“Get out!” drawled Jack. “I know what you mean. I can’t help being tall and thin.”
“Not you, my lad,” said the captain good-humouredly. “Never mind your looks so long as your ’art’s in the right place. We’re safe enough, doctor, and I should say that nothing better could have happened. Niggers is only niggers; but treat ’em well and they ain’t so very bad. You let young Squire Carstairs here ask the chief, and he’ll go with you, and take half his people, to try and find the professor; ah, and fight for you too, like trumps.”
“Do you think so?” I said.
“Think! I’m sure of it; and I’m all right now. They’ll be glad to see me and trade with me. I’m glad you made me set those chaps free.”
“And what has become of the crew of the other schooner?” I said anxiously.
“Nobbled,” said the captain; “and sarve ’em right. Tit for tat; that’s all. Men who plays at those games must expect to lose sometimes. They’ve lost—heavy. Change the subject; it’s making young Six-foot Rule stare, and you look as white as if you were going to be served the same. Where’s the doctor?”
“He said he was going to see to the injured men,” I replied.
“Come and let’s look how he’s getting on,” said the captain. “It’s all right now; no one will interfere with us more than mobbing a bit, because we’re curiosities. Come on.”
I followed the captain, the blacks giving way, but following us closely, and then crowding close up to the door of the great tent where the doctor was very busy repairing damages, as he called it, clipping away woolly locks, strapping up again and finishing off dressings that he had roughly commenced on board.
During the next few days we were the honoured guests of the savages, going where we pleased, and having everything that the place produced. The captain moored his vessel in a snug anchorage, and drove a roaring trade bartering the stores he had brought for shells, feathers, bird-skins, and other productions of the island.