No answer; the smoker's concern was for his pipe.
"Chief, d'you hear me? You're needed on board." The captain shook him gently, and then not so gently.
"Drop it. We've come to bring you away. For any sakes quit that devilment, now, will y'!"...
The figure on the couch made a languid effort.
"I'll grant ye—I'll grant ye the siller's weel enough for a change. Aye, it makes a change." He wagged his head at us confidentially. "But the bamboo's the best. It smokes sweet—varra sweet it smokes. An' that unhandy thief of a boy—" He paused to draw lazily at the mouthpiece and loosed a slow gout of vapor. "He's always mislayin' it somewhere—"
Raff cried a round oath and snatched the pipe from him; flung it down. But the chief only sank back among the pillows and closed his eyes, even smiling a little to himself, as one accustomed to the vagaries of phantom guests....
For the last few moments he had forgotten our appointed guide and leader. He had been standing by, a stricken witness, but with a common impulse the captain and I turned on him, and he started from contemplation of his handiwork as if he had pulled a secret wire.
"You brought us here," roared Raff, accusing.
"I—I didn't think he was as bad as this."
"Bad! He's crazy as a coot. What were you going to do about it?"