newspaper the third time he said 'haw-ah!'"

Monty laughed. Fred Oakes was busy across the room with his most
amazing gift of tongues, splicing together half-a-dozen of them in
order to talk with the old lazaretto attendant, so he heard nothing;
otherwise there would have been argument.

"Then it would have been you, not he who started trouble,"' said I, and
Yerkes threw both hands up in a gesture of despair.

"Even you're afraid of starting something!" He stared at both of us
with an almost startled expression, as if he could not believe his own
verdict, yet could not get away from it. "Else you'd give the
Bundesrath story to the papers! That German skipper's conduct ought to
be bruited round the world! You said you'd do it. You promised us!
You told the man to his face you would!"

"Now," said Monty, "you've touched on another national habit."

"Which one?" Yerkes demanded.

"Dislike of telling tales out of school. The man's dead. His ship's
at the bottom. The tale's ended. What's the use? Besides--?"

"Ah! You've another reason! Spill it!"

"As a privy councilor, y'know, and all that sort of thing--?"

"Same story! Afraid of starting something!"