Page:Frank Stockton--Adventures of Captain Horn.djvu/130

ADVENTURES OF CAPTAIN HORN although he had left one person to speak to another, the subject was not changed.

"Cap'n," said Maka, "when you go 'way, who's boss?"

The captain frowned, and yet he could not help feeling interested in this anxiety regarding his successor. "Why do you ask that?" he said. "What difference does it make who gives you your orders when I am gone?"

Maka shook his head. "Big difference," he said. "Cheditafa don' like boy for boss. He wan' me tell you, if boy is boss, he don' wan' stay. He wan' go 'long you."

"You can tell Cheditafa," said the captain, quickly, "that if I want him to stay he'll stay, and if I want him to go he'll go. He has nothing to say about that. So much for him. Now, what do you think?"

"Like boy," said Maka, "but not for boss."

The captain was silent for a moment. Here was a matter which really needed to be settled. If he had felt that he had authority to do as he pleased, he would have settled it in a moment.

"Cap'n big man. He know everyt'ing," said Maka. "But when cap'n go way, boy t'ink he big man. Boy know nothin'. Better have woman for boss."

Captain Horn could not help being amused.

"Which woman?" he asked.

"I say old one. Cheditafa say young one."

The captain was not a man who would readily discuss his affairs with any one, especially with such a man as Maka; but now the circumstances were peculiar, and he wanted to know the opinions of these men he was about to leave behind him. 118