Yes, none of us
are stuck on ourselves down here!"

The words fell cold. Sensing the purpose to offend, Terry straightened
in his chair to face Sears. He met his surly stare squarely: their
eyes battled, but under the level gaze Sears' bloodshot eyes wavered
and lowered, the flush deepening angrily with his confusion.

Lindsey hastily summoned the deckboy to take their orders and by the
time he returned with the drinks the constraint had abated. Sears, the
only one who had ordered whiskey, settled back in his chair in sullen
relief from a situation not quite to his liking. Lindsey raised his
glass to Terry.

"To your arrival among us," he offered, pleasantly.

"To you all, sir," Terry responded.

"More hemp!" suggested Cochran.

Little Casey attested to his passion: "To breeds and breeders and
breeding!" he grinned: it was his never-failing toast at the Davao
Club.

They waited a moment for Sears, but he had gulped his drink.

It was the enthusiastic Casey who first spoke: "Lieutenant, and when
do you think you can come down to my place? I want you to see my
Berkshire boar and my two American mares!"

Cochran smiled at him, affectionately: everybody liked Casey for his
wild enthusiasms. His latest hobby was the importation of blooded
animals to cross with native stock.

"Casey," said Cochran, "if you would pay half as much attention to
your plantation as you do to your mares and that old grunter, you'd
get somewhere!"

Casey snorted: "Sure, and in about three months I'll have a colt to
show you--then you'll sing another tune! And wait till I get some
half-breed pigs--instead of the hollow-backed scrawny things we've got
now--then you'll admit that Casey was the boy!"

Casey was more or less of a character in the Gulf. His words flew so
fast they overran each other in effort to keep abreast of his racing
ideas. Thoroughly respected for his sterling character, he was made
the target of much good-natured hilarity because of his constant
hobby-riding and the rushing speech that made him almost incoherent.
His mares and boar had cost him money that could better have gone into
plantation improvements.

The conversation, drifting fitfully, touched upon a new stripping
machine which Lindsey had purchased in Manila: he was bringing it down
in the hold of the _Francesca_.

"I watched them load it," he declared. "I took no chances in being shy
a necessary bolt or belt. I'll have it set up in a couple of weeks an