“But on deck—?”
“Just so. I don't mind telling you, in confidence, of course, that they used an axe.”
“This present crew of yours?”
Captain Hansen nodded.
“The other skipper always was too careless,” explained the mate. “He but just turned his back, when they let him have it.”
“We haven't any show down here,” was the skipper's complaint. “The government protects a nigger against a white every time. You can't shoot first. You've got to give the nigger first shot, or else the government calls it murder and you go to Fiji. That's why there's so many drowning accidents.”
Dinner was called, and Bertie and the skipper went below, leaving the mate to watch on deck.
“Keep an eye out for that black devil, Auiki,” was the skipper's parting caution. “I haven't liked his looks for several days.”
“Right O,” said the mate.
Dinner was part way along, and the skipper was in the middle of his story of the cutting out of the Scottish Chiefs.