You are very friendly with Captain Hermann I believe, but a man is bound
to be pleased at any little advantage he may get. Captain Hermann is a
good business man, and there's no such thing as a friend in business. Is
there?" He leaned forward and began to cast stealthy glances as usual.
"But Falk is, and always was, a miserable fellow. I would despise him."

I muttered, grumpily, that I had no particular respect for Falk.

"I would despise him," he insisted, with an appearance of anxiety which
would have amused me if I had not been fathoms deep in discontent. To a
young man fairly conscientious and as well-meaning as only the young
man can be, the current ill-usage of life comes with a peculiar cruelty.
Youth that is fresh enough to believe in guilt, in innocence, and in
itself, will always doubt whether it have not perchance deserved its
fate. Sombre of mind and without appetite, I struggled with the
chop while Mrs. Schomberg sat with her everlasting stupid grin and
Schomberg's talk gathered way like a slide of rubbish.

"Let me tell you. It's all about that girl. I don't know what Captain
Hermann expects, but if he asked me I could tell him something about
Falk. He's a miserable fellow. That man is a perfect slave. That's what
I call him. A slave. Last year I started this table d'hote, and sent
cards out--you know. You think he had one meal in the house? Give the
thing a trial? Not once. He has got hold now of a Madras cook--a blamed
fraud that I hunted out of my cookhouse with a rattan. He was not fit to
cook for white men. No, not for the white men's dogs either; but, see,
any damned native that can boil a pot of rice is good enough for Mr.
Falk. Rice and a little fish he buys for a few cents from the fishing
boats outside is what he lives on. You would hardly credit it--eh? A
white man, too. . . ."