Mr. Mellaire shakes his head.
"Wait till they get around and up into better weather," he astonished
me by telling me the other afternoon. "Wait till they get dried out,
and rested up, with more sleep, and their sores healed, and more
flesh on their bones, and more spunk in their blood--then they won't
stand for this driving. Mr. Pike can't realize that times have
changed, sir, and laws have changed, and men have changed. He's an
old man, and I know what I am talking about."
"You mean you've been listening to the talk of the men?" I challenged
rashly, all my gorge rising at the unofficerlike conduct of this
ship's officer.
The shot went home, for, in a flash, that suave and gentle film of
light vanished from the surface of the eyes, and the watching,
fearful thing that lurked behind inside the skull seemed almost to
leap out at me, while the cruel gash of mouth drew thinner and
crueller. And at the same time, on my inner sight, was grotesquely
limned a picture of a brain pulsing savagely against the veneer of
skin that covered that cleft of skull beneath the dripping sou'-
wester.
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