Gordon Young

“ And looking over the side Oi see a dozen sharks wid their noses right up agin the bilge as if the word had been passed to stan’ by. Queer how they know, them sharks. But know they do. Ax any man that’s followed the sea.
“Here then, hold this,” says he, putting out the pearl to me, big as the great eye of God, and all shiny-bright like an angel’s cheek.
“Nay, Buck O’Malley. Oi’d rather be a poor man like Oi been than mix wid the curse that’s come upon us. ”

“ We were moored in mongst a patch-work of reefs wid some palms an’ bushes hanging for dear life to the rocks, an’ the tide come in through the channel like the winds of —— a-wafting sinners south’ard. But them womin ’ud slip down, each wid a knife in her hand an’ a net on her back, and sometimes Oi ’d watch ’em wid the water-glass, an’ see one of them slidin’ gentle-like down mongst the coral an’ wavy weeds—a heavin’ over oysthers for the love of Buck O’Malley. ”

“ Oh, Buck O’Malley had a way wid womin! “” Him bein’ no sailorman Oi went along to show him how to run the thing, ’r else he’d av gone an’ drowned hisself, which Oi wish to Hivin he had done in his cradle. Yis, many’s the time Oi av wisht O’Malley ten fathoms deep in —— for ever bein’ born. An’ he’s there now, praise Hivin; for if it hadn’t been him that went, ’t would av been me. One of us had to go. An’ it’s always better for the worst man to go first, f’r don’t he av to roast longer than a good one? ”