"Oh, you always want something rough, something bad," put in Miss Aline. "I never saw such a man. Why do you always look for trouble? Don't you find it often enough without hunting it always?"
"Sure as eggs," I said; "but I'm only telling you what I believe, what the signs show me. I'm not trying to frighten you at all."
"I think you are perfectly horrid," said the young woman.
"I hope I'm wrong, at least," I answered. But as I scanned the perfect sky I felt that indeed I was trespassing upon the feelings of the passengers too much, in spite of the fact that I had a mercury glass to observe in Slade's room.
The coolies came on deck in the daytime now, and sat in rows along the waterways, eating their rice and chewing some sort of stuff to fill in the interval between meals. They chattered a lot, and appeared not to feel abashed at their former behavior.
At these times the old man would come on deck—it being about the time he'd take the noon sight—and gaze down at them dismally. He hated Chinks, and their presence in his ship was more than he could get used to.
"What good are Chinks, anyway?" he would say.
"Somebody's got to do the work in hot countries, and you can't always get the blacks. They are just like mules, carabao buffalo, or jacks. They'll work on ten cents a day and get fat; they don't know any better," I'd tell him.
But he would shake his old, shaggy head and mutter:
"What good, what good, anyway?"