightfully they chaff Now, I am Roasted about the Beastly Business from morning till Night. Uncle Podmore told me they had sent out 2 Boats to Find us and burned blue Lights. All Captain Clanarthur Said when He saw Mrs. Clanarthur come up the yacht’s side like a Ragbag, was, “So there You are, are you?� But suppose he is Lying Low to bring an Axion for Divorse, do you suppose I shall have to marry Mrs. Clanarthur?
I do jolly well Hope Not. She is old enough to be my mother, and Has a Perfectly awful temper.
Fancy me being as Pleased as a Fox-terrier with 2 tails when she let me Kiss Her under the Deck Awning after dinner. Fellows with lots of good sense can be asses at times.
Of course I tell you All this in Confidence on the Strict Q.T., because you are Not like other Girls about Keeping a Secret. There is a Big Review of the Home Fleet and the Swedish Squadron by the King to-day, and the Fleet will be elluminated in the Evening after dinner, and there will be Fireworks from the Victoria Pier. But whether it is my having been Out all Night with Nini—I mean Mrs. Clanarthur—in that rotten Dinghy or something else I don’t ixactly know, but I feel jolly miserable.