It appeared he calculated on three or four months, and my meeting Jessamine at Honolulu had cut him short. But I didn't see but he held the cards. Jessamine might arrest till he was blown. The crew of the Good Sister hadn't shipped to be speared by a king's bodyguard, and I didn't care much for parties in St. Louis.
Soon we were eating comfortably, sitting on the big piazza around one of Craney's black walnut tables. The palace seemed to be fitted and furnished so far mainly from the cargo. Each of us had two or three waiters back of his chair, some men, some women. The warriors squatted in line out in front among the flowers. Whenever we were through with a dish, Craney would send the rest of it down to the warriors, and they'd gobble it, and watch for more, with their eyes shining, but very quiet. I recollect there was something that was like a duck, and some canned tomatoes, and a kind of fruit with a yellow rind.
“There's two hundred in my army,” says Craney sociably, “in four divisions. This is a special one. Mighty fond of drilling they are. Fact, 'most everybody's in the army. They're softening under discipline, but some of 'em are bloodthirsty yet.”
“J. R.,” says Jessamine, “I hate to do it. It's a painful duty.” Craney says: “Just so. Say no more. You couldn't be expected to know the law of this state touching the person of the king. Fact is, foreigners ain't allowed to arrest royalty here. Fact, it's a new law. I just passed it the other day. You didn't mean any harm. We'll say no more.”
Jessamine looked hurt. “Come now, J. R., it's no use. You're not going to resist the law.”
“I'm going to maintain it, Jessamine, maintain it.”
“I say, I got the authority of the States of Missouri and California.”
“I asks you, what authority they've got here? First place, you want extradition papers. You can't have 'em. I won't give 'em to you. Trouble with you, Jessamine, is you're narrow. You're small, there ain't any vastness about you, Jessamine.”
“J. R.,” says Jessamine, remonstrating, “this isn't right, and you know it.”
“You don't expand, Jessamine,” says Craney. “You don't permeate. You ain't got on to large ideas.”