"Wha d'you think he said when you plumped overboard?"
"I don't know. What?"
"'Nelson might ha done that,' says the old man--Bible-truth, he did."
And he shook out loose coils of laughter.
The compliment was so staggering that it humbled the boy.
A minute since he could have stabbed that old man with the stiff knee.
Now he could have kissed him.
"No! did he _really_?" he gasped.
The Gunner clutched the boy with one arm, and
tilting his chin, looked down at the uplifted face.
"There _is_ a look o the little man about the kid," he said--"kind
o gal-like look--all eyes, and spirit, and long chin. Funny thing!--I've
always noticed the best biys to fight are them as got most gal about
em."
The purser's steward tripped up.
"Mr. Caryll, sir, Commander Harding desires to see you in his cabin."
"Told you, Sonny," crowed the Gunner. "It's to give you a certificate
for valour, and a drop o brandy on a lump o sugar."
II
A purser's glim lit the cabin, bare save for a solitary print upon
the bulk-head.
Facing it stood the old Commander, broad as a wall, his hands behind
him, and the scent-bottle, unstoppered now, in one of them.
Kit recognised the face on the wall at once.
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