“Understands English, doesn’t he?” growled the skipper.
“And speaks it. But these Hindoo servants don’t really know anything about the English sahibs they serve. The Britisher governs India in a boiled shirt and evening clothes. He is about as human to the natives as one of their own cast-iron gods. That’s how Johnny Bull has been able to boss the several million of blood-thirsty inhabitants of his colonies. No. The nigger wouldn’t be likely to know anything.”
“But why did he follow the girl to wait on her, then, Mr. Gates?” I asked.
“Because he’s a nigger—an inferior tribe. That’s the nature of ’em.”
I did not believe it. I had never read that the people of Hindoostan were particularly inferior to the whites. And Dao Singh looked to me as though he knew a whole lot more than the ordinary European. I was mistaken if he was not the best educated person aboard the Gullwing at that moment!
But it might be that the Hindoo knew nothing of the cause of the wreck and of what had become of her other passengers and the crew. Unless some other boats had been picked up from the lost Galland, her case was likely to be another of those unexplained tragedies of the deep which fill the columns of our newspapers for a few issues and then are forgotten—so easily forgotten!
The officers and I had held the brief conversation noted above when we had withdrawn out of earshot of the little girl. The cook had brought, her a beaten egg to drink as a “pick-me-up” between breakfast and dinner. When she had finished it she looked around for me again.
“Go on, boy,” said the captain. “Keep her amused. Poor little thing.”
“And encourage her to talk with you, Clint,” advised Mr. Gates. “Put what she says down in your log. If you do that, you may gradually get together a connected story of what and who she is. Such information will be valuable in aiding her to find her friends.”
I thought well of that idea, and promised to do so; though I wondered how the mate knew I kept a log. I had taken notes of my adventures ever since I had been blown out to sea on my little sloop, the Wavecrest; but at this time I did not know what an aid to memory a log—or diary—would be. By the way, a seaman never calls it “logbook;” the daybook of a ship at sea is merely a “log.” One of the most popular magazines published has a correspondence department called “The Logbook,” and that makes the sailor smile!