“That was a good idea of yours to bring them.”
“Yes, I reckon that was a bright notion.”
“Only you’ve spoiled it by being so cocky. I say, Bob, what a conceited chap you are.”
“Oh, am I? Pity you aren’t a little more so, too. Hallo! what’s the matter with Soup?”
Mark looked at the black sharply, half expecting that he was again going to leap overboard and swim for his liberty, for the man was glaring at the schooner they were approaching fast, his nostrils distended, and there was a curious lurid light in his eyes as if he were suddenly enraged.
“Why, Taters has got it too. Look at him.”
The bigger of the two blacks had muttered something to his companion as they sat together forward, and they both turned to Mark now as they started up in the boat and pointed to the schooner, uttering a low guttural cry.
“Sit down both of you; do you hear?” cried Bob.
“I see,” cried Mark, excitedly. “They know that it is a slaver, and they think we are going to take them off in it.”
“No, no!” growled the bigger black, fiercely.