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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/9657-8.txt b/9657-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..4d59102 --- /dev/null +++ b/9657-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8741 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mutineers, by Charles Boardman Hawes + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Mutineers + +Author: Charles Boardman Hawes + +Posting Date: December 5, 2011 [EBook #9657] +Release Date: January 2006 +First Posted: October 13, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu and the PG +Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + + + + +THE MUTINEERS + + + +_A tale of old days at sea and of adventures in the Far East as Benjamin +Lathrop set it down some sixty years ago_ + + + +by Charles Boardman Hawes + + + + + +_Illustrated_ + + + + +_To_ D.C.H. + + + + +_TO PAY MY SHOT_ + + +_To master, mate, and men of the ship Hunter, whose voyage is the backbone +of my story; to Captain David Woodard, English mariner, who more than a +hundred and twenty years ago was wrecked on the island of Celebes; to +Captain R.G.F. Candage of Brookline, Massachusetts, who was party to the +original contract in melon seeds; and to certain blue-water skippers who +have left sailing directions for eastern ports and seas, I am grateful for +fascinating narratives and journals, and indebted for incidents in this +tale of an earlier generation._ + +_C.B.H._ + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + I My Father and I Call on Captain Whidden + II Bill Hayden + III The Man Outside the Galley + IV A Piece of Pie + V Kipping + + +II +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + + VI The Council in the Cabin + VII The Sail with a Lozenge-Shaped Patch + VIII Attacked + IX Bad Signs + X The Treasure-Seeker + + + +III +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + + XI A Hundred Thousand Dollars in Gold + XII A Strange Tale + XIII Trouble Forward + XIV Bill Hayden Comes to the End of His Voyage + + + +IV +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + + XV Mr. Falk Tries to Cover His Tracks + XVI A Prayer for the Dead + XVII Marooned +XVIII Adventures Ashore + + + +V +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + + XIX In Last Resort + XX A Story in Melon Seeds + XXI New Allies + XXII We Attack +XXIII What We Found in the Cabin + + + +VI +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + + XXIV Falk Proposes a Truce + XXV Including a Cross-Examination + XXVI An Attempt to Play on Our Sympathy +XXVII We Reach Whampoa, but Not the End of Our Troubles + + + +VII +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +XXVIII A Mystery Is Solved and a Thief Gets Away + XXIX Homeward Bound + XXX Through Sunda Strait + XXXI Pikes, Cutlasses, and Guns + XXXII "So Ends" + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + +"_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!" + +_Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a +pistol shot rang out sharply, and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and +fall_. + +_We helped him pile his belongings into his chest ... and gave him a hand +on deck_. + +"_Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk_. + +_He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo_. + + + + +[Illustration: "_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!"] + + + + +I + +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + + +CHAPTER I + +MY FATHER AND I CALL ON CAPTAIN WHIDDEN + + +My father's study, as I entered it on an April morning in 1809, to learn +his decision regarding a matter that was to determine the course of all my +life, was dim and spacious and far removed from the bustle and clamor of +the harbor-side. It was a large room paneled with dark wood. There were +books along the walls, and paintings of ships, and over the fireplace there +stood a beautiful model of a Burmese junk, carved by some brown artist on +the bank of the Irawadi. + +My father sat by the open window and looked out into the warm sunshine, +which was swiftly driving the last snow from the hollows under the +shrubbery. + +Already crocuses were blossoming in the grass of the year before, which was +still green in patches, and the bright sun and the blue sky made the study +seem to me, entering, dark and sombre. It was characteristic of my father, +I thought with a flash of fancy, to sit there and look out into a warm, gay +world where springtime was quickening the blood and sunshine lay warm on +the flowers; he always had lived in old Salem, and as he wrote his sermons, +he always had looked out through study windows on a world of commerce +bright with adventure. For my own part, I was of no mind to play the +spectator in so stirring a drama. + +With a smile he turned at my step. "So, my son, you wish to ship before the +mast," he said, in a repressed voice and manner that seemed in keeping with +the dim, quiet room. "Pray what do you know of the sea?" + +I thought the question idle, for all my life I had lived where I could look +from my window out on the harbor. + +"Why, sir," I replied, "I know enough to realize that I want to follow the +sea." + +"To follow the sea?" + +There was something in my father's eyes that I could not understand. He +seemed to be dreaming, as if of voyages that he himself had made. Yet I +knew he never had sailed blue water. "Well, why not?" he asked suddenly. +"There was a time--" + +I was too young to realize then what has come to me since: that my father's +manner revealed a side of his nature that I never had known; that in his +own heart was a love of adventure that he never had let me see. My sixteen +years had given me a big, strong body, but no great insight, and I thought +only of my own urgent desire of the moment. + +"Many a boy of ten or twelve has gone to sea," I said, "and the Island +Princess will sail in a fortnight. If you were to speak to Captain +Whidden--" + +My father sternly turned on me. "No son of mine shall climb through the +cabin windows." + +"But Captain Whidden--" + +"I thought you desired to follow the sea--to ship before the mast." + +"I do." + +"Then say no more of Captain Whidden. If you wish to go to sea, well and +good. I'll not stand in your way. But we'll seek no favoritism, you and I. +You'll ship as boy, but you'll take your medicine like a man." + +"Yes, sir," I said, trying perversely to conceal my joy. + +"And as for Captain Whidden," my father added, "you'll find he cuts a very +different figure aboard ship from that he shows in our drawing-room." + +Then a smile twinkled through his severity, and he laid his hand firmly on +my shoulder. + +"Son, you have my permission ungrudgingly given. There was a time--well, +your grandfather didn't see things as I did." + +"But some day," I cried, "I'll have a counting-house of my own-- +some day--" + +My father laughed kindly, and I, taken aback, blushed at my own eagerness. + +"Anyway," I persisted, "Roger Hamlin is to go as supercargo." + +"Roger--as supercargo?" exclaimed a low voice. + +I turned and saw that my sister stood in the door. + +"Where--when is he going?" + +"To Canton on the Island Princess! And so am I," I cried. + +"Oh!" she said. And she stood there, silent and a little pale. + +"You'll not see much of Roger," my father remarked to me, still smiling. He +had a way of enjoying a quiet joke at my expense, to him the more pleasing +because I never was quite sure just wherein the humor lay. + +"But I'm going," I cried. "I'm going--I'm going--I'm going!" + +"At the end of the voyage," said my father, "we'll find out whether you +still wish to follow the sea. After all, I'll go with you this evening, +when supper is done, to see Joseph Whidden." + +The lamps were lighted when we left the house, and long beams from the +windows fell on the walk and on the road. We went down the street side by +side, my father absently swinging his cane, I wondering if it were not +beneath the dignity of a young man about to go to sea that his parent +should accompany him on such an errand. + +Just as we reached the corner, a man who had come up the street a little +distance behind us turned in at our own front gate, and my father, seeing +me look back when the gate slammed, smiled and said, "I'll venture a guess, +Bennie-my-lad, that some one named Roger is calling at our house this +evening." + +Afterwards--long, long afterwards--I remembered the incident. + +When my father let the knocker fall against Captain Whidden's great front +door, my heart, it seemed to me, echoed the sound and then danced away at a +lively pace. A servant, whom I watched coming from somewhere behind the +stairs, admitted us to the quiet hall; then another door opened silently, a +brighter light shone out upon us, and a big, grave man appeared. He +welcomed us with a few thoughtful words and, by a motion of his hand, sent +us before him into the room where he had been sitting. + +"And so," said Captain Whidden, when we had explained our errand, "I am to +have this young man aboard my ship." + +"If you will, sir," I cried eagerly, yet anxiously, too, for he did not +seem nearly so well pleased as I had expected. + +"Yes, Ben, you may come with us to Canton; but as your father says, you +must fill your own boots and stand on your own two feet. And will you, +friend Lathrop,"--he turned to my father,--"hazard a venture on the +voyage?" + + +My father smiled. "I think, Joe," he said, "that I've placed a considerable +venture in your hands already." + +Captain Whidden nodded. "So you have, so you have. I'll watch it as best I +can, too, though of course I'll see little of the boy. Let him go now. I'll +talk with you a while if I may." + +My father glanced at me, and I got up. + +Captain Whidden rose, too. "Come down in the morning," he said. "You can +sign with us at the Websters' counting-house.--And good-bye, Ben," he +added, extending his hand. + +"Good-bye? You don't mean--that I'm not to go with you?" + +He smiled. "It'll be a long time, Ben, before you and I meet again on quite +such terms as these." + +Then I saw what he meant, and shook his hand and walked away without +looking back. Nor did I ever learn what he and my father talked about after +I left them there together. + + + +CHAPTER II + +BILL HAYDEN + + +More than two-score years and ten have come and gone since that day when I, +Benjamin Lathrop, put out from Salem harbor, a green hand on the ship +Island Princess, and in them I have achieved, I think I can say with due +modesty, a position of some importance in my own world. But although +innumerable activities have crowded to the full each intervening year, +neither the aspirations of youth nor the successes of maturity nor the +dignities of later life have effaced from my memory the picture of myself, +a boy on the deck of the Island Princess in April, 1809. + +I thought myself very grand as the wind whipped my pantaloons against my +ankles and flapped the ribbons of the sailor hat that I had pulled snugly +down; and I imagined myself the hero of a thousand stirring adventures in +the South Seas, which I should relate when I came back an able seaman at +the very least. Never was sun so bright; never were seas so blue; never was +ship so smart as the Island Princess. + +On her black hull a nicely laid band of white ran sheer from stem to stern; +her bows swelled to meet the seas in a gentle curve that hinted the swift +lines of our clippers of more recent years. From mainmast heel to truck, +from ensign halyard to tip of flying jib-boom, her well-proportioned masts +and spars and taut rigging stood up so trimly in one splendidly +coördinating structure, that the veriest lubber must have acknowledged her +the finest handiwork of man. + +It was like a play to watch the men sitting here and there on deck, or +talking idly around the forecastle, while Captain Whidden and the chief +mate conferred together aft. I was so much taken with it all that I had no +eyes for my own people who were there to see me off, until straight out +from the crowded wharf there came a young man whom I knew well. His gray +eyes, firm lips, square chin, and broad shoulders had been familiar to me +ever since I could remember. + +As he was rowed briskly to the ship, I waved to him and called out, "O +Roger--ahoy!" + +I thought, when he glanced up from the boat, that his gray eyes twinkled +and that there was the flutter of a smile on his well-formed lips; but he +looked at me and through me and seemed not to see me, and it came over me +all at once that from the cabin to the forecastle was many, many times the +length of the ship. + +With a quick survey of the deck, as if to see who had spoken, yet seeming +not to see me at all, Roger, who had lived all his life within a cable's +length of the house where I was born, who had taught me to box the compass +before I learned my ABC's, whose interest in my own sister had partly +mystified, partly amused her younger brother--that very Roger climbed +aboard the Island Princess and went on into the cabin without word or sign +of recognition. + +It was not the first time, of course, that I had realized what my chosen +apprenticeship involved; but the incident brought it home to me more +clearly than ever before. No longer was I to be known as the son of Thomas +Lathrop. In my idle dreams I had been the hero of a thousand imaginary +adventures; instead, in the strange experiences I am about to relate, I was +to be only the ship's "boy"--the youngest and least important member of +that little isolated community banded together for a journey to the other +side of the world. But I was to see things happen such as most men have +never dreamed of; and now, after fifty years, when the others are dead and +gone, I may write the story. + +When I saw that my father, who had watched Roger Hamlin with twinkling eyes +ignore my greeting, was chuckling in great amusement, I bit my lip. What if +Roger _was_ supercargo, I thought: he needn't feel so big. + +Now on the wharf there was a flutter of activity and a stir of color; now a +louder hum of voices drifted across the intervening water. Captain Whidden +lifted his hand in farewell to his invalid wife, who had come in her +carriage to see him sail. The mate went forward on the forecastle and the +second mate took his position in the waist. + +"Now then, Mr. Thomas," Captain Whidden called in a deep voice, "is all +clear forward?" + +"All clear, sir," the mate replied; and then, with all eyes upon him, he +took charge, as was the custom, and proceeded to work the ship. + +While the men paid out the riding cable and tripped it, and hove in the +slack of the other, I stood, carried away--foolish boy!--by the thought +that here at last I was a seaman among seamen, until at my ear the second +mate cried sharply, "Lay forward, there, and lend a hand to cat the +anchor." + +The sails flapped loose overhead; orders boomed back and forth; there was +running and racing and hauling and swarming up the rigging; and from the +windlass came the chanteyman's solo with its thunderous chorus:-- + + "Pull one and all! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + On this catfall! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Answer the call! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Hoy! Haulee! + Hoy! Hoy!!! + Oh, cheery men!" + +As the second anchor rose to the pull of the creaking windlass, we sheeted +home the topsails, topgallantsails and royals and hoisted them up, braced +head-yards aback and after-yards full for the port tack, hoisted the jib +and put over the helm. Thus the Island Princess fell off by the head, as we +catted and fished the anchor; then took the wind in her sails and slipped +slowly out toward the open sea. + +Aft, by the lee rail, I saw Roger Hamlin watching the group, a little apart +from the others, where my own people had gathered. My father stood half a +head above the crowd, and beside him were my mother and my sister. When I, +too, looked back at them, my father waved his hat and I knew his eyes were +following me; I saw the flutter of white from my mother's hand, and I knew +that her heart was going out with me to the uttermost parts of the earth. + +Then, almost timidly, my sister waved her handkerchief. But I saw that she +was looking at the quarter-deck. + +As land fell astern until it became a thin blue line on the western +horizon, and as the Island Princess ran free with the wind full in her +sails, I took occasion, while I jumped back and forth in response to the +mate's quick orders, to study curiously my shipmates in our little kingdom. +Now that we had no means of communication with that already distant shore, +we were a city unto ourselves. + +Yonder was the cook, a man as black as the bottom of his iron pot, whose +frown, engraved deeply in his low forehead, might have marked him in my +eyes as the villain of some melodrama of the sea, had I not known him for +many years to be one of the most generous darkies, so far as hungry small +boys were concerned, that ever ruled a galley. The second mate, who was now +in the waist, I had never seen before--to tell the truth, I was glad that +he held no better berth, for I disliked the turn of his too full lips. +Captain Whidden and the chief mate, Mr. Thomas, I had known a long time, +and I had thought myself on terms of friendship with them, even +familiarity; but so far as any outward sign was concerned, I might now have +been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate. + +We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin--Captain Whidden, Mr. +Thomas, Mr. Falk, and Roger, whose duties included oversight of the cargo, +supervision of matters purely of business and trade in foreign ports, and a +deal of clerical work that Captain Whidden had no mind to be bothered with; +three in the steerage--the cook (contrary, perhaps, to the more usual +custom), the steward, and the carpenter; and fourteen in the forecastle. + +All in all I was well pleased with my prospects, and promised myself that I +would "show them a thing or two," particularly Roger Hamlin. I'd make a +name for myself aboard the Island Princess. I'd let all the men know that +it would not take Benjamin Lathrop long to become as smart a seaman as +they'd hope to see. + +Silly lad that I was! + +Within twenty minutes of that idle dream the chain of circumstances had +begun that was to bring every man aboard the Island Princess face to face +with death. Like the small dark cloud that foreruns a typhoon, the first +act in the wild drama that came near to costing me my own life was so +slight, so insignificant relatively, that no man of us then dreamed of the +hidden forces that brought it to pass. + +On the forecastle by the larboard rigging stood a big, broad-shouldered +fellow, who nodded familiarly at the second mate, cast a bit of a leer at +the captain as if to impress on the rest of us his own daring and +independence, and gave me, when I caught his eye, a cold, noncommittal +stare. His name, I shortly learned, was Kipping. Undeniably he was +impudent; but he had, nevertheless, a mild face and a mild manner, and when +I heard him talk, I discovered that he had a mild voice; I could find no +place for him in the imaginary adventures that filled my mind--he was quite +too mild a man. + +I perceived that he was soldiering at his work, and almost at the same +moment I saw the mate come striding down on him. + +"You there," Mr. Thomas snapped out, "bear a hand! Do you think you're +waiting for the cows to come home?" + +"No-o-o, sir," the mild man drawled, starting to walk across the deck. + +The slow reply, delivered with a mocking inflection, fanned to sudden +laughter chuckles that the mate's words had caused. + + +Mr. Thomas reddened and, stepping out, thrust his face close to the +other's. "You try any of your slick tricks on me, my man," he said slowly +and significantly, "you try any of your slick tricks on me, and so help me, +I'll show you." + +"Ye-e-es, sir," the man replied with the same inflection, though not so +pronounced this time. + +Suddenly the deck became very still. The listeners checked their laughter. +Behind me I heard some one mutter, "Hear that, will you?" Glancing around, +I saw that Captain Whidden had gone below and that Mr. Thomas was in +command. I was confident that the mild seaman was mocking the mate, yet so +subtle was his challenge, you could not be sure that he actually was +defiant. + +Although Mr. Thomas obviously shared the opinion of the men, there was so +little on which to base a charge of insubordination or affront that he +momentarily hesitated. + +"What is your name?" he suddenly demanded. + +"Kipping, sir," the mild man replied. + +This time there was only the faintest suggestion of the derisive +inflection. After all, it might have been but a mannerism. The man had such +a mild face and such a mild manner! + +"Well, Kipping, you go about your work, and after this, let me warn you, +keep busy and keep a civil tongue in your head. We'll have no slick tricks +aboard this ship, and the sooner you men realize it, the easier it will be +for all hands." + +Turning, the mate went back to the quarter-deck and resumed his station by +the weather rail. + +While his back was toward us, however, and just as I myself, who had +listened, all ears, to the exchange of words between them, was turning to +the forecastle, I saw--or thought I saw--on Kipping's almost averted face +just such a leer as I had seen him cast at the captain, followed, I could +have taken my oath, by a shameless wink. When he noticed me gazing at him, +open-mouthed, he gave me such another cold stare as he had given me before +and, muttering something under his breath, walked away. + +I looked aft to discover at whom he could have winked, but I saw only the +second mate, who scowled at me angrily. + +"Now what," thought I, "can all this mean?" Then, being unable to make +anything of it, I forgot it and devoted myself industriously to my own +affairs until the hoarse call of "All hands on deck" brought the men who +were below tumbling up, to be summoned aft and addressed by the captain. + +Apparently Captain Whidden was not aware that there was a soul on board +ship except himself. With his eyes on the sea and his hands clasped behind +him, he paced the deck, while we fidgeted and twisted and grew more and +more impatient. At last, with a sort of a start, as if he had just seen +that we were waiting, he stopped and surveyed us closely. He was a fine +figure of a man and he affected the fashions of a somewhat earlier day. +A beaver with sweeping brim surmounted his strong, smooth-shaven face, and +a white stock, deftly folded, swathed his throat to his resolute chin. Trim +waistcoat, ample coat, and calmly folded arms completed his picture as he +stood there, grave yet not severe, waiting to address us. + +What he said to us in his slow, even voice was the usual speech of a +captain in those times; and except for a finer dignity than common, he did +not deviate from the well-worn customary phrases until he had outlined the +voyage that lay before us and had summed up the advantages of prompt, +willing obedience and the penalties of any other course. His tone then +suddenly changed. "If any man here thinks that he can give me slovenly work +or back talk and arguing," he said, "it'll be better for that man if he +jumps overboard and swims for shore." I was certain--and I still am--that +he glanced sharply at Kipping, who stood with a faint, nervous smile, +looking at no one in particular. "Well, Mr. Thomas," he said at last, +"we'll divide the watches. Choose your first man." + +When we went forward, I found myself, as the green hand of the voyage, one +of six men in the starboard watch. I liked the arrangement little enough, +for the second mate commanded us and Kipping was the first man he had +chosen; but it was all in the day's work, so I went below to get my jacket +before eight bells should strike. + +The voices in the forecastle suddenly stopped when my feet sounded on the +steps; but as soon as the men saw that it was only the boy, they resumed +their discussion without restraint. + +"I tell you," some one proclaimed from the darkest corner, "the second +mate, he had it all planned to get the chief mate's berth this voyage, and +the captain, he put him out no end because he wouldn't let him have it. +Yes, sir. And he bears a grudge against the mate, he does, him and that sly +friend of his, Kipping. Perhaps you didn't see Kipping wink at the second +mate after he was called down. I did, and I says to myself then, says I, +'There's going to be troublous times ere this voyage is over.' Yes, sir." + +"Right you are, Davie!" a higher, thinner voice proclaimed, "right you are. +I was having my future told, I was, and the lady--" + +A roar of laughter drowned the words of the luckless second speaker, and +some one yelled vociferously, "Neddie the fortune-teller! Don't tell me +he's shipped with us again!" + +"But I tell you," Neddie persisted shrilly, "I tell you they hit it right, +they do, often. And the lady, she says, 'Neddie Benson, don't you go +reckless on this next voyage. There's trouble in store,' she says. +'There'll be a dark man and a light man, and a terrible danger.' And I paid +the lady two dollars and I--" + +Again laughter thundered in the forecastle. + +"All the same," the deep-voiced Davie growled, "that sly, slippery--" + +"Hist!" A man raised his hand against the light that came faintly from on +deck. + +Then a mild voice asked, "What are you men quidding about anyway? One of +you's sitting on my chest." + +"Listen to them talk," some one close beside me whispered. "You'd think +this voyage was all of life, the way they run on about it. Now it don't +mean so much to me. My name's Bill Hayden, and I've got a little wee girl, +I have, over to Newburyport, that will be looking for her dad to come home. +Two feet long she is, and cute as they make them." + +Aware that the speaker was watching me closely, I perfunctorily nodded. At +that he edged nearer. "Now I'm glad we're in the same watch," he said. "So +many men just cut a fellow off with a curse." + +I observed him more sharply, and saw that he was a stupid-looking but +rather kindly soul whose hair was just turning gray. + +"Now I wish you could see that little girl of mine," he continued. "Cute? +there ain't no word to tell you how cute she is. All a-laughing and +gurgling and as good as gold. Why, she ain't but a little old, and yet she +can stand right up on her two little legs as cute as you please." + +I listened with mild interest as he rambled on. He seemed such a friendly, +homely soul that I could but regard him more kindly than I did some of our +keener-witted fellow seamen. + +Now we heard faintly the bell as it struck, _clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang-clang_. Feet scuffled overhead, and some one called down the hatch, +"Eight bells, starbow-lines ahoy!" + +Davie's deep voice replied sonorously, "Ay-ay!" And one after another we +climbed out on deck, where the wind from the sea blew cool on our faces. + +I had mounted the first rung of the ladder, and was regularly signed as a +member of the crew of the Island Princess, bound for Canton with a cargo of +woolen goods and ginseng. There was much that puzzled me aboard-ship--the +discontent of the second mate, the perversity of the man Kipping (others +besides myself had seen that wink), and a certain undercurrent of +pessimism. But although I was separated a long, long way from my old +friends in the cabin, I felt that in Bill Hayden I had found a friend of a +sort; then, as I began my first real watch on deck at sea, I fell to +thinking of my sister and Roger Hamlin. + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MAN OUTSIDE THE GALLEY + + +Strange events happened in our first month at sea--events so subtle as +perhaps to seem an unimportant part of this narrative of a strange voyage, +yet really as necessary to the foundation of the story as the single bricks +and the single dabs of mortar at the base of a tall chimney are necessary +to the completed structure. I later had cause to remember each trivial +incident as if it had been written in letters of fire. + +In the first dog watch one afternoon, when we were a few days out of port, +I was sitting with my back against the forward deck-house, practising +splices and knots with a bit of rope that I had saved for the purpose. I +was only a couple of feet from the corner, so of course I heard what was +going on just out of sight. + +The voices were low but distinct. + +"Now leave me alone!" It was Bill Hayden who spoke. "I ain't never troubled +you." + +"Ah, so you ain't troubled me, have you, you whimpering old dog?" + +"No, I ain't troubled you." + +"Oh, no! You was so glad to let me take your