The play grew rougher, and Jerry lost himself in the play.  Still playing, he grew so excited that all that had been feigned became actual.  This was battle a struggle against the hand that seized and shook him and thrust him away.  The make-believe of ferocity passed out of his growls; the ferocity in them became real.  Also, in the moments when he was shoved away and was springing back to the attack, he yelped in high-pitched puppy hysteria.  And Captain Van Horn, realizing, suddenly, instead of clutching, extended his hand wide open in the peace sign that is as ancient as the human hand.  At the same time his voice rang out the single word, “Jerry!” In it was all the imperativeness of reproof and command and all the solicitous insistence of love.

Jerry knew and was checked back to himself.  He was instantly contrite, all soft humility, ears laid back with pleadingness for forgiveness and protestation of a warm throbbing heart of love.  Instantly, from an open-mouthed, fang-bristling dog in full career of attack, he melted into a bundle of softness and silkiness, that trotted to the open hand and kissed it with a tongue that flashed out between white gleaming teeth like a rose-red jewel.  And the next moment he was in Skipper’s arms, jowl against cheek, and the tongue was again flashing out in all the articulateness possible for a creature denied speech.  It was a veritable love-feast, as dear to one as to the other.

“Gott-fer-dang!” Captain Van Horn crooned.  “You’re nothing but a bunch of high-strung sensitiveness, with a golden heart in the middle and a golden coat wrapped all around.  Gott-fer-dang, Jerry, you’re gold, pure gold, inside and out, and no dog was ever minted like you in all the world.  You’re heart of gold, you golden dog, and be good to me and love me as I shall always be good to you and love you for ever and for ever.”

And Captain Van Horn, who ruled the Arangi in bare legs, a loin cloth, and a sixpenny under-shirt, and ran cannibal blacks back and forth in the blackbird trade with an automatic strapped to his body waking and sleeping and with his head forfeit in scores of salt-water villages and bush strongholds, and who was esteemed the toughest skipper in the Solomons where only men who are tough may continue to live and esteem toughness, blinked with sudden moisture in his eyes, and could not see for the moment the puppy that quivered all its body of love in his arms and kissed away the salty softness of his eyes.

CHAPTER V

And swift tropic night smote the Arangi, as she alternately rolled in calms and heeled and plunged ahead in squalls under the lee of the cannibal island of Malaita.  It was a stoppage of the south-east trade wind that made for variable weather, and that made cooking on the exposed deck galley a misery and sent the return boys, who had nothing to wet but their skins, scuttling below.