Another whirlwind of activity, in which I joined as effectively as I
could, oppressed by the prospect of having to 'clear out'--who knows
whither?--at midnight. But Davies's _sang froid_ was infectious, I
suppose, and the little den below, bright-lit and soon fragrant with
cookery, pleaded insistently for affection. Yachting in this singular
style was hungry work, I found. Steak tastes none the worse for
having been wrapped in newspaper, and the slight traces of the day's
news disappear with frying in onions and potato-chips. Davies was
indeed on his mettle for this, his first dinner to his guest; for he
produced with stealthy pride, not from the dishonoured grave of the
beer, but from some more hallowed recess, a bottle of German
champagne, from which we drank success to the Dulcibella.

'I wish you would tell me all about your cruise from England,' I
asked. 'You must have had some exciting adventures. Here are the
charts; let's go over them.'

'We must wash up first,' he replied, and I was tactfully introduced
to one of his very few 'standing orders', that tobacco should not
burn, nor post-prandial chat begin, until that distasteful process
had ended. 'It would never get done otherwise,' he sagely opined. But
when we were finally settled with cigars, a variety of which, culled
from many ports--German, Dutch, and Belgian--Davies kept in a
battered old box in the net-rack, the promised talk hung fire.

'I'm no good at description,' he complained; 'and there's really very
little to tell. We left Dover--Morrison and I--on 6th August; made a
good passage to Ostend.'