“I’ll have one along with you,” the Cap’n urged sociably. “I can beat you peeling!”
The Cap’n started to peel one of the erstwhile magic balls. Lemmy dug his teeth quickly into his own orange. The race was on. Lemmy’s squeal of victory as he threw down the last bit of rind surprised the Cap’n amazingly.
“And mine only half peeled,” he exclaimed. “You are a quick-un.”
Then, quite naturally, Lemmy fell to eating oranges along with the Cap’n.
“Eating oranges with a Majishun—what’d Gus say?” Lemmy murmured, half in a trance. “What if I hadn’t run away from the ’Dopters?”
“The ’Dopters?” The Cap’n put his head on one side and raised his eyebrows very much puzzled indeed. “Who are they?”
“Oh, the ’Dopters are always hanging round the Home, trying to carry us off. A fellah has to watch out all the time. They’re sharp as tacks, always trying to fool us by looking something diff’rent. Ev’ry time they come they change their clothes to put us off the track.”
“Oh-ho—so you don’t like ’em, eh?”
“Oh, I’m afraid of ’em, they scare me so!” Lemmy’s voice quivered pitifully. “All the time I have to think of ’em. I’m never, never safe from the ’Dopters. I bet they’d poke a fellah’s eyes out once they got him, or starve him maybe. Oh, I don’t know what a ’Dopter wouldn’t do!”
The Cap’n listened gravely. Never once did he laugh as Lemmy poured forth his miserable fear of the ’Dopters. The Cap’n understood. Lemmy could tell that. By the time the oranges had disappeared, Lemmy had told the Cap’n all about the ’Dopters and even confided the existence of Nippy.