The mate flung his on the floor and crunched it beneath his heel, then
he thrust his hands in his pockets, and, leaning back, scowled darkly up
at the rain as it crackled on the skylight.
"If you are going to show off your nasty temper," said the girl
severely, "you'd better go forward. It's not quite the thing after all
for you to be down here--not that I study appearances much."
"I shouldn't think you did," retorted the mate, whose temper was rapidly
getting the better of him. "I can't think what your father was thinking
of to let a pret--to let a girl like you come away like this."
"If you were going to say pretty girl," said Miss Cringle, with calm
self-abnegation, "don't mind me, say it. The captain knows what he's
about. He told me you were a milksop; he said you were a good young man
and a teetotaller."
The mate, allowing the truth of the captain's statement as to his
abstinence, hotly denied the charge of goodness. "I can understand your
father's hurry to get rid of you for a spell," he concluded, being
goaded beyond all consideration of politeness. "His gout 'ud never get
well while you were with him. More than that, I shouldn't wonder if you
were the cause of it."
With this parting shot he departed, before the girl could think of a
suitable reply, and went and sulked in the dingy little fo'c'sle.
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