Hold Hideaway

"You... You all right?" Terry asked, taking the hat back. He was grinning at the thought that Mister Foxley didn't have a clue about it all, but twisted the hat in his hands for a moment. "You c'n... you c'n keep it for a bit, till, well, till yous hair grows again," he offered, shy because of all the grown seamen around to hear him make the offer, and because he didn't really want to remind Fingers of what had happened earlier.

He touched a hand to his newly-shortened hair and managed to keep from grimacing. "S'... all right," he said gamely. "Less for gettin' itchy, anyways!"

Terry grinned at him. "You's real brave," he said in a loud whisper and fiddled around putting his hat back on to hide his embarrassment.

His grin, at first, was forced, but it quickly became more natural when he slid down out of his hammock. "C'mon," Fingers said, tugging at the heavy wool jacket. "Let's find Corp'r'l."

Terry wasn't sure about that at all, but he wasn't about to admit that Fingers was braver than him. "Aw'right, then," he said. "He's down aft wiv the M'rines, ain't he?"

In truth, Fingers had no idea where Johnson might be found, but the prospect of wandering about the ship with the corporal's jacket appealed to him.

"Dunno," he replied. "He'll be the onn'y Marine wivvout a jacket, though!"

"True, that." Terry giggled. "Be int'restin' to see him doin' his duty in his shirtsleeves, for sure!"

Somehow, that idea was funny. Very funny.

He folded the jacket loosely in half, lengthwise and draped it over one shoulder. Either end trailed along the deck anyway. "Mebbe the officers seen him," Fingers suggested, making his way on quick feet toward the ladder. "Mebbe he's gettin' a roastin' like he's one've us!"

"Why'd he do that?" Terry wanted to know. He couldn't think of any good reason why Corporal Johnson would be in trouble... He was practically an officer, wasn't he, with those stripes on his jacket sleeve, and the way he told his Marines what to do, setting the sentries and everything else.

He giggled. "Ain't dressed like he's s'posed to, izzhe? 'Terupted the sawbones too. Silly sawbones!" One sleeve caught up around his feet when he started up the ladder, obliging him to toss it around his neck like a scarf.

"Don't think he done innerrupted nobody," Terry said doubtfully. "Sawbones had finished. If he innerupted anyone, it was Mister Evans."

Or whoever. It was not really important to Fingers. He skipped up the remaining steps to the gundeck, glanced briefly aft toward the irons, then carried on upwards.

The washing had since, apparently, ended. A couple of them were flogging the deck dry while others unrigged the pump. Fingers looked around for Corporal Johnson.

Quinn had heard that there was a prisoner in irons and that one of his Marines had been requested for sentry duty there.

It was a slightly puzzled Sergeant who headed up to the weather-deck to find out why and what all the fuss was about. He knew, of course, that all the boys, including the three drummers, had been requested on deck by the surgeon. He had sent Corporal Johnson after the two Shepherds, who had promptly made themselves scarce when they heard about the order.

He'd noticed wryly that they made very sure they left before they heard the order directly, so that they couldn't be accused of disobeying a direct order, of course. Whatever else they lacked, they had a fine sense of self-preservation.

The last time he'd seen Corporal Johnson was before going round to check on the sentries. The Corporal had been heading up on deck, with either hand firmly grasping one Shepherd by the collar. He had definitely been wearing his jacket.

So why was he in shirtsleeves now?

"Corporal!"

The summons came in time to interrupt him in the middle of a conversation with Evans the quartermaster, which, naturally, annoyed Johnson. He didn't care overly much that it was Sergeant Quinn calling for him. An interruption was an interruption.

"Sarn't." The corporal turned to face his superior, thinking he could very easily guess why he was being addressed.

"Where's your jacket, Corporal?" Quinn was genuinely curious; it wasn't like Johnson at all to appear on deck incorrectly dressed. And where was it now, if he'd come on deck wearing it?

Ah, hell.

"Loaned it off," Johnson replied. It would do no good to answer with anything but the truth. Hopefully that scamp Fingers wouldn't drag his jacket through some blacklead, or something else equally unpleasant.

"Loaned it?" Quinn repeated in surprise. Loaned his jacket? "Who'd you loan it to, and what in Heaven's name for?"

Quinn's surprise only made Johnson frown. "A lad needin' somethin' to cover himself," the corporal replied. He wasn't even sure why he'd done it but he had.

There he was!

"Corp'r'l!" Fingers pattered across the deck, the jacket trailing carelessly from his shoulder where he'd draped it. "Gotchyer jacket!"

Terry winced. This wasn't going to end well, was it? He trailed after his friend, hoping that... Oh, help. That was Sergeant Quinn with the Corporal.

"Um, Fingers," he hissed.

Speak of the ruddy devil...

"There it is now," Johnson said blandly.

Quinn turned as the Corporal was hailed by one of the ship's boys... who had a red jacket draped over his shoulder.

This was getting stranger and stranger by the minute.

The lad looked very like Fingers Smith, but rather cleaner, with much shorter hair. No... it was Fingers... Just what did his appearance have to do with Johnson's loaning the lad his jacket, Quinn wondered, and resolved to ask Tide Evans. He'd never get the whole truth from the Corporal, he was sure of that.

"Carry on, Corporal," he said, and turned to cross the deck to where Evans was supervising the stowing of the washdeck pump.

Fingers' grin faltered somewhat upon seeing Sergeant Quinn standing with Johnson. He hadn't seen the other Marine before speaking. Oops?

"Sorry," the boy said, dragging the jacket off his shoulder and holding it out. "But I brung it back!"

One of the seaman working on shifting off the deck pump looked up and nodded toward Tide.

"Sarn't Quinn comin'."

The quartermaster turned. "Aft'noon Sarn't."

"Aft'noon, Mister Evans. Hope I ain't interruptin', but you got any idea why Corporal Johnson let a powder monkey have his jacket?"

Not that he really expected the quartermaster to inform on the corporal, of course. Officially, anyway.

"I'm askin' off the record, o' course."