"I don't understand what you are driving at," said Sinclair, with a trace of irritation.
"It's all right, Doc. Never mind now. Go on and tell us some more."
When Sinclair related the incident of the "charge of the Tamsui blues," and Gorman's remarks to Carteret, McLeod laughed so heartily that the doctor had to join him.
"It's all very well for you to laugh like that," he said, a little ruefully, when McLeod stopped for a moment. "You have nothing at stake. But it's different with me."
"You'll laugh about it yet, just as heartily as I have done. Probably more so. Haven't you another yarn up your sleeve? I know that you have. Go on. Give us another."
He did. He told about Clark praying under the teak table, and De Vaux dancing and stuttering around it. Sinclair was a good story-teller, and before he was through with the Free Methodist prayer-meeting McLeod's laughter could be heard the length of the ship. Sinclair had forgotten his love troubles, and his laugh, mingled with his chum's, was as rollicking and care-free as that of a schoolboy.
In the midst of it Captain Whiteley's voice was heard outside:
"What in the world's going on in here?"
A lady's voice replied:
"It's those two lovers. They should never be separated. Either one is quite inconsolable without the other."