n of
the thing. Well, he's done for me, and Tommy Tonga for him, and that's
all you've got to say about that. Next thing is to ask 'em to sling
Tommy a fiver over and above his wages--for saving of the boat and
trade, mind, Joe. Don't say for potting the nigger, Joe; boat and trade,
boat and trade, that's the tack to go on with owners, Joe. Well, let's
see now.... My old woman. See she gets fair play, wages up to date of
death, eh, Joe? By God, old man, she won't get much of a cheque--only
four months out now from Sydney. Look here, Joe, the Belgian's all
right. He won't go telling tales. So don't you log me dead for another
month, and make as bad a passage as you can. There's only us three white
men aboard, and the native boys will take their Bible oath I didn't die
until the ship was off Lord Howe Island if you give 'em a box of
tobacco. You see, Joe? That's the dodge. More days, more dollars, and
the longer you keep the ship at sea the more money comes to all hands.
And I know I can trust you, Joe, to lend a hand in making the old
woman's cheque a little bigger. Right.... We've been two years together
now, Joe, and this is the only thing I've ever asked you to do or done
myself that wasn't square and aboveboard. But look here"--here, for some
half-minute, Captain Dave Liardet launched into profanity--"I tell you
that the owners of this ship wouldn't care a single curse if you and I
and every living soul aboard had had our livers cut out at La Vandola as
long as _they_ didn't lose money over it, and haven't to pay our wages
to our wives and children."

*****

Liardet gasped and choked, and the little Belgian naturalist tripped
down and wiped away the dark stream that began to trickle down the
grizzled beard, and then he and Russell, the mate, laid him down again.

"Don't go," whispered the Belgian to the other, "he sink ver' fast now."
The closed eyelids opened a little and looked up through the skylight
at the brown face of Tommy the Tongan, and then Russell gave the dying
skipper brandy and water. Then, with fast-fading eyes on the picture in
porcelain, he asked Russell what course he was keeping.

"As near south as can be," said the mate, "but with this breeze we could
soon make the Great Barrier, and there's always hope, cap'n. Let me keep
her away to the westward a bit, and who knows but you may----"

For answer the grizzled Liardet held out his hand, shook his head
faintly, and muttering, "I hope to God it'