Old Dibs seemed less gay about it, and had thought up a lot of fresh objections; but Tom said there was only one thing to worry about, and that was whether the whole concern wouldn't show plain against the sky. We got off a ways to take a look, and very unsatisfying it was, too. A big, leafy tree seems a mighty solid affair, till you stand off and look right through it; and Old Dibs was for giving up the idea and trying the cellar, which was Tom's other notion. But the tree business appealed to Tom more, and he explained how we'd paint the contraption green, and how people, when they were walking, never looked up, but ahead; and how unwholesome a cellar would be, and likely to give Old Dibs the rheumatics; not to speak of pigs rooting him out, and no air to speak of.
"Then think of the view," said Tom, who was as happy as a sand boy and in a bully humor, "and so close to the stars, Mr. Smith, that you can pick them down for lights to your cigar!"
Old Dibs smiled a sickly smile, like he was unbending to a pair of kids.
"Have it your own way, then, Riley," says he, "but you're responsible for the thing being a success, and don't look for me to dance tight ropes or do monkey on a stick."
"I'd engage to put a cow up there," said Tom, not overpolite, though he meant no harm, "or a parlor organ, with the young lady to play it."
"Mr. Smith," said I, "you'll only need shut your eyes and trust to us, and take it all as it comes."
"Boys," said Old Dibs, kind of solemn and helplesslike, "you'll do the square thing by me, won't you? You won't sell an old man for blood money? You won't get me up there and then strike a trade with them that's tracking me down?"
You ought to have seen Tom Riley's face at that! I was afraid there would be a bust-up then and there. But all he did was to walk faster ahead, like he didn't care to talk to us any more, and gave us the broad of his back. Old Dibs ran after him and caught his arm, panting out he was sorry and all that, and how Tom was to put himself in his place, with the whole world banded against him. I felt sorry to see the old fellow eating dirt, and trotting along so fat and wheezy, with Tom almost pushing him off like a beggar, and it was like spring sunshine when Tom turned square around and said:
"Hell! that's all right, Mr. Smith." And I guess it was Old Dibs's face that needed watching, it was beaming and happy, specially when they shook hands on it, and we all three walked along abreast, like a father and his two sons on the way to the bar.
Tom didn't let grass grow under his feet, and he went at it all with a rush, beginning first of all with Iosefo, the Kanaka pastor. Natives are never so helpful and willing as when you're egging them on to do something they shouldn't, and he fell in with the preaching idea, and wanted to start right away. But they finally decided it had better be a monthly affair, so the natives shouldn't lose track of it, and Iosefo commenced the first Sunday. Anybody that gave away Old Dibs was to have his house burned in this world and his soul in the next; and Iosefo laid it on thick about our all loving him, and what a friend he has proved himself to the island; and when he reached the point where he announced that Old Dibs had contributed fifty dollars toward the fund for the new church, you could feel a rustle go through the whole congregation, and a general gasp of satisfaction. Iosefo drew a fancy picture of Judas hanging himself, and brought it up to date with Old Dibs, and what a scaly thing it was to do anyway. He let himself rip in all directions, even to the persecutions in what he called the White Country, which he said Old Dibs had endured for religion's sake, and how he had been thrown to the lions in the Colossium.