Gordon, glaring as grimly at the
frightened monarch as he thought was safe. "Who wouldn't be angry? Who
do you think these people were who made a fool of him, Stedman? Ask
him to let us see this watch."

Stedman did so, and the King fumbled among his necklaces until he had
brought out a leather bag tied round his neck with a cord, and
containing a plain stem-winding silver watch marked on the inside
"Munich."

"That doesn't tell anything," said Gordon. "But it's plain enough.
Some foreign ship of war has settled on this place as a
coaling-station, or has annexed it for colonization, and they've sent
a boat ashore, and they've made a treaty with this old chap, and
forced him to sell his birthright for a mess of porridge. Now, that's
just like those monarchical pirates, imposing upon a poor old black."

Old Bradley looked at him impudently.

"Not at all," said Gordon; "it's quite different with us; we don't
want to rob him or Ollypybus, or to annex their land. All we want to
do is to improve it, and have the fun of running it for them and
meddling in their affairs of state. Well, Stedman," he said, "what
shall we do?"

Stedman said that the best and only thing to do was to threaten to
take the watch away from Messenwah, but to give him a revolver
instead, which would make a friend of him for life, and to keep him
supplied with cartridges only as long as he behaved himself, and then
to make him understand that, as Ollypybus had not given his consent to
the loss of the island, Messenwah's agreement, or treaty, or whatever
it was, did not stand, and that he had better come down the next day,
early in the morning, and join in a general consultation. This was
done, and Messenwah agreed willingly to their proposition, and was
given his revolver and shown how to shoot it, while the other presents
were distributed among the other men, who were as happy over them as
girls with a full dance-card.

"And now, to-morrow," said Stedman, "understand, you are all to come
down unarmed, and sign a treaty with great Ollypybus, in which he will
agree to keep to one-half of the island if you keep to yours, and
there must be no more wars or goat-stealing, or this gentleman on my
right and I will come up and put holes in you just as the gentleman on
the left did with the goat."

Messenwah and his warriors promised to come early, and saluted
reverently as Gordon and his three companions walked up together very
proudly and stiffly.