Chapter 15
There was a deal of cursing and groaning as the men at the bottom of the ladder crawled to their feet.
“Somebody strike a light, my thumb’s out of joint,” said one of the men, Parsons, a swarthy, saturnine man, boat-steerer in Standish’s boat, in which Harrison was puller.
“You’ll find it knockin’ about by the bitts,” Leach said, sitting down on the edge of the bunk in which I was concealed.
There was a fumbling and a scratching of matches, and the sea-lamp flared up, dim and smoky, and in its weird light bare-legged men moved about nursing their bruises and caring for their hurts. Oofty-Oofty laid hold of Parsons’s thumb, pulling it out stoutly and snapping it back into place. I noticed at the same time that the Kanaka’s knuckles were laid open clear across and to the bon
