"You understand all that we have been saying, Dominique?"
"Me understand, sar, and tink him bery good plan. Me suah to find
out which way dat rascal hab gone. Plenty of black fellows glad to
earn two dollar to guide us. Dey no money here. Two dollars big sum
to them."
"All right, Dominique, but we won't stick at two dollars. If it
were necessary I would pay two hundred cheerfully for news."
"We find dem widout dat," the black said, confidently. "Not good
offer too much. If black man offered two dollars he bery glad. If
offered twenty he begin to say to himself, 'Dis bery good affair;
perhaps someone else give forty.'"
"There is something in that, Dominique. Anyhow I shall leave that
part of the business to you. As a rule, I shall keep in hiding with
the boatmen and sailors all day. I shall be no good for asking
questions, for I don't know much French, and the dialect the
negroes of these islands speak is beyond me altogether. I cannot
understand the boatmen at all."
"Black men here bad, sar; not like dem in de other islands. Here
dey tink themselves better than white men; bery ignorant fellows,
sar. Most of dem lost religion, and go back to fetish.
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