THE BLACK CARGO
I
THOUGH forty years have gone, they still say I was one of Eliphalet Greer’s men. They still look at me and whisper when I walk down the street, and they’ve got a right to whisper. There was only one man like Eliphalet, and there’s still his shadow.
Somehow it’s got around that he sent me to a South Pacific island. The crew of the Felicity must have told it. The men in the long boat must have seen me take a pistol from my pocket when I went ashore alone. I should never have gone if I had been older or if I had any prospects to boast of, and I had to pay for going. I am paying for it still, which is why I am going to tell the whole story, right down to the time when I drew a weapon on Eliphalet himself.
You may say I should have guessed why Eliphalet sent me to that island; that I should have known he would have a hold on me like the Old Man of the Sea when I got back. Perhaps I should, but I did not know Eliphalet then as well as I knew him later. I suspected something was wrong, but not
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