‘What ha’ you got there?’ said the fellow at the dresser.
‘Dirty plates,’ said I.
This man, who was the cook’s mate, who had but one eye, and whose cast of face was certainly more villainous than any of the felons I had watched taking their exercise that day, put his head out of the galley-door, and exclaimed: ‘Fire that there steward! Here’s a gallus look out o’ dishes! If that there perishin’ Stiles could foul six plates ’stead o’ wan he’d do’t to spite me.’ He continued to grumble hideously, and I backed away from his ugly tongue and uglier face and walked toward the cuddy, but slowly, and holding on as I went, for the decks were steep and greasy and the ship was taking the seas in quick, angry jumps.
As I passed through the quarter-deck barricade my elbow was touched, and Will accosted me.
‘I’m going to bounce a mattress out of the steward for you, Marian,’ said he, ‘but as no more lies than can be helped must be told, follow me.’
I accompanied him up the lee poop-ladder. He led me a little way along the deck and then crossed it to where a man was standing under the shelter of one of the quarter-boats.
‘Here’s this stowaway lad asked me to help him to a mattress, sir,’ he exclaimed. ‘They’ve given him a bunk in the steerage, but there’s nothing in it to lie upon.’
‘He deserves the cat for hiding aboard us,’ answered the man, who was indeed Mr. Bates, the first mate. ‘What have they put him to, d’ye know, Johnstone?’
‘He’s cuddy bottle-washer, sir.’
‘What’s brought you to sea, you young fool?’