“And now, Mr. Wenlock, if you please,” said Kettle, “as you’re comfortably tied to the lady of your choice, I’ll trouble you for that fee you promised.”

“I’ll see you in somewhere hotter than Arabia,” said the bridegroom, mopping his pale face.

“Now look,” said Kettle, “I’m not going to scrap with you here, and I don’t want to break up this happy home with domestic unpleasantness; but if you don’t hand me over that L50, I shall ask your good lady to get it for me.”

Wenlock sullenly handed out a note.

“Thank you.  I know you feel injured, but I’m earning this money exactly according to promise, and of you don’t quite like what’s been done, you must remember that it’s your own fault for not wording the agreement a bit more carefully.  And now, as I seem to have got through my business here, if it’s agreeable to all parties, I’ll be going.  Good-by, Mrs. Wenlock, madam.  Let me call you by your name for the first time.”

The Lady Emir set back her great shoulders.  “That is not my name,” she said.  “I am Emir.  My name does not change.”

“Beg pardon,” said Kettle, “he takes yours, does he?  Didn’t know that was the custom of this country.  Well, good-afternoon.”

“But do you want,” said the lady, “no present?”

“Thank you,” said Kettle, with a cock of the head, “but I take presents from no one.  What bit of a living I get, your ladyship, I earn.”

“I do not onderstand.  But you are sailor.  You have ship.  You wish cargo?”

Captain Kettle snapped his fingers ecstatically.  “Now, ma’am, there you’ve hit it.  Cargo’s what I do want.  I’ll have to tell you that freights are up a good deal just now, and you’ll have to pay for accommodation, but my ship’s a good one, and my firm’s reliable, and will see that you are dealt by honest at the other end.”

“I do not onderstand.”

“Of course you don’t, your Majesty; of course you don’t.  Ladies like you don’t have to bother with the shipping trade.  But just you give me a line to the principal merchants in the town saying that you’d like me to have a few tons of their stuff, and that’ll do.  I guess that what your ladyship likes round here is usually done.”

“You wish me write.  I will write.  Now we will wash hands, and there is banquet.”

And so it came to pass that, some twenty-four hours later, Captain Kettle returned to the Parakeet sun-scorched, and flushed with success, and relieved the anxious Murray from his watch.  The mate was naturally curious to know what happened ashore.

“Let me get a glass of Christian beer to wash all their sticky nastinesses from my neck, and I’ll tell you,” said Kettle, and he did with fine detail and circumstance.

“Well, Wenlock’s got his heiress anyway,” said Murray, with a sigh, when the tale was over.  “I suppose we may as well get under way now, sir.”

“Not much,” said Kettle jubilantly.  “Why, man, I’ve squeezed every ton of cargo they have in the place, and stuck them for freights in a way that would surprise you.  Here’s the tally:  270 bags of coffee, 700 packets of dates, 350 baskets of figs, and all for London.  And, mark you,” said Kettle, hitting the table, “that or more’ll be waiting for me there every time I come, and no other skipper need apply.”