Thin his arms were as his legs, and, as Michael first beheld him, he had all the seeming of a big-bellied black spider.
He proceeded to dress, a matter of moments, slipping into duck trousers and blouse, dirty and frayed from long usage.

Two fingers of his left hand were doubled into a permanent bend, and, to an expert, would have advertised that he was a leper.

Although he belonged to Dag Daughtry just as much as if the steward possessed a chattel bill of sale of him, his owner did not know that his anaesthetic twist of ravaged nerves tokened the dread disease.
The manner of the ownership was simple.

At King William Island, in the Admiralties, Kwaque had made, in the parlance of the South Pacific, a pier-head jump.

So to speak, leprosy and all, he had jumped into Dag Daughtry's arms.