"Laugh, Kit!—I never saw a fellow laugh as he did. I roared to see him. And all the while those chaps were skipping about on the shore, howling like lunatics. You never heard such a row. Then Fat George, when he saw it was all up, tried the leary lay.
"'I know it's just a joke o the Genelman's,' says he in that greasy- wheazy voice of his.
"'That's just it, George,' the other calls across the water, 'and the best joke I've enjoyed since I saw Black Diamond brand you with the hot iron you'd just branded the lugger's kitten with.'
"'What I mean,' whines Fat George, 'you wouldn't go for to leave a lot o pore blokes on a dead foul lee-shore—what got there through trying to sarve you.'
"'Sarve me!' says the Gentleman. 'Yes, Garge, my faithful friend— sarve me in the back with two fut o carvin-knife, while I was chattin with Garge's pals.'
"At that Fat George snatches the musket and pulls.
"I heard the click of the hammer, but there was never so much as a flash in a pan.
"'Thank you, thank you, Fatty, my friend,' says the French feller. 'But you know you'd make better shooting, if I hadn't wetted your priming.'
"Then he struck his oars in the water. 'And now good-night all,' says he. 'Black Diamond was a man, if he was a devil. As to the rest of you, the best I can wish you is a long drop, and a rope that runs free. And as for you, Fat George, I won't forget you in this world, and God won't forget you in the next.'
"Then he came rowing along inside the barrier of rocks to me.