“No,” said Harman, rather shortly. “We’re not open to any trade of that sort.”
“Well, there was no harm in mentioning it,” said Gadgett.
He took them up to the frame house in the cocoanut grove, where he lived, and stood drinks. Then he showed them the godown where shell was stored and the Kanakas’ shanties.
Then Blood and Harman went off for a walk by themselves to explore the horrible desolation of the place.
Said Harman, when they were alone: “Skunk--he’s been tryin’ to do us, him and his spat! I know all about oysters, shell and pearl. Why, this place won’t be no use for another fifty years after the way he’s scraped it. He looks on us as a pair of mugs, wanderin’ about with a cargo of wheelbarrows--which we are. But we ain’t such mugs as to pay him good money for lyin’ yarns.”
They walked to the only eminence on the island, a rise of ground some hundred feet above the sea level, and there they stood breathing the sea air and watching the gulls and listening to the eternal song of the surf on the reef.
Then they came back to the beach and hailed the schooner for a boat, which presently put off and took them on board.
Once on deck, Mr. Harman made a dive below into the cabin, and Blood, following him, found him in the act of uncorking a bottle of whisky.
“I’m fair let down,” said Harman, mixing his drink. “It’s not Rafferty, nor the dog’s trick he’s played us, nor the sight of this blasted place that’s enough to give a dromedary the collywobbles. It’s that chap with the yalla eyes. I heard him laffin’ to himself when he went into the house, laffin’ at us. I’ve never been laffed at like that, but it’s not so much that as the chap. He’s onnatural.”
“I want to get back to Frisco and scrag Rafferty,” said Blood, taking hold of the bottle. “That’s all _I_ want.”
“You’ll have to scrag the whole of Frisco, then,” said Harman, “for the place is rockin’ with laughter now, from the China docks to Meiggs’. It’s the wheelbarrows that have done us; they’ll be had against us everywhere, and not a bar you’ll go into but you’ll be asked: Is your wheelbarrow outside? I don’t want to go back to Frisco, I tell you I don’t. I want to get to some place where I can sit down and cuss quiet. Lord, but that chap has had us lively!”