"Say! come to have your pictures took?" bawled the first merry fellow, as the height of sarcasm and quintessence of a joke.
"Look a' here, major," almost wept poor Captain Pharo, "how in thunder 'd they find that out?"
"Never mind," said I; "we're going up to the hotel, and we'll have a better dinner than they ever dreamed of."
"See here, wife!" said Captain Pharo, completely broken down--for we were all suffering, as usual, from the generic emptiness and craving of our natures for food--"major says 't we're goin' up to git baited, afore I'm took to the dagarrier's."
"I wish 't you could have your picture took jest as you look now, Captain Pharo Kobbe!" exclaimed his wife kindly and admiringly.
At the inn the most conspicuous object in the reception-room was a sink of water, with basins for ablutions.
Captain Pharo waited, visibly holding the leash on his impatience, for a "runner"--or travelling salesman--to complete his bath, when he plunged in gleefully, face and hands. Mrs. Kobbe drew him away with dismay. The paste that had endured the whole sea voyage he had now ruthlessly washed from one side of his head, the locks on the other side still standing out ebullient.
"'M sorry, wife," said the captain. But the captain, smelling the smoke from the kitchen, was not the forlorn companion of our treacherous voyage. "I reckon she'll stan' out ag'in, mebbe," said he, "soon 's she 's dry." But he winked at me with daring inconsequence.
In vain Mrs. Kobbe tried to flay out those locks to their former attitude with the hotel brush and comb, which the runner had finally abandoned.
"Poo! poo! woman, never mind," said the captain; "one side 's fa'r to wind'ard, anyhow. I can have a profiler took, jest showin' one side on me, ye know."
"I didn't want a profiler," lamented Mrs. Kobbe; "I wanted a full-facer."
"Wal, wal, woman, I hain't washed my face off, have I?" said the captain cheerfully, resurrecting his pipe. "Put up them thar' public belayin' pins," he added, referring to the hotel brush and comb, "and don't le's worry 'bout nothin' more, 'long as we're goin' to be baited."
The "runner" meanwhile was looking at us with the pale, scientific interest of one who covets curiosities which he yet dare not approach too intimately.