I have been waiting half an hour or more."
"There!" cried the captain, squeezing Elsie's arm, "that comes of using
so many unnecessary explanations. I ought to have adopted the
recognized Jack Tar method and just grabbed you round the waist without
ceremony. I wonder where Boyle is. He and Christobal take the first
watch, and it must be two bells, or later. I will hunt them up.
Good-by, sweetheart. Meet you at supper in ten minutes."
It was a strange and peculiar fact that Boyle had cornered Christobal
in the saloon, and had insisted on telling him various remarkable
anecdotes concerning the one-legged skipper of the _Flower of the
Ocean_ brig. It was still more odd that when Christobal yielded to a
fit of unwonted and melancholy silence after learning from Suarez that
the senor captain had been talking to the senorita for a very long time
on the promenade deck, Boyle should feel inclined to sing.
The chief officer's musical attainments were not of the highest, and
his repertory was archaic. But there must be some explanation of his
unwonted and melancholy chanting. He always spoke of Elsie with the
utmost admiration, and it was no secret that he rendered Courtenay a
sort of hero-worship hidden under the guise of an exaggerated belief in
the good luck which followed the captain of the _Kansas_ in all his
doings.
Pages:
270
271
272
273
274
275
276
277
278
279
280
281
282
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294