"Drink this," said Shoepack Sam. There he put champagne in a glass before him. Oh, they were careful of the man.
"Here, take my hand, and let me see if strength is coming back," said Shoepack. "What is a rainbow without colors?"
Then the little medicine-man took his pulse, kneeling on the floor beside him. Oh, the great sailor was puzzled. Still he drank what was in the glass before him and after this he put his mustache into his mouth, sipping it by chance.
"What is this you are preparing?" he said, pointing his bold nose to them. Oh, the eyes were like a dreamer's: he was a child to appearances.
Then they went speaking to him of the stringed instrument they had heard humming on the ledge, speaking another language than his own.
"This is a wife to be defended," said Shoepack Sam, padding there with his yellow shoepacks bringing another drink. But still there was no word of Pal Yachy. That black Italian was not popular at Throat River.
"Now I see you are speaking of another man," said Rainbow Pete. Then Shoepack Sam went roaring, it was time for honest men to speak, when an honest woman was being taken by a voice.
"Wait," said Rainbow Pete, with his thumb in the foam, "this is unlikely she will want me cruising in, with another man singing in her ear."
Oh my, he was a considerate man, he was a natural husband, thinking of his wife's feelings.
"Are you a man?" said Smash McGregor. "Here she has fed you when you were starving—this is her food you have been eating. Will you pass this ledge, leaving her to fortune?"