Young Tom Bowling Part 8

I led the way towards the forecastle of the old ship, where the high bulwarks, I saw, would screen us well from observation; although the place, of course, was on the open deck, and visible from aloft, had anybody been there on the look-out, anxious to take a peep at us.

In the old days, indeed, had this rencontre between 'Ugly' and me then took place, we might have fought in an enclosed arena; for the _Saint Vincent_, I have been told, when she was first built, was fitted with a p.o.o.p and topgallant-forecastle, and went to sea with them, but Admiral Sir Charles Napier, who was then commodore of the Channel Squadron, and hoisted his broad pennant in her, found the ship so top-heavy when under his command that he reported her to be unseaworthy on his return to Spithead with the fleet, the result of which was that she lost her p.o.o.p and topgallant-forecastle; hence 'Ugly' and I had now to fight under the eye of the circling seagulls, always on the wing, screeching round the old training-ship in their plaintive fashion, and diving ever and anon into the tideway to pick up sc.r.a.ps that were chucked overboard by our comrades, more sensible than us, down below at their dinners!

The deck was quite clear, the only person visible being the captain of the afterguard, who was taking a snooze on a pile of canvas and old sails that were stowed in a heap close by the main bitts; so, acting under the chaperonage of Larrikins, who officiated as bottle-holder, 'Ugly' and I stood up, facing each other with our fists doubled, ready for action, in a nice little open s.p.a.ce that seemed to have been left especially for the purpose between the heel of the bowsprit and the knight-heads.

One of the other first-cla.s.s boys had stopped up to see the fun in addition to Larrikins, and he now offered himself as second to 'Ugly,'

while Mick, of course, he being really the main cause of the quarrel, naturally came forward as mine.

"Now, gents," cried Larrikins, seeing my antagonist and myself were duly prepared, "yer can bergin the puffomince as soon as yer likes!"

Before waiting even for this mandate, 'Ugly' made that mad-bull rush at me which he had contemplated in the first instance at the commencement of hostilities; but having had some considerable previous experience in the use of those weapons of attack and defence alike, with which a beneficent nature has so thoughtfully provided menfolk, from many a rough and tumble fight on Common Hard with the mudlarks and other idle scamps frequenting that place, who used to be always playing pranks with father's wherry, trying to steal anything they could lay hold of, should we leave her for a minute alone, I had no difficulty in avoiding the onslaught of my opponent.

I kept my right hand well up on guard, across my chest; and, my left fist being extended, I caught my gentleman a pretty tidy blow under the chin that floored him as quickly as before.

"Bedad, Tom, ye had him there!" cried Mick, dancing round me in ecstasy, while 'Ugly's' second was picking him up. "Jist giv' him a onener in his bread-basket, me jewel, an' ye'll finish him!"

This was not so easy a matter, however, as my chum supposed; Moses Reeks being of that bulldog nature, as his looks testified, that would not give in until thoroughly licked.

"Steady there," cautioned his second, trying his best to prevent him from continuing his foolish mode of plunging attack; but the pig-headed chap would persist in continually rushing in on my guard, and getting knocked down as regularly, time after time, without his having a chance of landing a blow at me, his fists ever whirling about aimlessly, and being easily avoided by myself. "Keep yer bloomin' dukes out straight in front of yer, silly! 'It 'im in the heye, I tell yer! Wy, yer lettin' 'im 'ave hit hall 'is own way!"

"Blatheration!" cried Mick, my champion, quite as energetically, in counter encouragement to me. "Go for him, Tom; go straight for him agin! Faith, me jewel, you'll lave him soon so as how his blessed own mother, bad cess to her, wouldn't know him, sure as me name now's Mick Donovan!"

Urged on in this fashion on either side, we went at it hammer and tongs, 'Ugly' getting more cautious from his repeated familiarity with the deck planking, and fighting more scientifically after the first two or three rounds.

The consequence of this was that he got in one or two nasty blows with his sledge-hammer fists on the side of my head, which made my ears ache, besides giving me a fine black eye on the port side.

He could not manage to land me a facer, however, straight out, try all that he could; and presently, on my feeling particularly 'riled' by a backhanded clout he succeeded in landing on my cheek, I drew out my left, and, driving it home forwards with all my strength, let him have it straight on the nose.

"Faith, ye tapped his claret for him that time, mabouchal; it's stramin'

out all over the d.i.c.k."

