“Yus!” said the old man with terrible vehemence. Then he added: “That old barman up at Parsons’s is a blamed liar; he swore that the last case I bought was the best Jamaica rum. And yer don’t see shadders after drinking ther best Jamaica, that yer don’t!”
The old ex-sailor rambled on as he beat a violent tattoo on the floor of the bungalow with his wooden leg.
As for Hillary, he didn’t get home till sunrise, so he slept till near midday.
“Papalagi! Maser Hill-e-ary!” roared Madame Tamboo, his landlady, as she banged his bedroom door with a ponderous bamboo stick.
“All ri’!” answered the sleepy young apprentice. Then he jumped up. He was out and about in two ticks, for he had slept “all-standing.”
He couldn’t keep calm that day. Mango Pango the maid-of-all-work, opened her bright eyes with delight as he paid her pretty compliments over her beauty. “Ah, what nice papalagi!” she said, as she looked sideways in the German mirror at her image. True enough, she had fine eyes and features that were quite different from those of the full-blooded Solomon natives. Like most Polynesian girls, she was extremely romantic and imaginative. She lifted her eyes towards the roof in childish ecstasy when Hillary laughingly admired her yellow stockings and told her that she reminded him of Cleopatra.
“Who Cleopatra?” Mango Pango said. Then Hillary told her a lot about the doings of Antony, who loved Cleopatra.
“She and nicer Antony still liver in Peratania England?”
“No, they’re both dead,” said Hillary mournfully.
“Oh dear! poor tings!” said Mango Pango sympathetically. Then she looked into the apprentice’s eyes and said coquettishly: “Was Cleopatra a bery beautifuls woman, Mounsieur?”