Then they rushed up on deck, because the Hun and Bubbles meant to ask those girls on board to show them the holes made by the Smyrna shells, as some little "return" for the oranges.
The others had "dared" them to do this; and they would have asked them, but were too late—their boat had paddled back to the village.
What a dinner they had that night!
The miserable little messman, for once, had risen to the occasion, and bought potatoes, cabbages, lettuce, and onions, and fruit—oranges and bananas—which of course were "extras".
"I'm jolly sorry that the other three aren't here," Uncle Podger remarked, as he skinned his fourth orange. "Wouldn't old Bubbles have loved them? Wouldn't he have been pretty to watch?"
On these occasions, when "extras" had been provided, a comic scene always followed in the pantry. In order that the messman could know who devoured his precious "extras", and could put the names down in his book, he had to keep a very smart "look-out" through the sliding doors in the pantry bulkhead; and Barnes, who hated him like poison, would block one and then the other with his huge head and shoulders, so that he should not see which of the "young gen'l'men" had taken an orange or banana. As Uncle Podger always said on such occasions: "It was pretty to watch him and Barnes dodging each other backwards and forwards, from side to side."
Barnes would slide across one of the trap-doors, then block up the other; across would dart the little messman, slide back the one which had just been closed, and peep through it. Bang would go the other, and Barnes would be seen pushing the messman aside, muttering "'Ere you; you're getting in the way, you are", reaching through, and making pretence of drawing back any dirty plates or dishes which stood on the sideboard. And so this game went on; whilst the Pimple and the China Doll, keeping their eyes about them, would seize fruit at the most favourable moment, drop the skins on someone else's plate if possible, and if not, throw them far under the table.
Barnes, afterwards, when he cleared the table and swept up the deck, would do it to a muttered accompaniment of: "That nawsty little beggar, a-countin' up and a-puttin' down everythink of 'is beastly hextras. 'Umph!" (bang would go the broom against a leg of the table). "And who eats 'em? 'Umph! the nawsty, slimy toad. I'll learn 'im, me as what 'as a pub of 'is own at 'ome—or 'ad, afore this 'ere war a-started."
The days which followed were days of real delight, never to be forgotten by the Honourable Mess, who revelled in them and in the noiseless, peaceful nights when they slept on the quarter-deck, and woke to slip off their pyjamas and plunge over the side into the transparent water.
In a week's time, very early one morning, up the harbour came the grey picket-boat with the Orphan; behind her followed Trawler No. 370 with Bubbles, the Lamp-post, and all that was left of their beach party.