It was their first night in the Straits—what Stevenson, pumped dry of tropical epithets, so often called "a wonderful night of stars." Yet Madame Gilbert had no eyes and no mind for the wonder of it. She could think of nothing but the Cannibal who for months had seemed to be so very remote and who was now so very near. Indeed exactly opposite to her, seated cross-legged like an Englishman upon a sofa bunk. His lips and nostrils were rather thick and broad, and his hair distinctly negroid—one should, I suppose, say Australoid—he was of the colour of strong coffee, yet he was not in the least like a Cannibal.
"Gatepath must be even a bigger fool than I thought," muttered Madame angrily to herself. Which was unjust. She had not, like Gatepath, been chased down to a boat by a naked furious Willatopy urged on to speed by the prod of a fish spear. But at that moment Madame was unwilling to be just, especially to Roger Gatepath.
"What makes your hair so red?" asked Willatopy suddenly.
"It grows that way," murmured Madame feebly.
"I have never seen hair red like that," observed Willatopy. "At Thursday Island the white women's hair is black or muddy. Not nice. Your hair is very nice. It shines like, like red copper. And your skin is whiter than any skin I have seen. Are you white like that all over under your clothes?"
"Young man," said Ewing, who had just entered and caught the last enquiry. "You are vairy indiscreet. Leddies do not possess what they do not please to show us."
"No?" Willatopy lifted his eyebrows. "But Madame"—he had caught the title from Ching—"has such beautiful skin. Her stockings shine, like rich bronze, and are very beautiful, but I think that her legs would be much nicer without all those stockings and petticoats."
Ewing grinned. Ching frowned. Madame for a moment almost blushed and then laughed in her old rippling fashion.
"Willatopy," said she, "if you don't mind we will change the subject. White men don't talk like that about white women, and you must try to behave like a white man. It was all your fault, Alexander," she went on severely. "If you had left the boy alone I would have dealt with him myself. How often must I tell you that Scotsmen have no tact?"