Up they came on deck again, and on to the bridge. Rabeira himself was
there in charge, dark, smiling, affable as ever.

Nilssen looked sharply down at the main deck below. "Hullo," said he,
"those two niggers gone already? You haven't shifted them down below,
I suppose?"

The Portuguese Captain shrugged his shoulders. "No," he said, "it was
bad sickness, an' dey died an' gone over the side. I lose by their
passage. I lose also the two fire-bar which I give for funeral palaver.
Ver' disappointing."

"Sudden kind of sickness," said Nilssen.

"Dis sickness is. It make a man lib for die in one minute, clock time.
But it don' matter to you pilot, does it? You lib for below--off
duty--dis las' half hour. You see nothing, you sabby nothing. I
don'-want no trouble at Boma with doctor palaver. I make it all right
for you after. Sabby?"

"Oh, I tumble to what you're driving at, but I was just thinking out how
it works. However, you're captain of this ship, and if you choose not to
log down a couple of deaths, I suppose it's your palaver. Anyway, I
don't want to cause no ill-will, and if you think it's worth a dash, I
don't see why I shouldn't earn it. It's little enough we pick up else in
this service, and I've got a wife at home in Liverpool who has to be
thought about."

Kettle drew a deep breath. "It seems to me," he said, looking very hard