Shaddy’s one eye flashed, and he did not look half so ferocious.
“Thank ye, my lad,” he cried, stretching out his great hand. “Would you mind laying your fist in there and saying that again?”
Rob laughed, looked full in the man’s eye, and laid his hand in the broad palm, but wished the next moment that he had not, for the fingers closed over his with a tremendous grip.
“I say, you hurt!” he cried.
“Ay, I suppose so,” said Shaddy, loosing his grip a little. “I forgot that. Never mind. It was meant honest, and Mr Brazier shan’t repent bringing me.”
“I don’t think he does now,” said Rob. “He told me yesterday that you were a staunch sort of fellow.”
“Ah! thank ye,” said Shaddy, smiling more broadly; and his ruffianly, piratical look was superseded by a frank aspect which transformed him. “You see, Mr Harlow, I’m a sort of a cocoa-nutty fellow, all shaggy husk outside. You find that pretty tough till you get through it, and then you ain’t done, for there’s the shell, and that’s hard enough to make you chuck me away; but if you persevere with me, why, there inside that shell is something that ain’t peach, nor orange, nor soft banana, but not such very bad stuff after all.”
“I should think it isn’t,” cried Rob. “I say, it would make some of our boys at home stare who only know cocoa-nut all hard and woody, and the milk sickly enough to throw away, if they could have one of the delicious creamy nuts that we get here.”
“Yes, my lad, they’re not bad when you’re thirsty, nor the oranges either.”
“Delicious!” cried Rob.