"Come along or we'll miss lunch," Bubbles gurgled; and they romped aft, passing old Fletcher, the stoker, coming up, grimy and unwashed, from his watch below.
"I've just brought 'Kaiser Bill' up for an airing, sir," he said, as the Orphan stopped to speak to him. "I took him down out of mischief," and he carefully placed the idiotic tortoise down on the iron plates, and tried to tempt him with a piece of cabbage leaf to put out his ugly head.
Lunch in the gun-room was a very rowdy meal. If the Sub hadn't been pretty severe, precious little more crockery would have been left there than in those two stokers' mess decks.
"Just fancy! Six times hit—no, eight times—I counted them—all right, eight times—so much the better—and six wounded. Fancy old Cooky being knocked out—jolly hard luck; he oughtn't to have been there. You should have been in B3 when the shell hit the gun port, it did make a noise. They did make a funny noise all round (this from the China Doll). I had my cap blown off—one went between my turret and the shelter deck (this from Rawlinson).
"We're going back again," the Pimple, who had had to go back to the bridge and now came down, shouted. "I've just heard the Skipper tell the Navigator. Give me some soup, Barnes, quick—I say, you chaps, leave me a bit of pudding. We did get it hot. You should have been on the bridge."
"Bet you were safe and sound in the conning-tower," the others cried.
"I was only there part of the time. They kicked me out—it was too crowded. When that shell burst on the boat deck, bits came right over me. A bit hit a signal locker and dropped quite close to me. I've got it here," and the Pimple produced a bit of scrap iron out of his pocket and held it up.
"That isn't a bit of shell," they laughed, as they handed it round; "it's a bit of a deck plate."
"Well, it was jolly hot when I picked it up," said the Pimple, rather distressed. "I say, Barnes, do hurry up with some grub."
"Oh, you chaps, did you hear?" and the Pimple brightened again. "That shell which hit the Triumph killed a snotty."