They talked for some time, and then the conversation drifted upon the subject of the Ranger.
“Yes,” said her captain, “she is a new ship. It was at first thought to have her carry twenty-six guns; but I saw at once that she was too slight in structure to carry so heavy a battery, so I have mounted but eighteen six-pounders. And when I get her into a French port I’m going to make some changes that I think the trip across the Atlantic will show to be necessary.”
Ethan and Shamus secured lodgings in the town until such time as the ship would sail. Much trouble was experienced in shipping a crew. The seamen demanded advance money, and the commander was forced to pay it to them out of his own private funds, as Congress sent him none for the purpose. And indeed this was no new thing for this brave and generous officer to do, as Ethan subsequently discovered. The government was already in his debt to the amount of seven thousand dollars; and he had once fitted the brig Providence for sea, paying every copper of the expense.
It was in the month of October that the Ranger, everything being ready, finally dropped down the bay and squared away for France. Ethan and Longsword were provided with sleeping quarters with the younger officer of the ship and took their meals in the gun room. Mr. Simpson and Mr. Hall the first and second officers, were grumbling, discontented men, and before John Paul Jones was done with them they gave him much trouble. The third officer, Mr. Wallingford, was a pleasant, good humored young man with a fund of bright stories and much ability as a sailor.
From the first, Simpson did all he could to annoy Ethan; he had undertaken to do the same for Longsword, but the first petty act of malice in this direction brought such a long, steady, menacing stare from that grim faced trooper that the thing was not repeated.
“Mr. Simpson seems not to like me,” said Ethan, on the second day out, to Mr. Wallingford.
“You are apparently a friend to Captain Jones,” said the third lieutenant. “And as a man with half an eye can see, he hates the captain like poison.”
“Just because he’s the skipper, I suppose,” said Wallingford, with a shrug. “Simpson is one of those men who hate all those who are placed over them. He got his rank by influence, and fancies that the command should have been given him.”