As for Stump, who was not aware of his second mate's rise in the world,
the manner of their speech affected him so powerfully that he was in
imminent danger of an apoplectic seizure. His condition was rendered
all the more dangerous because he dared utter no word. But he silently
used the sailor-like formula which applies to such unexpected
situations, and added certain other variations of the rubric from the
extensive resources of his own private vocabulary. He recovered his
breath by the time Dick's attack, of weakness had passed, and the color
of his face slowly subsided from, a deep purple to its abiding tint of
brick red.
"Rather a sudden indisposition," said Fenshawe to Stump, smiling
quizzically as he watched Irene supporting Royson's head while she
urged him tenderly to drink a little more of the stimulant.
"Is that wot you call it?" asked the captain of the _Aphrodite_,
mopping his glowing cheeks with a handkerchief of brilliant hue. "I
thought it was a stroke of some kind, 'but I've fair lost my bearin's
since I gev' over plashin' at sea.
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