Armed Forces -- Fiction; English poetry; Prisoners -- Fiction; Short stories, English
“Ho! Was that the way Antonio looked at it? That shows he ’ad feelin’s.
To resoom. Without anyone givin’ us orders to that effect, we began to
creep about an’ whisper. Things got stiller and stiller, till they was
as still as—mushrooms! Then the bugler let off the ‘Dead March’ from
the upper bridge. He done it to cover the remarks of a cock-bird bein’
killed forrard, but it came out paralysin’ in its _tout ensemble_. You
never heard the ‘Dead March’ on a bugle? Then the pipes went twitterin’
for both watches to attend public execution, an’ we came up like so
many ghosts, the ’ole ship’s company. Why, Mucky ’Arcourt, one o’ our
boys, was that took in he give tongue like a beagle-pup, an’ was
properly kicked down the ladder for so doin’. Well, there we
lay—engines stopped, rollin’ to the swell, all dark, yards cock-billed,
an’ that merry tune yowlin’ from the upper bridge. We fell in on the
foc’sle, leavin’ a large open space by the capstan, where our
sail-maker was sittin’ sewin’ broken firebars into the foot of an old
’ammick. ’E looked like a corpse, an’ Mucky had another fit o’
hysterics, an’ you could ’ear us breathin’ ’ard. It beat anythin’ in
the theatrical line that even us _Archimandrites_ had done—an’ we was
the ship you could trust. Then come the doctor an’ lit a red lamp which
he used for his photographic muckin’s, an’ chocked it on the capstan.
That was finally gashly!
“Then come twelve Marines guardin’ Glass ’ere. You wouldn’t think to
see ’im what a gratooitous an’ aboundin’ terror he was that evenin’. ’E
was in a white shirt ’e’d stole from Cockburn, an’ his regulation
trousers, barefooted. ’E’d pipe-clayed ’is ’ands an’ face an’ feet an’
as much of his chest as the openin’ of his shirt showed. ’E marched
under escort with a firm an’ undeviatin’ step to the capstan, an’ came
to attention. The old man reinforced by an extra strong split—his
seventeenth, an’ ’e didn’t throw _that_ down the ventilator—come up on
the bridge an’ stood like a image. ’Op, ’oo was with ’im, says that ’e
heard Antonio’s teeth singin’, not chatterin’—singin’ like funnel-stays
in a typhoon. Yes, a moanin’ æolian harp, ’Op said.
“‘When you are ready, Sir, drop your ’andkerchief,’ Number One
whispers.
“‘Good Lord!’ says the old man, with a jump. ‘Eh! What? What a sight!
What a sight!’ an’ he stood drinkin’ it in, I suppose, for quite two
minutes.
“Glass never says a word. ’E shoved aside an ’andkerchief which the
sub-lootenant proffered ’im to bind ’is eyes with—quiet an’ collected;
an’ if we ’adn’t been feelin’ so very much as we did feel, his gestures
would ’ave brought down the ’ouse.”
“I can’t open my eyes, or I’ll be sick,” said the Marine with appalling
clearness. “I’m pretty far gone—I know it—but there wasn’t anyone could
’ave beaten Edwardo Glass, R.M.L.I., that time. Why, I scared myself
nearly into the ’orrors. Go on, Pye. Glass is in support—as ever.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account