"Well, they is."
"Den I reckon yo' lookin' faw a chance to get rid o' some o' dem."
"Not as I knows on," Bascom said.
"Wat?" cried the second schooner-man. "I'll give yo' dis." He took out a big Spanish pocket-knife that opened with a spring. "Yo' can have it faw t'ree of dem."
"I don't reckon I need any knife," Bascom said.
"Aw," said the third schooner-man, impatiently, "a lot of dem is good faw not'ing. He got to give us some. If he ain't got de sense to trade faw dem we take dem."
He spread Bascom out swiftly with his hands, and sat down on him, directing his mates to pile melons in their skiff. After the first instant Bascom did not offer the slightest resistance. He lay gathering breath against the weight of the man on his chest, and when he was quite sure of himself he lit it out again in a terrific howl for help. The man clapped a hand on his mouth, but Bascom had no need to speak again. A posse of men and boys came dashing round the house, some of them putting down the baskets, and others brandishing sticks as they ran.
The schooner-men jumped into their skiff, but Patrice and Rubier and Noel and Sonny Ladnier rushed into the water after them, and brought them back. A dozen hands rescued the stolen melons, while with Irish expletives and Creole fierceness Patrice pounded the biggest man as a preparation to bidding them good-by. The crowd was following his example, and it would have gone hard with the strangers if Bascom had not had a different mind.
"MAKE 'EM PICK YOUR FIGS!" HE SHOUTED, "MAKE EM PICK YOUR FIGS!"