Hardly had my chum made this observation, so highly expressive of his unconcealed delight, ere 'Ugly,' wiping away the blood from his face with the sleeve of his jumper, and clutching hold of the lanyard round his neck, to the end of which his knife was attached, made a spring at me from the knee of his second, where he had sat dazed for half a moment, giving vent to a cry that was more like the howl of a wild animal than anything else.

I put up my hands mechanically, though I had hardly then imagined he would have come so soon at me again; intending, however, more to guard his attack than hit him any blow, for I really thought he had received quite enough punishment already.

But he beat down my guard as easily as if my arms really had been made of pipeclay, and then I felt a stinging sensation through one of these and my left side, just as if I had run foul of a jelly-fish when swimming off the 'Hot Walls,' as I have done sometimes when bathing.

"Begorrah, the thafe's stabbed ye!" exclaimed Mick, putting his arms round me as I fell back. "Whare now is ye hoort, Tom, alannah?"

"Oh, it's nothing," I said with a laugh, as soon as I got back my breath, which had been knocked out of me by the rush 'Ugly' made, the knife having only grazed my ribs, while it had given an ugly gash to my arm; though, probably, had I not guarded the blow, the sharp weapon with which my antagonist had only been supplied, like the rest of us, that very morning, would as likely as not have 'settled my hash,' as father used to say. "Pray don't make a fuss of it, Mick, or any of you fellows. It will all rub off when it's dry!"

Larrikins and the other first-cla.s.s boy had meanwhile collared 'Ugly'

and taken the knife from him, to prevent his doing any further mischief with it; and, as fighting was prohibited on board, and they might possibly have been brought up on the quarter-deck as accomplices, should the affair get wind and come to the notice of the ship's police, the two, who no doubt were old and tried hands at the game, thought it best to take my advice and 'keep the matter dark,' as they said.

"I doesn't like that yere knifin', though," said Master Larrikins, when Mick had bound up my arm with his handkerchief, taking it off his neck for the purpose; and we had all turned to sneak below out of observation before 'quarters' should be sounded and the fellows come tumbling up from dinner, 'Ugly' concealing his battered face by dragging down his cap over his eyes, and pulling up his collar as if he had toothache, which no doubt was not very far from the truth. "Don't yer try on that yere bloomin' game agin, you Reeks, I tell yer, my joker, or else yer 'ad better git yer coffin ready afore yer comes aboard this ship. Lor'!

W'y, if the 'Jaunty' or 'Jimmy the One' knowed it, yer'd be strung up at the yard-arm this very minnit!"

The incident, however, pa.s.sed off without notice from the authorities; although the news of our encounter, with its almost tragic finale, got about amongst the boys, most of the well-conducted of whom gave 'Ugly' a wide berth in consequence, the poor beggar being shunned thenceforth by all but the ne'er-do-wells of the ship, that is, until the circ.u.mstance became gradually buried in the past through the pressure of more prominent events.

We managed, combatants and seconds alike, not forgetting the director- in-chief of the fight, Master Larrikins, to reach the sanctuary of the lower deck unseen by any of the ship's corporals, or 'crushers,' as Larrikins facetiously called them.

Not only this; through that wily individual's artful manoeuvring and pathetic appeal to the G.o.ds of the cook's galley, we also contrived to get some dinner, which, indeed, was particularly grateful to all of us after our exertions.

The meal this day, being a Wednesday, consisted, for a change, of salt pork and pea-soup; 'pea doo and bolliky,' as it is styled in _Saint Vincent_ slang.

"Faith, it smills good," exclaimed Mick, with a loud and prolonged sniff of enjoyment, on the friendly Larrikins anon placing a bowl of the steaming compound under his nose on the mess-table. "A'most as good as tay, begorrah!"

"Ga-a!" cried our caterer. "Only a Paddy wud say that!"

"Bedad, I don't say much differ," said Mick, after quickly gulping down the contents of his bowl with great gusto and much apparent inward satisfaction. "Pay-soup an' tay soup--sure, they bees as loike as two pays!" This certainly seemed a very logical deduction; but, before we could argue the point out, or indeed laugh at Mick's Irish way of putting it, the bugle sounded again for 'divisions.'

As we all scrambled up the after-hatch, the ship's corporal, Brown, who had helped me to sling my hammock again after I had been cut down the first night I was on board, a very decent man altogether, stopped 'Ugly,' who was on his way up ahead of me.

