You couldn’t notice it, though. In fact, this chesty, cocksure attitude seemed to have grown on him, and it was plain that most of his soreness just now come from findin’ himself in with a lot of folks that didn’t take any special pains to admit what a great man he was. So, as him and me was sort of left to flock by ourselves, I undertook the job of supplyin’ a few soothin’ remarks, just for old time’s sake. And that’s how it was he got rung in on this little mix-up with Cap’n Spiller.
You see, the way the committee had mapped it out, part of the doin’s was a grand illumination of the fleet. Anyway, they had all the craft they could muster anchored in a semicircle off the end of the float and trimmed up with Japanese lanterns. Well, just about time for lightin’ up, into the middle of the fleet comes driftin’ a punk lookin’ old sloop with dirty, patched sails, some shirts and things hangin’ from the riggin’, and a length of stovepipe stickin’ through the cabin roof. When the skipper has struck the exact center, he throws over his mud hook and lets his sail run.
Not bein’ posted on the details, I didn’t know but that was part of the show, until the chairman of my committee comes rushin’ up to me all excited, and points it out.
“Oh, I say, McCabe!” says he. “Do you see that?”
“If I didn’t,” says I, “I could almost smell it from here. Some new member, is it?”
“Member!” he gasps. “Why, it’s some dashed old fisherman! We—we cawn’t have him stay there, you know.”
“Well,” says I, “he seems to be gettin’ plenty of advice on that point.” And he was; for they was shoutin’ things at him through a dozen megaphones.
“But you know, McCabe,” goes on the chairman, “you ought to go out and send him away. That’s one of your duties.”
“Eh?” says I. “How long since I’ve been official marine bouncer for this organization? G’wan! Go tell him yourself!”
We had quite an argument over it too, with Peter K. chimin’ in on my side; but, while the chappy insists that it’s my job to fire the old hooker off the anchorage, I draws the line at interferin’ with anything beyond the shore. Course, it might spoil the effect; but the way it struck me was that we didn’t own any more of Long Island Sound than anyone else, and I says so flat.