The Gentleman: A Romance of the Sea Part 15

"Trying the distance with a bow-chaser," said the old man imperturbably.

"I'd have a lick back, only I can't spare no men for the deck carronades.

All below with Lanyon."

The tip of his tongue shot out, and made the journey of his lips, cat-like. From behind that grim and weathered visage peeped the child, arch, mischievous, infinitely cunning.

"Master Mouche, he _reckons_ I'm going to cross his bows and rake him," he whispered. "He _reckons_ I'll keep my course to sarve his consort the same. He _reckons_ to come up under my starn and rake me fore and aft, while his consort wears ship and pounds me with her broadside. That's his little game. 'Tain't mine though, ye know, Mr. Caryll--'tain't mine." He rolled a blue eye on the boy; and in that eye, twinkling cunning, bubbled the delight of a child about to play a practical joke on an elder.

So unexpected was the effect, and so tickling--this grim old veteran revealing in himself the Eternal Child who hides behind us all--that the Frenchmen at their guns, hearing in the silence the sudden ripple of a boy's laughter, whispered among themselves that the Englishman had a woman aboard.

III

The breeze was very light and fast falling away. Old Ding-dong kept one eye on his topsails, and one on his foe, sliding towards him across the water.

"Like the Shadow o Death a'most, ain't she?" said the old man in hushed voice--"so still-like and stealy." He dropped a kind eye on the boy's face. "Makes ye think first time, don't it?--I mind Quiberon. Guts feel fainty like."

He renewed his watch. The twinkle had left his eyes. He had withdrawn deep down into himself. Somewhere in the centre of that square body sat his mind, alert, cat-like, about to pounce.

The shadow of the _Cocotte_ fell across the sea nearly to their feet. The wind breathed on the waters, dulling them. The languid topsails swelled faintly.

The old man spun the wheel. The _Tremendous_ swung towards her enemy.

Delicately across the glittering floor the two ships drew towards each other, wary as panthers about to fight.

There was dead silence, alow and aloft. Only the tricolour at the enemy's fore flapped insolently; and the red-cross flag, at the mizzen gaff of the sloop, licked out a long tongue and taunted back.

"That's Mouche at the wheel," grunted the old Commander--"her skipper.

A fine fighter, but treecherous like em all.... Funny thing no one on deck only him. Swarmin with men too, I'll lay."

The French skipper too was at the wheel: a dapper little personage, black-a-vised, with fierce moustachios and eye-tufts.

He wore a huge tricorne, and vast tawdry epaulettes.

"How do you, sair?" he called, all bows and smiles and teeth, as the two ships came within biscuit-toss. "Vair please to meet you once more."

"Queer lingo, ain't it?" muttered old Ding-dong. "All spit and gargle.

Comes from eatin all them frogs, I reck'n. Stick in their throats or summat."

He raised his voice.

"Same to you and many on em," he growled. "I ain't seen that dirty phiz o your'n in the Channel since our little bit of a tiff off the Casquets last May. I yeard tell you was in the West Indies conwalescin a'ter an attack o de _Tremendous_!" He chuckled at his joke.

The Frenchman shrugged and smiled.

"So I wa.s.s, sair, a while back. And now here--on express pisness; the Emperor's pisness."

"What's up?" asked the Englishman bluffly. "Tired o waitin to wop Nelson? Goin to embark the Armee o England straight off?"

"Not yet," replied the other, showing his teeth. "All in goot time, my Captain. This first--this pit of pisness I do for my Emperor."

"Seems to me that Emperor o your'n must be put to the push if he's druv to gettin a mucky little pirit like you to do his business," grumbled the other.

The Frenchman waved the insult aside with utmost good humour.

"He send for me across the seas. 'I need my leetle Albairt,' he says.

'Come queegly.' So I spread my wings and come. And _La Coquette_ she slip out from Rochefort. And _La Guerriere_"-with a backward jerk--"from Brest. Like swallows in April we flock to the rendezvous--to meet the Queen of Hearts, is it not?"

He bowed low, hand to his bosom.

"And now you've come, sure I ope you'll stay," rumbled the grim old seaman. "The trouble with you's always been your despart hurry to get away."

"This time we stay," replied the Frenchman with a smirk--"all three, for ever, if need be."

"We'll do our best to make you at ome, sir," grunted the Englishman; and turning to Kit--

"Slip below and tell Mr. Lanyon to begin to talk when we're locked fast--and not afoor."

CHAPTER X

THE MAIN-DECK

Kit scampered below.

The main-deck was clear as a room before a ball: bulkheads up; hammocks slung. But for the sand on it, you might have danced there.

How big and sweet and clean it looked!--like the loft at home, where he and Gwen and the black cat's kittens played on wet days.

But there was something other than the black cat's kittens to think about now.

The sunshine poured in through the ports on the sleek guns crouching ready. On the breech of one somebody had scrawled in chalk--

_G.o.d is Love. Hear me preach it:_

on others obscene mottoes, texts, and lines from patriotic songs.

About each gun cl.u.s.tered her crew, naked to the waist, black handkerchieves bound about their foreheads. All had solemn puckers about the brows; some were silent, some ghastly-joking in whispers, and one, face averted, was obviously praying.

Up and down the sanded deck between the guns, picking his teeth, strutted a tall and faded splendour.

His c.o.c.ked hat was a-rake; his kid gloves white as his skipper's were dingy; his whiskers, purple with dye newly applied, puffed out on cheeks touched with rouge.

Could this dilapidated dandy, so alert, so nonchalant, be the drunkard of last night?--