"Hallo!" he said. "What's the matter with your face, boy?"

"I dunno," replied my late antagonist, trying vainly to hide the effects of my fists with the sleeve of his blue jumper. "S'pose I run agin summat a-comin' downstairs jest now!"

The sun, though, streaming down through the open hatchway, handicapped all the yokel's attempts of concealment; and Mr Brown looked at him with a quizzical expression on his face and a comical twinkle in his eye that spoke a volume without words!

"It strikes me, young man," he said, with his broad good-humoured grin, "that theer 'summat' you knocked against must have been moving round you pretty smart! Bless me, if it ain't fetched you one on your b.o.o.by hatch and another on the conk, and bottled up your peepers as well! What's your name, boy?"

"Mo--ses," drawled out 'Ugly' slowly, the poor beggar having a difficulty in speaking, caused by the blow I first gave him on the mouth, which accentuated his provincial p.r.o.nunciation, "Re--eeks, zur."

"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed ship's corporal Brown. "Then, Mr Moses Reeks, you'd better go to the sick-bay and see the doctor."

'Ugly' backed down the hatchway to comply with this order, as we were just then ascending from the middle deck; and, from his withdrawing his intervening figure, I became disclosed to view.

My arm, which had swollen up, and necessitated my putting it in a sling, at once attracted the observation of the corporal.

"I say, youngster," he said, arresting my footsteps in like fashion, "why are you bandaged up? What the--ah, what does this hanky-panky mean?"

"I--I--I," I stammered, not knowing what to reply to this, as I did not like to tell him a barefaced lie in cold blood offhand-- "I've hurt my arm, sir."

"A-ah!" breathed out Mr Brown significantly; adding, after a pause, "You're Tom Bowling, ain't you?"

"Yes, sir," I said; "that's my name."

"Well, it strikes me, Thomas Bowling," said he drily, in the chaffy sort of way he adopted sometimes when hauling any of us 'over the coals' for some offence, performing his duty ever of guardian of the peace as lightly as he could make it, "there's some sort o' circ.u.mbendibus between this here arm of yourn and the spoilt face of that there joker I've jist sent to the sick-bay. Thomas Bowling, Esquire, I fancy you'd better foller him there, my boy."

Of course, I obeyed this command, a ship corporal's word, whether jocular or not, being as good as an order and regarded as law on board the training-ship.

Nothing was said, though, to either of us regarding our recent fight, nor any embarra.s.sing questions asked, when we reached the sick-bay.

Trimmens, the sick-berth steward, on the contrary, never moved a muscle of his mahogany face when 'Ugly' said that he had knocked his head against the hatchway, and I told a 'banger' by volunteering the statement that I had broken a plate on the mess-table, and one of the pieces had run into my arm. The wound in my side, which was really only a scratch, I never mentioned to any one, not even to Mick, who thought, and to this day knows nothing to the contrary, I believe, that I had guarded off 'Ugly's' thrust, and had been only stabbed in the arm.

Our injuries not being sufficiently serious to put either of us in the sick-list, 'Ugly' and I were sent back, after being lotioned and 'dressed' by Trimmens, to rejoin our division, then at their 'instruction drill' on the lower deck, and engaged making what are known to those learned in the arts of the sea as 'bends and hitches.'

To explain these properly to a landsman, I would say, for the sake of easier comprehension, that the theory of a 'bend' is based on the good- natured truism contained in the old adage, 'One good turn deserves another'; while a second proverb, 'Safe bind, safe find,' will equally justify the existence of the 'hitch'; but if the inquirer be not satisfied with either of these definitions or explanations, whichever term he may choose to apply to them, I can only advise him to follow Captain Cuttle's injunction and 'overhaul his Church catechism.'

To drop joking, all of us new hands were taught our work as well as sailors could teach us, which was so effectually done that what we once learnt we never forgot; this work being to treat ropes and rigging as if they were reasoning and responsible beings, and to be capable of making fast or letting loose, whensoever it so pleased us, anything under the sun, from knotting a reef point to parbuckling a cask--a dodge by which, I believe, Admiral Rodney, or Abercromby, or some other hero, during the times of the wars, contrived to drag one of his ship's guns to the top of a lofty mountain guarding the entrance to Castries, the harbour of Saint Lucia, which was by this means captured from its French possessors, and is now numbered with the rest of our West Indian colonies.