'The same as'll make me glad to get to New York,' answered Mr. Prunes, putting on his cap, and caressing the tassel, whilst his eyes met in a squint of earnestness in the grog-flowered countenance of Mr. Tweed. He paused, and seemed to reflect.
'What is it?' said Mr. Tweed.
Mr. Prunes began to nod at him, and then said in a low, confidential voice, and a glance aft at the companion-hatch:
'She's in want of that sort of mate which ashore they calls a husband.'
'Ha!' said Mr. Tweed; 'and it drove the other chap out of a good berth?'
'Well, there was a many quarrels, I believe, afore they got to Calcutta. Thinking that I might stand the better with her, seeing that I'm middling young, and that the sea hasn't robbed me of all that I owe to my mother, who was the handsomest woman in Shadwell, I kept dark about my 'ome, and to this bloomed hour she don't know that I've got a wife and three young uns awaiting my return in the little house I left 'em in at Stepney.'
'I'd up and tell her the truth, if I were you,' said Tweed.
A gleam of cunning twinkled in Mr. Prunes's eyes.
'I've been pretty comfortable for eighty days,' said he, 'under an error. There's no call now to correct it, seeing that the end of the voyage isn't fur off.'
Whilst he spoke, Captain Lind and Mr. and Miss Vanderholt were coming on deck. The captain sang out in a shrill, bantam-like voice, that caused Prunes to glance somewhat sheepishly at Tweed: