"At a distance. I never landed there. I was only a trader then."
"And these men you'd like to see strung up like Haman, only more so, Captain Cathie?"
"You know them as well as I do, sir. Kidnappers, black-birders, treacherous devils, scum of the earth. They don't have the times they used to have, but they're not wholly cleared out yet in the outlying groups. I'll be glad to give what time's left me to helping clear them."
"You're up to steam?"
"Had five years of it."
"Any hand with a Long Tom?"
"Was gunner's mate for three years on the Blenheim before I got married, and we always carried guns in the Islands," and the bold blue eyes snapped with a touch of puzzlement. "But—I thought it was a missionary cruise you were bound on, Mr. Blair?"
"I'm a new kind of missionary, Captain Cathie. The faithful shepherd protects his flock. If the wolves try to steal his lambs, the wolves must take the consequences."
"By God, sir, I'm your man!" and the burly one jumped up with a flame in his face, because he could not sit still under the hopes that were in him.
"I'm inclined to think you may be," said Blair. "You will understand, Captain Cathie, that the master of our ship will be one of the most important links in the chain. If you will look in about this time to-morrow, you shall hear what we have decided."