“Why I’ve gone in for trade a bit. I’ve been among the South Sea Islands, shipping blacks for the interior here; and, to tell you the truth, my boy, I am pretty well sick of the job from all I’ve seen. It is more like buying slaves, and that is the honest truth.”
“And I suppose you are going to give it up?” The captain laughed—a laugh that Archie did not quite like.
“Yes,” he said, “I’ll give it up after—another turn or two. But come and have something cooling, the weather is quite summery already. What a great man you have grown! When I saw you first you were just a—”
“A hobbledehoy?”
“Something like that—very lime-juicy, but very ardent and sanguine. I say, you didn’t find the streets of Sydney paved with gold, eh?”
“Not quite,” replied Archie, laughing as he thought of all his misery and struggles in the capital of New South Wales.
“But,” he added, “though I did not find the streets paved with gold, I found the genuine ore on a housetop, or near it, in a girl called Sarah.”
“What, Archie Broadbent, you don’t mean to say you’re married?”
“No; but Bob is.”
“What Bob? Here, waiter, bring us drinks—the best and coolest you have in the house. Now, lad, you’ve got to begin at the beginning of your story, and run right through to the end. Spin it off like a man. I’ll put my legs on a chair, smoke, and listen.”