The Long Trick Part 11

The next moment the Doctor was tripped up into the depths of the sofa, the bull-terrier, thus rudely awakened from slumber, dumped on top of him, and his struggles stifled by the bodies of the Paymaster and First Lieutenant. "Eat him, Garm--Hi! good beastie! Chew his nose, lick his collar...!"

The great bull-terrier, accustomed to being the instrument of such summary execution, entered into the game with zest, and sprawling across the Surgeon's chest with one ma.s.sive paw on his face, nuzzled and slavered in an abandonment of affectionate gusto.

"Oh!--oh!--oh!--pah!--phew!" The victim writhed and spluttered protests.

"Dry up--Garm, you great donkey! Piff!--you're--smothering--me--beast!

Ugh! my collar--clean--no offence--Jimmy, I 'pologise--lemme get up ...

Faugh!"

In the midst of the uproar the door opened and the Mids.h.i.+pman of the Watch appeared.

"Mr. Thorogood, sir," he called. "Someone to see you."

The group on the sofa broke up. The Surgeon sat up panting and wiping his face. The dog jumped to the deck and accompanied Thorogood across to the door, wagging a friendly tail.

Sir William Thorogood, hat in hand, with his cloak over his arm, entered the ante-room. His eyegla.s.s fell from his eye.

"Hullo, Uncle Bill," exclaimed his nephew. "You're early--nice and early--we've just started training for the Regatta and we're straffing the c.o.xswain by way of a start! Er--Staff Surgeon Tucker, Sir William Thorogood."

The Surgeon advanced with a rather embarra.s.sed grin and shook hands with the eminent scientist.

"I fancy I knew your father once," said the latter smiling. "He held the chair of Comparative Anatomy--we were at college together--bless me!--a good many years ago now." He stood smiling down at Pills from his lean height.

The Mess chortled at the Surgeon's discomfiture. Thorogood turned to the Commander who had just then entered. "This is Commander Hornby," he said, and introduced the two men. "There's Mouldy--you remember him?"

Mouldy Jakes came over and shook hands gravely. "And this is the rest of the Mess." He included the remainder with a wave of his hand, and Sir William acknowledged the informal general introduction with the grave, smiling self-possession of the perfectly bred Englishman.

"Now," said his nephew, "what about a c.o.c.ktail, Uncle Bill?"

"Yes," said Mouldy Jakes, sharing with his friend the responsibility of entertaining this eminent guest. "We've got rather a good brand--fizzy ones. Do you a power of good, sir!"

Sir William laughed. "Thank you," he said, "but fizzy c.o.c.ktails and I came to the parting of the ways more years ago than I care to remember.

Perhaps I may be allowed to join you in a gla.s.s of sherry....?"

"Rather," said his host, and gave the order. "Well, Uncle Bill," he said, "what brings you up to Ultima Thule and on board the Flags.h.i.+p?"

The Scientist helped himself to a biscuit from the tray on a little table near the door. "I'm staying with--with an old friend for a few days, for a change of air," he said. He took the proffered gla.s.s of sherry and sipped it appreciatively. "May I congratulate you on your excellent sherry?"

"It's not bad," said Mouldy Jakes. "I'm the wine caterer," he added modestly.

At this juncture dinner was announced and they pa.s.sed through into the long Wardroom.

Shaded electric lights hung down above the table that traversed the length of the Mess. A number of ornamental pieces of silver and trophies adorned the centre of the table and winked and glistened against the dark mahogany. Slips of white napery ran down on either side, on which the gla.s.ses, silver and cutlery lay. They took their places, the presidential hammer tapped, and the Chaplain, rising, offered brief thanks. Immediately after a buzz of conversation broke out generally.

Sir William, on the right of the President, indicated the glittering trophies. "I see you keep your plate on board," he said, smiling, "even in war."

The Commander laughed. "Well," he said, "all these things we actually won ourselves. There's a lot more stuff--the things that belong to the s.h.i.+p itself, one commission as much as another, and those we landed.

