The pilot smiled. "Don't you know Gideon Hayle would put him ashore at the first wood-yard?"
"He'd be wrong if he didn't," gravely said Hugh.
"Do you mean that for a threat?—either of you?" snapped Lucian.
"No," said the pilot, "I was merely trying to reason with you. Come, now, go down to supper. It's a roaring good one: crawfish gumbo, riz biscuits, fresh butter, fried oysters, and coffee to make your hair curl. Go on, both of you. You've had—naturally enough—last day in the city—a few juleps too many, but that's all right. A square meal, a night's rest, and you'll wake up in the morning with Baton Rouge and all the sugar lands astern, the big cotton plantations on both sides of us, you feeling at home with everybody, everybody at home with you."
"Many thanks," sneered Julian. "We'll go to our meals self-invited. Good evening."
Hugh granted the pair a slight nod. As they went, Lucian, looking back over Julian's shoulder with eyes bigger than ever, said: "We'll wake up in the morning without the least change of feeling for this boat's owners, their relatives, or their hirelings."
The relative and the hireling glanced sharply at each other. But then Hugh said quietly: "A man can't quarrel with boys, Mr. Watson."
"No," mused the pilot aloud as he watched the pair go below, "but he can wait. They'll soon be men."
"And this be all forgotten," said Hugh.
"Not by them!" rejoined Mr. Watson. "They'll remember it ef they have to tattoo it—on their stomachs."