nice dry boots, you was, when +mine was filled with water." + +The slow, mild, ostensibly patient voice could be none other than +Kipping's. + +"I had to wear 'em myself." + +"Oh, had to wear 'em yourself, did you?" + +"Let go o' my arm!" + +"So?" + +"Let go, I tell you; let go or I'll--I swear I'll hammer you good." + +"Oh, you'll hammer me good, will you?" + +"Let go!" + +There was a sudden scuffle, then out from the corner of the deck-house +danced Kipping with both hands pressed over his jaw. + +"You bloody scoundrel!" he snarled, meek no longer. "You wait--I'll get +you. I'll--" Seeing me sitting there with my bit of rope, he stopped short; +then, with a sneer, he walked away. + +Amazed at the sudden departure of his tormentor, Bill Hayden stuck his own +head round the corner and in turn discovered me in my unintentional +hiding-place. + +Bill, however, instead of departing in chagrin, joined me with a puzzled +expression on his kind, stupid face. + +"I don't understand that Kipping," he said sadly. "I've tried to use him +right. I've done everything I can to help him out and I'm sure I don't want +to quarrel with him, yet for all he goes around as meek as a cat that's +been in the cream, he's always pecking at me and pestering me, till just +now I was fair drove to give him a smart larrup." + +Why, indeed, should Kipping or any one else molest good, dull old Bill +Hayden? + +"I'm a family man, I am," Bill continued, "with a little girl at home. I +ain't a-bothering no one. I'm sure all I want is to be left alone." + +For a time we sat in silence, watching the succession of blue waves through +which the Island Princess cut her swift and almost silent passage. A man +must have been a cowardly bully to annoy harmless old Bill. Yet even then, +young though I was, I realized that sometimes there is no more dangerous +man than a coward and a bully, "He's great friends with the second mate," +Bill remarked at last. "And the second mate has got no use at all for Mr. +Thomas because he thought he was going to get Mr. Thomas's berth and +didn't; and for the same reason he don't like the captain. Well, I'm glad +he's only _second mate_. He ain't got his hands out of the tar-bucket yet, +my boy." + +"How do you know he expected to get the mate's berth?" I asked. + +"It's common talk, my boy. The supercargo's the only man aft he's got any +manner of use for, and cook says the steward says Mr. Hamlin ain't got no +manner of use for him. There you are." + +"No," I thought,--though I discreetly said nothing,--"Roger Hamlin is not +the man to be on friendly terms with a fellow of the second mate's +calibre." + +And from that time on I watched Mr. Falk, the second mate, and the +mild-voiced Kipping more closely than ever--so closely that one night I +stumbled on a surprising discovery. + +Ours was the middle watch, and Mr. Falk as usual was on the quarter-deck. +By moonlight I saw him leaning on the weather rail as haughtily as if he +were the master. His slim, slightly stooped figure, silhouetted against the +moonlit sea, was unmistakable. But the winds were inconstant and drifting +clouds occasionally obscured the moon. Watching, I saw him distinctly; +then, as the moonlight darkened, the after part of the ship became as a +single shadow against a sea almost as black. While I still watched, there +came through a small fissure in the clouds a single moonbeam that swept +from the sea across the quarter-deck and on over the sea again. By that +momentary light I saw that Mr. Falk had left the weather rail. + +Certainly it was a trifling thing to consider twice, but you must remember, +in the first place, that I was only a boy, with all a boy's curiosity about +trifles, and in the second place that of the four men in the cabin no other +derived such obvious satisfaction from the minor prerogatives of office as +Mr. Falk. He fairly swelled like a frog in the sun as he basked in the +prestige that he attributed to himself when, left in command, he occupied +the captain's place at the weather rail. + +Immediately I decided that under the cover of darkness I would see what had +become of him. So I ran lightly along in the shelter of the lee bulwark, +dodging past the galley, the scuttle-butt, and the cabin in turn. At the +quarter-deck I hesitated, knowing well that a sound thrashing was the least +I could expect if Mr. Falk discovered me trespassing on his own territory, +yet lured by a curiosity that was the stronger for the vague rumors on +which it had fed. + +On hands and knees I stopped by the farther corner of the cabin. Clouds +still hid the moon and low voices came to my ears. Very cautiously I peeked +from my hiding-place, and saw that Mr. Falk and the helmsman had put their +heads together and were talking earnestly. + +While they talked, the helmsman suddenly laughed and prodded Mr. Falk in +the ribs with his thumb. Like a flash it came over me that it was Kipping's +trick at the wheel. Here was absolute proof that, when the second mate and +the mild man thought no one was spying upon them, they were on uncommonly +friendly terms. Yet I did not dream that I had stumbled on anything graver +than to confirm one of those idle rumors that set tongues wagging in the +forecastle, but that really are too trifling to be worth a second thought. + +When the crew of a ship is cut off from all communication with the world at +large, it is bound, for want of greater interests, to find in the +monotonous daily round something about which to weave a pretty tale. + +At that moment, to my consternation, the bell struck four times. As the two +dark figures separated, I started back out of sight. Kipping's trick at the +wheel was over, and his relief would come immediately along the very route +that I had chosen; unless I got away at once I should in all probability be +discovered on the quarterdeck and trounced within an inch of my life. Then +suddenly, as if to punish my temerity, the cloud passed and the moonlight +streamed down on deck. + +Darting lightly back to the companion-ladder, I slipped down it and was on +the point of escaping forward when I heard slow steps. In terror lest the +relief spy me and reveal my presence by some exclamation that Kipping or +the second mate would overhear, I threw myself down flat on the deck just +forward of the scuttle-butt, where the moon cast a shadow; and with the +fervent hope that I should appear to be only a heap of old sail, I lay +without moving a muscle. + +The steps came slowly nearer. They had passed, I thought, when a pause set +my heart to jumping madly. Then came a low, cautious whisper:-- + +"You boy, what you doin' dah?" + +It was not the relief after all. It was the good old villainous-looking +black cook, with a cup of coffee for Mr. Falk. + +"Put yo' head down dah," he whispered, "put yo' head down, boy." + +With a quick motion of his hand he jerked some canvas from the butt so that +it concealed me, and went on, followed by the quick steps of the real +relief. + +Now I heard voices, but the only words I could distinguish were in the +cook's deep drawl. + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah. Ah brought yo' coffee, sah, Yass, sah, Ah'll wait +fo' yo' cup, sah." + +Next came Kipping's step--a mild step, if there is such a thing; even in +his bullying the man was mild. Then came the slow, heavy tread of the +returning African. + +Flicking the canvas off me, he muttered, "All's cleah fo' you to git away, +boy. How you done come to git in dis yeh scrape sho' am excruciatin'. You +just go 'long with you while dey's a chanst." + +So, carrying with me the very unimportant discovery that I had made, I ran +cautiously forward, away from the place where I had no business to be. + +When, in the morning, just before eight bells, I was sent to the galley +with the empty kids, I found the worthy cook in a solemn mood. + +"You boy," he said, fixing on me a stare, which his deeply graven frown +rendered the more severe, "you boy, what you think you gwine do, prowlin' +round all hours? Hey? You tell dis nigger dat. Heah Ah's been and put you +onto all de ropes and give you more infohmative disco'se about ships and +how to behave on 'em dan eveh Ah give a green hand befo' in all de years Ah +been gwine to sea, and heah you's so tarnation foolish as go prowlin' round +de quarter-deck whar you's like to git skun alive if Mistah Falk ketches +you." + +I don't remember what I replied, but I am sure it was flippant; to the day +of my death I shall never forget the stinging, good-natured cuff with which +the cook knocked my head against the wall. "Sho' now," he growled, "go +'long!" + +I was not yet ready to go. "Tell me, doctor," I said, "does the second mate +get on well with the others in the cabin?" + +The title mollified him somewhat, but he still felt that he must uphold the +dignity of his office. "Sho' now, what kind of a question is dat fo' a +ship's boy to be askin' de cook?" He glanced at me suspiciously, then +challenged me directly, "Who put dose idea' in yo' head?" + +By the tone of the second question, which was quite too straightforward to +be confused with the bantering that we usually exchanged, I knew that he +was willing, if diplomatically coaxed, to talk frankly. I then said +cautiously, "Every one thinks so, but you're the only man forward that's +likely to know." + +"Now ain't dat jest like de assumptivity of dem dah men in de forecastle. +How'd Ah know dat kind of contraptiveness, tell me?" + +Looking closely at me he began to rattle his pans at a great rate while I +waited in silence. He was not accomplishing much; indeed, he really was +throwing things into a state of general disorder. But I observed that he +was working methodically round the galley toward where I stood, until at +last he bumped into me and started as if he hadn't known that I was there +at all. + +"You boy," he cried, "you still heah?" He scowled at me with a particularly +savage intensity, then suddenly leaned over and tapped me on the shoulder. +"You's right, boy," he whispered. "He ain't got no manner of use foh dem +other gen'lems, and what's mo', dey ain't got no manner of use foh him. +Ah's telling you, boy, it's darn lucky, you bet, dat Mistah Falk he eats at +second table. Yass, sah. Hark! dah's de bell--eight bells! Yo' watch on +deck, hey?" After a short pause, he whispered, "Boy, you come sneakin' +round to-morrow night when dat yeh stew'd done gone to bed, an' Ah'll jest +gadder you up a piece of pie f'om Cap'n's table--yass, sah! Eight bells is +struck. Go 'long, you." And shoving me out of his little kingdom, the +villainous-looking darky sent after me a savage scowl, which I translated +rightly as a token of his high regard and sincere friendship. + +In my delight at the promised treat, and in my haste to join the watch, I +gave too little heed to where I was going, and shot like a bullet squarely +against a man who had been standing just abaft the galley window. He +collapsed with a grunt. My shoulder had knocked the wind completely out of +him. + +"Ugh!--" he gasped--"ugh! You son of perdition--ugh! Why in thunder don't +you look where you're running--ugh!--I'll break your rascally young +neck--ugh--when I get my wind." + +It was Kipping, and for the second time he had lost his mildness. + +As he clutched at me fiercely, I dodged and fled. Later, when I was hauling +at his side, he seemed to have forgotten the accident; but I knew well +enough that he had not. He was not the kind that forgets accidents. His +silence troubled me. How much, I wondered, had he heard of what was going +on in the galley? + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A PIECE OF PIE + + +At two bells there sounded the sonorous call, "Sail ho!" + +"Where away?" cried Mr. Falk. + +"One point off the larboard bow." + +In all the days since we had lost sight of land, we had seen but one other +sail, which had appeared only to disappear again beyond the horizon. It +seemed probable, however, that we should speak this second vessel, a brig +whose course crossed our own. Captain Whidden came on deck and assumed +command, and the men below, getting wind of the excitement, trooped up and +lined the bulwarks forward. Our interest, which was already considerable, +became even keener when the stranger hove out a signal of distress. We took +in all studding-sails and topgallantsails fore and aft, and lay by for her +about an hour after we first had sighted her. + +Over the water, when we were within hailing distance, came the cry: "Ship +ahoy!" + +Captain Whidden held the speaking trumpet. "Hullo!" + +"What ship is that, pray?" + +"The ship Island Princess, from Salem, bound to Canton. Where are you +from?" + +"The brig Adventure, bound from the Straits to Boston. Our foretopmast was +carried away four hours ago. Beware of--" + +Losing the next words, the Captain called, "I didn't hear that last." + +"Beware,"--came again the warning cry, booming deeply over the sea while +one and all we strained to hear it--"beware of any Arab ship. Arabs have +captured the English ship Alert and have murdered her captain and fifteen +men." + +Squaring her head-yards, the brig dropped her mainsail, braced her cross +jack-yard sharp aback, put her helm a-weather and got sternway, while her +after sails and helm kept her to the wind. So she fell off from us and the +two vessels passed, perhaps never to meet again. + +Both forward and aft, we aboard the Island Princess were sober men. Kipping +and the second mate were talking quietly together, I saw (I saw, too, that +Captain Whidden and some of the others were watching them sharply) Mr. +Thomas and Roger Hamlin were leaning side by side upon the rail, and +forward the men were gathering in groups. It was indeed an ominous message +that the brig had given us. But supper broke the tension, and afterwards a +more cheerful atmosphere prevailed. + +As I was sweeping down the deck next day, Roger, to my great surprise,--for +by now I was accustomed to his amused silence,--came and spoke to me with +something of the old, humorous freedom that was so characteristic of him. + +"Well, Bennie," said he, "we're quite a man now, are we not?" + +"We are," I replied shortly. Although I would not for a great deal have +given him the satisfaction of knowing it, I had been much vexed, secretly, +by his rigidly ignoring me. + +"Bennie," he said in a low voice, "is there trouble brewing in the +forecastle?" + +I was startled. "Why, no. I've seen no sign of trouble." + +"No one has talked to you, then?" + +"Not in such a way as you imply." + +"Hm! Keep your eyes and ears open, anyway, and if you hear anything that +sounds like trouble, let me know--quietly, mind you, even secretly." + +"What do you mean?" + +"We are carrying a valuable cargo, and we have very particular orders. All +must be thus and so,--exactly thus and so,--and it means more to the +owners, Bennie, than I think you realize. Now you go on with your work. But +remember--eyes and ears open." + +That night, as I watched the restless sea and the silent stars, my +imagination was stirred as never before. I felt the mystery and wonder of +great distances and far places. We were so utterly alone! Except for the +passing hail of some stranger, we had cut ourselves off for months from all +communication with the larger world. Whatever happened aboard ship, in +whatever straits we found ourselves, we must depend solely upon our own +resources; and already it appeared that some of our shipmates were scheming +and intriguing against one another. Thus I meditated, until the boyish and +more natural, perhaps more wholesome, thought of the cook's promise came to +me. + +Pie! My remembrance of pie was almost as intangible as a pleasant dream +might be some two days later. With care to escape observation, I made my +way to the galley and knocked cautiously. + +"Who's dah?" asked softly the old cook, who had barricaded himself for the +night according to his custom, and was smoking a villainously rank pipe. + +"It's Ben Lathrop," I whispered. + +"What you want heah?" the cook demanded. + +"The pie you promised me," I answered. + +"Humph! Ain't you fo'got dat pie yet? You got de most miraculous memorizer +eveh Ah heared of. You wait." + +I heard him fumbling inside the galley; then he opened the door and stepped +out on deck as if he had just decided to take a breath of fresh air. Upon +seeing me, he pretended to start with great surprise, and exclaimed rather +more loudly than before:-- + +"What you doin' heah, boy, at dis yeh hour o' night?" + +But all this was only crafty by-play. Having made sure, so he thought, +that no one was in sight, he grabbed me by the collar and yanked me into +the galley, at the same time shutting the door so that I almost stifled in +the rank smoke with which he had filled the place. + +Scowling fiercely, he reached into a little cupboard and drew out half an +apple pie that to my eager eyes seemed as big as a half moon on a clear +night. + + +"Dah," he said. "Eat it up. Mistah Falk, he tell stew'd he want pie and he +gotta have pie, and stew'd he come and he say, 'Frank,' says he, 'dat +Mistah Falk, his langwidge is like he is in liquo'. He _gotta_ have pie.' +'All right,' Ah say, 'if he gotta have pie, he gotta wait twill Ah make +pie. Cap'n, he et hearty o' pie lately.' Stew'd he say, 'Cap'n ain't had +but one piece and Mistah Thomas, he ain't had but one piece, and Mistah +Hamlin, he ain't had any. Dah's gotta be pie. You done et dat pie yo'se'f,' +says he. 'Oh, no,' says Ah. 'Ah never et no pie. You fo'get 'bout dat pie +you give Cap'n foh breakfas'.' Den stew'd he done crawl out. He don' know +Ah make two pies yestidday. Dat's how come Ah have pie foh de boy. Boys dey +need pie to make 'em grow. It's won'erful foh de indignation, pie is." + +I was appalled by the hue and cry that my half-circle of pastry had +occasioned, and more than a little fearful of the consequences if the truth +ever should transpire; but the pie in hand was compensation for many such +intangible difficulties in the future, and I was making great inroads on a +wedge of it, when I thought I heard a sound outside the window, which the +cook had masked with a piece of paper. + +I stopped to listen and saw that Frank had heard it too. It was a scratchy +sound as if some one were trying to unship the glass. + +"Massy sake!" my host gasped, taking his vile pipe out of his mouth. + +Although it was quite impossible for pallor to make any visible impression +on his surpassing blackness, he obviously was much disturbed. + +"Gobble dat pie, boy," he gasped, "gobble up ev'y crumb an' splinter." + +Now, as the scratchy noise sounded at the door, the cook laid his pipe on a +shelf and glanced up at a big carving-knife that hung from a rack above his +head. + +"Who's dah?" he demanded cautiously. + +"Lemme in," said a mild, low voice, "I want some o' that pie." + +"Massy sake!" the cook gasped in disgust, "ef it ain't dat no 'count +Kipping." + +"Lemme in," persisted the mild, plaintive voice. "Lemme in." + +"Aw, go 'long! Dah ain't no pie in heah," the cook retorted. "You's +dreamin', dat's what you is. You needs a good dose of medicine, dat's what +you needs." + +"I'm dreaming, am I?" the mild voice repeated. "Oh, yes, I'm dreaming I am, +ain't I? I didn't sneak around the galley yesterday morning and hear you +tell that cocky little fool to come and get a piece of pie tonight. Oh, no! +I didn't see him come prowling around when he thought no one was looking. +Oh, no! I didn't see you come out of the galley like you didn't know there +was anybody on deck, and walk right under the rigging where I was waiting +for just such tricks. Oh, no! I was dreaming, I was. Oh, yes." + + +"Dat Kipping," the cook whispered, "he's hand and foot with Mistah Falk." + +"Lemme in, you woolly-headed son of perdition, or I swear I'll take the +kinky scalp right off your round old head." + +"He's gettin' violenter," the cook whispered, eyeing me questioningly. + +Saying nothing, I swallowed the last bit of pie. I had made the most of my +opportunity. + +Kipping now shook the door and swore angrily. Finally he kicked it with the +full weight of his heel. + +It rattled on its hinges and a long crack appeared in the lower panel. + +"He's sho' coming in," the African said slowly and reflectively. "He's sho' +coming in and when he don't get no pie, he's gwine tell Mistah Falk, and +you and me's gwine have trouble." Putting his scowling face close to my +ear, the cook whispered, "Ah's gwine scare him good." + +Amazed by the dramatic turn that events were taking, I drew back into a +corner. + +From the rack above his head the cook took down the carving-knife. Dropping +on hands and knees and creeping across the floor, he held the weapon +between his even white teeth, sat up on his haunches, and noiselessly +drew the bolt that locked the door. Then with a deft motion of an +extraordinarily long arm he put out the lantern behind him and threw the +galley into darkness. + + + +CHAPTER V + +KIPPING + + +I thought that Kipping must have abandoned his quest. In the darkness of +the galley the silence seemed hours long. The coals in the stove glowed +redly, and the almost imperceptible light of the starry sky came in here +and there around the door. Otherwise not a thing was visible in the +absolute blackness that shrouded my strange host, who seemed for the moment +to have reverted to the savage craft of his Slave Coast ancestors. Surely +Kipping must have gone away, I thought. He was so mild a man, one could +expect nothing else. Then somewhere I heard the faint sigh of indrawn +breath. + +"You blasted nigger, open that door," said the mild, sad voice. "If you +don't, I'm going to kick it in on top of you and cut your heart out right +where you stand." + +The silence, heavy and pregnant, was broken by the shuffling of feet. +Evidently Kipping drew off to kick the door a second time. His boot struck +it a terrific blow, but the door, instead of breaking, flew open and +crashed against the pans behind it. + +Then the cook, who so carefully had prepared the simple trap, swinging the +carving-knife like a cutlass, sprang with a fierce, guttural grunt full in +Kipping's face. Concealed in the dark galley, I saw it all silhouetted +against the starlit deck. With the quickness of a weasel, Kipping evaded +the black's clutching left hand and threw himself down and forward. Had the +cook really intended to kill Kipping, the weapon scarcely could have failed +to cut flesh in its terrific swing, but he gave it an upward turn that +carried it safely above Kipping's head. When Kipping, however, dived under +Frank's feet, Frank, who had expected him to turn and run, tripped and +fell, dropping the carving-knife, and instantly black man and white +wriggled toward the weapon. + +It would have been funny if it hadn't been so dramatic. The two men +sprawled on their bellies like snakes, neither of them daring to take time +to stand, each, in the snap of a finger, striving with every tendon and +muscle to reach something that lay just beyond his finger-tips. I found +myself actually laughing--they looked so like two fish just out of water. + +But the fight suddenly had become bitter earnest, Kipping unquestionably +feared for his life, and the cook knew well that the weapon for which they +fought would be turned against him if his antagonist once got possession of +it. + +As Kipping closed his fingers on the handle, the cook grabbed the blade. +Then the mate appeared out of the dark. + + +"Here, what's this?" he demanded, looming on the scene of the struggle. + +I saw starlight flash on the knife as it flew over the bulwark, then I +heard it splash. Kipping got away by a quick twist and vanished. The cook +remained alone to face the mate, for you can be very sure that I had every +discreet intention not to reveal my presence in the dark galley. + +"Yass, sah," said the cook, "yass, sah. Please to 'scuse me, sah, but Ah +didn't go foh no premeditation of disturbance. It is quite unintelligible, +sah, but one of de men, sah, he come round, sah, and says Ah gotta give him +a pie, sah, and of co'se Ah can't do nothin' like dat, sah. Pies is foh de +officers and gen'lems, sah, and of co'se Ah don't give pie to de men, sah, +not even in dey vittles, sah, even if dey was pie, which dey wa'n't, sah, +fob dis we'y day Mistah Falk he wants pie and stew'd he come, and me and +he, sah, we sho' ransack dis galley, sah, and try like we can, not even two +of us togetheh, sah, can sca' up a piece of pie foh Mistah Falk, sah, and +he--" + +Unwilling to listen longer, the mate turned with a grunt of disgust and +walked away. + +After he had gone, the cook stood for a time by the galley, looking +pensively at the stars. Long-armed, broad-shouldered, bullet-headed, he +seemed a typical savage. Yet in spite of his thick lips and protruding +chin, his face had a certain thoughtful quality, and not even that deeply +graven scowl could hide the dog-like faithfulness of his dark eyes. + +After all, I wondered, was he not like a faithful dog: loyal to the last +breath, equally ready to succor his friend or to fight for him? + +"Boy," he said, when he came in, "Ah done fool 'em. Dey ain' gwine believe +no gammon dat yeh Kipping tells 'em--leastwise, no one ain't onless it's +Mistah Falk. Now you go 'long with you and don't you come neah me foh a +week without you act like Ah ain't got no use foh you. And boy," he +whispered, "you jest look out and keep clear of dat Kipping. Foh all he +talk' like he got a mouth full of butter, he's an uncommon fighter, he is, +yass sah, an uncommon fighter." + +He paused for a moment, then added in such a way that I remembered it long +afterward, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +I reached the forecastle unobserved, and as I started to climb into my +bunk, I felt very well satisfied with myself indeed. Not even Kipping had +seen me come. But a disagreeable surprise awaited me; my hand encountered a +man lying wrapped in my blankets. + +It was Kipping! + +He rolled out with a sly smile, looked at me in silence a long time, and +then pretended to shake with silent laughter. + +"Well," I whispered, "what's the matter with you?" + +"There wasn't any pie," he sighed--so mildly. "How sad that there wasn't +any pie." + +He then climbed into his own bunk and almost immediately, I judged, went to +sleep. + +If he desired to make me exceedingly uncomfortable, he had accomplished his +purpose. For days I puzzled over his queer behavior. I wondered how much he +knew, how much he had told Mr. Falk; and I recalled, sometimes, the cook's +remark, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +Of one thing I was sure: both Kipping and Mr. Falk heartily disliked me. +Kipping took every occasion to annoy me in petty ways, and sometimes I +discovered Mr. Falk watching me sharply and ill-naturedly. But he always +looked away quickly when he knew that I saw him. + +We still lacked several days of having been at sea a month when we sighted +Madeira, bearing west southwest about ten leagues distant. Taking a fresh +departure the next day from latitude 32° 22' North, and longitude 16° 36' +West of London, we laid our course south southwest, and swung far enough +away from the outshouldering curve of the Rio de Oro coast to pass clear of +the Canary Islands. + + + * * * * * + + +"Do you know," said Bill Hayden one day, some five weeks later, when we +were aloft side by side, "they don't like you any better than they do me." + +It was true; both Kipping and Mr. Falk showed it constantly. + +"And there's others that don't like us, too," Bill added. "I told 'em, +though, that if they got funny with me or you, I'd show 'em what was what." + +"Who are they?" I asked, suddenly remembering Roger Hamlin's warning. + +"Davie Paine is one." + +"But I thought he didn't like Kipping or Mr. Falk!" + +"He didn't for a while; but there was something happened that turned his +mind about them." + +I worked away with the tar-bucket and reflected on this unexpected change +in the attitude of the deep-voiced seaman who, on our first day aboard +ship, had seen Kipping wink at the second mate. It was all so trivial that +I was ready to laugh at myself for thinking of it twice, and yet stupid +old Bill Hayden had noticed it. A new suspicion startled me. "Bill, did +any one say anything to you about any plan or scheme that Kipping is +concerned in?" I asked. + +"Why, yes. Didn't they speak to you about it?" + +"About what?" + +"Why, about a voyage that all the men was to have a venture in. I thought +they talked to every one. I didn't want anything to do with it if Kipping +was to have a finger in the pie. I told 'em 'No!' and they swore at me +something awful, and said that if ever I blabbed I'd never see my little +wee girl at Newburyport again. So I never said nothing." He looked at me +with a frightened expression. "It's