Then, if we get sunk, successive s.h.i.+ps bearing our name will carry them, you see ... yes, half a gla.s.s, please. But all you see here we won at battle practice just before the war, boat-racing and so on....

Incidentally we hope to win the Squadron Regatta this year. That big one over there was from the pa.s.sengers of a burning s.h.i.+p we rescued.... If we're sunk they may as well go down with us; at least, that's how we look at it. It is only in keeping with our motto, after all."

He pushed across a silver menu-holder, bearing the s.h.i.+p's crest and motto on a scroll beneath it. The guest picked it up and examined it. "What we hold we hold," he read. "Yes, I see. It's not a bad interpretation."

Sir William looked round the table at the laughing, animated faces--many of them little more than boys seen through the long perspective of his own years.

The Chaplain was having "his leg hauled." The joke was obscure, and concerned an episode of bygone days which appeared to be within the intimate recollection of at least half the number seated round the table.

The other half were demanding enlightenment, and in the laughter and friendly mischief on certain faces Sir William read an affectionate, mysterious freemasonry apparently shared by all.

For a moment he leaned back, contemplating in imagination the scores of great s.h.i.+ps surrounding them on all sides, invisible in the night: in each Wardroom there was doubtless a similar cheerful gathering beneath the shaded electric lights. Musing thus, glancing from face to face, and listening, half uncomprehending, to the laughing jargon, he glimpsed for an instant the indefinable Spirit of the Fleet. Each of these communities, separated by steel and darkness from the other, shared it.

It stretched back into a past of unforgotten memories, linking one and all in a brotherhood that compa.s.sed the waters of the earth, and bore their traditions with unfailing hands across the hazard of the future.

The meal drew to a close and the decanters went slowly round. Mouldy Jakes, from his seat opposite the President, was attempting to catch Sir William's eye. His nephew intercepted and interpreted the gesticulations. "Mouldy's recommending the Madeira, Uncle Bill," said his nephew; "he evidently feels that his reputation as wine caterer is at stake after your comments on the sherry!"

Sir William laughed and filled his gla.s.s accordingly.

Obedient to a signal conveyed to the Bandmaster by a Marine waiter, the band in the flat outside came suddenly to a stop.

Down came the President's hammer, and the name of the King preceded the raising of gla.s.ses. Then the violins outside resumed their whimpering melody; coffee followed a second circulation of the decanters, and presently the smoke of cigars and cigarettes began to eddy across the polished mahogany.

A few minutes later the Master-at-Arms entered the Wardroom, and stepping up to the Commander's chair, reported something in a low voice. The Commander turned sideways to the guest of the evening. "Will you excuse me if I leave you?" he said. "I have to go the rounds." And rising from the table left a gap at Sir William's side. Intimate conversation between uncle and nephew, hitherto impracticable, was now possible.

"How's Cecily, Uncle Bill?" asked James. "Which reminds me," he added, "that I met Armitage when I was coming back from leave."

Sir William removed his cigar and contemplated the pale ash with inscrutable eyes.

"I heard from Armitage," he replied. "Did you by any chance meet his companion on the journey up?"

James shook his head. "No, I only saw Armitage for a moment, and that was in the darkness at the rail-head. But you haven't told me how Cecily is."

"She wants to go to America," replied his uncle.

"America!" echoed his nephew. "Why?"

"To stay with an old school friend. It seems she wants to go over for a Newport season."

"But," said James and paused, "are you going to let her go, Uncle Bill?"

"She says she's going," was her guardian's reply.

James smoked in silence for a moment.

"But Newport," he said. "Where on earth did Cecily develop a taste for that sort of life?"

"Read about it in a book, I fancy," said Sir William.

"But it isn't the sort of thing I can imagine appealing to Cecily in the least," objected her cousin. "I know what Cecily likes--pottering about in old tweeds with a dog, sketching and fis.h.i.+ng. I can't see her at Bailey's Beach surf-bathing with millionaires in the family diamonds.

Besides, what about her war work--her Hospital Supply Depot?"

Sir William made no answer.