“Yes?” she asked eagerly. “Then what happened?”
“The nine Malaita men ate the two from San Cristoval, all except the heads, which are too valuable for mere eating. They stowed them away in the stern-locker till they landed. And those two heads are now in some bush village back of Langa Langa.”
She clapped her hands and her eyes sparkled. “They are really and truly cannibals! And just think, this is the twentieth century! And I thought romance and adventure were fossilized!”
He looked at her with mild amusement.
“What is the matter now?” she queried.
“Oh, nothing, only I don’t fancy being eaten by a lot of filthy niggers is the least bit romantic.”
“No, of course not,” she admitted. “But to be among them, controlling them, directing them, two hundred of them, and to escape being eaten by them—that, at least, if it isn’t romantic, is certainly the quintessence of adventure. And adventure and romance are allied, you know.”
“By the same token, to go into a nigger’s stomach should be the quintessence of adventure,” he retorted.
“I don’t think you have any romance in you,” she exclaimed. “You’re just dull and sombre and sordid like the business men at home. I don’t know why you’re here at all. You should be at home placidly vegetating as a banker’s clerk or—or—”
“A shopkeeper’s assistant, thank you.”