I had heard about it in the morning; Bob, who was running the picket-boat, had told me. Her pinnace had tried to get alongside before our boat, neither would give way, because the two mids. disliked each other so much, and there’d been a collision. ’It was your boat’s fault, Ginger; she cut across our bows. I’ve reported it to the Commander.’ ’Be blowed for a yarn. Our Padre was in the boat and said it was done on purpose—the whole boat’s crew said it was. The mid. tried his best to get out of the way, and had his engines full speed astern. It was done on purpose, I tell you.’ ’It wasn’t,’ I said, getting angry with Ginger. ’It was your confounded mid. who tried to cut across our bows, our Engineer Commander was in the boat and told me so. The picket-boat has had to be hoisted in with her stem smashed in. D’you mean to say you don’t believe me?’ ’Well, if it comes to that, d’you mean to say you don’t believe me?’ Ginger jerked out. ’No, I’m hanged if I do! you’ve got hold of the wrong end of the stick,’ I said hotly. ’But, my dear chap, the Padre said——’ ’I don’t care a hang for your Padre—our Engineer Commander——’ ’Then you won’t take any notice of it?’ Ginger was getting excited now. ’None,’ I said, ’except to report your mid.’ ’You won’t cane your chap?’ ’No, I’m hanged if I will. It was young Bob Temple, he’s too stupid to try and do a thing like that. Your boat was simply poaching—I’m hanged if I’ll cane him.’ Ginger’s face looked as angry as mine felt, and he burst out with: ’Thank goodness, I haven’t got a cousin aboard my ship, and ain’t in love with his sister!’ Well, that finished me, and I swung off that if he thought that was why I didn’t cane him he was welcome to think so for the rest of his blooming existence. ’All right,’ he muttered angrily, ’I’ll not trouble to try and patch things up again.’ ’I hope you jolly well won’t. If your chaps want to cut across our bows, tell ’em to look out—that’s all.’ ’You absolutely refuse?’ he said very coldly. ’Absolutely,’ I answered, just as icily, holding the door curtain back. ’All right; sorry to have troubled you,’ and Ginger had gone up on deck before I could think of anything more, and I knew that we’d jolly well parted ’brass rags’ at last—after all the times we’d sworn that we’d never let the gun-room quarrels make any difference to us. I wanted to rush off to the _Hercules_ and make it ’up’ on the spot, but that beastly remark about Bob being my cousin—and the other thing—simply set me tingling all over, and I’d see him in Jericho first. If he thought that every time our midshipmen had a row, mine were to go to the wall, he was jolly well mistaken. There was bound to be a row about the damaged boats, and there was—a regular Court of Inquiry—and a lot of hard swearing on both sides, the only result of which was that Ginger and I—we’d been glaring at each other all the time—got badly snubbed for not keeping better control over our gun-rooms.