"Nor do I," said Kettle. "There's nothing foolish with me about niggers.
But there's a limit to everything, and this snuff-colored Dago goes too
far. He's got to be squared with, and I'm going to do it."

"Guess it's your palaver. I've told you what the risks are."

"And I'm going to take them," said Kettle grimly. "You may watch me
handle the risks now with your own eyes, if you wish."

He went down off the bridge, walked along the clean decks, and came to
where a poor wretch lay in the last stage of small-pox collapse. He
examined the man carefully. "My friend," he said at last, "you've not
got long for this world, anyway, and I want to borrow your last moments.
I suppose you won't like to shift, but it's in a good cause, and anyway
you can't object."

He stooped and lifted the loathsome bundle in his arms, and then, in
spite of a cry of expostulation from Nilssen, walked off with his burden
to Rabeira's room.

The Portuguese captain was in his bunk, trying to sleep. He was sober
for the first time for many days, and, in consequence, feeling not a
little ill.

Kettle deposited his charge with carefulness on the littered settee, and
Rabeira started up with a wild scream of fright and a babble of oaths.
Kettle shut and locked the door.

"Now look here," he said, "you've earned more than you'll ever get paid
in this life, and there's a tolerably heavy bill against you for the
next. It looks to me as if it would be a good thing if you went off
there to settle up the account right now. But I'm not going to take upon
myself to be your hangman. I'm just going to give you a chance of
pegging out, and I sincerely hope you'll take it. I've brought our
friend here to be your room mate for the evening. It's just about
nightfall now, and you've got to stay with him till daybreak."

"You coward!" hissed the man. "You coward! You coward!" he screamed.

"Think so?" said Kettle gravely. "Then if that's your idea, I'll stay
here in the room, too, and take my risks. God's seen the game, and I'll
guess He'll hand over the beans fairly."

Perspiration stood in beads on all their faces. The room, the one
unclean room of the ship, was full of breathless heat, and stale with
the lees of drink. Kettle, in his spruce-white drill clothes, stood out
against the squalor and the disorder, as a mirror might upon a
coal-heap.

The Portuguese captain, with nerves smashed by his spell of debauch,
played a score of parts. First he was a