"I believe I could persuade him to take a low wage."
"Not for me, Captain. I know McTodd. He's far too thirsty and far too cantankerous. You'd find him a ugly handful."
"Me! By James, sir, I can handle that swine in a way that would surprise you. He's had a bad up-bringing; he belongs to the Free Kirk; but after I've had the manipulation of Mr. McTodd for a week, I can make him as mild as Norwegian Swiss milk."
"Well, we'll say 'not for the present,' at any rate. With the organization I've got together, and the backing from the King of Okky that I've told you about, you'll be able to haul down all the available ore if you follow out my instructions, and when it comes to bonus, Captain, if you've been successful, you'll find me a generous paymaster. I don't toil for nothing myself. I work about ten times as hard as my neighbors, and draw in about seventeen times as much pay. I like a man who has got the same ambitions."
The little sailor sighed. "I've always done ten times the normal whack of work, sir, but somehow I've missed fingering the dibs. I tell you flat, fourteen pounds a month has been good for me, and month in and month out I've not averaged ten."
"Then, if that's the case," said Carter briskly, "just here should come the turn in your fortunes. Shake hands, Captain. Good-bye to you, good health and good luck. Here's my surf boat. The steamer's heaving short."
"Good-bye, sir," said Kettle, "I'm sure you'll remember to send that check."
*****
The mail-boat called as usual at Las Palmas and was boarded on arrival by the usual batch of invalids and Liverpool trippers for the run home. Carter landed as soon as the port doctor gave clearance papers, rowed to the mole and chartered a tartana, between whose shafts there drooped a mouse-colored mule. In it he bumped over the badly laid tram lines from the Isleta to the city, and then left the city by the Telde road.
Las Palmas is the meeting place of all West Africa, and if one is there long enough, one expects to meet sooner or later every man who has business or other interests on the Coast. Carter waved his hand to a Haûsa constabulary officer in the gateway of the Catalina, and to a Lagos branch boat skipper who was standing on the steps of the Elder Dempster office. Coming down from the telegraph station he saw one of the Germans who had been frightened out of Mokki, and under a café awning by the dry river bed no less a personage than Burgoyne of Monk River waved a hospitable hand and invited him to try a glass of Bass.