Page:Paine--J Archibauld McKaney collector of whiskers.djvu/169

  It was as easy as stealing the handles from your grandmother's coffin.

"I was to help the game along all I could, usin' my pull with the police in case of trouble, and this dyed-in-the wool King swore he'd make me his right hand man and executive officer. But I didn't have to lift a finger when his Sacred Red Whiskers landed. He was discovered at sun-up chumming with the wooden gods of the tribe as if he had fell among a bunch of long-lost brothers. The Lemuel Wilkins Islanders flopped on their knees and surrendered, hook, line and sinker, body, soul and breeches which they didn't have none. The cheap human being of a King that was in power was tipped on his royal head and the Red Whiskers God took the throne without a murmur. Then he picked me as the spoiled darling of his muster roll, and nobody dared whimper. Oh, but them were brief but beauteous years!

"It was a fifty-pound case of plug tobacco that ruined Lemuel Wilkins. It was cast ashore from some wreck or other, and I [151