The man looked at him curiously.
“Oh, that’s all right,” he said, waving his hand deprecatingly. “You needn’t think as I’ll ’arm you or your blasted dust.
“You’re a rum ’un, you are,” he added reflectively, as he watched the sweat pouring from off Kent’s face and the quavering of his knees.
“W’y don’t you pipe up an’ say somethin’?” he went on, as the other struggled for breath. “Wot’s gone wrong o’ your gaff? Anythink the matter?”
“W—w—where’d you get it?” Kent at last managed to articulate, raising a shaking forefinger to the ghastly scar which seamed the other’s cheek.
“Shipmate stove me down with a marlin-spike from the main-royal. An’ now as you ’ave your figger’ead in trim, wot I want to know is, wot’s it to you? That’s wot I want to know—wot’s it to you? Gawd blime me! do it ’urt you? Ain’t it smug enough for the likes o’ you? That’s wot I want to know!”
“No, no,” Kent answered, sinking upon a stool with a sickly grin. “I was just wondering.”
“Did you ever see the like?” the other went on truculently.
“No.”
“Ain’t it a beute?”