We tramped along for a hundred yards or so, turned round a bit of a cocoa plantation, and there, behind a slope, was the first gun, and sitting on the top of one wheel was Bob Temple, and on the other, young Sparks—the 'Angel' they called him—both as black as my hat, swilling kola bitters,[#] whilst my young clerk, Marchant, with his hand bound up in a blood-stained handkerchief, and half-a-dozen other mids. were lying on the slope, most of them doing the same. Twenty or more ragamuffins were standing by with baskets full of more bottles of kola, and trays of pastry, and the ground was littered with empty brass cylinder cases.
[#] Kola bitters is a sweetish pink aerated water.
So it was they who'd fired over the Hector, was it! and I wished to goodness that I could look impressive and angry when I wanted to.
They'd sprung to attention when they saw me, and the only thing I could say was, 'Tut! tut! disgraceful!—go on board at once—your leave's stopped for ever—tut! tut!' and as they picked up their coats and obeyed me, I stalked away to the other gun, fifty yards farther along.
Well, the rest of my beauties were there, but I'd had time to fix my eyeglass, and had worked up a fierce glare—I can glare much more successfully behind an eyeglass.
Mr. Bostock, my Gunner, was with them, too, in plain clothes, looking very sheepish, and trying to put one foot on the ground between two brass cylinders which would roll together.
'You ought to have known better, Mr. Bostock,' I said.
'Beg you pardon, sir,' he muttered humbly, 'but it was like this. I 'appened to stroll up 'ere, arter the firing began—just to 'ave a look, sir—and I sees the young gen'l'men 'aving a bit of a spree.'
'And you helped them—you ought to be ashamed of yourself.'
'Well, sir, it was like this, sir, I didn't want the young gen'l'men to disgrace 'emselves in front of all this kittle cattle, so I just stays 'ere, sir, to see they do the drill proper, sir.'