“It’s for the benefit of all, Pete. With a couple of hundred cartridges, even if half of them are small shot—”
“We could kick up such a row, sir, as would make the niggers think we had no end of supplies. Let’s get them, sir.”
“How, Pete?”
“Oh, that means you are on, sir. How? Well, that wants a considering-cap and a little bit of thinkum-thinkum. How? Don’t quite see it yet, sir; but if you sets your mind on a thing, and comes to me—it always did end in our seeing how to do it, and that’s how it’s going to be now.” Peter began to whistle softly and then sing in a whisper about—
“Some talks of Alex-ander,
And some of Hercules,
Of Hector and Lysander,
And such brave chaps as these.
“Here, I have got it, sir.”
“Yes—how?” cried Archie.
“A boat, sir.”
“Bother! I have been thinking of boats and sampans and nagas and gunboats, and all the rest of them. How are we to do it with a boat?”
“Don’t be waxy with me, Mister Archie, sir. You are in such a hurry with a chap. I said boat.”