The Lost Middy Part 4

"No, no; don't ask me, Tom."

"Not ast yer, my lad? Well, I won't if yer say as I arn't to. But it must ha' been something very bad indeed."

"It was, Tom, horribly bad; but--but he didn't call me anything. It was something he said made me so angry. I wouldn't have fought like that for anything he had called me."

"Ho!" said the sailor, thoughtfully. "Then it was about somebody else?"

"Yes, Tom," said the lad, frowning, and with his eyes flas.h.i.+ng with the remains of his anger.

"Then it must have been something as he called me," said the sailor, naively. "Yes, I know he's got his knife into me. So you licked him well for saying what he did, Master Aleck?"

"Yes," said the lad, thoughtfully, and with the frown deepening upon his face.

"Then I says thankye, Master Aleck, and I won't forget it, for it was very hansum on yer."

"What was?" said the lad, starting.

"What was? Why, you licking that big ugly lout, my lad, for calling me names."

"No, no, no," cried Aleck, quickly; "it was not for that."

"Why, you said just now as you did, Master Aleck," said the sailor, blankly.

"Oh, no; you misunderstood me, Tom. It was not for that."

"Ho! Then what for was it, my lad?"

"I can't tell you, Tom," cried the boy, pa.s.sionately. "Don't worry me.

Can't you see I'm all in pain and trouble?"

"All right, sir; I don't want to worry yer. It don't matter. I couldn't help wanting to know why you larruped him; but, as I said afore, it don't matter. You did larrup him, and give it him well, and it strikes me as his father'll give him the rope's-end as well, as soon as he sees him for going back home with such a face as he's got on his front. My word, you did paint him up. His old man won't hardly know him."

"Tom!" cried Aleck, excitedly, as these last words impressed him deeply.

"Ay, ay, sir! Tom it is."

"Look at my face," said the lad, looking up sharply from where he had been leaning over the gunwale scooping up the water in his hand and bathing the injuries he had received in his encounter. "Look at me. Is my face much knocked about?"

The sailor s.h.i.+fted the hands which had held rudder and sheet, afterwards raising that which held the latter and rubbing his mahogany brown nose with the rope.

"Well, why don't you speak, Tom?" said the lad, pettishly.

"'Cause I was 'specting yer like, my lad--smelling yer over like, so as to think out what to say."

"Go on, then; only say something."

"So I will, sir, if yer really wants to hear."

"Why, of course I do. Does my face show much?"

"Well, yes, sir," said the sailor, gravely, as he went on rubbing one side of his nose with the rope. "You've got it pretty tidy."

"Tell me what you can see."

The sailor grunted and hesitated.

"Go on," cried Aleck. "Here, my bottom lip smarts a good deal. It's cut, isn't it?"

"That's right, sir. Cut it is, but I should say as it'll soon grow up together again."

Aleck pressed the kerchief to his lip, and winced with pain.

"Arn't loosened no teeth, have yer, sir?"

Aleck shook his head.

"Go on," he said. "What about my nose? It's swollen, isn't it?"

"Well, yes, sir, it is a bit swelled like. Puffy, as yer might say; but, bless yer 'art, it's nothing to what Big Jem's is. I shouldn't mind about that a bit now, for it have stopped bleeding. There's nothing like cold sea water for that, though it do make yer tingle a bit. I 'member what a lot o' good it used to do when we'd been in action and the lads had got chopped about in boarding the enemy. The Frenchies used to be pretty handy with their cutla.s.ses and boarding-pikes. They used axes too."

"Oh, I don't want to know about that," cried Aleck, pettishly. "There's a scratch or something on my forehead, isn't there?"

"It's 'most too big and long to call it a scratch, sir. I should call that a cut."

"Tut, tut, tut!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Aleck.

"That'll soon be all right, sir," continued the sailor, cheerfully.

"Bit o' sticking plaster'll soon set that to rights. What I don't like is your eyes."

"My eyes?" cried Aleck. "Yes, they do feel stiff when I wink them. Do they look bad, then?"

The sailor chuckled softly.

"What do you mean by that?" cried the lad, angrily. "Are they swollen too? I'm sure there's nothing to laugh at in that."

The sailor tried to look very serious, but failed. The laughing crinkles were smoothed out of his face, but his eyes sparkled and danced with merriment as he said:

"I didn't mean no harm, Master Aleck, but you wouldn't say what you did if you could see your eyes. They do look so rum."

"Why? How?" cried Aleck, excitedly.

"Did yer see Benny Wiggs's eyes las' year after he took the bee swarm as got all of a lump in Huggins's damsel tree?"

"No, of course I didn't," cried Aleck, impatiently.

"Ah, that's a pity, sir, because yourn looks just like his'n did. You see, they don't look like eyes!"

"Then what do they look like?" cried Aleck.