“The second officer struck a match and looked at it, and it cert’n’y was a beauty.
“‘I hope you reported this at the police station?’ ses the skipper.
“‘No, sir,’ ses the mate, holding up ’is ’ead. ‘I don’t want no p’lice to protect me. Five’s a large number, but I drove ’em off, and I don’t think they’ll meddle with any British fust officers again.’
“‘You’d better turn in,’ ses the second, leading him off by the arm.
“The mate limped off with him, and as soon as the coast was clear we put our ’eads together and tried to make out how it was that Bill Cousins and Bob ’ad changed themselves into five German sailor-men.
“‘It’s the mate’s pride,’ ses the carpenter. ‘He didn’t like being knocked about by Hindoos.’
“We thought it was that, but we had to wait nearly another hour afore the two came aboard, to make sure. There was a difference in the way they came aboard, too, from that of the mate. They didn’t make no noise, and the fust thing we knew of their coming aboard was seeing a bare, black foot waving feebly at the top of the fo’c’s’le ladder feelin’ for the step.
“That was Bob. He came down without a word, and then we see ’e was holding another black foot and guiding it to where it should go. That was Bill, an’ of all the ’orrid, limp-looking blacks that you ever see, Bill was the worst when he got below. He just sat on a locker all of a heap and held ’is ’ead, which was swollen up, in ’is hands. Bob went and sat beside ’im, and there they sat, for all the world like two wax figgers instead o’ human beings.
“‘Well, you done it, Bill,’ ses Joe, after waiting a long time for them to speak. ‘Tell us all about it.’
“‘Nothin’ to tell,’ ses Bill, very surly. ‘We knocked ’im about.’