Part 17

"I did, sir," answered the First Lieutenant. "In fact, it was so hot, that I nearly followed your example."

Potvin glared. "I hardly understand what you mean, Mr. Pardoe?" he said with asperity. "The fact of its being hot or cold does not effect my religious ideas."

"I beg your pardon, sir. I thought that..."

"Kindly do not impute these motives to me," the Commander went on to say. "I consider that we should all attend divine service in a state of the utmost humility, and I removed my tunic so that I should appear before the Almighty in the same simple garb as the men, not as their commanding officer!" He puffed out his chest with importance.

Pardoe merely gasped, for the idea that the Almighty might be unduly influenced by the sight of the three gold stripes and curl on his captain's shoulder-straps was quite beyond his comprehension. Nevertheless, Commander Potvin was quite serious, and on leaving his presence Pardoe repaired to his cabin, and wrote a fervent appeal to a former captain of his, asking that officer to use his influence to have him removed from his present appointment. He loved his little Puffin, it is true. He would be very sorry to leave her; but anything was better than serving in a ship commanded by a lunatic.

For a week the gunboat's officers and men endured the new routine with what fortitude they could muster. On Monday they had their progressive games, when the watch on board,--the watch whose turn it was to go on leave had gone ashore to a man,--were compelled, much to their disgust, to squat round on the upper deck with draughts, halma, and picture-lotto boards spread out before them. The proceedings were not exactly jovial, for the men looked, and were, frankly bored, while a party of four able seamen, finding the innocent attractions of Happy Families hardly exciting enough, were subsequently brought up before the First Lieutenant on a charge of gambling.

Half an hour after the games started, moreover, two other men, one a marine and the other the ship's steward's assistant, fell in to see him.

"What is the matter?" he asked.

"Well, sir," the marine explained. "It's like this 'ere. I was told off to play draughts along o' this man, an' all goes well until I makes two o' my men kings an' starts takin' all 'is. Then 'e says as 'ow I've been cheatin', so I says to 'im, polite like, as 'ow I 'adn't done no such thing, an' wi' that 'e ups an' 'its me in the eye, sir, which isn't fair."

"He hit you in the eye?" asked Number One.

"Yes, sir," said the sea-soldier, exhibiting a rapidly swelling cheek.

"What have you to say?" the First Lieutenant asked the alleged assailant.

"What he says isn't true, sir. I did say he had been cheatin', becos he had, becos he was movin' all his other pieces over the board how he liked. I says he mustn't do that, becos it isn't the game, but he says that as he's been told off to play, he'll play how he bloomin' well likes. I says it's cheatin', and he hits me on the nose, so I hits him back, and we has a bit of a dust up." He exhibited a gory handkerchief as proof of his injuries.

"Do either of you men bear any grudge against the other?" asked Pardoe, knowing that they had often been ashore together.

"No, sir," came the immediate reply.

"Well, go away, and don't make such fools of yourselves again. We can't have all this bickering and fighting over a simple game of draughts."

The two combatants retired grinning, and Pardoe, sighing deeply, walked up and down the deck wrapped in thought. One fact was quite patent, and that was that if the innocent amusements for the ship's company were suffered to continue, he would require the wisdom and patience of a Solomon to arbitrate between the disputants.

On Tuesday they had a reading from Shakespeare, conducted by the Captain, and, to judge from the sotto-voce remarks of the audience, they were neither amused nor instructed.

"'E must be wet if 'e thinks we liken listenin' to this 'ere stuff!" muttered Able Seaman McSweeny dismally. "'E talks abart 'is ruddy merchant o' Venice, but I doesn't want to 'ear nothin' abart a.... Eyetalian shopkeeper. I expec's 'e was one o' these 'ere blokes wot wheeled an ice-cream barrer. S'welp me I do!"

A loud titter greeted his utterance, and Commander Potvin stopped reading for a moment, and glanced round with a fierce expression, without being able to see whence the sounds of merriment emanated.

No, judging from the trite remarks from the men, the reading from the works of England's most famous poet and playwright was not an unqualified success.

On Thursday came the Captain's lecture on the effects of alcohol, at which, to Pardoe's great astonishment, there was an unusually full attendance. Even men belonging to the watch ashore were present, some of them bringing friends from other ships with them.

The audience, suspicious at first, eventually became strangely enthusiastic, loud cheering, much stamping on the deck, and even shrieks and cat-calls completely drowning the lecturer's voice for moments at a time. The applause became more vociferous still when the man attending the magic lantern inadvertently placed his hand on its almost red-hot top, and interrupted the proceedings with a loud and very startled: "Ow! The bloomin' thing's burnt me!"

Anyone but the Commander might have detected something sarcastic and ironical in the excessive applause, but he, the possessor of a skin like unto that of an armadillo, was very pleased with the reception of his discourse.

"I told you I had an interesting subject," he said afterwards to the First Lieutenant. "The hearty applause was very gratifying, and it is wonderful how a little straight talk goes down with the men."

"I only hope my lecture will be an equal success, sir," answered Pardoe, rather at a loss what to say.

His subject was "Cities of Ancient Greece."

But at last came the time when the Puffin was ordered to sea, and at 8.30 on that fateful morning the gunboat, with her gallant commander standing on the poop in the attitude of Sir Francis Drake starting on his circumnavigation of the world, paddled gently down the crowded harbour and out through the Lye-mun pass. It was in this narrow passage that they had their altercation with a lumbering Chinese junk tacking slowly to and fro against the tide.