without stumbling? Oh, dear, what endless see-sawing! Up and down, up and down, relentlessly, and the heavy drawers groaned, the lamps swung patiently, in their sockets. The smell of oil! The strong, clean smell of tar and hemp in the store-room as one replaced the tin of kerosene in its frame—everything had a frame or a rack at sea; even the dining-table, in case the plate should slide off! Once in one's cabin—but it was away at the other side of the saloon, down another corridor, next to the lazaret—a long way. "A long wa-ays from home!" Sometimes, like Becky, he felt "like a motherless chile!" Dare he put down the lamp a minute? Terrible to set the ship afire!
Oh, dear! Would there be anyone on deck to see, in case After all, it was dark out there—the lee side. Would it be safe to try and blow out the lamp, or would the act of blowing tend to release the muscular control—that drawn-in tension
He had reached the lee side just in time.
By standing on the huge iron "double post thing"—would they call it a cleat? No, not that, something more nautical; "bits," that was it—one's shoulders cleared the side. Rather comfortable, standing on these bits, pressed against the teak shelf-thing in which holes were bored for belaying pins, which were like "men" in the game called "cribbage." What a long slow rhythm to this incessant teetering; it seemed minutes between the rise and fall, and for all the see-sawing, the deck had a permanent slant—one would have to walk uphill to get back to the cabin door. One would be walking uphill all the way to Australia.
It hadn't lasted long. But how it made your eyes smart! Those big pilot-crackers in the pantry locker—they would help make up for a lost supper. Thank Heaven nobody had seen.
Would one be all right in the morning? Surely.
