Abdool, as usual, had placed himself behind his master's chair, but Harry said: "I sha'n't want you to wait on me during the voyage, Abdool; the captain's steward will do that." After the meal was over, cheroots lighted, and a decanter of port placed on the table, Fairclough asked Harry for the story he had promised him; and the latter accordingly gave them a sketch of his life and adventures.
"I no longer wonder, Lindsay, at your having attained the rank of captain so young.

That old nurse of yours must have been a trump, indeed; but certainly it is wonderful that you should have lived, first as a peasant and then at the Peishwa's court, so long without anyone having had a suspicion that you were an Englishman.

Fancy your meddling in politics, being regarded as a friend of the Peishwa and this minister of his, and being the means of getting the latter out of prison, and so perhaps averting a war between the Mahrattas and Bombay! That was a ticklish business, too, at Nagpore; and you were lucky in coming so well out of it.
"But after all, I think the most wonderful part is that a boy of sixteen should have been a shikaree, and killed no end of tigers, leopards, and bears and, after that, have risen so soon to the rank of captain in the Company's service.

Why, you have seen and done more than most men double your age!" "Yes, I have had great luck, and it is all owing to my old nurse having taken such pains; first to enable me to pass as a Mahratta, and in the next place to teach me the English language and English ways.
"Well, the story has been an unconscionably long one.

I think I will go on deck and smoke a last cheroot, and then turn in." "If you were a new hand from England, I should say that you had better smoke it here," Fairclough said; "for the mists from the water and swamps are apt to give fresh hands a touch of fever." The time passed pleasantly, as they made direct for the mouth of the straits between the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra.