g.

"Look at that--look at that! All smooth an' soft--an' kind of slimy,
like. Oh, no, we 'in't struck it fair rich this time, nor nothin'--oh,
_now_!... Mytey, I tell you--by Gaw', I tell you it's the real stuff!"

"But oughtn't there be an odor--a perfume?"

"Not yet--not while it's fresh. That comes after. And any'ow, what else
could it be--'ey?"

Junius shook his head.

"'Ere, I'll show you, you poor flat!" The larrikin raged about like a
man in a strong temper. "Where's a nail? Gimme a nail, a long nail, or a
piece of wire--'ell, I'll show you!"

He snatched up a strip of planking from the sand and wrenched a rusty
spike from it. With swift jerky gestures he gathered a few dry chips and
splinters, whipped a match, and set them alight. In this brief blaze he
heated the spike and then applied it to the lump. It sank smoothly,
leaving a little melted ring around the hole.

"Ambergris!" he yelped. "Worth near two pound an ounce, right 'ere in
Fufuti.... And the 'arf of it's mine," he added, with a startling shift
to the most brazen impudence.

Junius regarded him, incredulous.

"What? That's wot! Wasn't I here? 'In't I been pallin' along of you?
It's a fair divvy. W'y, damn your soul," he screamed in a sudden febrile
blast of fury, "you don't think you're goin' to 'og my 'arf an' all!"

"_Your_ half!" repeated Junius. "Huh--nothing small about you, is there?
Why, you weren't anywhere near when I found it. Didn't you pass up the
swim?"

Just here the Sydney Duck made his mistake. Had he proceeded with any
finesse, with any understanding of his man, he might have done about as
he pleased and it is likely that little of moment would have transpired
on Fufuti beach that morning. But he acted by his lights, which were
narrow and direct, and he hit Junius Peabody suddenly in the smiling
face of him and knocked him reeling backward. The next instant he was
running for the nearest palms with the prize tucked under one arm.

* * * * *

Junius sat on the sand and blinked, and at first he felt rather hurt,
for he was not used to being treated so, at least not while he was
sober. And thereafter he grinned, for such was his way of turning aside
a casual unpleasantness, and the thing undeniably had its humorous
aspect. But finally came the throb of a strange new emotion, as if some
one had planted a small, hot coal in his breast.

It is a fact worthy of note that never before had Juniu