tremendously loud, harsh and resonant, as if produced by some powerful mechanical contrivance in the nature of a fog-horn.  I do not know what he did with it in the private life of his home, but in the larger sphere of business it presented the advantage of overcoming arguments without the slightest mental effort, by the mere volume of sound.  We had had several passages of arms.  It took me all I knew to guard the interests of my owners—­whom, nota bene, I had never seen—­while Siegers (who had made their acquaintance some years before, during a business tour in Australia) pretended to the knowledge of their innermost minds, and, in the character of “our very good friends,” threw them perpetually at my head.

He looked at me with a jaundiced eye (there was no love lost between us), and declared at once that it was strange, very strange.  His pronunciation of English was so extravagant that I can’t even attempt to reproduce it.  For instance, he said “Fferie strantch.”  Combined with the bellowing intonation it made the language of one’s childhood sound weirdly startling, and even if considered purely as a kind of unmeaning noise it filled you with astonishment at first.  “They had,” he continued, “been acquainted with Captain Falk for very many years, and never had any reason. . . .”

“That’s why I come to you, of course,” I interrupted.  “I’ve the right to know the meaning of this infernal nonsense.”  In the half light of the room, which was greenish, because of the tree-tops screening the window, I saw him writhe his meagre shoulders.  It came into my head, as disconnected ideas will come at all sorts of times into one’s head, that this, most likely, was the very room where, if the tale were true, Falk had been lectured by Mr. Siegers, the father.  Mr. Siegers’ (the son’s) overwhelming voice, in brassy blasts, as though he had been trying to articulate his words through a trombone, was expressing his great regret at a conduct characterised by a very marked want of discretion. . .  As I lived I was being lectured too!  His deafening gibberish was difficult to follow, but it was my conduct—­mine!—­that . . .  Damn!  I wasn’t going to stand this.

“What on earth are you driving at?” I asked in a passion.  I put my hat on my head (he never offered a seat to anybody), and as he seemed for the moment struck dumb by my irreverence, I turned my back on him and marched out.  His vocal arrangements blared after me a few threats of coming down on the ship for the demurrage of the lighters, and all the other expenses consequent upon the delays arising from my frivolity.