Of course, she gave them a few sticks of tobacco to keep them in
good humour."
"Sure she did," Sparrowhawk broke forth. "She gave the beggars five
fathoms of calico for the big mainsail, two sticks of tobacco for the
chronometer, and a sheath-knife worth elevenpence ha'penny for a hundred
fathoms of brand new five-inch manila. She got old Kina-Kina with that
strong hand on the go off, and she kept him going all the time. She--here
she comes now."
It was with a shock of surprise that Sheldon greeted her appearance. All
the time, while the tale of happening at Poonga-Poonga had been going on,
he had pictured her as the woman he had always known, clad roughly, skirt
made out of window-curtain stuff, an undersized man's shirt for a blouse,
straw sandals for foot covering, with the Stetson hat and the eternal
revolver completing her costume. The ready-made clothes from Sydney had
transformed her. A simple skirt and shirt-waist of some sort of wash-
goods set off her trim figure with a hint of elegant womanhood that was
new to him. Brown slippers peeped out as she crossed the compound, and
he once caught a glimpse to the ankle of brown open-work stockings.
Somehow, she had been made many times the woman by these mere extraneous
trappings; and in his mind these wild Arabian Nights adventures of hers
seemed thrice as wonderful.
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