"I'll take you on a private's pay," he said. "A thousand a year. Is that satisfactory?"
"I'm signed," Paddy whooped. "Hooray!"
When Peter Gross and his company left Tanjong Priok a fortnight later Captain Rouse bade them a wistful good-bye at the wharf.
"Take care of the lad; he's all I got," he said huskily to the resident. "If it wasn't for the damned plantation I'd go with ye, too."
CHAPTER XI
Mynheer Muller's Dream
The Dutch gun-boat Prins Lodewyk, a terror to evil-doers in the Java and Celebes seas, steamed smartly up Bulungan Bay and swung into anchorage a quarter of a mile below the assemblage of junks and Malay proas clustered at the mouth of Bulungan River. She carried a new flag below her ensign, the resident's flag. As she swung around, her guns barked a double salute, first to the flag and then to the resident. Peter Gross and his company were come to Bulungan.
The pert brass cannon of the stockade answered gun for gun. It was the yapping of terrier against mastiff, for the artillery of the fortress was of small caliber and an ancient pattern. Its chief service was to intimidate the natives of the town who had once been bombarded during an unfortunate rebellion and had never quite forgotten the sensation of being under shell-fire.