“Yes. He wants to be put ashore at the Mortlocks Islands. We have no trader there, and he has lived there before.”
“I'd like to see him go over the side in some new canvas, with a couple of fire bars slung to his heels,” snarled Hendry viciously.
“So would I,” said Chard meditatively.
At four bells the wheel was relieved, and Huka the Niué native trotted off, and immediately sent a message to Carr's servant Malua to come for'ard. The boy did as requested, and remained away for about ten minutes. When he returned he seated himself as usual near his master. Hendry was in his cabin on deck, Chard was below in the trade room, and only Tessa, Harvey, and himself were on the after-deck.
“Master,” he said in Fijian, to Harvey, “listen to what Huka, the man of Niué, has told me. The captain and the supercargo have been talking about thee and the lady.” Then he repeated all that which Huka had heard.
“The infernal scoundrels!” Harvey could not help exclaiming. “But they won't get rid of me as easily as they think.”
“What is it, Harvey?” asked Tessa, anxiously bending forward to him.
The trader thought a moment or two before speaking. Then he decided to tell her what he had just heard.
She laughed contemptuously. “His wife! His wife!” she repeated scornfully. “If he knew what my father knows of him, and how I hate and despise him, he would not have said that. Does he think that because my mother was a Portuguese, I am no better than some native slave girl whom he could buy from her master?”
Harvey smiled gravely as he looked into her flashing eyes, and saw her clench her hands angrily. Then he said—