"At once, august mate, I go," he said, and went.
"Quite a superior steward, that Japanese boy," said the elder lady to me.
"Oh, he's a wonder, all right," I assented; "but his place is in the galley, and not on the quarter-deck—if I may be allowed to speak of it."
"And I do hope you will treat him kindly—not as you did the Chinese man who went bad," said Miss Aline.
"No fear of it—not the king. He wouldn't stand roughing—and don't call for it. You see, while he goes with the Chinks altogether too much for their own good, and talks altogether too much for his own, he is not a Chinaman. Oh, no; he is far removed from the coolie Chinks, as far as the skipper himself. He's just a plain little fighting man, that a good-sized mate like myself could bite in two; but I know him—just what he'd do."
"Why, what?" asked Miss Aline.
"I'd hate to tell you," I grinned.
"You may be a good seaman, but you're somewhat stupid," said Miss Aline, and I laughed outright at her humor.
"What do you think of this fine weather?" asked her aunt to change the conversation.
"It's good as it goes, but it's the hurricane season, and we can't count on it lasting all the way, you know," I said. "Maybe we'll hook right into a typhoon before——"