“Well, I don’t know,” said the mate, shrugging his shoulders; “seems to me if I’d saved a fellow-critter’s life I shouldn’t mind hearing about it.”
“That’s what you think,” said the skipper, drawing himself up a little. “If ever you do do anything of the kind perhaps you’ll feel different about it.”
“Well, I don’t see how you should know any more than me,” said the other.
The skipper cleared his throat.
“There have been one or two little things in my life which I’m not exactly ashamed of,” he said modestly.
“That ain’t much to boast of,” said the mate, wilfully misunderstanding him.
“I mean,” said the skipper sharply, “one or two things which some people might have been proud of. But I’m proud to say that there isn’t a living soul knows of ’em.”
“I can quite believe that,” assented the mate, and walked off with an irritating smile.
The skipper was about to follow him, to complain of the needless ambiguity of his remarks, when he was arrested by a disturbance from the fo’c’sle. In response to the cordial invitation of the cook, the mate and one of the hands from the brig Endeavour, moored alongside, had come aboard and gone below to look at George. The manner in which they were received was a slur upon the hospitality of the John Henry; and they came up hurriedly, declaring that they never wanted to see him again as long as they lived, and shouting offensive remarks behind them as they got over the side of their own vessel.
The skipper walked slowly to the fo’c’sle and put his head down.