It was about midday when the Petite Jeanne went to pieces, and it must have been two hours afterward when I picked up with one of her hatch-covers.  Thick rain was driving at the time; and it was the merest chance that flung me and the hatch-cover together.  A short length of line was trailing from the rope handle; and I knew that I was good for a day, at least, if the sharks did not return.  Three hours later, possibly a little longer, sticking close to the cover, and, with closed eyes, concentrating my whole soul upon the task of breathing in enough air to keep me going and at the same time of avoiding breathing in enough water to drown me, it seemed to me that I heard voices.  The rain had ceased, and wind and sea were easing marvellously.  Not twenty feet away from me on another hatch-cover, were Captain Oudouse and the heathen.  They were fighting over the possession of the cover—­at least, the Frenchman was.

“Paien noir!” I heard him scream, and at the same time I saw him kick the kanaka.

Now, Captain Oudouse had lost all his clothes, except his shoes, and they were heavy brogans.  It was a cruel blow, for it caught the heathen on the mouth and the point of the chin, half stunning him.  I looked for him to retaliate, but he contented himself with swimming about forlornly a safe ten feet away.  Whenever a fling of the sea threw him closer, the Frenchman, hanging on with his hands, kicked out at him with both feet.  Also, at the moment of delivering each kick, he called the kanaka a black heathen.

“For two centimes I’d come over there and drown you, you white beast!” I yelled.

The only reason I did not go was that I felt too tired.  The very thought of the effort to swim over was nauseating.  So I called to the kanaka to come to me, and proceeded to share the hatch-cover with him.  Otoo, he told me his name was (pronounced o-to-o); also, he told me that he was a native of Bora Bora, the most westerly of the Society Group.  As I learned afterward, he had got the hatch-cover first, and, after some time, encountering Captain Oudouse, had offered to share it with him, and had been kicked off for his pains.

And that was how Otoo and I first came together.  He was no fighter.  He was all sweetness and gentleness, a love-creature, though he stood nearly six feet tall and was muscled like a gladiator.  He was no fighter, but he was also no coward.  He had the heart of a lion; and in the years that followed I have seen him run risks that I would never dream of taking.  What I mean is that while he was no fighter, and while he always avoided precipitating a row, he never ran away from trouble when it started.  And it was “’Ware shoal!” when once Otoo went into action.  I shall never forget what he did to Bill King.  It occurred in German Samoa.  Bill King was hailed the champion heavyweight of the American Navy.  He was a big brute of a man, a veritable gorilla, one of those hard-hitting, rough-housing