‘I shall insist upon your not meddling, Edward, in whatever may happen,’ cried his wife, giving him an emphatic nod over the edge of her fan with her Roman nose. ‘I shall meddle, then, my dear,’ he shouted. ‘If it comes to those rascals attacking us, I shall fight, as of course we all will,’ and again he bent his little fiery eyes upon Mr. Johnson. ‘My note-book is ready, colonel,’ said Mr. Johnson pleasantly, with a satirical grin at the peppery little soldier. ‘I’ll not lose sight of you, sir.’ ‘I believe you will then, sir,’ sneered the colonel, ‘unless Captain Keeling takes the precaution to clap his hatches on to prevent anybody skulking below from off the deck.’ ‘Mere bluster is not going to help us,’ said Colledge, who disliked the colonel; ‘no good in railing and storming like heroes in a blank-verse performance for an hour at a time before falling to. If Captain Keeling wants any assistance outside that of his crew, he may command me for one.’ ‘I wath never taught fenthing,’ said Mr. Fairthorne; ‘if I fight, it mutht be with a muthket.’ ‘If the ship should be captured, what’s to become of us?’ cried Mrs. Hudson. ‘I’ve read the most barbarous histories about pirates. They have no respect for sex or age; and it’s quite common, I’ve heard, for every pirate to have twelve wives.’ Here Mrs. Trevor suddenly shrieked out for some one to bring her baby to her, then went into hysterics, and was presently carried away in a dead faint by the stewards, followed by her daughter, weeping bitterly. Old Keeling whipped out an oath. ‘Now, gentlemen,’ he exclaimed, ‘you see what your conversation has brought about. Ladies, I beg that you will not be uneasy. The stranger will give us no trouble, I am persuaded;’ and rising with a look of contempt, he bowed stiffly to Miss Temple and her aunt, and went on deck. I was too curious to observe what was going forward to linger in the cuddy amid this idle rattle of tongues. Our ship having no steerage-way, had slewed to the beat of the swell, and the brig was now off the starboard bow, pretty much distant as she had been when we went to lunch, but showing out with amazing clearness against the sooty sky past her, upon which her topsails swung from side to side so heavily that the lower yard-arms at times seemed to spear the water lifting to them in hills. All over and beyond her lay a deep shadow of thunder, a sky scowling to the zenith thick as though viewed through a dust-storm, with a vision of the tufted cloud of the electric tempest hovering here and there; but there was no lightning as yet, no echo of distant grumbling; there was not a breath of air to cool the moistened lip, and the noiseless heave of the swell was as though old ocean lay breathing hard in a posture of dumb expectation.