back."

"You're not too hot to talk back, Franky."

"Eh? Hullo! Why, I ought to fly at you now for calling me by that
ridiculous name _Franky_."

"Bah! Here, do talk sense. What were you going to tell me about old
Anderson and the skipper?"

"I don't know, dear boy. You've bullied it all out of me, or else the
weather has taken it out. Oh, I know now: old Anderson went up to him
and said something--what it was I don't know--unless it was about
changing our course--and he snarled, turned his back and went below to
cool himself, I think. I say, though, it is hot, Dick."

"Well, do you think I hadn't found that out?"

"No, it is all plain to see. You are all in a state of trickle, old
chap. I say, though, isn't it a sort of midsummer madness to expect to
catch one of these brutal craft on a day like this?"

There was an angry grunt.

"Quite right, old fellow. Bother the slavers! They're all shut up
snugly in the horrible muddy creeks waiting for night, I believe. Then
they'll steal out and we shall go on sailing away north or south as it
pleases the skipper. Here, Dicky--I mean, Dick--what will you give me
for my share of the prize money?"

"Bah!" ejaculated the youth addressed. "Can't you be quiet, Frank?
_Buss, buss, buss_! It's just for the sake of talking. Can't you
realise the fact?"

"No, dear boy; it's too hot to realise anything?"

"Well, then, let me tell you a home truth."

"Ah, do! Anything about home and the truth would be delicious here.
Wish I could have an ice!"

"There you go! I say, can't you get tired of talking?"

"No, dear boy. I suppose it is my nature to. What is a fellow to do?
You won't."

"No, I'm too hot. I wish every slaver that sails these muddy seas was
hung at the yard-arm of his own nasty rakish schooner."

"Hee-ah, hee-ah, hee-ah! as we say in Parliament."

"_Parliament! Parler_, to talk!" grunted the other. "That's where you
ought to be, Frank, and then you'd be in your element."

"Oh, I say! I was only politely agreeing with you. That was a splendid
wish. The beasts! The wretches! But somehow they don't get their
deserts. Here have we been two months on this station, and I haven't
had so much as a squint of a slaver. I don't believe there are any.
All myths or fancies--bits of imagination."

"Oh, there are plenty of them, lad, but they know every in and out of
these mangrove-infested shores, and I'll be bound to say they are
watching