"But there aren't many enemy ships to capture now," he protested in a feeble voice. "They have all been driven off the seas."
"I'll wager there are enough ships left to pay a healthy dividend on your capital, Solomon. Besides, if the supply does run short we're not dainty and——" He concluded his sentence with a grimly significant laugh.
For some moments there was silence, broken only by the Captain's puffing as he exhaled cloud after cloud of fierce tobacco-smoke. Mr. Solomon's expressive countenance was again exhibiting signs of deep mental agitation, and his brow was wrinkled by a perplexed frown. Suddenly this cleared away and into his shifty eyes there came the triumphant look of one who has unexpectedly found the solution to a seemingly impossible problem. The change was so marked that Calamity regarded him with undisguised suspicion, for when Solomon looked like that it generally meant that somebody was going to be made wise by experience.
"I vill dink it over," he said at last.
A bland smile came over Calamity's face. He had not had intimate business relations with his companion during the past ten years for nothing, and knew that this was mere bluff, a sort of playful coquettishness on Mr. Solomon's part. But he, also, was an old hand at this game as his next remark proved.
"Please yourself," he answered indifferently, rising as if to go. "You think it over as you say, and in the meantime I'll trip over to Johore and see your pal Rossenbaum. He may be glad of the chance to——"
"Vait a minute! Vait a minute!" interrupted Mr. Solomon, starting to his feet. "Vat you in such a 'urry for?"
In moments of excitement he was apt to drop the h's which at other times he assiduously cultivated.
"Well, you don't suppose I'm going to hang about Singapore and get drunk on the local aperients while you make up your mind, do you?" inquired Calamity.
"Now just you sit down, Captain, and ve'll talk the matter over," said Mr. Solomon in a mollifying tone. "Make yourself at home now."