"No, Mr. Hudig. Not yet. But I am trying," was Willems' invariable
reply, delivered with a ring of regretful deprecation.

"Try! Always try! You may try! You think yourself clever perhaps,"
rumbled on Hudig, without looking up. "I have been trading with him
twenty--thirty years now. The old fox. And I have tried. Bah!"

He stretched out a short, podgy leg and contemplated the bare instep and
the grass slipper hanging by the toes. "You can't make him drunk?" he
would add, after a pause of stertorous breathing.

"No, Mr. Hudig, I can't really," protested Willems, earnestly.

"Well, don't try. I know him. Don't try," advised the master, and,
bending again over his desk, his staring bloodshot eyes close to the
paper, he would go on tracing laboriously with his thick fingers the
slim unsteady letters of his correspondence, while Willems waited
respectfully for his further good pleasure before asking, with great
deference--

"Any orders, Mr. Hudig?"

"Hm! yes. Go to Bun-Hin yourself and see the dollars of that payment
counted and packed, and have them put on board the mail-boat for
Ternate. She's due here this afternoon."

"Yes, Mr. Hudig."

"And, look here. If the boat is late, leave the case in Bun-Hin's godown