“Home orders!” cried Boyle, who was certainly beyond himself. Probably he missed his regular vocal exercise owing to lack of a crew. “My missus says to me, ‘You just stick to Captain Courtenay, young feller-me-lad. He’s one of the get-rich-quick sort. P’raps you’ll learn from him how to dodge Board of Trade inquiries.’ You stand on what I told you, Miss Maxwell. You remember? Commodore! Huh!” Something must be done to stem the long-pent flood of Mr. Boyle’s gossip. Elsie turned on him desperately. “How do you expect me to listen to you, and work at the same time?” she said. “Sorry,” he answered, composing himself to sleep. Courtenay glanced at the chronometer. “I must be off,” he announced. “Tollemache may need some help with his bombs, and those Chileans require looking after.” Christobal, too, quitted the chart-room to visit his patients. He had said very little while he sat there, and Elsie did not know whether to laugh or cry at the tragic-comedy of her environment. She was only certain of one thing—she would like to box Boyle’s ears. She was completely at a loss to account for his persistent efforts to drag in references to their prior conversation. She dared not catechize him. That would be piling up more difficulties for the future. But what possessed him to blurt out such embarrassing details in the presence of the two men whom she most wished to remain in ignorance of them? She peeped at Boyle sideways. His eyes were closed, the cigar was between his teeth, and he had a broad grin on his face. She could not guess that the once taciturn chief officer of the _Kansas_ was saying to himself: “My godfather, how Pills glared! There will be trouble on this ship about a woman before long, or I’m a Dutchman. An’ didn’t the skipper rise at the fly, too! Huh!” He uttered the concluding monosyllable aloud. “Did you speak?” inquired Elsie, severely. “Eh? No, Miss Maxwell.” “Oh, I thought you wanted to say something.” “Not a word. Too much talking makes my back stiff.” “Your physical peculiarities are amazing, Mr. Boyle.” “Huh, it’s odd how things take some people. I once knew a chap, skipper of the _Flower of the Ocean_, who could drink a hogshead of beer an’ be as sober as a judge except in one leg, an’ that was a wooden one.” She laughed. It was impossible to be vexed with him. “You have met some very remarkable shipmasters, if all you say be true,” she cried.