"
"Well, show me."
"Show yer?"
"Yes, you big sausage, show me."
"Show yer? Show yer?" The big man peered around the ship. Surely it was
a mirage.
At the very first whoop from the big man the pump-man had stopped dead,
softly set down his suit-case, and waited. Now he stepped swiftly toward
the big man. And to the passenger, looking and listening from the cabin
mess-room, it looked like the finest kind of a battle; but just then the
captain came up the gang-plank calling out, "Cast off those lines. And
don't fall asleep over it, either." The deck force scattered to carry
out his orders. The pump-man picked up his suit-case and went on to his
quarters.
Next morning (the ship by now well down the Jersey coast and the
passenger on the bridge by the captain's invitation) again was heard the
carolling voice:
"Our ship she was alaborin' in the Gulf o' Mexico,
The skipper on the quarter, with eyes aloft and low.
Says he, 'My bucko boys--'"
that far when the big man's hoarse bass interrupted, "Say you, what
about that Number Seven tank?"
"--Says he, 'My bucko boys, it's asurely goin' to blow'"
The pump-man paused, inclined his head, set one hand back of his ear,
and asked, "And what about Number Seven tank? And speak up, son, so I
can hear you."
"Speak up!" The big man roared to the heavens. "Speak up! Don't tell me
to speak up.
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