'As you have stolen the duck,' Ping Wang continued, sternly, 'you must return to me the money which I gave for it.'
'Would my honourable brother rob his slave?' the boat-owner asked, in alarm.
'Yes. If you cannot give me the duck, I must have back the price I paid for it. If you cannot give me the money, I will keep the rifle which the foreigner is holding.'
This decision alarmed the boat-owner. 'Honourable brother,' he said, after a few moments' silence, 'I will search for the duck: perhaps it has rolled off the dish.'
He searched in what appeared to Ping Wang to be very unlikely places, and found the missing dainty in a basket on top of the pile of cargo.
'The rifle shall be given you,' said Ping Wang, and then turned to speak to Charlie and Fred. 'We had better breakfast on shore,' he said; 'let us land at once.'
Ping Wang handed over the Lee-Metford to the boat-owner, and the three travellers stepped ashore, thoroughly glad to get out of the boat.