“Now we are t-through, you b’lieve? No,” says Mark.
“The leetle Japanese boy—the bad, naughty leetle Japanese boy who runnings away from his father—you will now give him to me? In that case of the event nothing shall happen that is not nice. No! no! no! And besides additionally there shall be Christmas gift and handy present for you. Nice, beautiful presents that boys shall like to be owners of.”
“We can wait for Christmas,” says Mark. “We ain’t in any hurry for p-p-presents.”
“Ah, but butter and bread and vittle, eh? There are stomachs that are lonesome for feed. To be certainly sure. There is thirstiness. It is bad and not a pleasant happening to be thirsty. Suppose I am staying here three days, maybe a week? How is that? You will be starving and thirsting. What then? Eh?”
“Mister,” says Mark, “when you’re hungry just s-s-send word. We’ll be g-glad to lend you some grub. We’ve got p-plenty to last till you’re far, far away.”
“You are a pig-head like a mule. You do not listen to commonest sense. No. Must I come to take away the bad leetle Japanese boy?”
“You must if you get him. But so far, lookin’ at it from the p-p-point of view of a man that’s not int’rested, you ’ain’t had much l-l-luck so far.”
“I will buy and paying very generous for the leetle boy. How much?”
“We haven’t any little boys for sale, mister. And now that’ll be about all. This t-truce is over. If you ain’t gone from there by the time I count ten we’ll open f-fire. Git!”
The Man stared up a moment through his one eye-glass and grinned and shrugged his shoulders, but before Mark had counted ten he was out of range.