GUS MALZAHN THE DREAD DEALS THE COMMODORE A BLOW

Sailor: Commodore! You are wounded!

The Commodore: Aye, verily so.

Sailor 2: We were so close to capturing him!

The Commodore: And yet so far. The Mad German of The Galapagos, Gustav of Malzahn is over the horizon. So soon may I join him, metaphorically speaking.

Sailor 3: You'll come along, sir. The bleeding isn't much.

The Commodore: I fear I may have sustained a blow below the waterline, sailor. I'll not scuttle the ship, but this--

VOICE: You have sustained a non-fatal wound to the lower abdomen, and need to cease your caterwauling.  

Sailor 1: By the shanks of Neptune! It's--

The Detestable Mr. Leach strides onto the deck of the S.S. Vanderbilt.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Sherry, please, and make it quick.

Sailor 1: I'll not take an order from a pirate, sir.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Your feeble understanding of my role in international commerce disappoints but does not surprise. You have a most invasive cancer, sailor. Have you a physician on this overblown bindle of tinder and misery?

Sailor 2: No. We have a blacksmith and a pederast, sir.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Well, make a poultice of the two and you'd have yourself a doctor. Do you drink, Sailor?

Sailor 1: Never water, and constantly.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Double your efforts and half your caution in battle, and pray chance beats malignancy to the windows, yes?

Sailor 1: Sorry, m'lord?

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Never mind. Commodore, you will live, but I'm afeared of but one course of action to save full function of your inkwell and its attendant quill.

The Commodore: How'd you know about my amorous shortcomings--

The Detestable Mr. Leach: By the distinct cut of the braided lapel on your jacket, the work of Barbudan tailors, yes?

The Commodore: Why I--yes, yes, I did get this stitched in Barbados.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Their emotions come out in their tailoring. This hem, in its own cipher, is that of an impotent lecher, named you, who still managed to sleep with the wife using lovemaking strategems of a perverse and possibly Oriental nature? Yes?

Sailor 2: Why, now, that's a right lot to say about an officer.

The Commodore: No, no. He's correct.They were Keralan in nature, and best not spoken of in Christendom.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Ah, yes. The Keruvapalingam, or "God-cock of the Mind's Anus." Quite the exertion, potent or not. 

Sailor 1: Wait, how'd you sneak on the ship, guv'nor?

The Detestable Mr. Leach: How you have kept me off for so long is the better question. Tell me, sailor, where is my sherry?

Sailor 2: The sherry? The Commodore issues the allotments for grog and other spirits, sir--

The Commodore: Give this man his fill.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: That may be your ship's entire allotment, but a challenge I'll accept. You clearly need some assistance here, and I present myself at your service. 

Sailor 3: What of your scurrilous past?

The Detestable Mr. Leach: That word means little outside of the context of your sister's rodentious features and mating habits.

Sailor 2: I've 'erd he takes no prisoners!

The Detestable Mr. Leach: I can speak confidently to the veracity of that claim being lacking, pending the testimony of Messrs James, Adam and Craig. One I bound in a well-appointed building of variable definition. In Cape Verde it would be referred to as a manse; pity, in Lubbock it is known as a shed. The elder I bound in a lawsuit, as is the habit of lawyers.

Sailors, all together: A LAWYER! TO THE YARDARM WITH HIM--

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Ah, ah, ah, a pirate first with a lawyer's wasted education, and himself bound by the fiendish ties of a legal disputation. 

Sailor 1: I've  heard of your indifference to defense!

The Detestable Mr. Leach: What better defense is there than a hail of cannonballs poured into your enemy's countenance?

The Commodore: I'm going to have to think about it.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: Good. I'll be in the map room if you should need me. I shall be plotting a course for city of Knoxville, Tennessee. We've got bilge to dump in the living room of one young pampered aristocrat, the Coiffure d'Ordure himself, Derek Dooley.

Sailor: 2; Sir, we cannot sail into someone's home. This is but a ship of the seas.

The Detestable Mr. Leach: It is precisely that kind of thinking I seek to eliminate around here.