"Hang the captain's orders!" said Tristram. "This is better than supper."
But the foamy crest of a great wave that was level with the bow was caught just then by the wind and hurled up in their faces. The ladies sputtered, drenched with the spray, and the water seethed at their feet. Of course they shrieked and there was nothing for it but to descend and repair to their staterooms to prepare for the supper.
The dishes were clattering and dancing like marionettes. Capt. Keen had acted wisely in ordering an early supper. If the sea increased it would soon be impossible to eat at all.
"Isn't this superb?" cried the enthusiast again, as the vessel perceptibly rose under them, but she fell so suddenly that he probably bit his tongue. At least for a moment his eloquence abated.
"Now to go above again," he said when at last the tipping of the dishes made satisfactory eating no longer possible. "What a rare quality portability is! The portable arts—music and poetry; the portable instruments—fiddles, flutes, etc.; the portable eatables (excuse the unhappy jingle)—oranges, bananas, biscuits."
Suiting the word to the action, he laid in a liberal supply himself and pressed as much more on each of the ladies. He was not so unpractical as he seemed, our friend Tristram, with all his badinage and transparent sophistries.
"But you are not seriously going out on deck?" cried his sister in some alarm, when he made for the stairs.
"And surely you are not going to remain in?" answered Tristram in feigned astonishment. "Lose this glorious sea picture? Atmosphere, nature's own murk; canvas, infinity; music furnished by old Boreas himself, master of Beethoven and Rubinstein; accompaniments, night, sleet, danger and the lightning."
"I fear we are philistines," said Beulah Ware; "we prefer painted storms and the mimic thunders of the symphony."
"Accompaniment, dry dresses," added Rosalie. Whereupon Tristram gallantly saw the ladies housed in his sister's cabin and left them, lunching on his portable eatables, but not a little anxious while he himself climbed up to his perch on the quarter-deck. The sea tumbled over the steamer when she cut her way into a billow, but Tristram had drawn on thick boots and felt prepared to rough it.