“For what?”
“Do you think dead pigs grow on trees? The sum of ten shillings for that pig is entered in the accounts.”
Cornelius bowed his assent with a shudder.
“Sure it's grateful I am it wasn't a fifteen-shilling pig or a twenty-shilling one.”
Chapter Eight—THE PEARLS OF PARLAY
I
The Kanaka helmsman put the wheel down, and the Malahini slipped into the eye of the wind and righted to an even keel. Her head-sails emptied, there was a rat-tat of reef-points and quick shifting of boom-tackles, and she was heeled over and filled away on the other tack. Though it was early morning and the wind brisk, the five white men who lounged on the poop-deck were scantily clad. David Grief, and his guest, Gregory Mulhall, an Englishman, were still in pajamas, their naked feet thrust into Chinese slippers. The captain and mate were in thin undershirts and unstarched duck pants, while the supercargo still held in his hands the undershirt he was reluctant to put on. The sweat stood out on his forehead, and he seemed to thrust his bare chest thirstily into the wind that did not cool.
“Pretty muggy, for a breeze like this,” he complained.