“He must have been a wonderful man, sir,” said Tess, while Dot sat round-eyed and listened.
“Wonderful! wonderful!” agreed the clam digger. “But about them warmin’ pans. When we got ter Porto Rico we broke out the first of them things. Looked right foolish. All them dons in Panama hats and white pants, an’ barefooted comin’ aboard to look over samples of tradin’ stock, an’ all they can see is warmin’ pans.
“‘What’s them things for?’ axed the first planter, in the Spanish lingo.
“‘Them’s skimmers,’ says Cap’n Roebuck, knowin’ it warn’t no manner o’ use to try to explain the exact truth to a man what ain’t never seed snow, or knowed there was a zero mark on the almanack.
“He grabbed up one o’ them warmin’ pans and made a swing with it like you’d use a crab-net. ‘See! See!’ says the dons. ‘Skim-a da merlasses.’ That’s Spanish for ‘Yes, yes! skim the merlasses,’” explained Kuk, seriously.
“‘But what’s the cover for?’ axed the don. ‘Ye don’t hafter have no cover,’ says Cap’n Roebuck, and he yanks the cover off the warmin’ pan an’ throws it away.
“And there them dons had the finest merlasses dipper that ever went inter the islan’s. Cap’n Roebuck seen their eyes snap an’ put a good, stiff price on the things, and inside of a week there warn’t a warmin’ pan left on the Spankin’ Sal.
“Then,” pursued the clam digger, “we stowed away in our upper holt goods what would bring a fancy price at Rio, and laid our course for the Amazon.
“But we was all hands mighty worritted,” admitted Kuk, lowering his voice mysteriously. “Ye see, ye never could tell in them old days, an’ in the West Injies, who it was safe to trust, an’ who it was safe ter dis-trust.
“Yer see, so many of them snaky Spanish planters was hand an’ glove with the pi-rats. And ev’rybody on the island knowed the Spankin’ Sal was takin’ away a great treasure that had been exchanged for them warmin’ pans. We was a fair mark, as ye might say, for them pi-rats.”