Michael, Brother of Jerry | Page 5

his day's work nor his six daily quarts of bottled beer, even, as
he bragged, when in the German islands, where each bottle of beer
carried ten grains of quinine in solution as a specific against malaria.
The captain of the Makambo (and, before that, the captains of the
Moresby, the Masena, the Sir Edward Grace, and various others of the

queerly named Burns Philp Company steamers had done the same) was
used to pointing him out proudly to the passengers as a man- thing
novel and unique in the annals of the sea. And at such times Dag
Daughtry, below on the for'ard deck, feigning unawareness as he went
about his work, would steal side-glances up at the bridge where the
captain and his passengers stared down on him, and his breast would
swell pridefully, because he knew that the captain was saying: "See him!
that's Dag Daughtry, the human tank. Never's been drunk or sober in
twenty years, and has never missed his six quarts of beer per diem. You
wouldn't think it, to look at him, but I assure you it's so. I can't
understand. Gets my admiration. Always does his time, his
time-and-a-half and his double-time over time. Why, a single glass of
beer would give me heartburn and spoil my next good meal. But he
flourishes on it. Look at him! Look at him!"
And so, knowing his captain's speech, swollen with pride in his own
prowess, Dag Daughtry would continue his ship-work with extra vigour
and punish a seventh quart for the day in advertisement of his
remarkable constitution. It was a queer sort of fame, as queer as some
men are; and Dag Daughtry found in it his justification of existence.
Wherefore he devoted his energy and the soul of him to the
maintenance of his reputation as a six-quart man. That was why he
made, in odd moments of off-duty, turtle-shell combs and hair
ornaments for profit, and was prettily crooked in such a matter as
stealing another man's dog. Somebody had to pay for the six quarts,
which, multiplied by thirty, amounted to a tidy sum in the course of the
month; and, since that man was Dag Daughtry, he found it necessary to
pass Michael inboard on the Makambo through a starboard port-hole.
On the beach, that night at Tulagi, vainly wondering what had become
of the whaleboat, Michael had met the squat, thick, hair- grizzled ship's
steward. The friendship between them was established almost instantly,
for Michael, from a merry puppy, had matured into a merry dog. Far
beyond Jerry, was he a sociable good fellow, and this, despite the fact
that he had known very few white men. First, there had been Mister
Haggin, Derby and Bob, of Meringe; next, Captain Kellar and Captain

Kellar's mate of the Eugenie; and, finally, Harley Kennan and the
officers of the Ariel. Without exception, he had found them all different,
and delightfully different, from the hordes of blacks he had been taught
to despise and to lord it over.
And Dag Daughtry had proved no exception from his first greeting of
"Hello, you white man's dog, what 'r' you doin' herein nigger country?"
Michael had responded coyly with an assumption of dignified
aloofness that was given the lie by the eager tilt of his ears and the
good-humour that shone in his eyes. Nothing of this was missed by
Dag Daughtry, who knew a dog when he saw one, as he studied
Michael in the light of the lanterns held by black boys where the
whaleboats were landing cargo.
Two estimates the steward quickly made of Michael: he was a likable
dog, genial-natured on the face of it, and he was a valuable dog.
Because of those estimates Dag Daughtry glanced about him quickly.
No one was observing. For the moment, only blacks stood about, and
their eyes were turned seaward where the sound of oars out of the
darkness warned them to stand ready to receive the next cargo-laden
boat. Off to the right, under another lantern, he could make out the
Resident Commissioner's clerk and the Makambo's super-cargo
heatedly discussing some error in the bill of lading.
The steward flung another quick glance over Michael and made up his
mind. He turned away casually and strolled along the beach out of the
circle of lantern light. A hundred yards away he sat down in the sand
and waited.
"Worth twenty pounds if a penny," he muttered to himself. "If I
couldn't get ten pounds for him, just like that, with a thank-you- ma'am,
I'm a sucker that don't know a terrier from a greyhound.-- Sure, ten
pounds, in any pub on Sydney beach."
And ten pounds, metamorphosed into quart bottles of beer, reared an
immense and radiant vision, very like a