The reader will guess what followed. I fell deeply in love with Clara Maitland, to whom I confided the secret of my birth. The generous girl asserted that she had detected the superiority of my manner at once. We plighted our troth, and resolved to wait upon events.
Briggs called to see me a few days afterward. He said that the purser had insulted the whole cockpit, and all the midshipmen had called him out. But he added thoughtfully: “I don’t see how we can arrange the duel. You see there are six of us to fight him.”
“Very easily,” I replied. “Let your fellows all stand in a row, and take his fire; that, you see, gives him six chances to one, and he must be a bad shot if he can’t hit one of you; while, on the other hand, you see, he gets a volley from you six, and one of you’ll be certain to fetch him.”
“Exactly;” and away Briggs went, but soon returned to say that the purser had declined,—“like a d—d coward,” he added.
But the news of the sudden and serious illness of Captain Boltrope put off the duel. I hastened to his bedside, but too late,—an hour previous he had given up the ghost.
I resolved to return to England. I made known the secret of my birth, and exhibited my adopted father’s letter to Lady Maitland, who at once suggested my marriage with her daughter, before I returned to claim the property. We were married, and took our departure next day.
I made no delay in posting at once, in company with my wife and my friend Briggs, to my native village. Judge of my horror and surprise when my late adopted father came out of his shop to welcome me.
“Then you are not dead!” I gasped.
“No, my dear boy.”
“And this letter?”
My father—as I must still call him—glanced on the paper, and pronounced it a forgery. Briggs roared with laughter. I turned to him and demanded an explanation.
“Why, don’t you see, Greeny, it’s all a joke,—a midshipman’s joke!”
“But”—I asked.
“Don’t be a fool. You’ve got a good wife,—be satisfied.”
I turned to Clara, and was satisfied. Although Mrs. Maitland never forgave me, the jolly old Governor laughed heartily over the joke, and so well used his influence that I soon became, dear reader, Admiral Breezy, K. C. B.
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