understand his nonsense about the Red Planet Mars and the King, and the
rest of it. Chuck me the Longfellow again."

I handed him the book and wrote out as much as I could remember of his
description of the sea-fight, appealing to him from time to time for
confirmation of fact or detail. He would answer without raising his eyes
from the book, as assuredly as though all his knowledge lay before him on
the printed page. I spoke under the normal key of my voice that the
current might not be broken, and I know that he was not aware of what he
was saying, for his thoughts were out on the sea with Longfellow.

"Charlie," I asked, "when the rowers on the gallies mutinied how did they
kill their overseers?"

"Tore up the benches and brained 'em. That happened when a heavy sea was
running. An overseer on the lower deck slipped from the centre plank and
fell among the rowers. They choked him to death against the side of the
ship with their chained hands quite quietly, and it was too dark for the
other overseer to see what had happened. When he asked, he was pulled down
too and choked, and the lower deck fought their way up deck by deck, with
the pieces of the broken benches banging behind 'em. How they howled!"

"And what happened after that?"

"I don't know. The hero went away--red hair and red beard and all. That
was after he had captured our galley, I think."

The sound of my voice irritated him, and he motioned slightly with his
left hand as a man does when interruption jars.