human
Look here, Mr Count, he said;
gpt
I am only a rough Englishman, and a lot of what you have been saying about mission and that sort of thing is just so much Greek to me. But do you mean to tell me that you got a ball through the bottom of your smart brig that night in Havre, and have never been able to stop the leak?
human
Yes, yes; that is so, my friend. My chief officer has tried everything that he could do, but we could not get at the place. And look yonder! The pump has been kept going ever since.
gpt
Well, sir, continued Captain Chubb,
human
I don't know your first mate, and I don't want to say hard things of a man who could take that there smart craft out of the French harbour as he did that night. He is a very fine sailor, sir. But if I aren't got a carpenter on board this schooner as would give him ninety out of a hundred and then beat him, without bringing to work the little bit I knows myself, why, I'm a Dutchman, and that I aren't.
gpt
Ah! cried the Count excitedly.
human
You think--
gpt
No, sir; I don't say I think anything without having a look. But as there don't seem to be any fighting going on, and you and the doctor here turns out to be old friends, why, before you talk of throwing up your job and taking to your boats--which would be a much more sensible thing to do than going down with colours flying when there warn't no need, and setting aside getting some fresh water and provisions into your boats and making for a place on the West Afric coast--I should just like to come on board your craft with my man and see what mightn't be done by stopping that there leak.
human
My friend!
gpt
Well, sir, said the skipper, with a grim smile,
human
he continued, as he gave the Count's thin white hand a tremendous grip,
gpt
Ah, yes, of course, said the Count warmly.
human
It is what I should have done.
gpt
And you would like me to come aboard and see if there's anything we can do?
human
Yes, yes!
gpt
All right, then, sir, said the skipper coolly;
human
I am sailing under the doctor's orders, and if he's willing, I'm your man.
gpt
Well, Mr Rodd, sir, said Captain Chubb, as he and the lad stood watching the regular dip of oars in the brig's two boats as they glided back over the tranquil sea to where their vessel lay motionless in the calm.
human
Well, Mr Rodd, sir, don't you wish you'd been born a Frenchman?
gpt
No, cried the boy sharply.
human
I am thankful I was born English.
gpt
And so you ought to be, my lad. Of all the crackbrained, sentimental, outrageous chaps I ever met there's none of them comes up to a Frenchman.
human
Oh, you are too bad, Captain Chubb.
gpt
Too bad, eh? Why, aren't they always kicking up a dust and making revolutions, cutting off their kings' and queens' heads, and then going to war with all the world, with their Napoleons and Bonapartes and all the rest of them? Call themselves men!
human
Why, you are as bad as uncle, cried Rodd merrily.
gpt
You and he ought to be always the best of friends. But, if you speak fairly you must own that they are very gallant men.
human
Gallant men! cried the skipper scornfully.
gpt
I don't call them men. I call them monkeys! Men! Butchers, as cut off the head of their beautiful Queen Mary What-you-may-call-it, and then after shedding blood like that, sending no end of poor women who never did them a bit of harm to that guillotine. I'd be ashamed of myself, Mr Rodd, to take their part.
human
Oh, nonsense! cried Rodd warmly.
gpt
I say that the Count and his son have proved themselves to be very brave fellows. Why, you owned as much yourself about the way in which they escaped with the brig.
human
Oh, that was right enough,
gpt
I am not going to deny, continued Rodd,
human
Well, yes, we have had some pretty tidy ones, if you come to read your histories. But I don't know so much about those chaps being brave. It was a very clever bit of seamanship, mind you, that taking the brig out in the teeth of the storm with hardly room to tack. I am not a bad pilot in my way when I like to try, but I will be honest over it; I daren't have tried that job. It was a very clean thing. But look here, my lad. It's no use for you to try and crack that up, because him who did it must have been as mad as a hatter, and between ourselves, that's what I think that Count is.
gpt
Oh, fudge, captain! cried Rodd.
human
No more mad than you or I.
gpt
Well, I can answer for myself, my lad, said the skipper, with a chuckle,
human
I?
gpt
Yes, you, my lad.
human
What a shame! cried Rodd indignantly.
gpt
I defy you to prove that I have done anything that you could call mad. Now tell me something. What have you ever known me do that wasn't sensible?
human
Oh, that's soon done, cried the skipper.
gpt
Didn't you go and gammon the soldiers when they were after the escaped French prisoners? Don't you call that a mad act? Fighting against the laws of your country like that!
human
Ah, well, I suppose I oughtn't to have helped them, captain; but I couldn't help it.
gpt
No, sir, and that's what the Frenchmen would say. Now, what in the world is that chap after, with his mission, as he calls it? What does he mean by coming rampaging out south with a hole in the bottom of his brig and the pumps going straight on to keep the water down? Would any one but a lunatic go risking his crew and his vessel like that?
human
Well, it does seem rather wild,
gpt
Wild? Well, that's only your way of saying he's stick, stark, staring mad. And here he's been out weeks and weeks, knowing as he says that his brig was sinking, when he could have put in at Gib, or the Azores, or Las Palmas, or brought up in one of the West Coast rivers, where he could run up on the tidal mud, careened his vessel, and set his ship's carpenter to work to clap patches upon her bottom outside and in. Don't you call that mad?
human
No. He might have had reasons for not doing so.
gpt
Ah, that's right, sir; argufy. You young scholarly chaps who have been to big schools and got your heads chock-full of Latin and Greek, you are beggars to argufy--chopping logic, I suppose you calls it--and I give in. You could easily beat me at that; just as easily as I could turn you round my little finger at navigation. But I'll have one more go at you; I says that there French Count is mad.
human
And I say he is not, said Rodd,
gpt
All right, youngster. I give you my side. Now that's yours. Now, just answer me this. Warn't it the crack-brainedest bit of ask-you-to-go-and-borrow-a-new-strait-waistcoat-to-put-me-in sort of a job for him to bring his two boat-loads of men, like a black-flag-and-cross-boned Paul Jones sort of a pirate, aboard our schooner in the dark, thinking he's going to take possession of it to use instead of his own brig, when if he'd had any gumption he might have managed to patch her up, and--Here, I say, I can't go on talking like this before breakfast, my lad. I must have my bowl of coffee and a bit of salt pork and biscuit before I say another word.
human
Oh, very well, cried Rodd merrily.
gpt
I see we shan't agree; and we don't want to quarrel, do we, captain?
human
Quarrel? Not us, my lad! It takes two to do that, and we knows one another too well.
gpt
Then look here, cried Rodd,
human
I aren't a-going to do anything till I have had my breakfast, said the captain.
gpt
They've spoilt my morning snooze, but I aren't going to let them spoil my morning meal, nor my lads' neither.
human
But it's urgent, cried Rodd.
gpt
Suppose while you are thinking of eating and drinking the brig goes down?
human
Yah! She won't go down. If she's floated for weeks like that she'll keep her nose above water while I swallow two bowls of coffee. I can't work without something to keep me going. Let them pump for another half-hour, and then we'll go.
gpt
We! said Rodd sharply.
human
That means me too?
gpt
Oh, ah, if you like to come; only we shall have to keep a sharp look-out.
human
What, for fear it should sink under us?
gpt
Nay, I didn't mean that, my lad. I mean, you see, we are dealing with a lunatic.
human
Captain!
gpt
Ay, but we are, and there's no knowing what sort of games fellows like that will be up to. I mean to give the mate strict orders to load all three guns, and if he sees the Count coming off again with his two boats full of men to take possession while he's got us tight, to sink them without mercy. Ah, here's the stooard, welcome, as you might say, as the flowers in spring. Come along, my lad, and let's lay in stores.