Commodore Norrington was not a happy man.

There was water. Water in places where there should be no water. Like in his hat, which was floating on the tide next to him. In the curls of his wig. In his fancy blue coat with the fancier trim. In the scabbard of his sword. And in his bloody BREECHES!

He scowled up at pirate standing on the dock above him, glared at the scruffy smile that was parting the man’s face, and said, "Mark my words, Sparrow…"

Sparrow immediately tried to look innocent, of course. Tried to look as if he had a bloody golden halo hanging above his dread-locked and ornamented head. He didn’t reach out a hand to help Norrington out of the water, though, but that could have been because Norrington was sitting in less than a foot of it, his hands and feet slowly sinking into the soft sand and silt below him.

"’Mark your words…’ what, Commodore?"

Norrington bared his teeth and growled, but Sparrow’s smile just spread wider.

"’T’wasn’t my doing, mate. There was this bug, see? This really big one. And it was flying right towards you, and I said to myself, I said, ‘Captain Jack Sparrow, you don’t want to let that bug bite the good Commodore, now do you?’—It was a really big bug. Quite vicious looking—and it’s not my fault, is it, that when I went to slap it away, you thought I was trying to slap you, and you stepped off this little dock here and into the water, now is it?"

Norrington growled again, watching as Sparrow looked heavenward, rolling his eyes.

"Fine, fine. Mark your words…" The pirated sighed heavily, then all of a sudden looked quite happy, as if he’d just come upon a marvelous idea.

Norrington didn’t have time to start backing away, crab-like through the water, before Sparrow said, "Well, if I’m going to have to mark your words, I might as well give myself a reason to mark them, aye?"

And with that, Sparrow jumped off the dock and into the slightly deeper water only a few feet away from where Norrington was sitting, curled his arms around his knees, and landed with such a splash that the Commodore found himself submerged again , underneath the waves that the pirate had caused.

When the water had settled again, and Sparrow was sitting in the water beside him, just as dripping, just as drenched, Norrington tried to look fearsome again.

"Mark my words, Sparrow…"

He watched as Sparrow laughed. Then the pirate reached over and pulled a strand of seaweed from Norrington’s own wig, holding it up so that dangled in front of his face. He could see crawly things moving over the limp green leaves.

"Consider them marked," Sparrow said, grinning far too widely. Then he dropped the seaweed back in the water and used the back of his hand to splash some water in Norrington’s direction.

Later, when he was in a dry coat and dry breeches and his wig had been wrung out like a sponge, Norrington would deny that he’d used his own hand to splash Sparrow right back.