funny they never said nothing to you. +Don't you tell 'em I talked. If they thought I'd split, they'd knock me in +the head, that's what they' d do." + +"Who's in it besides Kipping and Davie Paine?" + +"The two men from Boston and Chips and the steward. Them's all I know, but +there may be others. The men have been talking about it quiet like for a +good while now." + +As Mr. Falk came forward on some errand or other, we stopped talking and +worked harder than ever at tarring down the rigging. + +Presently Bill repeated without turning his head, "Don't you tell 'em I +said anything, will you, Bennie? Don't you tell 'em." + +And I replied, "No." + +We then had passed the Canaries and the Cape Verdes, and had crossed the +Line; from the most western curve of Africa we had weathered the narrows of +the Atlantic almost to Pernambuco, and thence, driven by fair winds, we had +swept east again in a long arc, past Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha, +and on south of the Cape of Good Hope. + +The routine of a sailor's life is full of hard work and petty detail. Week +follows week, each like every other. The men complain about their duties +and their food and the officers grow irritable. There are few stories worth +telling in the drudgery of life at sea, but now and then in a long, long +time fate and coincidence conspire to unite in a single voyage, such as +that which I am chronicling, enough plots and crimes and untoward incidents +to season a dozen ordinary lifetimes spent before the mast. + +I could not, of course, even begin as yet to comprehend the magnitude that +the tiny whirlpool of discontented and lawless schemers would attain. But +boy though I was, in those first months of the voyage I had learned +enough about the different members of the crew to realize that serious +consequences might grow from such a clique. + +Kipping, whom I had thought at first a mild, harmless man, had proved +himself a vengeful bully, cowardly in a sense, yet apparently courageous +enough so far as physical combat was concerned. Also, he had disclosed an +unexpected subtlety, a cat-like craft in eavesdropping and underhanded +contrivances. The steward I believed a mercenary soul, tricky so far as his +own comfort and gain were concerned, who, according to common report, had +ingratiated himself with the second mate by sympathizing with him on every +occasion because he had not been given the chief mate's berth. The two men +from Boston I cared even less for; they were slipshod workmen and +ill-tempered, and their bearing convinced me that, from the point of view +of our officers and of the owners of the ship, they were a most undesirable +addition to such a coterie as Kipping seemed to be forming. Davie Paine and +the carpenter prided themselves on being always affable, and each, although +slow to make up his mind, would throw himself heart and body into whatever +course of action he finally decided on. But significant above all else was +Kipping's familiarity with Mr. Falk. + +The question now was, how to communicate my suspicions secretly to Roger +Hamlin. After thinking the matter over in all its details, I wrote a few +letters on a piece of white paper, and found opportunity to take counsel +with my friend the cook, when I, as the youngest in the crew, was left in +the galley to bring the kids forward to the men in the forecastle. + +"Doctor," I said, "if I wanted to get a note to Mr. Hamlin without +anybody's knowing,--particularly the steward or Mr. Falk,--how should I go +about it?" + +The perpetually frowning black heaped salt beef on the kids. "Dah's enough +grub foh a hun'erd o'nary men. Dey's enough meat dah to feed a whole +regiment of Sigambeezel cavalry--yass, sah, ho'ses and all. And yet Ah'll +bet you foh dollahs right out of mah pay, doze pesky cable-scrapers fo'ward +'ll eat all dat meat and cuss me in good shape 'cause it ain't mo', and +den, mah golly, dey'll sot up all night, Ah'll bet you, yass, sah, +a-kicking dey heads off 'cause dey ain't fed f'om de cabin table. Boy, if +you was to set beefsteak and bake' 'taters and ham and eggs down befo' dem +fool men ev'y mo'ning foh breakfas', dey'd come heah hollerin' and cussin' +and tellin' me dey wah n't gwine have dey innards spiled on all dat yeh +truck jest 'cause dem aft can't eat it." + +Turning his ferocious scowl full upon me, the savage-looking darky handed +me the kids. "Dah! you take doze straight along fo'ward." Then, dropping +his voice to a whisper, he said, "Gimme yo' note." + +Knowing now that the cook approached every important matter by an +extraordinarily indirect route, I had expected some such conclusion, and I +held the note ready. + +"Go long," he said, when I had slipped it into his huge black hand. "Ah'll +do it right." + +So I departed with all confidence that my message would go secretly and +safely to its destination. Even if it should fall into other hands than +those for which it was intended, I felt that I had not committed myself +dangerously. I had written only one word: "News." + + +[Illustration] + + + + +II + +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COUNCIL IN THE CABIN + + +Sometimes in the night I dream of the forecastle of the Island Princess, +and see the crew sitting on chests and bunks, as vividly as if only +yesterday I had come through the hatchway and down the steps with a kid of +"salt horse" for the mess, and had found them waiting, each with his pan +and spoon and the great tin dipper of tea that he himself had brought from +the galley. There was Chips, the carpenter, who had descended for the +moment from the dignity of the steerage; calmly he helped himself to twice +his share, ignoring the oaths of the others, and washed down his first +mouthful with a great gulp of tea. Once upon a time Chips came down just +too late to get any meat, and tried to kill the cook; but as the cook +remarked to me afterwards, "Foh a drea'ful impulsive pusson, he wah n't +ve'y handy with his fists." There was Bill Hayden, who always got last +chance at the meat, and took whatever the doubtful generosity of his +shipmates had left him--poor Bill, as happy in the thought of his little +wee girl at Newburyport as if all the wealth of the khans of Tartary were +waiting for him at the end of the voyage. There was the deep-voiced Davie, +almost out of sight in the darkest corner, who chose his food carefully, +pretending the while to be considerate of the others, and growled amiably +about his hard lot. Also there was Kipping, mild and evasive, yet amply +able to look out for his own interests, as I, who so often brought down the +kids, well knew. + +When, that evening, Bill Hayden had scraped up the last poor slivers of +meat, he sat down beside me on my chest. + +"If I didn't have my little wee girl at Newburyport," he said, "I might +be as gloomy as Neddie Benson. Do you suppose if I went to see a +fortune-teller I'd be as gloomy as Neddie is? I never used to be gloomy, +even before I married, and I married late. I was older than Neddie is +now when I married. Neddie ought to get a wife and stop going to see +fortune-tellers, and then he wouldn't be so gloomy." + +Bill would run on indefinitely in his stupid, kindly way, for I was almost +the only person aboard ship who listened to him at all, and, to tell the +truth, even I seldom more than half listened. But already he had given me +valuable information that day, and now something in the tone of his +rambling words caught my attention. + +"Has Neddie Benson been talking about the fortuneteller again?" I asked. + +"He's had a lot to say about her. He says the lady said to him--" + +"But what started him off?" + +"He says things is bound to come to a bad end." + +"What things?" + +As I have said before, I had a normal boy's curiosity about all that was +going on around us. Perhaps, I have come to think, I had more than the +ordinary boy's sense for important information. Roger Hamlin's warning had +put me on my guard, and I intended to learn all I could and to keep my +mouth shut where certain people were concerned. + +"It's queer they don't say nothing to you about what's going on," Bill +remarked. + +For my own part I understood very well why they should say nothing of any +underhanded trickery to one who ashore was so intimately acquainted with +Captain Whidden and Roger Hamlin. But I kept my thoughts to myself and +persisted in my questions. + +"What is going on?" + +"Oh, I don't just make out what." Bill's stupidity was exasperating at +times. "It's something about Mr. Falk. Kipping, he--" + +"Yes?" said that eternally mild voice. "Mr. Falk? And Kipping? What else +please?" + +Both Bill and I were startled to find Kipping at our elbows. But before +either of us could answer, some one called down the hatch:-- + +"Lathrop is wanted aft." + +Relieved at escaping from an embarrassing situation, I jumped up so +promptly that my knife fell with a clatter, and hastened on deck, calling +"Ay, ay," to the man who had summoned me. I knew very well why I was wanted +aft. + +Mr. Falk, who was on duty on the quarter-deck, completely ignored me as I +passed him and went down the companionway. + +"At least," I thought, "he can't come below now." + +The steward, when I appeared, raised his eyebrows and almost dropped his +tray; then he paused in the door, inconspicuously, as if to linger. But +Captain Whidden glanced round and dismissed him by a sharp nod, and I found +myself alone in the cabin with the captain, Mr. Thomas, and Roger Hamlin. + +"I understand there's news forward, Lathrop," said Captain Whidden. + +Roger looked at me with that humorous, exasperating twinkle of his eyes,--I +thought of my sister and of how she had looked when she learned that he was +to sail for Canton,--and Mr. Thomas folded his arms and leaned back in his +chair. + +"Yes, sir," I replied, "although it seems pretty unimportant to be worth +much as news." + +"Tell us about it." + +To all that I had gathered from Bill Hayden I added what I had learned by +my own observations, and it seemed to interest them, although for my own +part I doubted whether it was of much account. + +"Has any one approached you directly about these things?" Captain Whidden +asked when I was through. + +"No, sir." + +"Have you heard any one say just what this little group is trying to +accomplish, or just when it is going to act?" + +"No, sir." + +"Do you, Lathrop, know anything about the cargo of the Island Princess? Or +anything about the terms under which it is carried?" + +"Only in a general way, sir, that it is made up of ginseng and woolen goods +shipped to Canton." + +Captain Whidden looked at me very sharply indeed. "You are positive that +that is all you know?" + +"Yes, sir--except, in a general way, that the cargo is uncommonly +important." + +The three men exchanged glances, and Roger Hamlin nodded as if to +corroborate my reply. + +"Lathrop," Captain Whidden began again, "I want you to say nothing about +this interview after you leave the cabin. It is more important that you +hold your peace than you may ever realize--than, I trust, you ever _will_ +realize. I am going to ask you to give me your word of honor to that +effect." + +It seemed to me then that I saw Captain Whidden in a new light. We of the +younger generation had inclined to belittle him because he continued to +follow the sea at an age when more successful men had established their +counting-houses or had retired from active business altogether. But twice +his mercantile adventures had proved unfortunate, and now, though nearly +sixty years old and worth a very comfortable fortune, he refused to leave +again for a less familiar occupation the profession by which he had amassed +his competence. I noticed that his hair was gray on his temples, and that +his weathered face revealed a certain stern sadness. I felt as if suddenly, +in spite of my minor importance on board his ship, I had come closer to the +straightforward gentleman, the true Joseph Whidden, than in all the years +that I had known him, almost intimately, it had seemed at the time, in my +father's house. + +"I promise, sir," I said. + +He took up a pencil and with the point tapped a piece of paper. + +"Tell me who of all the men forward absolutely are not influenced by this +man Kipping." + +"The cook," I returned, "and Bill Hayden, and, I think, Neddie Benson. +Probably there are a number of others, but only of those three am I +absolutely sure." + +"That's what I want--the men you are absolutely sure of. Hm! The cook, +useful but not particularly quick-witted. Hayden, a harmless, negative +body. Benson, a gloomy soul if ever there was one. It might be better +but--" He looked at Mr. Thomas and smiled. "That is all, Lathrop; you may +go now. Just one moment more, though: be cautious, keep your eyes and ears +open, and if anything else comes up, communicate with Mr. Hamlin or,--" he +hesitated, but finally said it,--"or directly with me." + +As I went up on deck, I again passed Mr. Falk and again he pretended not to +see me. But although he seemed to be intent on the rolling seas to +windward, I was very confident that, when I had left the quarter-deck, he +turned and looked after me as earnestly as if he hoped to read in my step +and carriage everything that had occurred in the cabin. + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE SAIL WITH A LOZENGE-SHAPED PATCH + + +It was not long before we got another warning even more ominous than the +one from the captain of the Adventure. On Friday, July 28, in latitude +19° 50' South, longitude 101° 53' East,--the log of the voyage, kept beyond +this point in Mr. Thomas's own hand, gives me the dates and figures to the +very day for it still is preserved in the vaults of Hamlin, Lathrop & +Company,--we sighted a bark to the south, and at the captain's orders wore +ship to speak her. When she also came about, we served out pikes and +muskets as a precaution against treachery, and Mr. Falk saw that our guns +were shotted. But she proved to be in good faith, and in answer to our hail +she declared herself the Adrienne of Liverpool, eight days from the +Straits, homeward bound. Her master, it appeared, wished to compare notes +on longitude, and a long, dull discussion followed; but in parting Captain +Whidden asked if there was news of pirates or marauders. + +"Yes," was the reply. "Much news and bad news." And the master of the +Adrienne thereupon launched into a tale of piracy and treachery such, as I +never had heard before. Leaning over the taffrail, his elbows out-thrust +and his big hands folded, he roared the story at us in a great booming +voice that at times seemed to drown the words in its own volume. Now, as +the waves and the wind snatched it away, it grew momentarily fainter and +clearer; now it came bellowing back again, loud, hoarse, and indistinct. + +It was all about an Arab ship off Benkulen; Ladronesers and the havoc they +had wrought among the American ships in the China Sea; a warning not to +sail from Macao for Whampoa without a fleet of four or five sail; and +again, about the depredations of the Malays. The grizzled old captain +seemed to delight in repeating horrible yarns of the seas whence he came, +whither we were going. He roared them after us until we had left him far +astern; and at the last we heard him laughing long and hoarsely. + +"What dat yeh man think we all am? He think we all gwine believe dat yeh? +Hgh!" the cook growled. + +But Neddie Benson dolefully shook his head. + +Parting, the Adrienne and the Island Princess continued, each on her +course, the one back round the Cape of Good Hope and north again to +Liverpool, the other on into strange oceans beset with a thousand dangers. + +We sailed now a sea of opalescent greens and purples that shimmered and +changed with the changing lights. Strange shadows played across it, even +when the sky was cloudless, and it rolled past the ship in great, regular +swells, ruffled by favoring breezes and bright beneath the clear sun. + +At daylight on August 3 we saw land about nine miles away, bearing from +east by south to north, a long line of rugged hills, which appeared to be +piled one above another, and which our last lunar observations indicated +were in longitude 107° 15' East; and we made out a single sail lying off +the coast to the north. + +The sail caught and held our attention--not that, so far as we then could +see, that particular sail was at all remarkable: any sail, at that time and +in that place, would have interested us unusually. Mindful of the warnings +we had received, we paused in our work to watch it. Kipping, with a sly +glance aft, left the winch with which he was occupied and leaned on the +rail. Here and there the crew conversed cautiously, and on the quarter-deck +a lively discussion, I could see, was in progress. + +We were so intent on that distant spot of canvas which pricked the horizon, +that a fierce squall, sweeping down upon us, almost took us aback. + +The cry, "All hands on deck!" brought the sleeping watch from the bunks +below, and the carpenter, steward, and sailmaker from the steerage. The +foresail ripped from its bolt ropes with a deafening crack, and tore to +ribbons in the gale. As the ship lay into the wind, I could hear the +captain's voice louder than the very storm, "Meet her!--Meet her!--Ease her +off!" But the reply of the man at the wheel was lost in the rush of wind +and rain. + +I had been well drilled long since in furling the royals, for on them the +green hands were oftenest practised; and now, from his post on the +forecastle, Mr. Thomas spied me as I slipped and fell half across the deck. +I alone at that moment was not hard at work, and, in obedience to the +captain's orders, during a lull that gave us a momentary respite, he sent +me aloft. + +It was quite a different thing from furling a royal in a light breeze. When +I had got to the topgallant masthead, the yard was well down by the lifts +and steadied by the braces, but the clews were not hauled chock up to the +blocks. Leaning out precariously, I won Mr. Thomas's attention with +greatest difficulty, and shrieked to have it done. This he did. Then, +casting the yard-arm gaskets off from the tye and laying them across +between the tye and the mast, I stretched out on the weather yard-arm and, +getting hold of the weather leech, brought it in to the slings taut along +the yard. Mind you, all this time I, only a boy, was working in a gale of +wind and driven rain, and was clinging to a yard that was sweeping from +side to side in lurching, unsteady flight far above the deck and the angry +sea. Hauling the sail through the clew, and letting it fall in the bunt, I +drew the weather clew a little abaft the yard, and held it with my knee +while I brought in the lee leech in, the same manner. Then, making up my +bunt and putting into it the slack of the clews, the leech and footrope and +the body of the sail, I hauled it well up on the yard, smoothed the skin, +brought it down abaft, and made fast the bunt-gasket round the mast. +Passing the weather and lee yard-arm gaskets round the yard in turn, and +hauling them taut and making them fast, I left all snug and trim. + +From aft came faintly the clear command, "Full and by!" And promptly, for +by this time the force of the squall was already spent, the answer of the +man at the wheel, "Full and by, sir." + +In this first moment of leisure I instinctively turned, as did virtually +every man aboard ship, to look for the sail that had been reported to the +north of us. But although we looked long and anxiously, we saw no sail, no +trace of any floating craft. It had disappeared during the squall, utterly +and completely. Only the wild dark sea and the wild succession of mountain +piled on mountain met our searching eyes. + +A sail there had been, beyond all question, where now there was none. +Driven by the storm, it had vanished completely from our sight. + +As well as we could judge by our lunar observations, the land was between +Paga River and Stony Point, and when we had sailed along some forty miles, +the shore, as it should be according to our reckoning, was less +mountainous. + +It was my first glimpse of the Sunda Islands, of which I had heard so much, +and I well remember that I stood by the forward rigging watching the +distant land from where it seemed on my right to rise from the sea, to +where it seemed on my left to go down beyond the horizon into the sea +again, and that I murmured to myself in a small, awed voice:-- + +"This is Java!" + +The very name had magic in it. Already from those islands our Salem +mariners had accumulated great wealth. Not yet are the old days forgotten, +when Elias Hasket Derby's ships brought back fortunes from Batavia, and +when Captain Carnes, by one voyage in Jonathan Peele's schooner Rajah to +the northern coast of Sumatra for wild pepper, made a profit of seven +hundred per cent of both the total cost of the schooner itself and the +whole expense of the entire expedition. I who lived in the exhilarating +atmosphere of those adventurous times was thrilled to the heart by my first +sight of lands to which hundreds of Salem ships had sailed. + +It really was Java, and night was falling on its shores. Far to the +northeast some tiny object pricked above the skyline, and a point of light +gleamed clearly, low against the blue heavens in which the stars had just +begun to shine. + +"A sail!" I cried. + +Before the words had left my lips a deep voice aloft sonorously +proclaimed:-- + +"Sa-a-ail ho!" + +"Where away?" Mr. Thomas cried. + +"Two points off the larboard bow, sir." + +The little knot of officers on the quarter-deck already were intent on the +tiny spot of almost invisible canvas, and we forward were crowding one +another for a better sight of it. Then in the gathering darkness it faded +and was gone. Could it have been the same that we had seen before? + +There was much talk of the mysterious ship that night, and many strange +theories were offered to account for it. Davie Paine, in his deep, rolling +voice, sent shivers down our backs by his story of a ghost-ship manned by +dead men with bony fingers and hollow eyes, which had sailed the seas in +the days of his great-uncle, a stout old mariner who seemed from Davie's +account to have been a hard drinker. Kipping was reminded of yarns about +Malay pirates, which he told so quietly, so mildly, that they seemed by +contrast thrice as terrible. Neddie Benson lugubriously recalled the +prophecy of the charming fortune-teller and argued the worst of our +mysterious stranger. "The lady said," he repeated, "that there'd be a dark +man and a light man and no end o' trouble. She was a nice lady, too." But +Neddie and his doleful fortune-teller as usual banished our gloom, and the +forecastle reechoed with hoarse laughter, which grew louder and louder when +Neddie once again narrated the lady's charms, and at last cried angrily +that she was as plump as a nice young chicken. + +"If you was to ask me," Bill Hayden murmured, "I'd say it was just a sail." +But no one asked Bill Hayden, and with a few words about his "little wee +girl at Newburyport," he buried himself in his old blankets and was soon +asleep. + +During the mid-watch that same night, the cook prowled the deck forward +like a dog sneaking along the wharves. Silently, the whites of his eyes +gleaming out of the darkness, he moved hither and thither, careful always +to avoid the second mate's observation. As I watched him, I became more and +more curious, for I could make nothing of his veering course. He went now +to starboard, now to larboard, now to the forecastle, now to the steerage, +always silently, always deliberately. After a while he came over and stood +beside me. + +"It ain't right," he whispered. "Ah tell you, boy, it ain't right." + +"What's not right?" I asked. + +"De goin's on aboa'd dis ship." + +"What goings on?" + +"Boy, Ah's been a long time to sea and Ah's cooked foh some bad crews in my +time, yass, sah, but Ah's gwine tell you, boy, 'cause Ah done took a fancy +to you, dis am de most iniquitous crew Ah eveh done cook salt hoss foh. +Yass, sah." + +"What do you mean?" + +The negro ignored my question. + +"Ah's gwine tell you, boy, dis yeh crew am bad 'nough, but when dah come a +ha'nt boat a-sailin' oveh yondeh jest at dahk, boy, Ah wish Ah was back +home whar Ah could somehow come to shoot a rabbit what got a lef' +hind-foot. Yass, sah." + +For a long time he silently paced up and down by the bulwark; but finally I +saw him momentarily against the light of his dim lantern as he entered his +own quarters. + +Morning came with fine breezes and pleasant weather. At half-past four we +saw Winerow Point bearing northwest by west. At seven o'clock we took in +all studding-sails and staysails, and the fore and mizzen topgallant-sails. +So another day passed and another night. An hour after midnight we took in +the main topgallantsail, and lay by with our head to the south until six +bells, when we wore ship, proceeding north again, and saw Java Head at nine +o'clock to the minute. + +We now faced Sunda Strait, the channel that separates Java from Sumatra and +unites the Indian Ocean with the Java Sea. From the bow of our ship there +stretched out on one hand and on the other, far beyond the horizon, Borneo, +Celebes, Banka and Billiton; the Little Sunda Islands--Bali and Lombok, +Simbawa, Flores and Timor; the China Sea, the Philippines, and farther and +greater than them all, the mainland of Asia. + +While we were still intent on Java Head there came once more the cry, "Sail +ho!" + +This time the sail was not to be mistaken. Captain Whidden trained on it +the glass, which he shortly handed to Mr. Thomas. "See her go!" the men +cried. It was true. She was running away from us easily. Now she was hull +down. Now we could see only her topgallant-sails. Now she again had +disappeared. But this time we had found, besides her general appearance and +the cut of her sails, which no seaman could mistake, a mark by which any +landsman must recognize her: on her fore-topsail there was a white +lozenge-shaped patch. + +At eleven o'clock in the morning, with Prince's Island bearing from north +to west by south, we entered the Straits of Sunda. At noon we were due east +of Prince's Island beach and had sighted the third Point of Java and the +Isle of Cracato. + +Fine breezes and a clear sky favored us, and the islands, green and blue +according to their distance, were beautiful to see. Occasionally we had +glimpses of little native craft, or descried villages sleeping amid the +drowsy green of the cocoanut trees. It was a peaceful, beautiful world +that met our eyes as the Island Princess stood through the Straits and up +the east coast of Sumatra; the air was warm and pleasant, and the leaves of +the tufted palms, lacily interwoven, were small in the distance like the +fronds of ferns in our own land. But Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas +remained on deck and constantly searched the horizon with the glass; and +the men worked uneasily, glancing up apprehensively every minute or two, +and starting at slight sounds. There was reason to be apprehensive, we +all knew. + +On the evening of Friday, August 11, beyond possibility of doubt we sighted +a ship; and that it was the same which we already had seen at least once, +the lozenge-shaped patch on the foresail proved to the satisfaction +of officers and men. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +ATTACKED + + +In the morning we were mystified to see that the sail once again had +disappeared. But to distract us from idle speculations, need of fresh water +now added to our uneasiness, and we anchored on a mud bottom while the +captain and Mr. Thomas went ashore and searched in vain for a +watering-place. + +During the day we saw a number of natives fishing in their boats a short +distance away; but when our own boat approached them, they pulled for the +shore with all speed and fled into the woods like wild men. Thus the day +passed,--so quietly and uneventfully that it lulled us into confidence that +we were safe from harm,--and a new day dawned. + +That morning, as we lay at anchor, the strange ship, with the sun shining +brightly on her sails, boldly reappeared from beyond a distant point, and +hove to about three miles to the north-northeast. As she lay in plain sight +and almost within earshot, she seemed no more out of the ordinary than any +vessel that we might have passed off the coast of New England. But on her +great foresail, which hung loose now with the wind shaken out of it, there +was a lozenge-shaped patch of clean new canvas. + +Soon word passed from mouth to mouth that the captain and Mr. Falk would go +in the gig to learn the stranger's name and port. + +To a certain extent we were relieved to find that our phantom ship was +built of solid wood and iron; yet we were decidedly apprehensive as we +watched the men pull away in the bright sun. The boat became smaller and +smaller, and the dipping oars flashed like gold. + +With his head out-thrust and his chin sunk below the level of his +shoulders, the cook stood by the galley, in doubt and foreboding, and +watched the boat pull away. + +His voice, when he spoke, gave me a start. + +"Look dah, boy! Look dah! Dey's sumpin' funny, yass, sah. 