Alongside, the man in her laid in his oars, caught the rope flung to him by Harman, and made fast.
He was a pale-faced, lantern-jawed, dyspeptic-looking person, and he was chewing, for the first thing he did after scrambling on deck was to spit overboard. The next was to ask a question.
“What’s your name?” said he, saluting the afterguard with a nod, and sweeping the deck with his eyes—eyes like the wine-coloured, large, soulless eyes of a hare.
“Heart of Ireland, out of Frisco—what’s yours?” replied Harman.
“Gadgett,” replied the hare-eyed man. “I came out thinking maybe you were bringing news of my schooner, the Bertha Mason. She’s overdue from Sydney. I’m owner here. This island’s mine, leased from the Australian government.” Then, with another look round the deck: “What in the nation are you doing down here anyway?”
“Makin’ fools of ourselves,” replied Harman, “unless we’ve mistook your place for a big copra island that ought to lay in your position. You haven’t heard tell of such an island hereabouts?”
“Look at your charts,” said Gadgett. “This place is only marked on the last British Admiralty charts. There’s nothing round here but water from the Change Time Line to Johnston Island. You’ve come a thousand miles out for copra.”
“What’s your venture here, may I ask?” put in Blood.
“Shell,” replied Gadgett, leaning now against the starboard rail and cutting himself a new plug of tobacco. “I’ve been working this island six years, and had her nearly stripped of shell last spring, but I’ve hung on to clear the last of it. There isn’t much, but I thought I’d take the last squeeze. My schooner is overdue, and when it comes I’m going to clear out for good.”
“Say,” said Harman, “did a chap called Rafferty call here last spring?”