"I'll tell 'em, boss," he replied. "But, by snakes, it's a bad look-out."
"It is," assented Mr. McKay, as he prepared to go below and bind up a slight wound on his shoulder. "Your friends will have to be content with Ni Atong for a while, I'm thinking."
Andy was also in the cabin, where he was attending to a surface wound on his forehead—the legacy of one of the savages' showers of stones—so only Terence and Ellerton remained on deck with the ex-pearler.
"Couldn't the boss bring over the rest of your pals and settle our score with those niggers?"
"What pals?"' asked Terence, taken aback by the suddenness of the question.
"Why, the other chaps on your island."
"There are none," replied Terence.
Barely had the words escaped him, when he realised that he had made an admission. He had revealed the comparative weakness of the defences of McKay's Island.
"Oh! Is that so?" was the rejoinder.
Blight said no more on the subject, for the yawl was now within hailing distance of the forlorn flotilla.