s standing by the door looking at him.

'I excessively regret poor Gay,' said Carker, 'and the crew. I
understand there were some of our very best men among 'em. It always
happens so. Many men with families too. A comfort to reflect that poor
Gay had no family, Captain Cuttle!'

The Captain stood rubbing his chin, and looking at the Manager. The
Manager glanced at the unopened letters lying on his desk, and took up
the newspaper.

'Is there anything I can do for you, Captain Cuttle?' he asked looking
off it, with a smiling and expressive glance at the door.

'I wish you could set my mind at rest, Sir, on something it's uneasy
about,' returned the Captain.

'Ay!' exclaimed the Manager, 'what's that? Come, Captain Cuttle, I must
trouble you to be quick, if you please. I am much engaged.'

'Lookee here, Sir,' said the Captain, advancing a step. 'Afore my friend
Wal'r went on this here disastrous voyage--

'Come, come, Captain Cuttle,' interposed the smiling Manager, 'don't
talk about disastrous voyages in that way. We have nothing to do with
disastrous voyages here, my good fellow. You must have begun very early
on your day's allowance, Captain, if you don't remember that there are
hazards in all voyages, whether by sea or land. You are not made uneasy
by the supposition that young what's-his-name was lost in bad weather
that was got up against him in these offices--are you? Fie, Captain!
Sleep, and soda-water, are the best cures for such uneasiness as that.

'My lad,' returned the Captain, slowly--'you are a'most a lad to me,
and so I don't ask your pardon for that slip of a word,--if you find any
pleasure in this here sport, you ain't the gentleman I took you for. And
if you ain't the gentleman I took you for, may be my mind has call to
be uneasy. Now this is what it is, Mr Carker.--Afore that poor lad went
away, according to orders, he told me that he warn't a going away for
his own good, or for promotion, he know'd. It was my belief that he
was wrong, and I told him so, and I come here, your head governor being
absent, to ask a question or two of you in a civil way, for my own
satisfaction. Them questions you answered--free. Now it'll ease my mind
to know, when all is over, as it is, and when what can't be cured must
be endoored--for which, as a scholar, you'll overhaul the book it's in,
and thereof make a note--to know once more, in a word, that I warn't
mistaken; that I warn't back'ard in my duty when I didn'