Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-01-05

might have been a very prosperous factory.
Indeed theories on this very point were
already lodged in the older mans brain;
Its this new partner, X. O'Neill. that
don't like the sound Of he explained to
Carter one day. by the way. who is hep
Don't know AS l told you, / was stay
ing with my father at the vicarage and l
| was engaged by wire the day before the
MpOso sailed and only caught her by the
skin of my teeth. There was nobody there
to see me off and on the boat all they could
tell me that X came into the business
when the late head died..
"Old Godfrey, that was'-SwiZzle-Stick
Smith sighed-"poor old Godfrey ONeill!
He was one of the best fellows going in the
old days not a bit like the usual cut of
palm-oil ruffian as we used to call the trad
ers then. And, my God. to think of my
coming down to the grade of one of them
myself"
Again the subject cropped up when one
of their mails came in. Here's eX
pense.' grumbled Swizzle- Stick Smith.
! Letters landed at our Monk River factory
and sent on to Mulla-Nulla by special rum
ner. K. O'Neilrs orders, the Monk River
agent says. In the old days you could
always bet on the beach being too bad for
the steamer to call twice out of three
times and you weren't pestered with a mail
more than once in six months. That's
mainly why I've stuck by O'Neill and
Craven all these years. Now this new man
wants our output of kernels to be doubled
by this time next year and hopes I'll take
steps to work up the rubber connection. If
l can't see my way to do all this, will l
kindly give my reasons in writing, and if
| steamers calling point, so that reply may
be in Liverpool within six weeks at latest.
What do you think of that?'
ooh, l should say it was reasonable
enough from the Liverpool point of view"
bah! There's not much of the coast
about YOU" He tore the letters into
shreds and folded these carefully into
pipe-lights. Dear old Godfrey trusted me
l H. I, tic raJ-
to learn to do the same. 1 shall resign
my commission. If he understood any
thing about running the office. he might
know l should do all the work that was
good for me-"
I'm sure you do" said Carter civilly.
I'm afraid I'm the Stacker. You let me
have such an easy time of it whilst my
| arm was getting well, that I've slid off
into lazy ways. 1 must buck up. and If
, you'll load the work onto me, Mr.. Smith,
you'll find can do a lot more
SwzZle-Stick Smith dried the perspira-
ton from his eye socket, fixed his glass
| into firmer hold, and stared. WELL" he
said at last. you are a ID fool" And
there the talk ended
his first introduction to royalty. He was
in the retail store-"feteesh." they call 1t
on the coast-weighing out baskets of palm
kernels, measuring calabashes of orange
colored palm oil, judging as best he could
the amount of adulterants the simple
negro had added to increase the bulk, and
powder, flintlock guns at twelve and six
pence apiece, and green cubical boxes of
Holland gin Trade proceeded slowly. The
interior of the feteesh was a stew of heat
and odors, and the whites man elaborate
calculations were none of the most glib.
To knock some idea of the fairness of
these into the black mans skull was a
work that required not only eloquence,
but also athletic power. The simple savage.
who did only one days shopping per an
mum was willing always to let the delights
of it linger out as long as possible and
all the white mans hustling could not
drive the business along at more than a
snafs pace.
By coast custom, work for Europeans
starts in those cool hours that know the
day break, and switches off between II
and ~ for breakfast; and thereafter siesta
is the rule till the sun once more begins
| to throw a shadow. But on this particular
day, when Swzzle-Stick Smith had
knocked out his pipe and turned in under
| his mosquito bar, Carter sluiced a parafin
| can full of water over his red head by way
of final refreshment, and went down
| once more from the living rooms of the
! factory to the heat and the odors of the
| feteesh below.
| The sweating customers saw him come
and reused up out of the purple shadows
and presently the game of hagge was
once more in full swing.
Carter had natural gift for tongues,
and was picking up the difficult COAST lam
guages to the best of his ability, but his
vocabulary was of necessity small, and a
passages into idom more likely to pene-
| trate the harder skulls The Krooboy
wore trousers and snglet in token of his
advanced civilization, and bore with pride
| the name of White Man s-Trouble.
There was glut of customers that