‘Why, the air is full of the news,’ said I: ‘a ship’s a village, where whatever happens is known to all the neighbours.’
‘I don’t know about losing a man,’ said he, striking a spark into a tinder-box and lighting his pipe with a sulphur match; ‘he’s not dead yet, anyway. We must keep our voices hushed in these matters aboard ship, Mr. Dugdale. Wherever there are ladies, there’s a deal of nervousness.’
‘True; and I’ll be as hushed as you please. But this Crabb is so amazing a figure, that I can’t but feel interested in his illness. What ails him, now?’
‘If he dies, it must be of decay,’ he answered, with a toss of his hand. ‘I can find nothing wrong with him but the manner of his going. He lies motionless, and groans occasionally. It will be a matter in which the heart is involved, no doubt.’
I saw my curiosity did not please him, and so, after exchanging a few idle sentences, I mounted the poop and joined Mr. Colledge.
He was looking at the water that was passing, but not greatly heeding the sight of it. I daresay, though there was much, nevertheless, to engage the eye of a lover of sea-bits in the delicate interlacery of foam that came past in spaces like veils of lace spreading out on the heave of the sea along with cloudy seethings of milk-white softness under the surface, which made a wonder of the radiant opalescent blue of the clear profound there that was softened out of its sunny brilliance by the shadowing of the high side of the Indiaman.
‘This is going to be a long voyage, I am afraid,’ exclaimed Colledge, with a sort of sigh, bringing his back round upon the rail and leaning against it with folded arms.
‘Not bored already, I hope?’ said I.
‘Well, do you know, Dugdale,’ he exclaimed, whilst I caught his eye following the form of Miss Hudson, who was walking the weather-deck with Mr. Emmett, ‘I believe I made a mistake in engaging myself before I started. When a man asks a girl to be his wife, he ought to marry her with as little delay as possible. Now, here am I leaving the sweetheart I have affianced myself to for perhaps ten months of ocean voyaging, with some months on top of it in India for shooting, and the chance beyond of being eaten up by the game I pursue.’
‘Why did you engage yourself?’ said I.