'Tain't safe foh +to truck with ha'nts, no sah! You can't make dis yeh nigger think a winkin' +fire-bug of a fly-by-night ship ain't a ha'nt." + +"Ha'nts," said Kipping mildly, "ha'nts is bad things for niggers, but they +don't hurt white men." + +"Lemme tell you, you Kipping, it ain't gwine pay you to be disrespectable +to de cook." Frank stuck his angry face in front of the mild man's. "Ef you +think--ha!"--He stopped suddenly, his eyes fixed on something far beyond +Kipping, over whose shoulder he now was looking. "Look dah! Look dah! What +Ah say? Hey? What Ah say? Look dah! Look dah!" + +Startled by the cook's fierce yell, we turned as if a gun had been fired; +but we saw only that the boat was coming about. + +"Look dah! Look dah! See 'em row! Don' tell me dat ain't no ha'nt!" Jumping +up and down, waving his arms wildly, contorting his irregular features till +he resembled a gorilla, he continued to yell in frenzy. + +Although there seemed to be no cause for any such outburst, the rest of us +now were alarmed by the behavior of the men in the boat. Having come about, +they were racing back to the Island Princess as fast as ever they could, +and the captain and Mr. Falk, if we could judge by their gestures, were +urging them to even greater efforts. + +"Look dah! Look dah! Don't you tell me dey ain't seen a ha'nt, you +Kipping!" + +As they approached, I heard Roger Hamlin say sharply to the mate, "Mr. +Thomas, that ship yonder is drifting down on us rapidly. See! They're +sheeting home the topsail." + +I could see that Mr. Thomas, who evidently thought Roger's fear groundless, +was laughing, but I could not hear his reply. In any case he gave no order +to prepare for action until the boat came within earshot and the captain +abruptly hailed him and ordered him to trip anchor and prepare to make +sail. + +As the boat came aboard, we heard news that thrilled us. "She's an Arab +ship," spread the word. "They were waiting for our boat, with no sign of +hostility until Mr. Falk saw the sunlight strike on a gun-barrel that was +intended to be hidden behind the bulwark. As the boat veered away, the man +with the gun started to fire, but another prevented him, probably because +the distance was so great." + +Instantly there was wild activity on the Island Princess. While we loosed +the sails and sheeted them home and, with anchor aweigh, braced the yards +and began to move ahead, the idlers were tricing up the boarding nettings +and double-charging our cannon, of which we carried three--a long gun +amidships and a pair of stern chasers. Men to work the ship were ordered to +the ropes. The rest were served pikes and loaded muskets. + +We accomplished the various preparations in an incredibly short time, and, +gathering way, stood ready to receive the stranger should she force us to +fight. + +For the time being we were doubtful of her intentions, and seeing us armed +and ready, she stood off as if still unwilling to press us more closely. +But some one aboard her, if I guess aright, resented so tame an end to a +long pursuit and insisted on at least an exchange of volleys. + +[Illustration: Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two +thunderous reports, a pistol shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain +Whidden spin around and fall.] + +Now she came down on us, running easily with the wind on her quarter, and +gave us a round from her muskets. + +"Hold your fire," Captain Whidden ordered. "They're feeling their way." + +Emboldened by our silence, she wore ship and came nearer. It seemed now +that she would attempt to board us, for we spied men waiting with +grapnels, and she came steadily on while our own men fretted at their +guns, not daring to fire without the captain's orders, till we could see +the triumphant sneer on the dark face of her commander. + +Now her muskets spoke again. I heard a bullet sing over my head and saw one +of our own seamen in the waist fall and lie quite still. Should we never +answer her in kind? In three minutes, it seemed, we should have to meet her +men hand to hand. + +Now our helmsman luffed, and we came closer into the wind, which gave our +guns a chance. + +"Now, then," Captain Whidden cried, "let them have the long gun and hold +the rest." + +With a crash our cannon swept the deck of the Arab, splintering the cabin +and accomplishing ten times as much damage as all her muskets had done to +us. But she in turn, exasperated by the havoc we had wrought, fired +simultaneously her two largest guns at point-blank range. + +I ducked behind the bulwark and looked back along the deck. One ball had +hit the scuttle-butt and had splashed the water fifteen feet in every +direction. Another had splintered the cross jack-yard. Suddenly, in the +brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a single +pistol-shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and fall. + +Our own guns, as we came about, sent an answer that cut the Arab's lower +sail to ribbons, disabled many men and, I am confident, killed several. But +there was no time to load again. Although by now we showed our stern to the +enemy, and had a fair--chance to outstrip her in a long race, her greater +momentum was bringing her down upon us rapidly. From aft came the order--it +was Mr. Thomas who gave it,--"All hands to the pikes and repel boarders!" + +There was, however, no more fighting. Our assailants took measure of the +stout nets and the strong battery of pikes, and, abandoning the whole +unlucky adventure, bore away on a new course. + +One man forward was killed and four were badly hurt. Mr. Thomas sat with +his back against the cabin, very white of face, with streams of red running +from his nostrils and his mouth; and Captain Whidden lay dead on the deck. +An hour later word passed through the ship that Mr. Thomas, too, had died. + + + +CHAPTER IX + +BAD SIGNS + + +It was strange that, while some of us in the forecastle were much cast down +by the tragic events of the day, others should seem to be put in really +good humor by it all. Neddie Benson soberly shook his head from time to +time; old Bill Hayden lay in his bunk without even a word about his "little +wee girl in Newburyport," and occasionally complained of not feeling well; +and various others of the crew faced the future with frank hopelessness. + +For my own part, it seemed to me as unreal as a nightmare that Captain +Joseph Whidden actually had been shot dead by a band of Arab pirates. I was +bewildered--indeed, stunned--by the incredible suddenness of the calamity. +It was so complete, so appallingly final! To me, a boy still in his 'teens, +that first intimate association with violent death would have been in +itself terrible, and I keenly felt the loss of our chief mate. But Captain +Whidden to me was far more than master of the ship. He had been my father's +friend since long before I was born; and from the days when I first +discriminated between the guests at my father's house, I had counted him as +also a friend of mine. Never had I dreamed that so sad an hour would darken +my first voyage. + +Kipping, on the other hand, and Davie Paine and the carpenter seemed +actually well pleased with what had happened. They lolled around with an +air of exasperating superiority when they saw any of the rest of us looking +at them; and now and then they exchanged glances that I was at a loss to +understand until all at once a new thought dawned on me: since the captain +and the first mate were dead, the command of the ship devolved upon +Mr. Falk, the second mate. + +No wonder that Kipping and Davie and the carpenter and all the rest of that +lawless clique were well pleased. No wonder that old Bill Hayden and some +of the others, for whom Kipping and his friends had not a particle of use +were downcast by the prospect. + +I was amazed at my own stupidity in not realizing it before, and above all +else I now longed to talk with someone whom I could trust--Roger Hamlin by +preference; as second choice, my friend the cook. But for the time being I +was disappointed in this. Almost immediately Mr. Falk summoned all hands +aft. + +"Men," he said, putting on a grave face that seemed to me assumed for the +occasion, "men, we've come through a dangerous time, and we are lucky to +have come alive out of the bad scrape that we were in. Some of us haven't +come through so well. It's a sad thing for a ship to lose an officer, and +it is twice as sad to lose two fine officers like Captain Whidden and Mr. +Thomas. I'll now read the service for the burial of the dead, and after +that I'll have something more to say to you." + +One of the men spoke in an undertone, and Mr. Falk cried, "What's that?" + +"If you please, sir," the man said, fidgeting nervously, "couldn't we go +ashore and bury them decently?" + +Others had thought of the same thing, and they showed it by their faces; +but Mr. Falk scowled and replied, "Nonsense! We'd be murdered in cold +blood." + +So we stood there, bareheaded, silent, sad at heart, and heard the droning +voice of the second mate,--even then he could not hide his unrighteous +satisfaction,--who read from a worn prayer-book, that had belonged to +Captain Whidden himself, the words committing the bodies of three men to +the deep, their souls to God. + +When the brief, perfunctory service was over, Mr. Falk put away the +prayer-book,--I verily believe he put away with it all fear of the +Lord,--folded his arms and faced us arrogantly. + +"By the death of Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas," he said, "I have become +the rightful master of this ship. Now I've got a few things to say to you, +and I'm going to have them understood. If you heed them and work smartly, +you'll get along as well as you deserve. If you don't heed them, you'd +better be dead and done with it. If you don't heed them--" he sneered +disagreeably--"if you don't heed them I'll lash the skin off the back of +every bloody mother's son of ye. This voyage from now on is to be carried +out for the best interests of all concerned." He stopped and smiled and +repeated significantly, "_Of_ ALL _concerned_." After another pause, in +which some of the men exchanged knowing glances, he went on, "I have no +doubt that the most of us will get along as well as need be. So far, well +and good. But if there's those that try to cross my bows,"--he swore +roundly,--"heaven help'em! They'll need it. That's all. Wait! One thing +more: we've got to have officers, and as I know you'll not be bold to pick +from among yourselves, I'll save you the trouble. Kipping from this time on +will be chief mate. You'll take his things aft, and you'll obey him from +now on and put the handle to his name. Paine will be second mate. That's +all. Go forward." + +Kipping and Davie Paine! I was thunderstruck. But some of the men exchanged +glances and smiles as before, and I saw by his expression that Roger, +although ill pleased, was by no means so amazed as I should have expected +him to be. + +For the last time as seaman, Kipping, mild and quiet, came to the +forecastle. But as he packed his bag and prepared to leave us, he smiled +constantly with a detestable quirk of his mouth, and before going he +stopped beside downcast old Bill Hayden. "Straighten up, be a man," he said +softly; "I'll see that you're treated right." He fairly drawled the words, +so mildly did he speak; but when he had finished, his manner instantly +changed. Thrusting out his chin and narrowing his eyes, he deliberately +drew back his foot and gave old Bill one savage kick. + +I was right glad that chance had placed me in the second mate's watch. + +As for Davie Paine, he was so overcome by the stroke of fortune that had +resulted in his promotion, that he could not even collect his belongings. +We helped him pile them into his chest, which he fastened with trembling +fingers, and gave him a hand on deck. But even his deep voice had failed +him for the time being, and when he took leave of us, he whispered +piteously, '"Fore the Lord, I dunno how it happened. I ain't never learned +to figger and I can't no more than write my name." + +What was to become of us? Our captain was a weak officer. Our present chief +mate no man of us trusted. + +Our second mate was inexperienced, incompetent, illiterate. More than ever +I longed to talk with Roger Hamlin, but there was no opportunity that +night. + +Our watch on deck was a farce, for old Davie was so unfamiliar with his new +duties and so confused by his sudden eminence that, according to the men at +the wheel, he didn't know north from south or aloft from alow. Evading his +confused glances, I sought the galley, and without any of the usual +complicated formalities was admitted to where the cook was smoking his rank +pipe. + +Rolling his eyes until the whites gleamed, he told me the following +astounding story. + +"Boy," he said, "dis am de most unmitigated day ol' Frank ever see. Cap'n, +he am a good man and now he's a dead un. Mistah Thomas he am a good man and +now _he's_ a dead un. What Ah tell you about dem ha'nts? Ef Ah could have +kotched a rabbit with a lef' hind-leg, Ah guess we'd be better off. Hey? +Mistah Falk, he am cap'n--Lo'd have mercy on us! Dat Kipping, he am chief +mate--Lo'd have mercy on us mis'able sinners! Davie Paine, he am second +mate--Lo'd perserve ou' souls! Ah guess you don't know what Ah heah Mistah +Falk say to stew'd! He says, 'Stew'd, we got ev'ything--ev'ything. And we +ain't broke a single law!' Now tell me what he mean by dat? What's stew'd +got, Ah want to know? But dat ain't all--no, sah, dat ain't all." + +He leaned forward, the whites of his eyes rolling, his fixed frown more +ominous than ever. "Boy, Ah see 'em when dey's dead, Ah did. Ah see 'em +all. Mistah Thomas, he have a big hole in de middle of his front, and dat +po' old sailo' man he have a big hole in de middle of his front. Yass, sah, +Ah see 'em! But cap'n, he have a little roun' hole in the back of his +head.--Yass, sah--_he was shot f'om behine_!" + +The sea that night was as calm and as untroubled as if the day had passed +in Sabbath quiet. It seemed impossible that we had endured so much, that +Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas were dead, that the space of only +twenty-four hours had wrought such a change in the fortunes of all on +board. + +[Illustration: We helped him pile his belongings into his chest +and gave him a hand on deck.] + +I could not believe that one of our own men had shot our captain. Surely +the bullet must have hit him when he was turning to give an order or to +oversee some particular duty. And yet I could not forget the cook's words. +They hummed in my ears. They sounded in the strumming of the rigging, in +the "talking" of the ship:-- + +"A little roun' hole in the back of his head--yass, sah--he was shot f'om +behine." + +Without the captain and Mr. Thomas the Island Princess was like a strange +vessel. Both Kipping and Davie Paine had been promoted from the starboard +watch, leaving us shorthanded; so a queer, self-confident fellow named +Blodgett was transferred from the chief mate's watch to ours. But even so +there were fewer hands and more work, and the spirit of the crew seemed to +have changed. Whereas earlier in the voyage most of the men had gone +smartly about their duties, always glad to lend a hand or join in a +chantey, and with an eye for the profit and welfare of the owners as well +as of themselves, now there came over the ship, silently, imperceptibly, +yet so swiftly and completely that, although no man saw it come, in +twenty-four hours it was with us and upon us in all its deadening and +discouraging weight, a spirit of lassitude and procrastination. You would +have expected some of the men to find it hard to give old Davie Paine quite +all the respect to which his new berth entitled him, and for my own part I +liked Kipping less even than I had liked Mr. Falk. But although my own +prejudice should have enabled me to understand any minor lapses from the +strict discipline of life aboard ship, much occurred in the next +twenty-four hours that puzzled me. + +For one thing, those men whom I had thought most likely to accord Kipping +and Mr. Falk due respect were most careless in their work and in the small +formalities observed between officers and crew. The carpenter and the +steward, for example, spent a long time in the galley at an hour when they +should have been busy with their own duties. I was near when they came out, +and heard the cook's parting words: "Yass, sah, yass, sah, it ain't +neveh no discombobilation to help out gen'lems, sah. Yass, sah, no, sah." + +And when, a little later, I myself knocked at the door, I got a reception +that surprised me beyond measure. + +"Who dah," the cook cried in his usual brusque voice. "Who dah knockin' at +mah door?" + +Coming out, he brushed past me, and stood staring fiercely from side to +side. I knew, of course, his curiously indirect methods, and I expected him +by some quick motion or muttered command to summon me, as always before, +into his hot little cubby-hole. Never was boy more taken aback! "Who dah +knockin' at mah door?" he said again, standing within two feet of my elbow, +looking past me not two inches from my nose. "Humph! Somebody knockin' at +mah door better look at what dey doin' or dey gwine git into a peck of +trouble." + +He turned his back on me and reentered the galley. + +Then I looked aft, and saw Kipping and the steward grinning broadly. +Before, I had been disconcerted. Now I was enraged. How had they turned old +black Frank against me, I wondered? Kipping and the steward, whom the negro +disliked above all people on board! So the steward and the carpenter and +Kipping were working hand in glove! And Mr. Falk probably was in the same +boat with them. Where was Roger Hamlin, and what was he doing as supercargo +to protect the goods below decks? Then I laughed shortly, though a little +angrily, at my own childish impatience. + +Certainly any suspicions of danger to the cargo were entirely without +foundations. Mr. Falk--Captain Falk, I must call him now--might have a +disagreeable personality, but there was nothing to indicate that he was not +in most respects a competent officer, or that the ship and cargo would +suffer at his hands. The cook had been companionable in his own peculiar +way and a very convenient friend indeed; but, after all, I could get along +very well on my own resources. + +The difference that a change of officers makes in the life and spirit of a +ship's crew is surprising to one unfamiliar with the sea. Captain Whidden +had been a gentleman and a first-class sailor; by ordering our life +strictly, though not harshly or severely, he had maintained that efficient, +smoothly working organization which is best and pleasantest for all +concerned. But Captain Falk was a master whose sails were cut on another +pattern. He lacked Captain Whidden's straightforward, searching gaze. From +the corners of his mouth lines drooped unpleasantly around his chin. His +voice was not forceful and commanding. I was confident that under ordinary +conditions he never would have been given a ship; I doubted even if he +would have got a chief mate's berth. But fortune had played into his hands, +and he now was our lawful master, resistance to whom could be construed as +mutiny and punished in any court in the land. + +Never, while Captain Whidden commanded the ship, would the steward and the +carpenter have deserted their work and have hidden themselves away in the +cook's galley. Never, I was positive, would such a pair of officers as +Kipping and old Davie Paine have been promoted from the forecastle. To be +sure, the transgressions of the carpenter and the steward were only petty +as yet, and if no worse came of our new situation, I should be very foolish +to take it all so seriously. But it was not easy to regard our situation +lightly. There were too many straws to show the direction of the wind. + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE TREASURE-SEEKER + + +It was a starlit night while we still lingered off the coast of Sumatra for +water and fresh vegetables. The land was low and black against the steely +green of the sky, and a young moon like a silver thread shone in the west. +Blodgett, the new man in our watch, was the centre of a little group on the +forecastle. + +He was small and wrinkled and very wise. The more I saw and heard of him, +the more I marveled that he had not attracted my attention before; but up +to this point in the voyage it was only by night that he had appeared +different from other men, and I thought of him only as a prowler in the +dark. + +In some ways he was like a cat. By day he would sit in corners in the sun +when opportunity offered, or lurk around the galley, shirking so brazenly, +that the men were amused rather than angry. Even at work he was as slow and +drowsy as an old cat, half opening his sleepy eyes when the officers called +him to account, and receiving an occasional kick or cuff with the same mild +surprise that a favorite cat might show. But once darkness had fallen, +Blodgett was a different man. He became nervously wakeful. His eyes +distended and his face lighted with strange animation. He walked hither and +yon. He fairly arched his neck. And sometimes, when some ordinary incident +struck his peculiar humor, he would throw back his head, open his great +mouth, and utter a screech of wild laughter for all the world like the yowl +of a tom-cat. + +On that particular night he walked the forecastle, keeping close to the +bulwarks, till the rest of us assembled by the rigging and watched him with +a kind of fascination. After a time he saw us gathered there and came over +to where we were. His eyes were large and his wrinkled features twitched +with eagerness. He seemed very old; he had traveled to the farthest lands. + +"Men," he cried in his thin, windy voice, "yonder's the moon." + +The moon indeed was there. There was no reason to gainsay him. He stood +with it over his left shoulder and extended his arms before him, one +pointing somewhat to the right, the other to the left. "The right hand is +the right way," he cried, "but the left we'll never leave." + +We stared at the man and wondered if he were mad. + +"No," he said, smiling at our puzzled glances, "we'll never leave the +left." + +"Belay that talk," said one of the men sharply. "Ye'll have to steer a +clearer course than that if you want us to follow you." + +Blodgett smiled. "The course is clear," he replied. "Yonder"--he waved his +right hand--"is Singapore and the Chinese Sea and Whampoa. It's the right +course. Our orders is for that course. Our cargo is for that course. It's +the course that will make money for the owners. It's the right--you +understand?--my right hand and the right course according to orders. But +yonder"--this time he waved his left hand--"is the course that won't be +left. And yet it's the left you know--my left hand." + +He explained his feeble little joke with an air of pride. + +"Why won't it be left?" the gruff seaman demanded. + +"Because," said Blodgett, "we ain't going to leave it. There's gold there +and no end of treasure. Do you suppose Captain Falk is going to leave it +all for some one else to get? He's going to sail through Malacca Strait and +across the Bay of Bengal to Calcutta. That's what he's going to do. I've +been in India myself and seen the heaps of gold lying on the ground by the +money-changer's door and no body watching it but a sleepy Gentoo." + +"But what's this treasure you're talking about," some one asked. + +"Sure," said Blodgett in a husky whisper, "it's a treasure such as never +was heard of before. There's barrels and barrels of gold and diamonds and +emeralds and rubies and no end of such gear. There's idols with crowns of +precious stones, and eyes in their carved heads that would pay a king's +ransom. There's money enough in gold mohurs and rupees to buy the Bank of +England." + +It was a cock-and-bull story that the little old man told us; but, absurd +though it was, he had an air of impressive sincerity; and although every +one of us would have laughed the yarn out of meeting had it been told of +Captain Whidden, affairs had changed in the last days aboard ship. +Certainly we did not trust Captain Falk. I thought of the cook's dark +words, "A little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine!" As we followed the direction of Blodgett's two hands,--the right +to the northeast and the Chinese shore, the left to the northwest and the +dim lowlands of Sumatra that lay along the road to Burma,--anything seemed +possible. Moon-madness was upon us, and we were carried away by the mystery +of the night. + +Such madness is not uncommon. Of tales in the fore-castle during a long +voyage there is no end. Extraordinary significance is attributed to trivial +happenings in the daily life of the crew, and the wonders of the sea and +the land are overshadowed completely by simple incidents that superstitious +shipmates are sure to exaggerate and to dwell upon. + +After a time, though, as Blodgett walked back and forth along the bulwark, +like a cat that will not go into the open, my sanity came back to me. + +"That's all nonsense," I said--perhaps too sharply; "Mr. Falk is an honest +seaman. His whole future would be ruined if he attempted any such thing as +that." + +"Ay, hear the boy," Blodgett muttered sarcastically. "What does the boy +think a man rich enough to buy all the ships in the king's navy will care +for such a future as Captain Falk has in front of him? Hgh! A boy that +don't know enough to call his captain by his proper title!" + +Blodgett fairly bristled in his indignation, and I said no more, although I +knew well enough--or thought I did--that such a scheme was quite too wild +to be plausible. Captain Falk might play a double game, but not such a +silly double game as that. + +"No," said Bill Hayden solemnly, as if voicing my own thought, "the captain +ain't going to spoil his good name like that." Poor, stupid old Bill! + +Blodgett snorted angrily, but the others laughed at Bill--silly old butt of +the forecastle, daft about his little girl!--and after speculating at +length concerning the treasure that Blodgett had described so vaguely, fell +at last into a hot argument about how far a skipper could disobey the +orders of his owners without committing piracy. + +Thus began the rumor that revealed the scatterwitted convictions so +characteristic of the strange, cat-like Blodgett, which later were to lead +almost to death certain simple members of the crew; which served, by a +freak of chance, to involve poor Bill Hayden in an affair that came to a +tragic end; and which, by a whim of fortune almost as remote, though +happier, placed me in closer touch with Roger Hamlin than I had been since +the Island Princess sailed from Salem harbor. + +An hour later I saw the cook standing silently by his galley. He gave me +neither look nor word, although he must have known that I was watching him, +but only puffed at his rank old pipe and stared at the stars and the hills. +I wondered if the jungle growth reminded him of his own African tropics; if +behind his grim, seamed face an unsuspected sense of poetry lurked, a sort +of half-beast, half-human imagination. + +Never glancing at me, never indicating by so much as a quiver of his black +features that he had perceived my presence, he sighed deeply, walked to the +rail and knocked the dead ashes from his pipe into the water. He then +turned and went into the galley and barricaded himself against intruders, +there to stay until, some time in the night, he should seek his berth in +the steerage for the few hours of deep sleep that were all his great body +required. But as he passed me I heard him murmuring to himself, "Dat Bill +Hayden, he betteh look out, yass, sah. He say Mistah Captain Falk don't +want to go to spoil his good name. Dat Hay den he betteh look out." + +With a bang of his plank door the old darky shut himself away from all of +us in the darkness of his little kingdom of pots and pans. