“What I contended all along—the house-boys are not to be trusted.”
“It does look serious,” Harriwell admitted, “but we'll come through it all right. What the sanguinary niggers need is a shaking up. Will you gentlemen please bring your rifles to dinner, and will you, Mr. Brown, kindly prepare forty or fifty sticks of dynamite. Make the fuses good and short. We'll give them a lesson. And now, gentlemen, dinner is served.”
One thing that Bertie detested was rice and curry, so it happened that he alone partook of an inviting omelet. He had quite finished his plate, when Harriwell helped himself to the omelet. One mouthful he tasted, then spat out vociferously.
“That's the second time,” McTavish announced ominously.
Harriwell was still hawking and spitting.
“Second time, what?” Bertie quavered.
“Poison,” was the answer. “That cook will be hanged yet.”
“That's the way the bookkeeper went out at Cape March,” Brown spoke up. “Died horribly. They said on the Jessie that they heard him screaming three miles away.”
“I'll put the cook in irons,” sputtered Harriwell. “Fortunately we discovered it in time.”
Bertie sat paralyzed. There was no color in his face. He attempted to speak, but only an inarticulate gurgle resulted. All eyed him anxiously.