"But we pays a bob a pound fur 'bacca on board o' the ship," he
expostulated. "It's something like 'bacca; grips you by the neck,
like."
Evidently the delicate flavour of my best John Cotton did not
sufficiently tickle his brazen palate.
For a moment or two there was silence between us as we watched the
gulls screaming and wheeling over some object in the water far beneath
us.
"Well," I asked, merely to start a conversation, "how d'you like the
Navy?"
"Suits me all right, sir," he said, "seein' as 'ow I've bin in it a
matter o' fifteen year. But between you an' me, sir," he hastened to
add, "it ain't like wot it wus when I fust jined. It's full o'
noo-fangled notions an' sichlike."
"What d'you mean?" I asked in some amazement.
"Carn't say no more, sir. Afore we wus sent on leaf we wus all
cautioned special not to git talkin' abart the Service wi' civvies."
I suppose I did look rather unlike a member of His Majesty's land
forces, for I was wearing plain clothes and had only come out of
hospital four days before, after being wounded for the second time on
the western front. (I am speaking of the fighting line in France, not
anatomically.) I hastened to explain who I was.
"Sorry I spoke, sir," he apologised. "I thought you wus one o' these
'ere la-de-dah blokes out fur an arrin'. Wot did you say your corpse
wus?"
"Corpse! What corpse?"
"Corpse, sir. Rig'mint."
"Oh, I see. I'm only a doctor, a Lieutenant in the R.A.M.C. I'm on
sick leave, and crawled up here to-day to get some fresh air and to ...
er, meet someone I know." I looked at my wrist watch and glanced over
my shoulder.
"Young lady, sir?" he queried in a husky, confidential whisper.