“Look!” he cried. “How lucky I saw! That harpoon is not fastened to the shaft.”
“No, sir. It ought not to be.”
“But why? Won’t it come off when you throw it?”
“I hope so, sir; we don’t want it broken. Don’t you see that the line is fastened to the head? We want the shaft to come out and float on the water, so that we can pick it up and use it again. It is almost the same as with the harpoons for the beluga.”
“Oh, I see. But wouldn’t they be better if they were made thicker?”
“No, sir,” said the man, giving the harpoon head a twist and taking it easily from the pointed end of the light pine shaft and replacing it. “That is just right, sir.”
Steve gave the Norseman a droll look.
“I say,” he whispered, “what an ignorant fellow you must think me!”
“No,” said the man, smiling. “You did not understand the things that long experience has taught us are the best; but they are very simple, and you know them now.”
“Yes, I know now. But tell me one more thing, and then I will not bother you any more.”