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +III + +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XI + +A HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS IN GOLD + + +Unquestionably the negro had known that I was there. Never otherwise could +he have ignored me so completely. I was certain too, that his cryptic +remarks about Bill Hayden were intended for my ears, for he never acted +without a reason, obscure, perhaps, and far-fetched, but always, according +to his own queer notions, sufficient. + +Sometimes it seemed as if he despised me; sometimes, as if he were +concealing a warm, friendly regard for me. + +An hour later, hearing the murmer of low voices, I discovered a little +group of men by the mainmast; and moved by the curiosity that more than +once had led me where I had no business to go, I silently approached. + +"Ah," said one of the men, "so you're keeping a weather eye out for my good +name, are you?" It was Captain Falk. + +I was startled. It seemed as if the old African were standing at my +shoulder, saying, "What did Ah told you, hey?" The cook had used almost +those very words. Where, I wondered, had he got them? It was almost +uncanny. + +"No, sir," came the reply,--it was poor Bill Hayden's voice,--"no, sir, I +didn't say that. I said--" + +"Well, what _did_ you say? Speak up!" + +"Why, sir, it--well, it wasn't that, I know. I wouldn't never ha' said +that. I--well, sir, it sounded something like that, I got to admit--I--I +ain't so good at remembering, sir, as I might be." + +The shadowy figures moved closer together. + +"You'll admit, then, that it _sounded_ like that?" There was the thud of a +quick blow. "I'll show you. I don't care what you _said_, as long as that +was what you _meant_. Take that! I'll show you." + +"Oh!--I--that's just it, sir, don't hit me!--It may have sounded like that, +but--Oh!--it never meant anything like that. I can't remember just how the +words was put together--I ain't so good at remembering but--Oh!--" + +The scene made me feel sick, it was so brutal; yet there was nothing that +the rest of us could do to stop it. + +Captain Falk was in command of the ship. + +I heard a mild laugh that filled me with rage. "That's the way to make 'em +take back their talk, captain. Give him a good one," said the mild voice. +"He ain't the only one that 'll be better for a sound beating." + + +There was a scuffle of footsteps, then I heard Bill cry out, "Oh--oh!--oh!" + +Suddenly a man broke from the group and fled along the deck. + +"Come back here, you scoundrel!" the captain cried with vile oaths; "come +back here, or I swear I'll seize you up and lash you to a bloody pulp." + +The fugitive now stood in the bow, trembling, and faced those who were +approaching him. "Don't," he cried piteously, "I didn't go to do nothing." + +"Oh, no, not you!" said the mild voice, followed by a mild laugh. "He +didn't do nothing, captain." + +"Not he!" Captain Falk muttered. "I'll show him who's captain here." + +There was no escape for the unfortunate man. They closed in on him and +roughly dragged him from his retreat straight aft to the quarter-deck, and +there I heard their brief discussion. + +"Hadn't you better call up the men, captain?" asked the mild voice. "It'll +do 'em good, I'll warrant you." + +"No," the captain replied, hotly. "This is a personal affair. Strip him and +seize him up." + +I heard nothing more for a few minutes, but I could see them moving about, +and presently I distinguished Bill's bare back and arms as they +spread-eagled him to the rigging. + +Then the rope whistled in the air and Bill moaned. + +Unable to endure the sight, I was turning away, when some one coming from +the cabin broke in upon the scene. + +"Well," said Roger Hamlin, "what's all this about?" + +Roger's calm voice and composed manner were so characteristic of him that +for the moment I could almost imagine myself at home in Salem and merely +passing him on the street. + +"I'll have you know, sir," said Captain Falk, "that I'm master here." + +"Evidently, sir." + +"Then what do you mean, sir, by challenging me like that?" + +"From what I have heard, I judge that the punishment is out of proportion +to the offense, even if the steward's yarn was true." + +"I'll have you know, that I'm the only man aboard this ship that has any +judgment," Falk snarled. + +"Judgment ?" Roger exclaimed; and the twist he gave the word was so funny +that some one actually snickered. + +"Yes, judgment !" Falk roared; and he turned on Roger with all the anger of +his mean nature choking his voice. "I'll--I'll beat you, you young upstart, +you! I'll beat you in that man's place," he cried, with a string of oaths. + +"No," said Roger very coolly, "I think you won't." + +"By heaven, I will!" + +The two men faced each other like two cocks in the pit at the instant +before the battle. There was a deathly silence on deck. + +Such a scene, as I saw it there, if put on the stage in a theatre, would be +a drama in itself without word or action. The sky was bright with stars; +the land lay low and dark against the horizon; the sea whispered round the +ship and sparkled with golden phosphorescence. Over our heads the masts +towered to slender black shafts, which at that lofty height seemed far too +frail to support the great network of rigging and spars and close-furled +canvas. Dwarfed by the tall masts, by the distances of the sea, and by the +vastness of the heavens, the small black figures stood silent on the +quarter-deck. But one of those men was bound half-naked to the rigging, and +two faced each other in attitudes that by outline alone, for we could +discern the features of neither, revealed antagonism and defiance. + +"No," said Roger once more, very coolly, "I think you won't." + +As the captain lifted his rope to hit Bill again, Roger stepped forward. + +The captain looked sharply at him; then with a shrug he said, "Oh, well, +the fellow's had enough. Cut him down, cut him down." + +So they unlashed Bill, and he came forward with his clothes in his arms and +one long, raw welt across his back. + +"Now, what did I say?" he whimpered. "What did I say to make 'em do like +that?" + +What had he said, indeed? Certainly nothing culpable. Some one had twisted +his innocent remarks in such a way as to irritate the captain and had +carried tales to the cabin. With decent officers such a thing never would +have happened. Affairs had run a sad course since Captain Falk had read the +burial service over Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas, both of whom had been +strict, fair, honorable gentlemen. There was a sober time in the forecastle +that night, and none of us had much to say. + +Next day we sent a boat ashore again, and got information that led us to +sail along five miles farther, where there was a settlement from which we +got a good supply of water and vegetables. This took another day, and on +the morning of the day following we made sail once more and laid our course +west of Lingga Island, which convinced us for a time that we really were +about to bear away through Malacca Strait and on to Burma, at the very +least. + +I almost believed it myself, India seemed so near; and Blodgett, sleepy by +day, wakeful by night, prowled about with an air of triumph. But in the +forenoon watch Roger Hamlin came forward openly and told me certain things +that were more momentous than any treasure-hunting trip to India that +Blodgett ever dreamed of. + +Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping--I suppose they must be given their titles +now--watched him, and I could see that they didn't like it. They exchanged +glances and stared after him suspiciously, even resentfully; but there +was nothing that they could do or say. So he came on slowly and +confidently, looking keenly from one man to another as he passed. + +By this time the two parties on board were sharply divided, and from the +attitude of the men as they met Roger's glance their partisanship was +pretty plainly revealed. The two from Boston, who were, I was confident, +on friendly and even familiar terms with Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping, gave +him a half-concealed sneer. There was no doubt where their sympathies would +lie, should Roger cross courses with our new master. The carpenter, working +on a plank laid on deck, heard him coming, glanced up, and seeing who it +was, continued at his labor without moving so much as a hair's breadth to +let him by; the steward looked him in the eye brazenly and impersonally; +and others of the crew, among them the strange Blodgett, treated him with a +certain subtle rudeness, even contempt. Yet here and there a man was glad +to see him coming and gave him a cordial nod, or a cheerful "Ay, ay, sir," +in answer to whatever observation he let fall. + +The cook alone, as I watched the scene with close interest, I could not +understand. To a certain extent he seemed surly, to a certain extent, +subservient. Perhaps he intended that we--and others--should be mystified. + +One thing I now realized for the first time: although the crew was divided +into two cliques, the understanding was much more complete on the side of +Captain Falk. Among those who enjoyed the favor of our new officers there +was, I felt sure, some secret agreement, perhaps even some definite +organization. There seemed to be a unity of thought and manner that only a +common purpose could explain, whereas the rest drifted as the wind blew. + +"Ben," Roger said, coming to me where I sat on the forecastle, "I want to +talk to you. Step over by the mast." + +I followed him, though surprised. + +"Here we can see on all sides," he said. "There are no hiding-places within +earshot. Ben"--He hesitated as if to find the right words. + +All were watching us now, the captain and the mate from the quarter-deck, +the others from wherever they happened to be. + +"I am loath to draw your sister's younger brother into danger," Roger +began. His adjective was tactfully chosen. "I am almost equally reluctant +to implicate you in what seems likely to confront us, because you are an +old friend of mine and a good deal younger than I am. But when the time +comes to go home, Ben, I'm sure we want to be able to look your sister and +all the others squarely in the eyes, with our hands clean and our +consciences clear--if we go home. How about it, Ben?" + + +I was too bewildered to answer, and in Roger's eyes something of his old +twinkle appeared. + +"Ultimately," he continued, grave once more and speaking still in enigmas, +"we shall be vindicated in any case. But I fear that, before then, I, for +one, shall have to clasp hands with mutiny, perhaps with piracy. How would +you like that, Ben, with a thundering old fight against odds, a fight that +likely enough will leave us to sleep forever on one of these green islands +hereabouts?" + +Still I did not understand. + +Roger regarded me thoughtfully. "Tell me all that you know about our +cargo." + +"Why," said I, finding my tongue at last, "it's ginseng and woollen goods +for Canton. That's all I know." + +"Then you don't know that at this moment there is one hundred thousand +dollars in gold in the hold of the Island Princess?" + +"What?" I gasped. + +"One hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +I could not believe my ears. Certainly, so far as I was concerned, the +secret had been well kept. + +Then a new thought came to me, "Does Captain Falk know?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Roger, "Captain Falk knows." + + + +CHAPTER XII + +A STRANGE TALE + + +Roger Hamlin's words were to linger a long time in my ears, and so far as I +then could see, there was little to say in reply. A hundred thousand +dollars in gold had bought, soul and body, many a better man than Captain +Falk. At that very moment Falk was watching us from the quarter-deck with +an expression on his face that was partly an amused smile, partly a sneer. +Weak and conceited though he was, he was master of that ship and crew in +more ways than one. + +But Roger had not finished. "Do you remember, Ben," he continued in a low +voice, but otherwise unmindful of those about us, "that some half a dozen +years ago, when Thomas Webster was sore put to it for enough money to +square his debts and make a clean start, the brig Vesper, on which he had +sent a venture, returned him a profit so unbelievably great that he was +able to pay his creditors and buy from the Shattucks the old Eastern +Empress, which he fitted out for the voyage to Sumatra that saved his +fortunes?" + +I remembered it vaguely--I had been only a small boy when it happened--and +I listened with keenest interest. The Websters owned the Island Princess. + +"Not a dozen people know all the story of that voyage. It's been a kind of +family secret with the Websters. Perhaps they're ashamed to be so deeply +indebted to a Chinese merchant. Well, it's a story I shouldn't tell under +other conditions, but in the light of all that's come to pass, it's best +you should hear the whole tale, Ben; and in some ways it's a fine tale, +too. The Websters, as you probably know, had had bad luck, what with three +wrecks and pirates in the West Indies. They were pretty much by the head in +those days, and it was a dark outlook before them, when young Webster +signed the Vesper's articles as first officer and went aboard, with all +that the old man could scrape together for a venture, and with the future +of his family hanging in the balance. At Whampoa young Webster went up to +the Hong along with the others, and drove what bargains he could, and +cleared a tidy little sum. But it was nowhere near enough to save the +family. If only they could get the money to tide them over, they'd weather +the gale. If not, they'd go on a lee shore. Certain men--you'd know their +names, but such things are better forgotten--were waiting to attach the +ships the Websters had on the ways, and if the ships were attached there +would be nothing left for the Websters but stools in somebody's +counting-house. + +"As I've heard the story, young Webster was waiting by the river for his +boat, with a face as long as you'd hope to see, when a Chinese who'd been +watching him from a little distance came up and addressed him in such +pidgin English as he could muster and asked after his father. Of course +young Webster was taken by surprise, but he returned a civil answer, and +the two fell to talking together. It seemed that, once upon a time, when +the Chinese was involved, head and heels, with some rascally down-east +Yankee, old man Webster had come to the rescue and had got him out of the +scrape with his yellow hide whole and his moneybags untapped. + +"The Chinaman seemed to suspect from the boy's long face that all was not +as it should be, and he squeezed more or less of the truth out of the +young fellow, had him up to the Hong again, gave him various gifts, and +sent him back to America with five teak-wood chests. Just five ordinary +teak-wood chests--but in those teak-wood chests, Ben, was the money that +put the Websters on their feet again. The hundred thousand dollars below +is for that Chinese merchant." + +It was a strange tale, but stranger tales than that were told in the old +town from which we had sailed. + +"And Captain Falk--?" I began questioningly. + +"Captain Falk was never thought of as a possible master of this ship." + +"Will he try to steal the money?" + +Roger raised his brows. "Steal it? Steal is a disagreeable word. He thinks +he has a grievance because he was not given the chief mate's berth to begin +with. He says, at all events, that he will not hand over any such sum to a +yellow heathen. He thinks he can return it to the owners two-fold. Although +he seldom reads his Bible, I believe he referred to the man who was given +ten talents." + +"But the owners' orders!" I exclaimed. + +"The owners' orders in that respect were secret. They were issued to +Captain Whidden and to me, and Captain Falk refuses to accept my version of +them." + +"And you?" + +Roger smiled and looked me hard in the eye. "I am going to see that they +are carried out," he said. "The Websters would be grievously disappointed +if this commission were not discharged. Also--" his eyes twinkled in the +old way--"I am not convinced that Captain Falk is in all respects an +honest--no, let us not speak too harshly--let us say, a _reliable_ man." + +"So there'll be a fight," I mused. + +"We'll see," Roger replied. "In any case, you know the story. Are you with +me?" + +After fifty years I can confess without shame that I was frightened when +Roger asked me that question, for Roger and I were only two, and Falk, by +hook or by crook, had won most of the others to his side. There was Bill +Hayden, to be sure, on whom we could count; but he was a weak soul at best, +and of the cook's loyalty to Roger and whatever cause he might espouse I +now held grave doubts. Yet I managed to reply, "Yes, Roger, I am with you." + +I thought of my sister when I said it, and of the white flutter of her +handkerchief, which had waved so bravely from the old wharf when Roger and +I sailed out of Salem harbor. After all, I was glad even then that I had +answered as I did. + +"I'll have more to say later," said Roger; "but if I stay here much longer +now, Falk and Kipping will be breaking in upon us." And, turning, he coolly +walked aft. + +Falk and Kipping were still watching us with sneers, and not a few of the +crew gave us hostile glances as we separated. But I looked after Roger with +an affection and a confidence that I was too young fully to appreciate. I +only realized that he was upright and fearless, and that I was ready to +follow him anywhere. + +More and more I was afraid of the influence that Captain Falk had +established in the forecastle. More and more it seemed as if he actually +had entered into some lawless conspiracy with the men. Certainly they +grumbled less than before, and accepted greater discomforts with better +grace; and although I found myself excluded from their councils without any +apparent reason, I overheard occasional snatches of talk from which I +gathered that they derived great satisfaction from their scheme, whatever +it was. Even the cook would have none of me in the galley of an evening; +and Roger in the cabin where no doubt he was fighting his own battles, was +far away from the green hand in the forecastle. I was left to my own +devices and to Bill Hayden. + +To a great extent, I suppose, it counted against me that I was the son of a +gentleman. But if I was left alone forward, so Roger, I learned now and +then, was left alone aft. + +Continually I puzzled over the complacency of the men. They would nod and +smile and glance at me pityingly, even when I was getting my meat from the +same kids and my tea from the same pot; and chance phrases, which I caught +now and then, added to my uneasiness. + +Once old Blodgett, prowling like a cat in the night, was telling how he was +going to "take his money and buy a little place over Ipswich way. There's +nice little places over Ipswich way where a man can settle snug as you +please and buy him a wife and end his days in comfort. We'll go home by way +of India, too, I'll warrant you, and take each of us our handful of round +red rubies. Right's right, but right'll be left--mind what I tell you." +Another time--on the same day, as I now recall it--I overheard the +carpenter saying that he was going to build a brick house in Boston up on +Temple Place. "And there'll be fan-lights over the door," he said, "their +panels as thin as rose-leaves, and leaded glass in a fine pattern." The +carpenter was a craftsman who aspired to be an artist. + +But where did old Blodgett or the carpenter hope to get the money to +indulge the tastes of a prosperous merchant? I suspected well enough the +answer to that question, and I was not far wrong. + +The cook remained inscrutable. I could not fathom the expressions of his +black frowning face. Although Captain Falk of course had no direct +communication with him openly, I learned through Bill Hayden that +indirectly he treated him with tolerant and friendly patronage. It even did +not surprise me greatly to be told that sometimes he secretly visited the +galley after dark and actually hobnobbed with black Frank in his own +quarters. It was almost incredible, to be sure; but so was much else in +which Captain Falk was implicated, and I could see revealed now in the game +that he was playing his desire to win and hold the men until they had +served his ends, whatever those ends might be. + +"Yass, sah," black Frank would growl absently as he passed me without a +glance, "dis am de most appetizin' crew eveh Ah cooked foh. Dey's got no +mo' bottom to dey innards dan a sponge has. Ah's a-cookin' mah head off to +feed dat bunch of wuthless man-critters, a-a-a-a-h!" And he would stump to +the galley with a brimming pail of water in each hand. + +I came sadly to conclude that old Frank had found other friends more to his +taste than the boy in the forecastle, and that Captain Falk, by trickery +and favoritism, really was securing his grip on the crew. In all his petty +manoeuvres and childish efforts to please the men and flatter them and make +them think him a good officer to have over them, he had made up to this +point only one or two false steps. + +Working our way north by west to the Straits of Singapore, and thence on +into the China Sea, where we expected to take advantage of the last weeks +of the southwest monsoon, we left far astern the low, feverous shores of +Sumatra. There were other games than a raid on India to be played for +money, and the men thought less and less now of the rubies of Burma and the +gold mohurs and rupees of Calcutta. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +TROUBLE FORWARD + + +In the starboard watch, one fine day when there was neither land nor sail +in sight, Davie Paine was overseeing the work on the rigging and badly +botching it. The old fellow was a fair seaman himself, but for all his deep +voice and big body, his best friend must have acknowledged that as an +officer he was hopelessly incompetent. "Now unlay the strands so," he would +say. "No, that ain't right. No, so! No, that ain't right either. Supposing +you form the eye so. No, that ain't right either." + +After a time we were smiling so broadly at his confused orders that we +caught the captain's eye. + +He came forward quickly--say what you would against Captain Falk as an +officer, no one could deny that he knew his business--and instantly he took +in the whole unfortunate situation. "Well, _Mister_ Paine," he cried, +sarcastically stressing the title, "are n't you man enough to unlay a bit +of rope and make a Flemish eye?" + +Old Davie flushed in hopeless embarrassment, and even the men who had been +chuckling most openly were sorry for him. That the captain had reason to be +dissatisfied with the second mate's work, we were ready enough to admit; +but he should have called him aside and rebuked him privately. We all, I +think, regarded such open interference as unnecessary and unkind. + +"Why--y-yes, sir," Davie stammered. + +"To make you a Flemish eye," Captain Falk continued in cold sarcasm, "you +unlay the end of the rope and open up the yarns. Then you half-knot some +half the inside yarns over that bit of wood you have there, and scrape the +rest of them down over the others, and marl, parcel, and serve them +together. That's the way you go to make a Flemish eye. Now then, _Mister_ +Paine, see that you get a smart job done here and keep your eyes open, you +old lubber. I thought you shipped for able seaman. A fine picture of an +able seaman you are, you doddering old fool!" + +It is impossible to reproduce the meanness with which he gave his little +lecture, or the patronizing air with which he walked away. Old Davie was +quite taken aback by it and for a time he could not control his voice +enough to speak. It was pitiful to see him drop all the pretensions of his +office and, as if desiring only some friendly word, try to get back on the +old familiar footing of the forecastle. + +"I know I ain't no great shakes of a scholar," he managed to mutter at +last, "and I ain't no great shakes of a second mate. But he made me second +mate, he did, and he hadn't ought to shame me in front of all the men, now +had he? It was him that gave me the berth. If he don't like me in it, now +why don't he take it away from me? I didn't want to be second mate when he +made me do it, and I can't read figures good nor nothing. Now why don't he +send me forrard if he don't like the way I do things?" + +The old man ran on in a pathetic monologue, for none of us felt exactly at +liberty to put in our own oars, and he could find relief only in his +incoherent talk. It had been a needless and unkind thing and the men almost +unanimously disapproved of it. Why indeed should Captain Falk not send +Davie back to the forecastle rather than make his life miserable aft? The +captain was responsible only to himself for the appointment, and its tenure +depended only on his own whims; but that, apparently, he had no intention +of doing. + +"'Tain't right," old Blodgett murmured, careful not to let Captain Falk see +him talking. "He didn't ought to use a man like that." + +"No, he didn't," Neddie Benson said in his squeaky voice, turning his face +so that neither Davie nor Captain Falk should see the motion of his lips. +"I didn't ought to ship for this voyage, either. The fortune teller--she +was a lady, she was, a nice lady--she says, 'Neddie, there'll be a dark man +and a light man and a store of trouble.' She kind of liked me, I think. But +I up and come. I'm always reckless." + +A ripple of low, mild laughter, which only Kipping could have uttered, +drifted forward, and the men exchanged glances and looked furtively at old +Davie. + +The murmur of disapproval went from mouth to mouth, until for a time I +dared hope that Captain Falk had quite destroyed the popularity that he had +tried so hard to win. But, though Davie was grieved by the injustice and +though the men were angry, they seemed soon to forget it in the excitement +of that mysterious plot from which Roger and I were virtually the only ones +excluded. + +Nevertheless, like certain other very trivial happenings aboard the Island +Princess, Captain Falk's unwarrantable insult to Davie Paine--it seems +incongruous to call him "mister"--was to play its part later in events that +as yet were only gathering way. + +We had not seen much of Kipping for a time, and perhaps it was because he +had kept so much to himself that to a certain extent we forgot his sly, +tricky ways. His laugh, mild and insinuating, was enough to call them to +mind, but we were to have a yet more disagreeable reminder. + +All day Bill Hayden had complained of not feeling well and now he leaned +against the deck-house, looking white and sick. Old Davie would never have +troubled him, I am sure, but Kipping was built by quite another mould. + +Unaware of what was brewing, I turned away, sorry for poor Bill, who seemed +to be in much pain, and in response to a command from Kipping, I went aloft +with an "Ay, ay sir," to loose the fore-royal. Having accomplished my +errand, I was on my way down again, when I heard a sharp sound as of +slapping. + +Startled, I looked at the deck-house. I was aware at the same time that the +men below me were looking in the same direction. + +The sound of slapping was repeated; then I heard a mild, gentle voice +saying, "Oh, he's sick, is he? Poor fellow! Ain't it hard to be sick away +from home?" Slap--slap. "Well, I declare, what do you suppose we'd better +do about it? Shan't we send for the doctor? Poor fellow!" Slap--slap. "Ah! +ah! ah!" Kipping's voice hardened. "You blinking, bloody old fool. You +would turn on me, would you? You would give me one, would you? You would +sojer round the deck and say you're sick, would you? I 'll show you--take +that--I'll show you!" + +Now, as I sprang on deck and ran out where I could see what was going +forward, I heard Bill's feeble reply. "Don't hit me, sir. I didn't go to do +nothing. I'm sick. I've got a pain in my innards. I _can't_ work--so help +me, I _can't_ work." + +"Aha!" Again Kipping laughed mildly. "Aha! _Can't_ work, eh? I'll teach you +a lesson." + +Bill staggered against the deck-house and clumsily fell, pressing his hands +against his side and moaning. + +"Hgh!" Kipping grunted. "Hgh!" + +At that moment the day flashed upon my memory when I had sat on one side of +that very corner while Kipping attempted to bully Bill on the other side of +it--the day when Bill had turned on his tormentor. I now understood some of +Kipping's veiled references, and a great contempt for the man who would use +the power and security of his office to revenge himself on a fellow seaman +who merely had stood up bravely for his rights swept over me. But what +could I or the others do? Kipping now was mate, and to strike him would be +open mutiny. Although thus far, in spite of the dislike with which he and +Captain Falk regarded me, my good behavior and my family connections had +protected me from abuse, I gladly would have