"Yes, Carteret, your memory and your arithmetic were right. There were five. But they are all the children of one woman. And that woman, though she is a Chinese, is just as much my wife as things out here go as if the banns had been published and the service read.... 'Pon my honour, she is! ... I am educating my children. They are safe in Hong-Kong at the present moment.... Bless my soul, I had a letter from the oldest by the last mail.... More than that, Carteret, since I have had that Chinese woman, I have never sought a white woman, and never intend to.... Thank God, I have a little bit of a man in me yet!"
"That's all old woman's sentiment, De Vaux. I didn't think you were such a molly-coddle. Wouldn't it make a furore in society if I was to take a Chinese tea-girl home to be the Countess of Lewesthorpe? I have none of your fastidious notions. I intend to have a woman suited to my position, and money to keep it up."
"And leave the girl and the kid."
"Then, by God, I'll have nothing more to do with you!"
And De Vaux meant what he said. But another bottle was broken, and then another. And when the dawn peeped in, De Vaux was stertorously slumbering on a long bamboo and rattan chair, and Carteret was hidden under his mosquito curtains.
XXIX
FLAGS OF TRUCE
"Looks as if we might have something doing to-day, sergeant. I shouldn't be surprised if we should have an interesting day. What do you make of those boats away there to the north?"
"Transports, docther. They're not men-o'-war, and what else could merchant ships be doin' there except waitin' for a chanst to land soldiers?"
"I wonder where the other warships are. I can make out only the Galissonnière and the Vipère."