“Did you drink rum last night?—get drunk? What’s the matter?” said he, as he concluded by munching fast at his bread and toasted cheese.
“You were drunk,” said the girl, squeezing the words out with an effort as her voice cracked.
“Wha’ you think of Rajah Koo Macka, gal, eh?”
“Not much,” she responded. Her mouth visibly twitched as she turned her eyes from the stupid, inquiring parental gaze.
“Nice fellow ’im; believes in God, Christ and in virginity. Rajahs ain’t knocking about everywhere, Gabby old gal, either,” he continued, as he gave a wink. Then he added: “It’s wonderful how people who was once ’eathens seems to be the most relygous folk; they seems to ’ave a real faith in goodness ’o things, that’s what it is.”
Gabrielle still kept silent, hardly hearing at all as the old idiot rambled on in this wise: “’E’s got ther brass too! Going to ’ire me to go on a pearl-hunting scheme in the Admiralty Group. ’E knows I know where the pearls are found. He he!”
Suddenly the man ceased his wild talk and looked at the girl quizzically for a second, then said: “Gabrielle, you’re a woman now, don’t yer feel like one?”
At this, to the old man’s astonishment, the girl burst into tears.
“What on earth ’ave I said,” he mumbled, as his eyes lost the bleared, rum-dim look, and he tapped his wooden leg. Something that slept deep down in his heart stirred in its long slumber: “Don’t cry, girlie. Aren’t you well?”
Even he saw the faint appeal of those violet-blue eyes.