"Not I," he said. "Most blacks are very uncivil to pelicans, and these had weapons close at hand. I have no wish to be found with a spear sticking in my heart, or in any other part of me."
"Did you notice what they were like?" Murla asked eagerly.
"I saw a fat woman, and a thin man," said Booran stupidly. "How should I know what they were like? They are not beautiful like pelicans. Oh, and I saw a very tall man, with a red bone through his nose. He was sitting idly on a stump while the others worked."
"That was my husband!" said Murla with a faint shriek. "Alas, I thought he was drowned! And the fat woman may be your wife, Goomah," she said to Karwin.
"Very likely," said Karwin. "Did you notice if they had food?"
"I do not know. But it is likely, for they had fire, and there was a pleasant smell."
"If my wife Goomah has food and fire, while I have nothing, there will be trouble," said Karwin wrathfully.
"That may be, but we will die here without ever knowing," Murla said. "Long before the water goes down we will have starved to death, and then nothing will matter." She broke off a bit of wood and flung it into the swirling river. "I wish we had never tried to save ourselves, or seen that hateful log!"
Now, Booran had been watching Murla, and he thought she looked very capable, and he thought that she could be very useful to him if he could get her away to some place where she could catch fish for him, so that he might spend all his time admiring himself and paddling about in his canoe.
But he did not quite know how to manage it.