“I shall do nothing of the kind, Blunt. My brother and I are only too well satisfied with your management. I have come here to help to take care of Nephew Stanley, and when the care is not necessary I am going to have a rest, fishing, botanising, and shooting—in other words, to have a spell of idleness, for I don’t think you will be attacked again after the taste you have given the miscreants of our quality here at the hong. Now then, Blunt,” he added, “are you satisfied?”
The manager hesitated and still looked doubtful, but the look that accompanied Uncle Jeff’s outstretched hand was sufficient, and he brightened up at once.
“Yes, sir,” he said warmly—“quite.”
Chapter Thirty Four.
“Wait till the Wretches come.”
The landing and stowing away of the cases of ammunition did not last long, for every one joined in it, four men without orders taking charge of a box that one could have carried with ease. In fact, they looked more like a party of schoolboys bringing boxes of fireworks for a fête than stern, energetic men fighting for the privilege of either carrying or simply watching the little chests, the possession of which turned them from helpless, unprotected beings, at the mercy of the next piratical crew that came down the river, to strong, vigorous folk ready for a fleet of junks and eager to fight to any desperate end.
The last case was placed in the little magazine, the trap-door shut down and locked, and then there was a burst of cheering which sounded stifled in the great stack-filled store.
“Why, I thought at one time,” said Uncle Jeff merrily when the whole party had filed out and the speaker was seated in Blunt’s private room, “that they were all going to break out in a triumphal war-dance.”