forfeited such security to +help Bill; but mutiny was quite another affair. + +We all stood silent, while Kipping berated Bill with many oaths, though +poor Bill was so white and miserable that it was almost more than we could +endure. I, for one, thought of his little girl in Newburyport, and I +remember that I hoped she might never know of what her loving, stupid old +father was suffering. + +Enraged to fury by nothing more or less than Bill's yielding to his +attacks, Kipping turned suddenly and reached for the carpenter's mallet, +which lay where Chips had been working nearby. With a round oath, he +yelled, "I'll make you grovel and ask me to stop." + +Kipping had moved quickly, but old Bill moved more quickly still. Springing +to his feet like a flash, with a look of anguish on his face such as I hope +I never shall see again, he warded off a blow of the mallet with his hand +and, running to the side, scrambled clean over the bulwark into the sea. + +We stood there like men in a waxwork for a good minute at the very least; +and if you think a minute is not a long time, try it with your eyes shut. +Kipping's angry snarl was frozen on his mean features,--it would have been +ludicrous if the scene had not been so tragic,--and his outstretched hand +still held the mallet at the end of the blow. The carpenter's mouth was +open in amazement. Neddie Benson, the first to move or break the silence, +had spread his hands as if he were about to clutch at a butterfly or a +beetle; dropping them to his side, he gasped huskily, "She said there'd be +a light man and a dark man--I--oh, Lord!" + +It was the cook, as black as midnight and as inscrutable as a figurehead, +who brought us to our senses. Silently observing all that had happened, he +had stood by the galley, without lifting his hand or changing the +expression of a single feature; but now, taking his pipe from his mouth, he +roared, "Man ovehboa'd!" Then, snatching up the carpenter's bench with one +hand and gathering his great body for the effort, he gave a heave of his +shoulders and tossed the bench far out on the water. + +As if waking from a dream, Mr. Kipping turned aft, smiling scornfully, and +said with a deliberation that seemed to me criminal, "Put down the helm!" + +So carelessly did he speak, that the man at the wheel did not hear him, and +he was obliged to repeat the order a little more loudly. "Didn't you hear +me? I say, put down the helm." + +"Put down the helm, sir," came the reply; and the ship began to head up in +the wind. + +At this moment Captain Falk, having heard the cook's shout, appeared on +deck, breathing hard, and took command. However little I liked Captain +Falk, I must confess in justice to him that he did all any man could have +done under the circumstances. While two or three hands cleared away a +quarter-boat, we hauled up the mainsail, braced the after yards and raised +the head sheets, so that the ship, with her main yards aback, drifted down +in the general direction in which we thought Bill must be. + +Not a man of us expected ever to see Bill again. He had flung himself +overboard so suddenly, and so much time had elapsed, that there seemed to +be no chance of his keeping himself afloat. I saw that the smile actually +still hovered on Kipping's mean, mild mouth. But all at once the cook, near +whom I was standing, grasped my arm and muttered almost inaudibly, "If dey +was to look behine, dey'd get ahead, yass, sah." + +Taking his hint, I looked astern and cried out loudly. Something was +bobbing at the end of the log line. It was Bill clinging desperately. + +When we got him on board, he was nearer dead than alive, and even the stiff +drink that the captain poured between his blue lips did not really revive +him. He moaned continually and now and then he cried out in pain. +Occasionally, too, he tried to tell us about his little girl at +Newburyport, and rambled on about how he had married late in life and had a +good wife and a comfortable home, and before long, God willing, he would be +back with them once more and would never sail the seas again. It was all so +natural and homely that I didn't realize at the time that Bill was +delirious; but when I helped the men carry him below, I was startled to +find his face so hot, and presently it came over me that he did not +recognize me. + +Poor old stupid Bill! He meant so well, and he wished so well for all of +us! It was hard that he should be the one who could not keep out of harm's +way. + +But there were other things to think of, more important even than the fate +of Bill Hayden, and one of them was an extraordinary interview with the +cook. + +I heard laughter in the galley that night, and lingered near as long as I +dared, with a boy's jealous desire to learn who was enjoying the cook's +hospitality. By his voice I soon knew that it was the steward, and +remembering how black Frank once was ready to deceive him for the sake of +giving me a piece of pie, I was more disconsolate than ever. After a while +I saw him leave, but I thought little of that. I still had two more hours +to stand watch, so I paced along in the darkness, listening to the sound of +the waves and watching the bright stars. + +When presently I again passed the galley I thought I heard a suspicious +sound there. Later I saw something move by the door. But neither time did I +go nearer. I had no desire for further rebuffs from the old negro. + +When I passed a third time, at a distance of only a foot or two, I was +badly startled. A long black arm reached out from the apparently closed +door; a black hand grasped me, lifted me bodily from the floor, and +silently drew me into the galley, which was as dark as Egypt. I heard the +cook close the door behind me and bolt it and cover the deadlight with a +tin pan. What he was up to, I had not the remotest idea; but when he had +barricaded and sealed every crack and cranny, he lighted a candle and set +it on a saucer and glared at me ferociously. + +"Mind you, boy," he said in a very low voice, "don't you think Ah'm any +friend of yo's. No, sah. Don't you think Ah'm doing nothin' foh you. No, +sah. 'Cause Ah ain't. No, sah. Ah'm gwine make a fo'tune dis yeh trip, Ah +am. Yass, sah. Dis yeh nigger's gwine go home putty darn well off. Yass, +sah. So don't you think dis yeh nigger's gwine do nothin' foh you. No, +sah." + +For a moment I was completely bewildered; then, as I recalled the darky's +crafty and indirect ways, my confidence returned and I had the keenest +curiosity to see what would be forthcoming. + +"Boys, dey's a pest," he grumbled. "Dey didn't had ought to have boys +aboa'd ship. No, sah. Cap'n Falk, he say so, too." + +The negro was looking at me so intently that I searched his words for some +hidden meaning; but I could find none. + +"No, sah, boys am de mos' discombobulationest eveh was nohow. Yass, sah. +Dey's been su'thin' happen aft. Yass, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy, +nohow. No, sah. 'Taint dis nigger would go tell a boy dat Mistah Hamlin he +have a riot with Mistah Cap'n Falk, no sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat +Mistah Hamlin, he say dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he ain't holdin' to de right +co'se, no, sah; nor dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he bristle up like a guinea +gander and he say, while he's swearin' most amazin', dat he know what co'se +he's sailin', no, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat Mistah Hamlin, he say +he am supercargo, an' dat he reckon he got orders f'om de owners; and +Mistah Cap'n Falk, he say he am cap'n and he cuss su'thin' awful 'bout dem +orders; and Mistah Roger Hamlin he say Mistah Cap'n Falk his clock am a +hour wrong and no wonder Mistah Kipping am writing in de log-book dat de +ship am whar she ain't; and Mistah Kipping he swear dre'ful pious and he +say by golly he am writer of dat log-book and he reckon he know what's what +ain't. No, sah, Ah ain't gwine tell a boy dem things 'cause Ah tell stew'd +Ah ain't, an' stew'd, him an' me is great friends, what's gwine make a +fo'tune _when Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +He said those last words in a whisper, and stared at me intently; in that +same whisper, he repeated them, "When Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +Then, in a strangely meditative way, as if an unfamiliar process of thought +suddenly occupied all his attention, he muttered absently, letting his eyes +fall, "Seem like Ah done see dat Kipping befo'; Ah jes' can't put mah +finger on him." It was the second time that he had made such a remark in my +hearing. + +The candle guttered in the saucer that served for a candlestick, and its +crazy, wavering light shone unsteadily on the black face of the cook, who +continued to stare at me grimly and apparently in anger. A pan rattled as +the ship rolled. Water splashed from a bucket. I watched the drops falling +from the shelf. One--two--three--four--five--six--seven! Each with its +_pht_, its little splash. They continued to drip interminably. I lost all +count of them. And still the black face, motionless except for the wildly +rolling eyes, stared at me across the galley stove. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +BILL HAYDEN COMES TO THE END OF HIS VOYAGE + + +I was ejected from the galley as abruptly and strangely as I had been drawn +into it. The candle went out at a breath from the great round lips; the big +hand again closed on my shoulder and lifted me bodily from my chair. The +door opened and shut, and there was I, dazed by my strange experience and +bewildered by the story I had heard, outside on the identical spot from +which I had been snatched ten minutes before. + +In my ears the negro's parting message still sounded, "Dis nigger wouldn't +tell a boy one word, no sah, not dis nigger. If he was to tell a boy jest +one leetle word, dat boy, he might lay hisself out ready foh a fight. Yass, +sah." + +For a long time I puzzled over the whole extraordinary experience. It was +so like a dream, that only the numbness of my arm where the negro's great +fist had gripped it convinced me that the happenings of the night were +real. But as I pondered, I found more and more significance in the cook's +incoherent remarks, and became more and more convinced that their +incoherence was entirely artful. Obviously, first of all, he was trying to +pacify his conscience, which troubled him for breaking the promise of +secrecy that he probably had given the steward, from whom he must have +learned the things at which he had hinted. Also he had established for +himself an alibi of a kind, if ever he should be accused of tattling about +affairs in the cabin. + +That Captain Falk had promised to divide the money among the crew, I long +had suspected; consequently that part of the cook's revelations did not +surprise me. But the picture he gave of affairs in the cabin, disconnected +though it was, caused me grave concern. After all, what could Roger do to +preserve the owners' property or to carry out their orders? Captain Falk +had all the men on his side, except me and perhaps poor old Bill Hayden. +Indeed, I feared for Roger's own safety if he had detected that rascally +pair in falsifying the log; he then would be a dangerous man when we all +went back to Salem together. I stopped as if struck: what assurance had I +that we should go back to Salem together--or singly, for that matter? There +was no assurance whatever, that all, or any one of us, would ever go back +to Salem. If they wished to make way with Roger, and with me too, for that +matter, the green tropical seas would keep the secret until the end of +time. + +I am not ashamed that I frankly was white with fear of what the future +might bring. You can forgive in a boy weaknesses of which a man grown might +have been guilty. But as I watched the phosphorescent sea and the stars +from which I tried to read our course, I gradually overcame the terror that +had seized me. I think that remembering my father and mother, and my +sister, for whom I suspected that Roger cared more than I, perhaps, could +fully realize, helped to compose me; and I am sure that the thought of the +Roger I had known so long,--cool, bold, resourceful, with that twinkle in +his steady eyes--did much to renew my courage. When eight bells struck and +some one called down the hatch, "Larbowlines ahoy," and the dim figures of +the new watch appeared on deck, and we of the old watch went below, I was +fairly ready to face whatever the next hours might bring. + +"Roger and I against them all," I thought, feeling very much a martyr, +"unless," I mentally added, "Bill Hayden joins us." At that I actually +laughed, so that Blodgett, prowling restlessly in the darkness, asked me +crossly what was the matter. I should have been amazed and incredulous if +anyone had told me that poor Bill Hayden was to play the deciding part in +our affairs. + +He lay now in his bunk, tossing restlessly and muttering once in a while to +himself. When I went over and asked if there was anything that I could do +for him, he raised himself on his elbow and stared at me more stupidly than +ever. It seemed to come to him slowly who I was. After a while he made out +my face by the light of the dim, swinging lantern, and thanked me, and said +if I would be so good as to give him a drink of water--He never completed +the sentence; but I brought him a drink carefully, and when he had finished +it, he thanked me again and leaned wearily back. + +His face seemed dark by the lantern-light, and I judged that it was still +flushed. Muttering something about a "pain in his innards," he apparently +went to sleep, and I climbed into my own bunk. The lantern swung more and +more irregularly, and Bill tossed with ever-increasing uneasiness. When at +last I dozed off, my own sleep was fitful, and shortly I woke with a start. + +Others, too, had waked, and I heard questions flung back and forth:-- + +"Who was that yelled?" + +"Did you hear that? Tell me, did you hear it?" + +Some one spoke of ghosts,--none of us laughed,--and Neddie Benson whimpered +something about the lady who told fortunes. "She said the light man and the +dark man would make no end o' trouble," he cried; "and he--" + +"Keep still," another voice exclaimed angrily. "It was Bill Hayden," the +voice continued. "He hollered." + +Getting out of my bunk, I crossed the forecastle. "Bill," I said, "are you +all right?" + +He started up wildly. "Don't hit me!" he cried. "That wasn't what I said-- +it--I don't remember _just_ what I said, because I ain't good at +remembering, but it wasn't that--don't-oh! oh!--I _know_ it wasn't that." + +Two of the men joined me, moving cautiously for the ship was pitching now +in short, heavy seas. + +"What's that he's saying?" one of them asked. + +Before I could answer, Bill seemed suddenly to get control of himself. +"Oh," he moaned. "I've got such a pain in my innards! I've got a rolling, +howling old pain in my innards." + +There was little that we could do, so we smoothed his blankets and went +back to our own. The Island Princess was pitching more fiercely than ever +now, and while I watched the lantern swing and toss before I went to sleep, +I heard old Blodgett saying something about squalls and cross seas. There +was not much rest for us that night. No sooner had I hauled the blankets to +my chin and closed my eyes, than a shout came faintly down to us, +"All-hands--on deck!" + +Some one called, "Ay, ay," and we rolled out again wearily--all except Bill +Hayden whose fitful tossing seemed to have settled at last into deep sleep. + +Coming on deck, we found the ship scudding under close-reefed maintopsail +and reefed foresail, with the wind on her larboard quarter. A heavy sea +having blown up, all signs indicated that a bad night was before us; and +just as we emerged from the hatch, she came about suddenly, which brought +the wind on the starboard quarter and laid all aback. + +In the darkness and rain and wind, we sprang to the ropes. Mr. Kipping was +forward at his post on the forecastle and Captain Falk was on the +quarter-deck. As the man at the wheel put the helm hard-a-starboard, we +raised the fore tack and sheet, filled the foresail and shivered the +mainsail, thus bringing the wind aft again, where we met her with the helm +and trimmed the yards for her course. For the moment we were safe, but +already it was blowing a gale, and shortly we lay to, close-reefed, under +what sails we were carrying. + +In a lull I heard Blodgett, who was pulling at the ropes by my side, say to +a man just beyond him, "Ay, it's a good thing for _us_ that Captain Falk +got command. We'd never make our bloody fortunes under the old officers." + +As the wind came again and drowned whatever else may have been said, I +thought to myself that they never would have. Plainly, Captain Falk and +Kipping had won over the simple-minded crew, which was ready to follow them +with never a thought of the chance that that precious pair might run off +with the spoils themselves and leave the others in the lurch. + +But now Kipping's indescribably disagreeable voice, which we all by this +time knew so well, asked, "Has anybody seen that sojering old lubber, +Hayden?" + +"Ay, ay, sir," Blodgett replied. "He's below sick." + +"Sick?" said the mild voice. "Sick is he? Supposing Blodgett, you go below +and bring him on deck. He ain't sick, he's sojering." + +"But, sir,--" Blodgett began. + +"But what?" roared Kipping. His mildness changed to fierceness. "_You go_!" +He snapped out the words, and Blodgett went. + +Poor stupid old Bill! + +When he appeared, Blodgett had him by the arm to help him. + +"You sojering, bloody fool," Kipping cried; "do you think I'm so blind I +can't see through such tricks as yours?" + +A murmur of remonstrance came from the men, but Kipping paid no attention +to it. + +"You think, do you, that I ain't on to your slick tricks? Take that." + +Bill never flinched. + +"So!" Kipping muttered. "So! Bring him aft." + +Though heavy seas had blown up, the squalls had subsided, and some of the +men, for the moment unoccupied, trailed at a cautious distance after the +luckless Bill. We could not hear what those on the quarterdeck said; but +Blodgett, who stood beside me and stared into the darkness with eyes that I +was convinced could see by night, cried suddenly, "He's fallen!" + +Then Captain Falk called, "Come here, two or three of you, and take this +man below." + +Old Bill was moaning when we got there. "Sure," he groaned, "I've got a +rolling--howling--old Barney's bull of a pain in my innards." But when we +laid him in his bunk, he began to laugh queerly, and he seemed to pretend +that he was talking to his little wee girl; for we heard him saying that +her old father had come to her and that he was never going to leave her +again. + +To me--only a boy, you must remember--it was a horrible experience, even +though I did not completely understand all that was happening; and to the +others old Bill's rambling talk seemed to bring an unnamed terror. + +All night he restlessly tossed, though he soon ceased his wild talking and +slept lightly and fitfully. The men watching him were wakeful, too, and as +I lay trying to sleep and trying not to see the swaying lantern and the +fantastic shadows, I heard at intervals snatches of their low conversation. + +"They hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. It warn't human. A sick man has +got _some_ rights," one of the men from Boston repeated interminably. He +seemed unable to hold more than one idea at a time. + +Then Blodgett would say, "Ay, it don't seem right. But we've all got to +stand by the skipper. That's how we'll serve our ends best. It don't do to +get too much excited." + +I imagined that Blodgett's voice did not sound as if he were fully +convinced of the doctrine he was preaching. + +"Ay," the other would return, "but they hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. +It warn't human. A sick man has got _some_ rights, and he was allers +quiet." + +They talked on endlessly, while I tried in vain to sleep and while poor +Bill tossed away, getting no good from the troubled slumber that the Lord +sent him. + +No sooner, it seemed to me, did I actually close my eyes than I woke and +heard him moaning, "Water--a--drink--of--water." + +The others by then had left him, so I got up and fetched water, and he +muttered something more about the "pain in his innards." Then my watch was +called and I went on deck with the rest. + +For the most part it was a day of coarse weather. Now intermittent squalls +from the southwest swept upon us with lightning and thunder, driving before +them rain in solid sheets; now the ship danced in choppy waves, with barely +enough wind to give her steerage-way and with a warm, gentle drizzle that +wet us to the skin and penetrated into the forecastle, where blankets and +clothing soon became soggy and uncomfortable. But the greater part of the +time we lurched along in a gale of wind, with an occasional dash of rain, +which we accepted as a compromise between those two worse alternatives, the +cloudbursts that accompanied the squalls, and the enervating warm drizzle. + +That Bill Hayden did not stand watch with the others, no one, apparently, +noticed. The men were glad enough to forget him, I think, and the officers +let his absence pass, except Davie Paine, who found opportunity to inquire +of me secretly about him and sadly shook his gray head at the tidings I +gave. + +Below we could not forget him. I heard the larboard watch talking of it +when they relieved us; and no sooner had we gone below in turn than +Blodgett cried, "Look at old Bill! His face is all of a sweat." + +He was up on his elbow when we came down, staring as if he had expected +some one; and when he saw who it was, he kept his eyes on the hatch as if +waiting for still another to come. Presently he fell back in his bunk. "Oh, +I've got such a pain in my innards," he moaned. + +By and by he began to talk again, but he seemed to have forgotten his pain +completely, for he talked about doughnuts and duff, and Sundays ashore when +he was a little shaver, and going to church, and about the tiny wee girl on +the bank of the Merrimac who would be looking for her dad to come home, and +lots of things that no one would have thought he knew. He seemed so natural +now and so cheerful that I was much relieved about him, and I whispered to +Blodgett that I thought Bill was better. But Blodgett shook his head so +gravely that I was frightened in spite of my hopes, and we lay there, some +of us awake, some asleep, while Bill rambled cheerily on and the lantern +swung with the motion of the ship. + +To-day I remember those watches below at +that time in the voyage as a succession of short unrestful snatches of +sleep broken by vivid pictures of the most trivial things--the swinging +lantern, the distorted shadows the muttered comments of the men, Bill +leaning on his elbow at the edge of his bunk and staring toward the hatch +as if some one long expected were just about to come. I do not pretend to +understand the reason, but in my experience it is the trifling unimportant +things that after a time of stress or tragedy are most clearly remembered. + +When next I woke I heard the bell--_clang-clang, clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang_--faint and far off. Then I saw that Blodgett was sitting on the edge +of his bunk, counting the strokes on his fingers. When he had finished he +gravely shook his head and nodded toward Bill who was breathing harder now. +"He's far gone," Blodgett whispered. "He ain't going to share in no +split-up at Manila. He ain't going to put back again to India when we've +got rid of the cargo. His time's come." + +I didn't believe a word that Blodgett said then, but I sat beside him as +still as the grave while the forecastle lantern nodded and swung as +casually as if old Bill were not, for all we knew, dying. By and by we +heard the bell again, and some one called from the hatch, "Eight bells! +Roll out!" + +The very monotony of our life--the watches below and on deck, each like +every other, marked off by the faint clanging of the ship's bell--made +Bill's sickness seem less dreadful. There is little to thrill a lad or +even, after a time, to interest him, in the interminable routine of a long +voyage. + +When we came on deck Davie Paine looked us over and said, "Where's Bill?" + +Blodgett shook his head. Even this simple motion had a sleepy quality that +made me think of a cat. + +"I'm afraid, sir," he replied, "that Bill has stood his last watch." + +"So!" said old Davie, reflectively, in his deep voice, "so!--I was afraid +of that." Ignorant though Davie was, and hopelessly incompetent as an +officer, he had a certain kindly tolerance, increased, perhaps, by his own +recent difficulties, that made him more approachable than any other man in +the cabin. After a time he added, "I cal'ate I got to tell the captain." +Davie's manner implied that he was taking us into his confidence. + +"Yes," Neddie Benson muttered under his breath, "tell the captain! If it +wasn't for Mr. Kipping and the captain, Bill would be as able a man this +minute as any one of us here. It didn't do to abuse him. He ain't got the +spirit to stand up under it." + +Davie shuffled away without hearing what was said, and soon, instead of +Captain Falk, Mr. Kipping appeared, bristling with anger. + +"What's all this?" he snapped, with none of the mildness that he usually +affected. "Who says Bill Hayden has stood his last watch? Is mutiny +brewing? I'll have you know I'm mate here, legal and lawful, and what's +more I'll show you I'm mate in a way that none of you won't forget if he +thinks he can try any more of his sojering on me. I'll fix him. You go +forward, Blodgett, and drag him out by the scalp-lock." + +Blodgett walked off, keeping close to the bulwark, and five minutes later +he was back again. + +Mr. Kipping grew very red. "Well, my man," he said in a way that made my +skin creep, "are you a party to this little mutiny?" + +"N-no, sir," Blodgett stammered. "I--he-it ain't no use, he _can't_ come." + +The mate looked sternly at Blodgett, and I thought he was going to hit +him; but instead, after a moment of hesitation, he started forward alone. + +We scarcely believed our eyes. + +By and by he came back again, but to us he said nothing. He went into the +cabin, and when next we saw him Captain Falk was by his side. + +"I don't like the looks of it," Kipping was saying, "I don't at all." + +As the captain passed me he called, "Lathrop, go to the galley and get a +bucket of hot water." + +Running to the deck-house, I thrust my head into the galley and made known +my want with so little ceremony that the cook was exasperated. Or so at +least his manner intimated. + +"You boy," he roared in a voice that easily carried to where the others +stood and grinned at my discomfiture, "you boy, what foh you come +promulgatin' in on me with 'gimme dis' and 'gimme dat' like Ah wahn't ol' +enough to be yo' pa? Ain't you got no manners nohow? You vex me, yass, sah, +you vex me. If we gotta have a boy on boa'd ship, why don' dey keep him out +of de galley?" + +Then with a change of voice that startled me, he demanded in an undertone +that must have been inaudible a dozen feet away, "Have things broke? Is de +fight on? Has de row started?" + +Bewildered, I replied, "Why, no--it's only Bill Hayden." + +Instantly he resumed his loud and abusive tone. "Well, if dey gwine send a +boy heah foh wateh, wateh he's gotta have. Heah, you wuthless boy, git! Git +out of heah!" + +Filling a bucket with boiling water, he thrust it into my hand and shoved +me half across the deck so roughly that I narrowly escaped scalding myself, +then returned to his work, muttering imprecations on the whole race of +boys. He was too much of a strategist for me. + +When I took the bucket to the forecastle, I found the captain and Mr. +Kipping looking at poor old Bill. + +"Dip a cloth in the water," the captain said carelessly, "and pull his +clothes off and lay the cloth on where it hurts." + +I obeyed as well as I could, letting the cloth cool a bit first; and +although Bill cried out sharply when it touched his skin, the heat eased +him of pain, and by and by he opened his eyes for all the world as if he +had been asleep and looked at Captain Falk and said in a scared voice, "In +heaven's name, what's happened?" + +The captain and Mr. Kipping laughed coldly. It seemed to me that they +didn't care whether he lived or died. + +Certainly the men of the larboard watch, who were lying in their bunks at +the time, didn't like the way the two behaved. I caught the word +"heartless" twice repeated. + +"Well," said Captain Falk at last, "either he'll live or he'll not. How +about it, Mr. Kipping?" + +The mate laughed as if he had heard a good joke. "That's one of the truest +things ever was said aboard a ship," he replied, in his slow, insincere +way. "Yes, sir, it hits the nail on the head going up and coming down." + +"Well, then, let's leave him to make up his mind." + +So the two went aft together as if they had done a good day's work. But +there was a buzz of disapproval in the forecastle when they had gone, and +one of the men from Boston, of whom I hitherto had had a very poor opinion, +actually got out of his blankets and came over to help me minister to poor +Bill's needs. + +"It ain't right," he said dipping the cloth in the hot water; "they never +so much as gave him a dose of medicine. A man may be only a sailor, but +he's worth a dose of medicine. There never come no good of denying poor +Jack his pill when he's sick." + +"Ay, heartless!" one of the others exclaimed. _"I could tell things if I +would."