Harry Collingwood
A Chinese Command
A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas
Published by Good Press, 2019
EAN 4064066193324
Table of Contents
Chapter Two.
Eastward Ho!
So soundly and dreamlessly did Frobisher sleep that he did not wake until the clear notes of the dressing bugle—a solemn farce which Dick insisted upon his servant performing when ashore—had almost finished ringing through the little cottage.
Punctually at 8 a.m. the old marine who acted as Dick’s servant when he was ashore, and as general housekeeper and caretaker when he was afloat, sounded the bugle as a signal to his master that it was time to turn out; and the neighbours in the houses round about—who, by the way, referred to Penryn as “that very eccentric young man”—had come to look upon the instrument somewhat in the light of a town clock; so much so that several of them set their watches by it, and one old gentleman was in the habit of leaving his front door and sprinting for the eight-fifteen train to town punctually upon the first note.
Frobisher sat up in bed with a yawn, and was half-way to the bath-room before he was sufficiently wideawake to recollect that this morning was different from the three hundred and sixty-five odd preceding mornings. But as he remembered that at last he had secured the offer of regular and profitable employment—although not quite along the lines he had hoped for—he let out a whoop of rejoicing that made the cottage ring.
Having completed his toilet, Frobisher came downstairs whistling, to find Penryn standing in front of the fire, warming his coat tails and sniffing hungrily, while from the direction of the kitchen came certain savoury smells.
“ ’Morning, Murray!”
“ ’Morning, Dick!” was the response. “What’s for breakfast this morning?”
“Don’t know,” answered his friend, “but it smells like eggs and bacon, and steak and mushrooms, and chops and kidneys on toast. I hope so, at any rate, for I’m hungry this morning, and feel quite ready for a snack.”
“Snack!” laughed Frobisher. “Is what you have just mentioned your idea of a snack? It sounds to me more like the menu of an aldermanic banquet. By the way, I didn’t know the parcel-postman had arrived yet; he’s early, isn’t he?”
“Oh,” replied Dick, turning rather red, “I thought I’d put that away. No, the postman hasn’t been. That’s just something I went out for, early this morning, for—oh—for a friend of mine.”
“Sorry, old man,” said Murray, “I didn’t mean to be inquisitive. By the way, is there a train to town somewhere about nine or half-past? I should like to catch it if there is.”
“One at nine twenty-three,” answered Dick. “You’ll catch it easily. And now, here’s Tom with the breakfast; bring yourself to an anchor, and let’s begin. I’m as hungry as a hunter. How about yourself?”
“Rather better than usual this morning,” laughed Frobisher. “A little hope is a splendid thing for giving one an appetite.” And with this remark both the young men fell to with a will.
The meal finished, Frobisher hurried off to catch his train; travelled up to London; crossed the city; and took another train down to the docks. Arrived there, he enquired the whereabouts of the steamer Quernmore.
“Over there, sir,” a policeman told him, pointing to a spot about two hundred yards distant; and thither the young man made his way, halting presently at the shore end of a gangway leading on to the steamer, to take a good look at the craft that was to be his floating home for so long a period.
Certainly, he told himself, if one might judge by appearances, Captain Drake had ample justification for being proud of his steamer; for she was as pretty a model of a craft as Frobisher, for all his long experience, had ever set eyes on. Indeed, one would almost have been excused for assuming that, but for her size, she might have been a private yacht at some period of her existence. Flush-decked, with a graceful curving run, a clipper bow with gilt figure-head, and a long, overhanging counter, the hull painted a particularly pleasing shade of dark green down to within a couple of feet of the water-line, and polished black below that, she made a picture completely satisfying to the eye of the most exacting critic. She was rigged as a topsail schooner, and her funnel was tall, oval-shaped, and cream-coloured. Indeed, anything less like the traditional tramp steamer, and more