they could not move a step, and put on more suitable garments. Gruddle, for instance, put on patent leather shoes and spats, which with black trousers and a loud check coat looked exceedingly striking. He wore a Royal Yacht Squadron cap, which he had as much right to as a Field Marshal's uniform. It suited his style of Oriental beauty as much as that would have done, and he went on deck as pleased as Punch. He felt every inch a sailor. The others followed him, and were almost as remarkable to look at in their own way. Shody, who was a very fat man, was in knickerbockers and shooting-boots, and wore a fur-lined overcoat; while Sloggett was adorned in a new yachtsman's rig-out which made him look like a pallid shop-walker. Butterworth was the only one who stuck to ordinary clothes, and, as a consequence, he looked like a gentleman beside the others. It was an illusion, of course, for he wasn't a gentleman by any means. On the contrary, he was a member of the firm, and a rising man in that branch of the shipping world which makes its money out of sinking ships.
"’Ow long will it be before we are in fine weather?" he asked, as he stared at the docks
