CHAPTER XXXIV

A corner of the hold of the _Médée_, in all the disarray of laying up. A lantern illumines a vast medley of heterogeneous objects more or less nibbled by rats.

A dozen or so sailors--Barrada, Guiaberry, Barazère, Le Hello, all the little band of friends--are grouped about a man lying on the floor. It is Yves in irons, stretched on the damp boards, his head supported on his elbow, his foot in the padlocked ring of the "bar of justice."

The most implacable of his three enemies. Petty Officer Lagatut, stands before him, threatening him in his old drunken voice. He threatens him with revenge for that affair of the cutter, in which, to his mind, I had taken too large a part.

He has quitted his close arrest to come and abuse him--and I, whose watch it is and who am making a round, enter from behind and find him there--the old rogue is very neatly caught! The sailors who saw me enter, chuckle quietly in their sleeves, in anticipation of what is about to happen. Yves makes no reply, contenting himself with turning over and presenting his back to his tormentor with supreme insolence. For he, too, had seen me enter.

"We have begun a game of écarté together," said Petty Officer Lagatut; "you, Kermadec, boatswain; I, Lagatut, chief gunner, decorated with the Legion of Honour. Thanks to certain officers who protect you, you have taken the first two tricks: it remains to see who is going to take the three others."

"Petty Officer Lagatut," said I from behind, "we will play a three-handed game, if you are agreeable: a game of _rams_, that will be more amusing. And you, my good Yves, take another trick."

A chicken finding a knife, a thief who stumbles against a policeman, a mouse, which, by inadvertence, puts its paw on a cat, have not a longer face than Petty Officer Lagatut at that moment.

This little pleasantry of mine was not perhaps in the best of form. But the gallery, which was very friendly to us, greatly enjoyed this triumph of Yves.