I found my time pretty well taken up. It was in connection with this painting that the climax came. We had left the West Indies behind us, and at the time were steering a straight course for Madeira. The men, when the incident I am about to describe happened, were at work on the port rails of the promenade deck. One of them, who had been outside the rail, climbed over, pot in hand, to obey an order I had given him. At the moment that he did so, the long Atlantic swell caused the vessel to give a big roll, and before he could save himself, he was flying across the deck towards a chair in which a lady was seated. They came into violent collision, with the result that the pot of white paint was deposited in her lap. I hastened to her assistance, and did all that was possible at the moment to remedy the mishap. Fortunately for the man, who was overcome by the magnitude of the catastrophe, she took the accident in excellent part.
"You must not blame the man," she said to me. "It was not his fault. I shall have to sue the ocean for damages."
Then with a laugh she went below to change her attire.
As ill luck would have it, just after she had disappeared, the skipper emerged from the companion, and saw the splashes of paint.
"What's the meaning of this, sir?" he asked, turning on me angrily.
"One of the men met with an accident, sir," I replied. "The roll of the ship caused him to upset the paint-pot."
"You should not put that class of fellow to do such work," he returned, oblivious to the fact that he was committing the unpardonable sin of admonishing an officer before the men. "You seem to have no discrimination at all, Mr. Helmsworth."
With that he walked away, leaving me to chew my cud of humiliation in silence. After luncheon I received an order to go to the captain's cabin. I could see that I was in for more trouble, but could not guess what. One thing was very evident; he was in a towering rage.
"How is it, Mr. Helmsworth," he began, when I had entered the cabin and had closed the door, "that you deliberately kept things from me this morning that it was your duty to tell me?"
"I am not aware that I have kept anything back from you, sir," I replied, as civilly as I knew how, for I had no desire to lose my temper. "If it is with regard to the tiller of the port quarter boat – "
"It has nothing whatever to do with the port quarter boat," he answered savagely. "I want to know how it was that you did not tell me about that lady's dress being spoilt this morning. You should have reported the matter to me. Had it not been for my steward, I should have known nothing whatsoever about it."
"I did not think it worth while to trouble you with it, sir," I replied. "It was a pure accident, and Miss Burgess forgave the man, and admitted that he was not to blame."
"Accident or no accident," he retorted, "you should have informed me of the circumstance. I consider you sadly wanting in your duty, Mr. Helmsworth. Of late, your manner has been most disrespectful to me, and I tell you to your face, sir, that your ship is a disgrace to any chief officer."
"I am sorry you should say that," I answered, endeavouring to keep my temper; "I have always had the reputation of turning my ship out well. If you will point out anything that is wrong, I will at once have it rectified."
"Don't bandy words with me, sir," he stormed. "I am not used to it from my officers. I repeat that your ship is a disgrace to any chief officer, and I shall take care that the matter is duly reported to the Board as soon as we reach London."
"Perhaps you will be good enough to tell me what you consider wrong, sir?"
"Everything," he answered. "I thought yesterday I pointed out to you a hole in the after awning."
"You did, sir, and it has been repaired. I put the sail-maker on to it at once."
He rose from his chair with a look of triumph on his face.
"Kindly step aft with me," he said, "and let us examine it for ourselves."
Feeling confident that what I had said was correct, I gladly accompanied him, but to my horror, when we reached the place in question, there was the rent gaping at us without a stitch in it.
"I regret exceedingly that you should consider it necessary to cover your negligence by telling me what is not true," he said in a voice so loud that some of the second-class passengers could hear it.
This was more than I could swallow.
"I'll not be called a liar by you, Captain Harveston, or by any man living," I retorted, feeling that I would have given something to have been able to have knocked him down. "If you will send for the sail-maker, he will inform you that I gave him orders to do it this morning. It is no fault of mine that he has neglected his duty."
"It is the fault of no one else, sir," returned the captain. "If you kept the men up to their work, this would not have been left undone. I shall be careful to enter this occurrence in the log-book."
So saying he stalked majestically away, and I went in search of the sail-maker. The man, it appeared, had intended doing the work, but had been called away to something else, and had forgotten it. After that, I returned to my own cabin, and sat down to think the matter over. There could be no sort of doubt that I was in an exceedingly unenviable position. I could quite see that if Harveston reported me, the Board would be likely to believe his version of the story, and even if they did not consider me quite as negligent as he was endeavouring to make me, they would probably argue that I was not all I might be, on the basis that there can be no smoke without fire. Whatever else might be said, a reputation for slovenliness and untruthfulness would be scarcely likely to help me in my career. From that day forward matters went from bad to worse. It seemed impossible for me to do right, however hard I might try. What was more annoying, I began to feel that, not content with disliking me himself, the captain was endeavouring to set the passengers against me also.
During the run across the Atlantic I had, as I have said, several long talks with Don Guzman de Silvestre. The man interested me immensely. What his profession was I could not ascertain, but from numberless little remarks he let fall, I gathered that he was the possessor of considerable wealth. Certainly he had seen a variety of strange life. Were it not that he narrated his adventures with an air of truth that left no room for doubt, it would have been impossible to have believed him. He had seen fighting in Mexico, in Nicaragua, in Brazil, and with Balmaceda in Chili.
"I suppose in South America there will be Revolutions until the end of Time," I remarked one evening, as we sat talking together in my cabin.
"I should say it is more than likely," he answered, taking his cigar from his mouth and holding it between his long, slim fingers. "If you take specimens of all the most excitable races in the world and graft them on stock even more excitable than themselves, what can you expect? In such countries Might must always be Right, and the weakest will go to the wall."
"I shouldn't care much about being President in that description of place," I returned. "It's a case of being in power and popular to-day, unpopular and assassinated to-morrow."
"There is certainly a large amount of risk in this," the Don replied meditatively. "And yet men are always to be found desirous of taking up the reins of government."
I could not help wondering whether he had ever felt the ambition he spoke of.
"I remember meeting a man in Paris some years ago," he continued after a few moments' silence, "who was what one might call a world's vagabond. He had been a soldier in French Africa, a shearer in Australia, a miner at the Cape, a stockbroker in New York, and several other things. When I met him, he was, as I have said, in Paris, and practically starving. He could
