"
Jan grinned triumphantly. "I tank I go mit der tent und haf a smoke."
"Ostensiblee y'r correct, Bill, me son," spoke up Lawson; "but y'r a
dummy, and you can lay to that for another cold frozen fact. Takes a sea
farmer to learn you landsmen things. Ever hear of a pair of shears? Then
clap y'r eyes to this."
The sailor worked rapidly. From the pile of dunnage where they had
pulled up the boat the preceding fall, he unearthed a pair of long oars.
These he lashed together, at nearly right angles, close to the ends of
the blades. Where the handles rested he kicked holes through the snow to
the sand. At the point of intersection he attached two guy-ropes, making
the end of one fast to a cake of beach-ice. The other guy he passed over
to Red Bill. "Here, me son, lay holt o' that and run it out."
And to his horror, Jan saw his gallows rise in the air. "No! no!" he
cried, recoiling and putting up his fists. "It is not goot! I vill not
hang! Come, you noddleheads! I vill lick you, all together, von after
der odder! I vill blay hell! I vill do eferydings! Und I vill die
pefore I hang!"
The sailor permitted the two other men to clinch with the mad creature.
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