_ + +That remark, I ask you to remember. The man who made it, the other of the +two from Boston, had black hair and a black beard, and a nose that +protruded in a big hook where he had broken it years before. It was easy to +recognize his profile a long way off because of the peculiar shape of the +nose. The remark itself is of little importance, of course; but a story is +made up of things that seem to be of little importance, yet really are more +significant by far than matters that for the moment are startling. + +It was touching to see the solicitude of the men and the clumsy kindness of +their efforts to help poor Bill when the captain and the mate had left him. +They crowded up to his bunk and smoothed out his blankets and spoke to him +more gently than I should have believed possible. So angry were they at the +brutality of the two officers, that the coldest and hardest of them all +gave the sick man a muttered word of sympathy or an awkward helping hand. + +We worked over him, easing him as best we could, while the bell struck the +half hours and the hours; and for a while he seemed more comfortable. In a +moment of sanity he looked up at me with a sad smile and said, "I wish, +lad, I surely wish I could do something for _you_." But long before the +watch was over he once more began to talk about the tiny wee girl at +Newburyport--"Cute she is as they make 'em," he reiterated weakly, +"a-waiting for her dad to come home." And by and by he spoke of his wife, +--"a good wife," he called her,--and then he made a little noise in his +throat and lay for a long time without moving. + +"He's dead," the man from Boston said at last; there was no sound in the +forecastle except the rattle of the swinging lantern and the chug-chug of +waves. + +I was younger than the others and more sensitive, so I went on deck and +leaned on the bulwark, looking at the ocean and seeing nothing. + + [Illustration] + + + + +IV + +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XV + +MR. FALK TRIES TO COVER HIS TRACKS + + +How long I leaned on the bulwark I do not know; I had no sense of passing +time. But after a while some one told me that the captain wished to see me +in the cabin, and I went aft with other tragic memories in mind. I had not +entered the cabin since Captain Whidden died--"_shot f'om behine_." The +negro's phrase now flashed upon my memory and rang over and over again in +my ears. + +The cabin itself was much as it had been that other day: I suppose no +article of its furnishings had been changed. But when I saw Captain Falk in +the place of Captain Whidden and Kipping in the place of Mr. Thomas, I felt +sick at heart. All that encouraged me was the sight of Roger Hamlin, and I +suspected that he attended uninvited, for he came into the cabin from his +stateroom at the same moment when I came down the companionway, and there +was no twinkle now in his steady eyes. + +Captain Falk glanced at him sharply. "Well, sir?" he exclaimed testily. + +"I have decided to join you, sir," Roger said, and calmly seated himself. + +For a moment Falk hesitated, then, obviously unwilling, he assented with a +grimace. + +"Lathrop," he said, turning to me, "you were present when Hayden died, and +also you had helped care for him previously. Mr. Kipping has written a +statement of the circumstances in the log and you are to sign it, Here's +the place for your name. Here's a pen and ink. Be careful not to blot or +smudge it." + +He pushed the big, canvas-covered book over to me and placed his finger on +a vacant line. All that preceded it was covered with paper. + +"Of course," said Roger, coldly, "Lathrop will read the statement before +signing it." He was looking the captain squarely in the eye. + +Falk scowled as he replied, "I consider that quite unnecessary." + +"A great many of the ordinary decencies of life seem to be considered +unnecessary aboard this ship." + +"If you are making any insinuations at me, Mr. Hamlin, I'll show you who's +captain here." + +"You needn't. You've done it sufficiently already. Anyhow, if Lathrop were +foolish enough to sign the statement without reading it, I should know that +he hadn't read it and I assure you that it wouldn't pass muster in any +court of law." + +As Captain Falk was about to retort even more angrily, Kipping touched his +arm and whispered to him. + +"Oh, well," he said with ill grace, "as you wish, Mr. Kipping. There's +nothing underhanded about this. Of course the account is absolutely true +and the whole world could read it; only I don't intend a silly young fop +shall think he can bully me on my own ship. Show Lathrop the statement." + +Kipping withdrew the paper and I began to read what was written in the log, +but Roger now interrupted again. + +"Read it aloud," he said. + +"What in heaven's name do you think you are, you young fool? If you think +you can bully Nathan Falk like that, I'll lash you to skin and pulp." + +"Oh, well," said Roger comically, in imitation of the captain's own air of +concession, "since you feel so warmly on the subject, I'm quite willing to +yield the point. It's enough that Lathrop should read it before he signs." +Then, turning to me suddenly, he cried, "Ben, what's the course according +to the log?" + +The angry red of Captain Talk's face deepened, but before he could speak, I +had seen and repeated it:-- + +"Northeast by north." + +Roger smiled. "Go on," he said. "Read the statement." + +The statement was straightforward enough for the most part--more +straightforward, it seemed to me, than either of the two men who probably +had collaborated in writing it; but one sentence caught my attention and I +hesitated. + +"Well," said Roger who was watching me closely, "is anything wrong?" + +"Why, perhaps not exactly wrong," I replied, "though I do think most of the +men forward would deny it." + +"See here," cried Captain Falk, cutting off Kipping, who tried to speak at +the same moment, "I tell you, Mr. Hamlin, if you thrust your oar in here +again I'll thrash you within an inch of your life! I'll keelhaul you, so +help me! I'll--" He wrinkled up his nose and twisted his lips into a sneer +before he added, almost in a whisper, "I'll do worse than that." + +"No," said Roger calmly, "I don't think you will. What's the sentence, +Benny?" + +Without waiting for another word from anyone I read aloud as follows:-- + +"'And the captain and the chief mate tended Hayden carefully and did what +they might to make his last hours comfortable.'" + +"Well," said Falk, "didn't we?" + +"No, by heaven, you didn't," Roger cried suddenly, taking the floor from +me. "I know how you beat Hayden. I know how you two drove him to throw +himself overboard. You're a precious pair! And what's more, all the men +forward know it. While we're about it, Captain Falk, here's something else +I know. According to the log, which you consistently have refused to let me +see the course is northeast by north. According to the men at the wheel,--I +will not be still! I will not close my mouth! If you assault me, sir, I +will break your shallow head,--according to the men at the wheel, of whom I +have inquired, according to the ship's compass when I've taken a chance to +look at it, according to the tell-tale that you yourself can see at this +very minute and--" Roger laid on the table a little box of hard wood bound +with brass--"according to this compass of my own, which I know is a good +one, our course is now and has been for two days east-northeast. Captain +Falk, do you think you can make us believe that Manila is Canton?" + +"It may be that I do, and it may be that I do not," Falk retorted hotly. +"As for you, Mr. Hamlin, I'll attend to your case later. Now sign that +statement, Lathrop." + +Falk was standing. His hands, a moment before lifted for a blow, rested on +the table; but the knuckles were streaked with red along the creases, and +the nails of his fingers, which were bent under, he had pressed hard +against the dull mahogany. When he had finished speaking, he sat down +heavily. + +"Sign it, Ben," said Roger; "but first draw your pen through that +particular sentence." + +Quick as thought I did what Roger told me, leaving a single broad line +through the words "and did what they might to make his last hours +comfortable"; then I wrote my name and laid the pen on the table. + +[Illustration: "Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk.] + +Leaning over to see what I had done, Falk leaped up white with passion. +"Good God!" he yelled, "that's worse than nothing." + +"Yes," said Roger coolly, "I think it is." + +"What--" Falk stopped suddenly. Kipping had touched his sleeve. "Well?" + +Kipping whispered to him. + +"No," Falk snarled, glancing at me, "I'm going to take that young pup's +hide off his back and salt it." + +Again Kipping whispered to him. + +This time he seemed half persuaded. He was a weak man, even in his +passions. "All right," he said, after reflecting briefly. "As you say, it +don't make so much odds. Myself, I'm for slitting the young pup's ears--but +later on, later on. And though I'd like to straighten out the record as far +as it goes--Well, as you say." + +For all of Captain Falk's bluster and pretension, I was becoming more and +more aware that the subtle Kipping could twist him around his little +finger, and that for some end of his own Kipping did not wish affairs to +come yet to a head. + +He leaned back in his chair, twirling his thumbs behind his interlocked +fingers, and smiled at us mildly. His whole bearing was odious. He fairly +exhaled hypocrisy. I remembered a dozen episodes of his career aboard the +Island Princess--the wink he had given Captain Falk, then second mate; his +coming to the cook's galley for part of my pie; his bullying poor old Bill +Hayden; his cold selfishness in taking the best meat from the kids, and +many other offensive incidents. Was it possible that Captain Falk was not +at the bottom of all our troubles? that Captain Falk had been from the +first only somebody's tool? + +We left the cabin in single file, the captain first, Kipping second, then +Roger, then I. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +A PRAYER FOR THE DEAD + + +In the last few hours we had sighted an island, which lay now off the +starboard bow; and as I had had no opportunity hitherto to observe it +closely, I regarded it with much interest when I came on deck. Inland there +were several cone-shaped mountains thickly wooded about the base; to the +south the shore was low and apparently marshy; to the north a bold and +rugged promontory extended. Along the shore and for some distance beyond it +there were open spaces that might have been great tracts of cleared land; +and a report prevailed among the men that a fishing boat had been sighted +far off, which seemed to put back incontinently to the shore. Otherwise +there was no sign of human habitation, but we knew the character of the +natives of such islands thereabouts too well to approach land with any +sense of security. + +Captain Falk and Kipping were deep in consultation, and the rest were +intent upon the sad duty that awaited us. On the deck there lay now a shape +sewed in canvas. The men, glancing occasionally at the captain, stood a +little way off, bare-headed and ill at ease, and conversed in whispers. For +the moment I had forgotten that we were to do honor for the last time--and, +I fear me, for the first--to poor Bill Hayden. Poor, stupid Bill! He had +meant so well by us all, and life had dealt so hardly with him! Even in +death he was neglected. + +As time passed, the island became gradually clearer, so that now we could +see its mountains more distinctly and pick out each separate peak. Although +the wind was light and unsteady, we were making fair progress; but Captain +Falk and Mr. Kipping remained intent on their conference. + +I could see that Roger Hamlin, who was leaning on the taffrail, was +imperturbable; but Davie Paine grew nervous and walked back and forth, +looking now and then at the still shape in canvas, and the men began to +murmur among themselves. + +"Well," said the captain at last, "what does all this mean, Mr. Paine? What +in thunder do you mean by letting the men stand around like this?" + +He knew well enough what it meant, though, for all his bluster. If he had +not, he would have been ranting up the deck the instant he laid eyes on +that scene of idleness such as no competent officer could countenance. + +Old Davie, who was as confused as the captain had intended that he should +be, stammered a while and finally managed to say, "If you please, sir, Bill +Hayden's dead." + +"Yes," said the captain, "it looks like he's dead." + +We all heard him and more than one of us breathed hard with anger. + +"Well, why don't you heave him over and be done with it?" he asked shortly, +and turned away. + + +The men exchanged glances. + + +"If you please, sir,--" it was Davie, and a different Davie from the one we +had known before,--"if you please, sir, ain't you goin' to read the service +and say the words?" + +I turned and stared at Davie in amazement. His voice was sharper now than +ever I had heard it and there was a challenge in his eyes as well. + +"What?" Falk snapped out angrily. + +"Ain't you goin' to read the Bible and say the words, sir?" + +I am convinced that up to this point Captain Falk had intended, after +badgering Davie enough to suit his own unkind humor, to read the service +with all the solemnity that the occasion demanded. He was too eager for +every prerogative of his office to think of doing otherwise. But his was +the way of a weak man; at Davie's challenge he instantly made up his mind +not to do what was desired, and having set himself on record thus, his +mulish obstinacy held him to his decision in spite of whatever better +judgment he may have had. + +"Not I!" he cried. "Toss him over to suit yourself." + +When an angry murmur rose on every side, he faced about again. "Well," he +said, "what do you want, anyway? I'm captain here, and if you wish I'll +_show_ you I'm captain here. I'll read the service or I'll not read it, +just as I please. If any man here's got anything to say about it, I'll do +some saying myself. If any man here wants to read the service over that +lump of clay, let him read it." Then, turning with an air of indifference, +he leaned on the rail with a sneer, and smiled at Kipping. + +What would have happened next I do not know, so angry were the men at this +wretched exhibition on the part of the captain, if Roger had not stepped +forward. + +"Very well, sir," he said facing the captain, "since you put it that way, +_I'll read the service_." And without ceremony he took from the captain's +hand the prayer-book that Falk had brought on deck. + +Disconcerted by this unexpected act and angered by the murmur of approval +from the men, Falk started to speak, then thought better of it and sidled +over beside Kipping, to whom he whispered something at which they both +laughed heartily. Then they stood smiling scornfully while Roger went down +beside poor Bill's body. + +Roger opened the prayer-book, turned the pages deliberately, and began to +read the service slowly and with feeling. He was younger and more slender +than many of the men, but straight and tall and handsome, and I remember +how proud of him I felt for taking affairs in his own hands and making the +best of a bad situation. + +"We therefore commit his body to the deep," he read "looking for the +general Resurrection in the last day, and the life of the world to come, +through our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in glorious majesty +to judge the world, the sea shall give up her dead; and the corruptible +bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed and made like unto his +glorious body; according to the mighty working whereby He is able to subdue +all things unto Himself." + +Then Blodgett, Davie Paine, the cook, and the man from Boston lifted the +plank and inclined it over the bulwark, and so passed all that was mortal +of poor Bill Hayden. + +Suddenly, in the absolute silence that ensued when Roger closed the +prayer-book, I became aware that he was signaling me to come nearer, and I +stepped over beside him. At the same instant the reason for it burst upon +me. Now, if ever, was the time to turn against Captain Falk. + +"Men," said Roger in a low voice, "are you going to stand by without +lifting a hand and see a shipmate's dead body insulted?" + +The crew came together in a close group about their supercargo. With stern +faces and with the heavy breathing of men who contemplate some rash or +daring deed, they were, I could see, intent on what Roger had to say. + +He looked from one to another of them as if to appraise their spirit and +determination. "I represent the owners," he continued tersely. "The owners' +orders are not being obeyed. Mind what I tell you--_the owners' orders are +not being obeyed._ You know why as well as I do, and you remember this: +though it may seem on the face of it that I advocate mutiny or even piracy, +if we take the ship from the present captain and carry out the voyage and +obey the owners' orders, I can promise you that there'll be a fine rich +reward waiting at Salem for every man here. What's more, it'll be an honest +reward, with credit from the owners and all law-abiding men. But enough of +that! It's a matter of ordinary decency--of common honesty! The man who +will conspire against the owners of this ship is a contemptible cur, a fit +shipmate with the brute who horsed poor Bill to death." + +I never had lacked faith in Roger, but never before had I appreciated to +the full his reckless courage and his unyielding sense of personal honor. + +He paused and again glanced from face to face. "What say, men? Are you with +me?" he cried, raising his voice. + +Meanwhile Captain Falk, aware that something was going on forward, shouted +angrily, "Here, here! What's all this! Come, lay to your work, you sons of +perdition, or I'll show you what's what. You, Blodgett, go forward and +heave that lead as you were told." + +In his hand Blodgett held the seven-pound dipsey lead, but he stood his +ground. + +"Well?" Falk came down on us like a whirlwind. "Well? You, Hamlin, what in +Tophet are you backing and hauling about?" + +"I? Backing and hauling?" Roger spoke as calmly as you please. "I am merely +advocating that the men take charge of the ship in the name of the lawful +owners and according to their orders." + +As Captain Falk sprang forward to strike him down, there came a thin, windy +cry, "No you don't; no, you don't!" + +To my amazement I saw that it was old Blodgett. + +"It don't do to insult the dead," he cried in a voice like the yowl of a +tom-cat. "You can kill us all you like. It's captain's rights. But, by the +holy, you ain't got no rights whatsoever to refuse a poor sailor a decent +burial." + +With a vile oath, Captain Falk contemplated this new factor in the +situation. Suddenly he yelled, "Kipping! It's mutiny! Help!" And with a +clutch at his hip he drew his pistol. + +"'Heave the lead' is it?" Blodgett muttered. "Ay, I'll heave the lead." He +whipped up his arm and hurled the missile straight at Captain Falk's head. + +The captain dodged, but the lead struck his shoulder and felled him. + +Seeing Kipping coming silently with a pistol in each hand, I ducked and +tried to pull Roger over beside Blodgett; but Roger, instantly aware of +Kipping's move, spun on his heel as the first bullet flew harmlessly past +us, and lithely stepped aside. With a single swing of his right arm he cut +Kipping across the face with a rope's end and stopped him dead. + +As the welt reddened on his face, Kipping staggered, leveled his other +pistol point-blank and pulled the trigger. + +For the moment I could not draw breath, but the pistol missed fire. + +"Flashed in the pan!" Roger cried, and tugged at his own pistol, which had +caught inside his shirt where he had carried it out of sight. "That's not +all--that's flashed in the pan!" + +"Now then, you fools," Kipping shrieked. "Go for 'em! Go for'em! The bell's +struck! Now's the time!" + +So far it all had happened so suddenly and so extraordinarily swiftly, with +one event fairly leaping at the heels of another, that the men were +completely dazed. + +Captain Falk sat on the deck with his hand pressed against his injured +shoulder and with his pistol lying beside him where he had dropped it when +he fell. Kipping, the red bruise showing across his face, confronted us +with one pistol smoking, the other raised; Blodgett, having thrown the +lead, was drawing his knife from the sheath; Roger was pulling desperately +at his own pistol; and for my part I was in a state of such complete +confusion that to this day I don't know what I did or said. In the moments +that followed we were to learn once and for all the allegiance of every man +aboard the Island Princess. + +One of the men from Boston, evidently picking me out as the least +formidable of the trio, shot a quick glance back at Kipping as if to be +sure of his approval, and springing at me, knocked me flat on my back. I +felt sure he was going to kill me when he reached for my throat. But I +heard behind me a thunderous roar, "Heah Ah is! Heah Ah is!" And out of the +corner of my eye I saw the cook, the meat-cleaver in his hand, leaping to +my rescue, with Roger, one hand still inside his shirt, scarcely a foot +behind him. + +The man from Boston scrambled off me and fled. + +"Ah's with you-all foh one," the cook cried, swinging his cleaver. "Ah +ain't gwine see no po' sailor man done to death and me not say 'What foh!'" + +"You fool! You black fool!" Chips shrieked, shaking his fist, "Stand by and +share up! Stand by and share up!" + + +Neddie Benson jumped over beside the cook. "Me too!" he called shrilly. +"Bad luck or good luck, old Bill he done his best and was fair murdered." + +Poor Bill! His martyrdom stood us in good stead in our hour of need. + +On the other side of the deck there was a lively struggle from which came +fierce yells as each man sought to persuade his friends to his own way of +thinking: + +"Stand by, lads, stand by--" + +"----the bloody money!--" + +"Hanged for mutiny--" + +"I know where my bed's made soft--" + +The greater part of the men, it seemed, were lining up behind Kipping and +Captain Falk, when a scornful shout rose and I was aware that some one else +had come over to our side. It was old Davie Paine. "He didn't ought to +shame me in front of all the men," Davie muttered. "No, sir, it wa'n't +right. And what's more, there's lots o' things aboard this ship that ain't +as they should be. I may be poor and ignorant and no shakes of a scholar, +but I ain't goin' to put up with 'em." + +So we six faced the other twelve with as good grace as we could +muster,--Roger, the cook, Blodgett, Neddie Benson, Davie, and I,--and there +was a long silence. But Roger had got out his pistol now, and the lull in +the storm was ominous. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +MAROONED + + +That it was important to control the after part of the ship, I was well +aware, and though we were outnumbered two to one, I hoped that by good +fortune we might win it. + +I was not long in doubt of Roger's sharing my hope. He analyzed our +opponents' position at a single glance, and ignoring their advantage in +numbers, seized upon the only chance of taking them by surprise. Swinging +his arm and crying, "Come, men! All for the cabin!" he flung himself +headlong at Falk. I followed close at his heels--I was afraid to be left +behind. I heard the cook grunt hoarsely as he apprehended the situation and +sprang after us. Then the others met us with knives and pistols. + +Our attack was futile and soon over, but while it lasted there was a merry +little fight. As a man slashed at Roger with a case-knife, laying open a +long gash in his cheek, Roger fired a shot from his pistol, and the fellow +pitched forward and lay still except for his limbs, which twitched +sickeningly. For my own part, seeing another who had run aft for a weapon +swing at me with a cutlass, I threw myself under his guard and got my arms +round both his knees. As something crashed above me, I threw the fellow +back and discovered that the cook had met the cutlass in full swing with +the cleaver and had shattered it completely. Barely in time to escape a +murderous blow that the carpenter aimed at me with his hammer, I scrambled +to my feet and leaped back beside Roger, who held his cheek with his hand. + +I believe it was the cook's cleaver that saved our lives for the time +being. Falk and Kipping had fired the charges in their pistols, and no one +was willing to venture within reach of the black's long arm and brutal +weapon. So, having spent our own last charge of powder, we backed away into +the bow with our faces to the enemy, and the only sounds to be heard were +flapping sails and rattling blocks, the groans of the poor fellow Roger had +shot, and the click of a powder-flask as Falk reloaded and passed his +ammunition to Kipping. + +"So," said Falk at last, "we have a fine little mutiny brewing, have we?" +He looked first at us, then at those who remained true to him and his +schemes. "Well, Mr. Kipping, with the help of Chips here, we can make out +to work the ship at a pinch. Yes, I think we can dispense with these young +cocks altogether. Yes,--" he raised his voice and swore roundly--"yes, we +can follow our own gait and fare a damned sight better without them. We'll +let them have a boat and row back to Salem. A voyage of a few thousand +miles at the oars will be a rare good thing to tone down a pair of young +fighting cocks." Then he added, smiling, "If they meet with no Ladronesers +or Malays to clip their spurs." + +Captain Falk looked at Kipping and his men, and they all laughed. + +"Ay, so it will," cried Kipping. "And old Davie Paine 'll never have a +mister to his name again. You old lubber, you, your bones will be rotting +at the bottom of the sea when we're dividing up the gold." + +Again the men laughed loudly. + +Davie flushed and stammered, but Blodgett spoke out bitterly. + +"So they will, before you or Captain Falk divide with any of the rest. Ah! +Red in the face, are ye? That shot told. Davie 'd rather take his chances +with a gentleman than be second mate under either one o' you two. He may +not know when he's well off, but he knows well when he ain't." + +For all Blodgett spoke so boldly, I could see that Davie in his own heart +was still afraid of Kipping. But Kipping merely smiled in his mean way and +slowly looked us over. + +"If we was to walk them over a plank," he suggested, deferentially, to the +captain, "there would be an end to all bother with them." + +"No," said Falk, "give them a boat. It's all the same in the long run, and +I ain't got the stomach to watch six of them drown one after another." + +Kipping raised his eyebrows at such weakness; then a new thought seemed to +dawn on him. His accursed smile grew broader and he began to laugh softly. +For the moment I could not imagine what he was laughing at, but his next +words answered my unspoken question. "Ha ha ha! Right you are, captain! +Just think of 'em, a-sailing home in a ship's boat! Oh, won't they have a +pretty time?" + +The predicament of six fellow men set adrift in an open boat pleased the +man's vile humor. We knew that he believed he was sending us to certain +death, and that he delighted in it. + +"This fine talk is all very well," said Roger, "and I've no doubt you think +yourselves very witty, but let that be as it may. As matters stand now, +you've got the upper hand--though I wish you joy of working the ship. +However, if you give us the long-boat and a fair allowance of water and +bread, we'll ask nothing more." + +"Ah," said Falk, with a leer at Kipping who was smiling quietly, "the +long-boat and a fair allowance of water and bread! Ay, next they'll be +wanting us to set 'em up in their