“‘Gal overboard!’ I ses, shouting.

“The skipper just asked where, and then ’im and the mate and a couple of ’ands tumbled into their boat and pulled under the jetty for all they was worth.  Me and the boy ran back and stood with the others, watching.

“‘Point out the exact spot,’ ses the skipper.

“The boy pointed, and the skipper stood up in the boat and felt round with a boat-hook.  Twice ’e said he thought ’e touched something, but it turned out as ’e was mistaken.  His face got longer and longer and ’e shook his ’ead, and said he was afraid it was no good.

“‘Don’t stand cryin’ ‘ere,’ he ses to the boy, kindly.  ’Jem, run round for the Thames police, and get them and the drags.  Take the boy with you.  It’ll occupy ‘is mind.’

“He ’ad another go with the boat-hook arter they ’ad gone; then ’e gave it up, and sat in the boat waiting.

“‘This’ll be a bad job for you, watchman,’ he ses, shaking his ’ead.  ’Where was you when it ‘appened?’

“‘He’s been missing all the evening,’ ses the cook, wot was standing beside me.  ’If he’d been doing ’is dooty, the pore gal wouldn’t ’ave been drownded.  Wot was she doing on the wharf?’

“‘Skylarkin’, I s’pose,’ ses the mate.  ’It’s a wonder there ain’t more drownded.  Wot can you expect when the watchman is sitting in a pub all the evening?’

“The cook said I ought to be ’ung, and a young ordinary seaman wot was standing beside ’im said he would sooner I was boiled.  I believe they ’ad words about it, but I was feeling too upset to take much notice.

“’Looking miserable won’t bring ‘er back to life agin,’ ses the skipper, looking up at me and shaking his ’ead.  ’You’d better go down to my cabin and get yourself a drop o’ whisky; there’s a bottle on the table.  You’ll want all your wits about you when the police come.  And wotever you do don’t say nothing to criminate yourself.’

“’We’ll do the criminating for ‘im all right,’ ses the cook.

“’If I was the pore gal I’d haunt ‘im,’ ses the ordinary seaman; ’every night of ’is life I’d stand afore ‘im dripping with water and moaning.’

“‘P’r’aps she will,’ ses the cook; ’let’s ‘ope so, at any rate.’

“I didn’t answer ’em; I was too dead-beat.  Besides which, I’ve got a ’orror of ghosts, and the idea of being on the wharf alone of a night arter such a thing was a’most too much for me.  I went on board the Lizzie and Annie, and down in the cabin I found a bottle o’ whisky, as the skipper ’ad said.  I sat down on the locker and ’ad a glass, and then I sat worrying and wondering wot was to be the end of it all.

“The whisky warmed me up a bit, and I ’ad just taken up the bottle to ’elp myself agin when I ‘eard a faint sort o’ sound in the skipper’s state-room.  I put the bottle down and listened, but everything seemed deathly still.  I took it up agin, and ‘ad just poured out a drop o’ whisky when I distinctly ’eard a hissing noise and then a little moan.