“Get me the Jamaica, you!” demanded Hal with growing anger. “I’ve got no time for your line of bull!”
“Lots that ain’t got no time for nothin’ in this world will have time to burn in the next! You’ll get no rum from me, Master Hal. An’ what’s more, if I’d ha’ thought you was goin’ to slip your cable an’ run ashore in any such dognation fool way on a wave o’ booze, I’d of hid the whisky where you wouldn’t of run it down!”
“You’d have hidden it!” echoed Hal, his face darkening, the veins on neck and forehead beginning to swell. “You’ve got the infernal nerve to stand there—you, a servant—and tell me you’d hide anything away from me in my own house?”
“This here craft is registered under your grandpa’s name an’ is sailin’ under his house-flag,” the old cook reminded him. His face was still bland as ever, but in his eyes lurked a queer little gleam. “It ain’t the same thing at all—not yet.”
“Damn your infernal lip!” shouted Hal, advancing. Captain Briggs, quivering, half-rose from his chair. “You’ve got the damned impudence to stand there and dictate to me?”
“Master Hal,” retorted Ezra with admirable self-restraint, “you’re sailin’ a bit too wide wide o’ your course now. There’s breakers ahead, sir. Look out!”
“I believe you’ve been at the Jamaica yourself, you thieving son of Satan!” snarled Hal. “I’ll not stand here parleying with a servant. Get me that Jamaica, or I’ll break your damned, obstinate neck!”
“Now, Master Hal, I warn you—”
“To hell with you!”
“With me, Master Hal? With old Ezra?”