"To g-get me back?"
"To buy you back! Shiver my timbers, but you've got more talk than a Madras monkey. How much ransom, hey? Five hundred?"
"I don't think so. Why, are you g-going—"
"Yes, my hearty, we're going to hold you to ransom!" came the disconcerting answer. "Is the figure five hundred?"
"But that's to-too much," shivered Redisham, squirming on the floor beneath the menace of the revolver, which the chief held in almost playful fashion four inches from his left eye.
"Too much! I should say it was too much!" rejoined the other, with promptness. "Five hundred for a bit of a puppy like you! Why, I'd not give five hundred pence! I'd throw the main deck overboard before I'd think of it! Wouldn't I?" he asked.
"I'm sure you would," said Redisham hurriedly.
"I expect your parents'll be downright glad to get rid of you, hey?"
"I—I suppose so."
"Well, belay my scuppers, if they don't part up with the boodle you'll be shipped to South America, that's all!"