Chapter 22 - Page 2

you have."

"Do you know, I think it would be nice to be married to a man such
as you seem to be becoming," she remarked, with one of her abrupt
changes that always astounded him. "I should think you could be
trained into a very good husband--you know, not one of the
domineering kind, but one who considered his wife was just as much
an individual as himself and just as much a free agent. Really,
you know, I think you are improving."

She laughed and rode away, leaving him greatly cast down. If he
had thought there had been one bit of coyness in her words, one
feminine flutter, one womanly attempt at deliberate lure and
encouragement, he would have been elated. But he knew absolutely
that it was the boy, and not the woman, who had so daringly spoken.

Joan rode on among the avenues of young cocoanut-palms, saw a
hornbill, followed it in its erratic flights to the high forest on
the edge of the plantation, heard the cooing of wild pigeons and
located them in the deeper woods, followed the fresh trail of a
wild pig for a distance, circled back, and took the narrow path for
the bungalow that ran through twenty acres of uncleared cane. The
grass was waist-high and higher, and as she rode along she
remembered that Gogoomy was one of a gang of boys that had been
detailed to the grass-cutting. She came to where they had been at
work, but saw no signs of them. Her unshod horse made no sound on
the soft, sandy footing, and a little further on she heard voices
proceeding from out of the grass. She reined in and listened. It
was Gogoomy talking, and as she listened she gripped her bridle-
rein tightly and a wave of anger passed over her.

"Dog he stop 'm along house, night-time he walk about," Gogoomy was
saying, perforce in beche-de-mer English, because he was talking to
others beside his own tribesmen. "You fella boy catch 'm one fella
pig, put 'm kai-kai belong him along big fella fish-hook. S'pose
dog he walk about catch 'm kai-kai, you fella boy catch 'm dog
allee same one shark. Dog he finish close up. Big fella marster
sleep along big fella house. White Mary sleep along pickaninny
house. One fella Adamu he stop along outside pickaninny house.
You fella boy finish 'm dog, finish 'm Adamu, finish 'm big fella
marster, finish 'm White Mary, finish 'em altogether. Plenty
musket he stop, plenty powder, plenty tomahawk, plenty knife-fee,
plenty porpoise teeth, plenty tobacco, plenty calico--my word, too
much plenty everything we take 'm along whale-boat, washee {5} like
hell, sun he come up we long way too much."

"Me catch 'm pig sun he go down," spoke up one whose thin falsetto
voice Joan recognized as belonging to Cosse, one of Gogoomy's
tribesmen.

"Me catch 'm dog,"