An Awfully Big Adventure by Bartimeus — Read

The storming and demolition parties came on board one lovely sunny morning -- the sort of day that makes you want to forget there's a war. They were two of the finest bodies of men I've ever set eyes upon, and as I watched them disencumbering themselves of their arms and accoutrements along the upper deck, laughing and joking among themselves, it occurred to me that if blood must be the price of Admiralty, we were going to pay full measure of our best.

We had a sort of informal Council of War in the Wardroom during the morning, and the Mess was crowded to the limits of its capacity with Subalterns and Lieutenants, smoking and talking nineteen to the dozen. Into that Dutch Parliament presently strolled Mouldy Jakes, and stood a moment in the doorway. "My word," he ejaculated, "who wouldn't sell his little farm and go to sea -- eh, boys? Anybody got a drink to give the Officer in Charge of the demolition party? " Someone handed him a cocktail and his lugubrious face brightened. It then occurred to me that he and Milsom had not yet met, and I rose from my seat on the edge of the table to find the latter in the crowd. I discovered him standing upright by the door staring at Mouldy with one of his odd, inscrutable smiles, and it struck me, I remember, that he looked unusually white. I introduced him and left him yarning over a drink.