At Sunwich Port Part 5

"Here, look here, Hall!" expostulated captain number two, starting up.

"It's all right, Cooper," said Nugent.

"It's all right," said captain number one, and in a rash moment undertook to explain. In five minutes he had clouded Captain Cooper's intellect for the afternoon.

He was still busy with his self-imposed task when a diversion was created by the entrance of a new arrival. A short, stout man stood for a moment with the handle of the door in his hand, and then came in, carefully bearing before him a gla.s.s of gin and water. It was the first time that he had set foot there, and all understood that by this intrusion Mr. Daniel Kybird sought to place sea-captains and other dignitaries on a footing with the keepers of slop-shops and dealers in old clothes. In the midst of an impressive silence he set his gla.s.s upon the table and, taking a chair, drew a small clay pipe from his pocket.

Aghast at the intrusion, the quartette conferred with their eyes, a language which is perhaps only successful in love. Captain Cooper, who was usually moved to speech by externals, was the first to speak.

"You've got a sty coming on your eye, Hall," he remarked.

"I daresay."

"If anybody's got a needle," said the captain, who loved minor operations.

n.o.body heeded him except the harbour-master, and he muttered something about beams and motes, which the captain failed to understand. The others were glaring darkly at Mr. Kybird, who had taken up a newspaper and was busy perusing it.

"Are you looking for anybody?" demanded Captain Nugent, at last.

"No," said Mr. Kybird, looking at him over the top of his paper.

"What have you come here for, then?" inquired the captain.

"I come 'ere to drink two o' gin cold," returned Mr. Kybird, with a dignity befitting the occupation.

"Well, suppose you drink it somewhere else," suggested the captain.

Mr. Kybird had another supposition to offer. "Suppose I don't?" he remarked. "I'm a respect-able British tradesman, and my money is as good as yours. I've as much right to be here as you 'ave. I've never done anything I'm ashamed of!"

"And you never will," said Captain Cooper's friend, grimly, "not if you live to be a hundred."

Mr. Kybird looked surprised at the tribute. "Thankee," he said, gratefully.

"Well, we don't want you here," said Captain Nugent. "We prefer your room to your company."

Mr. Kybird leaned back in his chair and twisted his blunt features into an expression of withering contempt. Then he took up a gla.s.s and drank, and discovered too late that in the excitement of the moment he had made free with the speaker's whisky.

"Don't apologize," interrupted the captain; "it's soon remedied."

He took the gla.s.s up gingerly and flung it with a crash into the fireplace. Then he rang the bell.

"I've smashed a dirty gla.s.s," he said, as the bar-man entered. "How much?"

The man told him, and the captain, after a few stern remarks about privacy and harpies, left the room with his friends, leaving the speechless Mr. Kybird gazing at the broken gla.s.s and returning evasive replies to the inquiries of the curious Charles.

He finished his gin and water slowly. For months he had been s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g up his courage to carry that room by a.s.sault, and this was the result. He had been insulted almost in the very face of Charles, a youth whose reputation as a gossip was second to none in Sunwich.

"Do you know what I should do if I was you?" said that worthy, as he entered the room again and swept up the broken gla.s.s.

"I do not," said Mr. Kybird, with lofty indifference.

"I shouldn't come 'ere again, that's what I should do," said Charles, frankly. "Next time he'll throw you in the fireplace."

"Ho," said the heated Mr. Kybird. "Ho, will he? I'd like to see 'im. I'll make 'im sorry for this afore I've done with 'im. I'll learn 'im to insult a respectable British tradesman. I'll show him who's who."

"What'll you do?" inquired the other.

"Never you mind," said Mr. Kybird, who was not in a position to satisfy his curiosity--"never you mind. You go and get on with your work, Charles, and p'r'aps by the time your moustache 'as grown big enough to be seen, you'll 'ear something."

"I 'eard something the other day," said the bar-man, musingly; "about you it was, but I wouldn't believe it."

"Wot was it?" demanded the other.

"Nothing much," replied Charles, standing with his hand on the door-k.n.o.b, "but I wouldn't believe it of you; I said I couldn't."

"Wot--was--it?" insisted Mr. Kybird.

"Why, they said you once gave a man a fair price for a pair of trousers," said the barman, indignantly.

He closed the door behind him softly, and Mr. Kybird, after a brief pause, opened it again and, more softly still, quitted the precincts of The Goblets, and stepped across the road to his emporium.

Captain Nugent, in happy ignorance of the dark designs of the wardrobe dealer, had also gone home. He was only just beginning to realize the comparative unimportance of a retired shipmaster, and the knowledge was a source of considerable annoyance to him. No deferential mates listened respectfully to his instructions, no st.u.r.dy seaman ran to execute his commands or trembled mutinously at his wrath. The only person in the wide world who stood in awe of him was the general servant Bella, and she made no attempt to conceal her satisfaction at the attention excited by her shortcomings.

He paused a moment at the gate and then, walking slowly up to the door, gave it the knock of a master. A full minute pa.s.sing, he knocked again, remembering with some misgivings his stern instructions of the day before that the door was to be attended by the servant and by n.o.body else. He had seen Miss Nugent sitting at the window as he pa.s.sed it, but in the circ.u.mstances the fact gave him no comfort. A third knock was followed by a fourth, and then a distressed voice upstairs was heard calling wildly upon the name of Bella.

At the fifth knock the house shook, and a red-faced maid with her shoulders veiled in a large damp towel pa.s.sed hastily down the staircase and, slipping the catch, pa.s.sed more hastily still upstairs again, affording the indignant captain a glimpse of a short striped skirt as it turned the landing.

"Is there any management at all in this house?" he inquired, as he entered the room.

"Bella was dressing," said Miss Nugent, calmly, "and you gave orders yesterday that n.o.body else was to open the door."

"n.o.body else when she's available," qualified her father, eyeing her sharply. "When I give orders I expect people to use their common sense. Why isn't my tea ready? It's five o'clock."

"The clock's twenty minutes fast," said Kate. "Who's been meddling with it?" demanded her father, verifying the fact by his watch.

Miss Nugent shook her head. "It's gained that since you regulated it last night," she said, with a smile.

The captain threw himself into an easy-chair, and with one eye on the clock, waited until, at five minutes to the hour by the right time, a clatter of crockery sounded from the kitchen, and Bella, still damp, came in with the tray. Her eye was also on the clock, and she smirked weakly in the captain's direction as she saw that she was at least two minutes ahead of time. At a minute to the hour the teapot itself was on the tray, and the heavy breathing of the handmaiden in the kitchen was audible to all.

"Punctual to the minute, John," said Mrs. Kingdom, as she took her seat at the tray. "It's wonderful how that girl has improved since you've been at home. She isn't like the same girl."

She raised the teapot and, after pouring out a little of the contents, put it down again and gave it another two minutes. At the end of that time, the colour being of the same unsatisfactory paleness, she set the pot down and was about to raise the lid when an avalanche burst into the room and, emptying some tea into the pot from a canister-lid, beat a hasty re-treat.

"Good tea and well-trained servants," muttered the captain to his plate. "What more can a man want?"

Mrs. Kingdom coughed and pa.s.sed his cup; Miss Nugent, who possessed a healthy appet.i.te, serenely attacked her bread and b.u.t.ter; conversation languished.

"I suppose you've heard the news, John?" said his sister.