"Me China boy, all same Melican," he told Martin, as he industriously turned the grindstone beneath the cleaver's edge. "Me like all same lepublic—me fight like devil all same time when China war. Now Jap he come take China. No good. Me kill um Jap. Velly good. All same chop um head, chop, chop!"
And Yip waved his cleaver over his head, and a seraphic smile lighted his bland, unwarlike face.
At last, on the sixty-eighth day of the passage, Martin came on deck for the morning watch and found the vessel bouncing along under unaccustomed blue skies, and with a fair breeze. The boatswain went below, swiggling himself very stiff with the fervent hope that no bleeding Jonah would interrupt the course before the next eight bells, and Ruth took up an expectant watch with the glasses handy. Captain Dabney also kept the deck. Martin knew the landfall was expected.
At the middle of the watch, a squall sent Martin racing aloft to furl the royal. It was then that his sea-sharpened sight raised the land.
His hail to the deck aroused the ship. By the time he had finished his descent from aloft, all hands were at the rail, endeavoring each to pick up the distant speck.
Four bells had gone while he was aloft, and he strode aft to take his wheel. As he passed along the poop, he heard Ruth say—
"If the breeze holds, we'll be inside in a couple of hours."
Captain Dabney turned his old, sea-wise face to the wind. After a moment, he shook his head.
"I feel fog," he said.