own ship." He changed suddenly from a +leer to a snarl. "You'll take what I give you and nothing more nor less. +Now then, men, we'll just herd these hearties overboard and bid them a gay +farewell." + +He stood there, pointing the way with a grand gesture and the late +afternoon sun sparkled on the buttons of his coat and shone brightly on the +fine white shirt he wore, which in better days had belonged to Captain +Whidden. "Murderer and thief!" I thought. For although about Captain +Whidden's death I knew nothing more than the cook's never-to-be-forgotten +words, "a little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine," I laid Bill Hayden's death at Captain Falk's door, and I knew well +by now that our worthy skipper would not scruple at stealing more than +shirts. + +When Falk pointed to the quarter-boat, the men, laughing harshly, closed in +on us and drove us along by threatening us with pistols and pikes, which +the bustling steward by now had distributed. And all the while Kipping +stood just behind the captain, smiling as if no unkind thought had ever +ruffled his placid nature. I could not help but be aware of his meanness, +and I suppose it was because I was only a boy and not given to looking +under the surface that I did not yet completely recognize in him the real +leader of all that had gone astray aboard the Island Princess. + +We let ourselves be driven toward the boat. Since we were outnumbered now +eleven to six,--not counting the wounded man of course,--and since, +compared with the others, we were virtually unarmed, we ought, I suppose, +to have been thankful that we were not murdered in cold blood, as doubtless +we should have been if our dangerous plight had not so delighted Kipping's +cruel humor, and if both Falk and Kipping had not felt certain that they +would never see or hear of us again. But we found little comfort in +realizing that, as matters stood, although in our own minds we were +convinced absolutely that Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping had conspired with +the crew to rob the owners, by the cold light of fact we could be proved in +the wrong in any court of admiralty. + +So far as Roger and I were concerned, our belief was based after all +chiefly on supposition; and so craftily had the whole scheme been phrased +and manoeuvred that, if you got down to categorical testimony, even +Blodgett and Davie Paine would have been hard put to it to prove anything +culpable against the other party. Actually we were guilty of mutiny, if +nothing more. + +The cook still carried his great cleaver and Blodgett unobtrusively had +drawn and opened a big dirk knife; but Neddie Benson, Davie, and I had no +weapons of any kind, and Roger's pistol was empty. + +We worked the boat outboard in silence and made no further resistance, +though I knew from Roger's expression as he watched Falk and Kipping and +their men, that, if he had seen a fair chance to turn the scales in our +favor, he would have seized it at any cost. + +Meanwhile the sails were flapping so loudly that it was hard to hear +Roger's voice when he again said, "Surely you'll give us food and water." + +"Why--no," said Falk. "I don't think you'll need it. You won't want to row +right home without stopping to say how-d'y'-do to the natives." + +Again a roar of laughter came from the men on deck. + +As the boat lay under the side of the ship, they crowded to the rail and +stared down at us with all sorts of rough gibes at our expense. +Particularly they aimed then-taunts at Davie Paine and Blodgett, who a +short time before had been hand-in-glove with them; and I was no little +relieved to see that their words seemed only to confirm the two in their +determination, come what might, never to join forces again with Falk and +Kipping. But Kipping singled out the cook and berated him with a stream of +disgusting oaths. + +"You crawling black nigger, you," he yelled. "Now what'll _you_ give _me_ +for a piece of pie?" + +Holding the cleaver close at his side, the negro looked up at the fox who +was abusing him, and burst into wild vituperation. Although Kipping only +laughed in reply, there was a savage and intense vindictiveness in the +negro's impassioned jargon that chilled my blood. I remember thinking then +that I should dread being in Kipping's shoes if ever those two met again. + +As we cast off, we six in that little boat soon to be left alone in the +wastes of the China Sea, we looked up at the cold, laughing faces on which +the low sun shone with an orange-yellow light, and saw in them neither pity +nor mercy. The hands resting on the bulwark, the hands of our own +shipmates, were turned against us. + +The ship was coming back to her course now, and some of us were looking at +the distant island with the cone-shaped peaks, toward which by common +consent we had turned our bow, when the cook, who still stared back at +Kipping, seemed to get a new view of his features. Springing up suddenly, +he yelled in a great voice that must have carried far across the sea:-- + +"You Kipping, Ah got you--Ah got you--Ah knows who you is--Ah knows who you +is--you crimp's runner, you! You blood-money sucker, you! Ah seen you in +Boston! Ah seen you befo' now! A-a-a-ah!--a-a-a-ah!" And he shook his great +black fist at the mate. + +The smile on Kipping's face was swept away by a look of consternation. With +a quick motion he raised his loaded pistol, which he had primed anew, and +fired on us; then, snatching another from one of the crew, he fired again, +and stood with the smoking weapons, one in each hand, and a snarl fixed on +his face. + +Captain Falk was staring at the negro in wrath and amazement, and there was +a stir on the deck that aroused my strong curiosity. But the cook was +groaning so loudly that we could hear no word of what was said, so we bent +to the oars with all our strength and rowed out of range toward the distant +island. + +Kipping's second ball had grazed the negro's head and had left a deep +furrow from which blood was running freely. But for the thickness of his +skull I believe it would have killed him. + +Once again the sails of the Island Princess, as we watched her, filled with +wind and she bore away across the sapphire blue of the sea with all her +canvas spread, as beautiful a sight as I have ever seen. The changing +lights in the sky painted the water with opalescent colors and tinted the +sails gold and crimson and purple, and by and by, when the sun had set and +the stars had come out and the ocean had darkened, we still could make her +out, smaller and ghostlike in the distance, sailing away before light winds +with the money and goods all under her hatches. + +Laboring at the oars, we rowed on and on and on. Stars, by which we now +held our course, grew bright overhead, and after a time we again saw dimly +the shores of the island. We dared not stay at sea in a small open boat +without food or water, and the island was our only refuge. + +Presently we heard breakers and saw once more the bluff headlands that we +had seen from the deck of the Island Princess. Remembering that there had +been low shores farther south, we rowed on and on, interminably and at +last, faint and weary, felt the keel of the boat grate on a muddy beach. + +At all events we had come safely to land. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +ADVENTURES ASHORE + + +As we rested on our oars by the strange island, and smelled the warm odor +of the marsh and the fragrance of unseen flowers, and listened to the +_wheekle_ of a night-hawk that circled above us, we talked of one thing and +another, chiefly of the men aboard the Island Princess and how glad we were +to be done with them forever. + +"Ay," said Davie Paine sadly, "never again 'll I have the handle before my +name. But what of that? It's a deal sight jollier in the fo'castle than in +the cabin and I ain't the scholar to be an officer." He sighed heavily. + +"It warn't so jolly this voyage," Neddie Benson muttered, "what with Bill +Hayden passing on, like he done." + +We were silent for a time. For my own part, I was thinking about old Bill's +"little wee girl at Newbury-port" waiting for her stupid old dad to come +back to her, and I have an idea that the others were thinking much the same +thoughts. But soon Blodgett stirred restlessly, and the cook, the cleaver +on his knees, cleared his throat and after a premonitory grunt or two began +to speak. + +"Boy, he think Ah ain't got no use foh boys," he chuckled. "Hee-ha ha! Ah +fool 'em. Stew'd, he say, 'Frank, am you with us o' without us?' He say, +'Am you gwine like one ol' lobscozzle idjut git cook's pay all yo' life?' + +"'Well,' Ah says, 'what pay you think Ah'm gwine fob to git? Cap'n's pay, +maybe? 0' gin'ral's pay? Yass, sah. Ef Ah'm cook Ah'm gwine git cook's +pay.' + +"Den he laff hearty and slap his knee and he say 'Ef you come in with us, +you won't git cook's pay, no' sah. You is gwine git pay like no admiral +don't git if you come in with us. Dah's money 'board dis yeh ol' +ship.' + +"'Yass, sah,' says I, suspicionin' su'thin' was like what it didn't had +ought to be. 'But dat's owner's money.' + +"Den stew'd, he say, 'Listen! You come in with me and Cap'n Falk and Mistah +Kipping, and we's gwine split dat yeh money all up'twix' one another. Yass, +sah! But you all gotta have nothin' to do with dat yeh Mistah Hamlin and +dat yeh cocky li'le Ben Lathrop.' + +"'Oh no,' Ah says inside, so stew'd he don't heah me. 'Guess you all don't +know me and dat yeh Ben Lathrop is friends.' + +"Den Ah stop sudden. 'Mah golly,' Ah think, 'dey's a conspiration a-foot, +yass, sah, and if dis yeh ol' nigger don't look out dey gwine hu't de boy.' +If Ah gits into dat yeh conspiration, den Ah guess Ah'll snoop roun' and +learn what Ah didn't had ought to, and when time come, den mah golly, Ah'll +took good keer of dat boy. So Ah done like Ah'm sayin' now, and Ah says to +stew'd, 'Yass, sah, yass, sah,' and Ah don't let boy come neah de galley +and Ah don't give him no pie nor cake, but when time come Ah take good keer +of him, and Ah's tellin' you, Ah knows a lot 'bout what dem crawlin' +critters yonder on ship think dey gwine foh to do." + +With a glance toward me in the darkness that I verily believe expressed as +much genuine affection as so villainous a black countenance could show, +Frank got out his rank pipe and began packing it full of tobacco. + +Here was further evidence of what we so long had suspected. But as I +reflected on it, with forgiveness in my heart for every snub the faithful, +crafty old darky had given me and with amusement at the simple way he had +tricked the steward and Falk and Kipping, I recalled his parting remarks to +our worthy mate. + +"What was that you said to Mr. Kipping just as we gave way this afternoon?" +I asked. + +"Hey, what dat?" Frank growled. + +"When had you seen Kipping before?" + +There was a long silence, then Frank spoke quietly and yet with obvious +feeling. "Ah got a bone to pick with Kipping," he said, "but dat yeh's a +matter 'twix' him and me." + +All this time Roger had watched and listened with a kindly smile. + +"Well, men," he now said, "we've had a chance to rest and get our wind. +It's time we set to work. What do you say, hadn't we better haul the boat +out?" + +Although we tacitly had accepted Roger as commander of our expedition, he +spoke always with a certain deference to the greater age and experience of +Blodgett and Davie Paine, which won them so completely that they would have +followed him anywhere. + +They both looked at the sky and at the darkly rolling sea on which there +now rested a low incoming mist; but Davie left the burden of reply to old +Blodgett, who spoke nervously in his thin, windy voice. + +"Ay, sir, that we had. There's not much wind, nor is there, I think, likely +to be much; but if we was to haul up into some bushes like those yonder, +there won't be a thousand savages scouring the coast, come daylight, +a-hunting for the men that came in the boat." + +That was sound common sense. + +We got out and, standing three on a side, hauled the boat by great effort +clean out of water. Then we bent ropes to each end of three thwarts, and +thrust an oar through the bights of each pair of ropes. Thus, with one of +us at each end of an oar, holding it in the crooks of his elbows, we made +out to lift the boat and drag it along till we got it safely hidden in the +bushes with the oars tucked away under it. We then smoothed out our tracks +and restored the branches as well as we could, and held a counsel in which +every man had an equal voice. + +That it would be folly to remain on the beach until daylight, we were all +agreed. Immediately beyond the muddy shore there was, so far as we could +tell, only a salt marsh overgrown with rank grass and scattered clumps of +vegetation, which might conceal us after a fashion if we were willing to +lie all day long in mud that probably swarmed with reptile life, but which +would afford us no real security and would give us no opportunity to forage +for fresh water and food. + +Blodgett, wide-eyed and restless, urged that we set out inland and travel +as far as possible before daybreak. "You can't tell about a country like +this," he said. "Might be we'd stumble on a temple with a lot of heathen +idols full of gold and precious stones to make our everlasting fortunes, or +a nigger or two with a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string." + +"Yeah!" the cook grunted, irritated by Blodgett's free use of the word +"nigger," "and Ah's tellin' you he'll have a Malay kris what'll slit yo' +vitals and chop off yo' head; and nex' time when you gwine come to say +howdy, you'll find yo' ol' skull a-setting in de temple, chockfull of dem +rubies and grinnin' like he was glad to see you back again. Ah ain't gwine +on no such promulgation, no sah! What Ah wants is a good, cool drink and a +piece of pie. Yass, sah," + +"Now that's like I feel," said Neddie Benson. "I never thought when the +lady was tellin' me about trouble in store, that there warn't goin' to be +enough victuals to go round--" + +"Ah, you make me tired," Blodgett snapped out. "Food, food, food! And +here's a chance to find a nice little temple an' better our fortunes. Of +course it ain't like India, but if these here slant-eyed pirates have stole +any gold at all, it'll be in the temples." + +"What I'd like"--it was Davie Paine's heavy, slow voice--"is just a drink +of water and some ship's bread." + +"Well," said Roger, "we'll find neither bread nor rubies lying on the +beach, and since we're agreed that it's best to get out of sight, let's set +off." + +He was about to plunge blindly into the marsh, when Blodgett, who had been +ranging restlessly while we talked, cried, "Here's a road! As I'm alive +here's a road!" + +We trooped over to where he stood, and saw, sure enough, an opening in the +brush and grass where the ground was beaten hard as if by the passing of +many feet. + +"Well, let's be on our way," said Blodgett, starting forward. + +"No, sah, dat ain't no way foh to go!" the cook exclaimed. He stood there, +head thrown forward, chin out-thrust, the cleaver, which he had carried all +the time since we left the ship, hanging at his side. + +"Why not?" asked Roger. + +"'Cause, sah, whar dey's a road dey's humans and humans heahbouts on dese +yeh islands is liable to be drefful free with strangers. Yass, sah, if we +go a-walkin' along dat yeh road, fust thing we know we's gwine walk into a +whole mob of dem yeh heathens. Den whar'll we be?" In answer to his +question, the negro thrust out his left hand and, grasping an imaginary +opponent by the throat, raised the cleaver, and swept it through the air +with a slicing motion. Looking keenly at us to be sure that we grasped the +significance of his pantomime he remarked, "Ah want mah ol' head to stay +put." + +"There ain't going to be no village till we come to trees," said Davie +Paine slowly. "If there is, we can see it anyhow, and if there isn't, this +road'll take us across the marsh. Once we're on the other side, we can +leave the road and take to the hills." + +"There's an idea," Roger cried. "How about it, Bennie?" + +I nodded. + +Blodgett eagerly went first and the cook, apparently fearing that he was on +his way to be served as a particularly choice tidbit at somebody else's +banquet, came last. The rest of us just jostled along together. But Davie +Paine, I noticed, held his head higher than I ever had seen it before; for +Roger's appreciation of his sound common sense had pleased him beyond +measure and had done wonders to restore his self-confidence. + +First there were interwoven bushes and vines beside the road, and then tall +reeds and marsh grasses; now there was sand underfoot, now mud. But it was +a better path by far than any we could have beaten out for ourselves, and +we all--except the cook--were well pleased that we had taken it. + +The bushes and tall grasses, which shut us in, prevented our seeing the +ocean behind us or the hills ahead, and the miasmic mist that we had +noticed some time since billowed around our knees. But the stars were very +bright above us, and phosphorescent creatures like fire-flies fluttered +here and there, and, all things considered, we made excellent progress. + +As it had been Blodgett in his eternal peering and prowling who had found +the path, so now it was Blodgett, bending low as he hurried at the head of +our irregular line, who twice stopped suddenly and said that he had heard +hoarse, distant calls. + +Each time, when the rest of us came up to him and listened, they had died +away, but Blodgett now had lost his confident air. He bent lower as he +walked and he peered ahead in a way that seemed to me more prowling and +catlike than ever. As we advanced his uneasiness grew on him, until +presently he turned and raised his hand. The five of us crowded close +together behind him and listened intently. + +For a while, as before, we heard nothing; then suddenly a new, strange +noise came to our ears. It was an indistinct sound of trampling, and it +certainly was approaching. + +The cook grasped my arm. "'Fo' de good Lo'd!" he muttered, "dey's voices!" + +Now I, too, and all the others heard occasional grunts and gutturals. We +dared not flee back to the beach, for there or in the open marshy land we +could not escape observation, and since it had taken us a good half hour to +carry our boat to its hiding-place, it would be utter folly to try to +launch it and put out to sea. + +Not knowing which way to turn, the six of us stood huddled together like +frightened sheep, in the starlight, in the centre of that great marsh, with +the white mist sweeping up around the bushes, and waited for we knew not +what. + +As the noise of tramping and the guttural voices grew louder, Blodgett +gasped, "Look! In heaven's name, look there!" + +Where the path wound over a gentle rise, which was blurred to our eyes by +the mist, there appeared a moving black mass above which swayed and rose +and fell what seemed to our excited vision the points of a great number of +spears. + +With one accord we turned and plunged from the path straight into the marsh +and ran with all our might and main. The cook, who hitherto had brought up +the rear, now forged to the front, springing ahead with long jumps. +Occasionally, as he leaped even higher to clear a bush or a stump, I could +see his kinky round head against the sky, and catch the flash of starlight +on his cleaver, which he still carried. Close behind him ran Neddie Benson, +who saw in the adventures of the night a more terrible fulfillment of the +plump lady's prophecies than ever he had dreamed of; then came Roger and I, +and at my shoulder I heard Davie's heavy breathing and Blodgett's hard +gasps. + +To snakes or other reptiles that may have inhabited the warm pools through +which we splashed, we gave no thought. Somewhere ahead of us there was high +land--had we not rowed close enough to the promontory to hear breakers? +When Davie and Blodgett fairly panted to us to stop for breath, the cook +and Neddie Benson with one voice urged us on to the hills where we could +find rocks or trees for a shelter from which to stand off whatever savages +might pursue us. + +Though we tried to make as little noise as possible, our splashing and +crashing as we raced now in single file, now six abreast, now as +irregularly as half a dozen sheep, must have been audible to keen ears a +mile away. When we came at last to woods and drier ground, we settled down +to a steady jog, which was much less noisy, but even then we stumbled and +fell and clattered and thrashed as we labored on. + +At first we had heard in the night behind us, repeated over and over again, +those hoarse, unintelligible calls and certain raucous blasts, which we +imagined came from some crude native trumpet; but as we climbed, the rising +mist floated about us, and hearing less of the calling and the blasts, we +slowed down to a hard walk and went on up, up, up, through trees and over +rocks, with the mist in our faces and obscuring the way until we could not +see three feet in front of us, but had to keep together by calling +cautiously now and then. + +Blodgett, coming first to a ridge of rock, stopped high above us like a +shadow cast by the moonlight on the mist. + +"Here's the place to make a stand," he cried in his thin voice. "A nat'ral +fort to lay behind. Come, lads, over we go!" + +Up on the rock we scrambled, all of us ready to jump down on the other +side, when Neddie Benson called on us to stop, and with a queer cry let +himself fall back the way he had come. Fearing that he was injured, we +paused reluctantly. + +"Don't go over that rock," he cried. + +"Why not?" Roger asked. + +"It gives me a sick feeling inside." + +"Stuff!" exclaimed Blodgett. "Behind that rock we'll be safe from all the +heathen in the Chinese Sea." + +"The lady she said there'd be trouble," Neddie wailed insistently, "and I +ain't going over that rock. No, sir, not when I feel squeamish like I do +now." + +With an angry snort Blodgett hesitated on the very summit of the ledge. +"Come on, come on," he said. + +"Listen dah!" the cook whispered. + +I thought of savage yells and trampling feet when, crouching on hands and +knees, I listened; but I heard none of them. The sound that came to my ears +was the faint, distant rumble of surf breaking on rocks. + +Now Roger spoke sharply: "Steady, men, go slow." + +"The sea's somewhere beyond us," I said. + +"Come, come," Blodgett repeated tiresomely in his thin windy voice, "over +these rocks and we'll be safe." He was so confident and eager that we were +on the very point of following him. I actually leaned out over the edge +ready to leap down. Never did a man's strange delusion come nearer to +leading his comrades to disaster! + +The cook raised his hand. "Look--look dah!" + +He was staring past Blodgett's feet, past my hands, down at the rocks +whither we were about to drop. The mist was opening slowly. There was +nothing for more than six feet below us--for more than twelve feet. Now the +mist eddied up to the rock again; now it curled away and opened out until +we could look down to the ghostly, phosphorescent whiteness of waves +breaking on rough stones almost directly under us. Blodgett, with a queer, +frightened expression, crawled back to Neddie Benson. + +We were sitting at the brink of a sheer precipice, which fell away more +than two hundred feet to a mass of jagged rock on which the sea was booming +with a hollow sound like the voice of a great bell. + +"Well, here we'll have to make our stand if they follow us," said Davie. + +Although the rest were white with horror at the death we so narrowly had +avoided, old Davie did not even breathe more quickly. The man had no more +imagination than a porpoise. + +Gathering in the lee of the rocky ridge, we took stock of our weapons and +recovered our self-possession. The cook again ran his thumb-nail along the +edge of the cleaver; Roger examined the lock of his pistol--I saw a queer +expression on his face at the time, but he said nothing; Blodgett sharpened +his knife on his calloused palm and the rest of us found clubs and stones. +We could flee no farther. Here, if we were pursued, we must fight. But +although we waited a long time, no one came. The mist gradually passed off; +the stars again shone brightly, and the moon presently peeped out from +between the cone-shaped mountains on our eastern horizon. + +[Illustration] + + + + +V + +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN LAST RESORT + + +"They're not on our heels at all events," said Roger, when we had sat +silent and motionless until we were cramped from head to foot. Of our +little band, he was by far the least perturbed. "If we should set an anchor +watch, we could sleep, turn and turn about. What do you say to that?" + + +He had a way with him, partly the quiet humor that twinkled in his eyes, +partly his courteous manner toward all of us, particularly the older men, +that already had endeared him to every member of our company, and a general +murmur of assent answered him. + +"Blodgett, Neddie, and I'll stand first watch, then. We'll make the watches +three hours on deck and three below, if you say so. You others had best +hunt out an easy place to sleep, but let every man keep his knife or club +where he can snatch it up in case of attack." + +Remembering his comfortable quarters in the steerage of the Island +Princess, the cook groaned; but we found a spot where there was some +sun-baked earth, which we covered with such moss as we could lay our hands +on, threw ourselves down, and fell asleep forthwith. + +We were so stiff when the other three waked us that we scarcely could stand +without help; but we gradually worked new life into our sore muscles and +took our stations with as much good-will as we could muster. Roger gave us +his watch to tell the time by, and we agreed on separate posts from which +to guard against surprise--the cook a little way down the hill to the +right, Davie Paine farther to the left, and I on the summit of the rocks +whence I could see in all directions. + +The wild view from that rock would have been a rare sight for old and +experienced voyagers, and to me, a boy in years and in travels, it was +fascinating both for its uncommon beauty and for the thousand perils that +it might conceal. Who could say what savages were sleeping or prowling +about under the dark branches of yonder shadowy woods? What wild creatures +lurked in their depths? What pirate prows were steering their course by +yonder cone-shaped peaks or by those same bright stars that twinkled +overhead? + +I studied the outline of the island, with its miles of flat marshland deep +in grass and tangled vines, its palms and dense forests, its romantic +mountains, and its jagged northern cliffs; I watched the moonbeams +sparkling on the water; I watched a single light shining far out at sea. By +and by I saw inland, on the side of one of the hills, a light shining in +the jungle, and stared at it with a sort of unwilling fascination. + +A light in the jungle could mean so many things! + +Startled by a sound down in our own camp, I quickly turned and saw old +Blodgett scrambling up to where I sat. + +"It ain't no use," he said in an undertone. "I can't sleep." He twisted his +back and writhed like a cat that wants to scratch itself against a +doorpost. "What an island for temples! Ah, Benny, here's our chance to make +our everlasting fortunes." + +I touched him and pointed at the distant light shining out of the darkness. + +Sitting down beside me, he watched it intently. "I tell ye, Benny," he +murmured thoughtfully, "either me and you and the rest of us is going to +make our everlasting fortunes out o' these here natives, or we're going to +lay out under these here trees until the trumpet blows for Judgment." + +After a time he spoke again. "Ah, but it's a night to be stirring! I'll +stake all my pay for this unlucky voyage that there's not a native on the +island who hasn't a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string, or +maybe emeralds--there's a stone for you! Emeralds are green as the sea by a +sandy shore and bright as a cat's eyes in the dark." + +Morning came quickly. Pink and gold tinted the cone-shaped peaks, the sky +brightened from the color of steel to a clear cobalt, and all at once the +world lay before us in the cool morning air, which the sun was soon to warm +to a vapid heat. As we gathered at the summit of the cliff over which +Blodgett nearly had let us into eternity, we could see below, flying in and +out, birds of the variety, as I afterwards learned, that make edible nests. + +It now was apparent that the light I had seen at sea was that of a ship's +lantern, for to our amazement the Island Princess lay in the offing. +Landward unbroken verdure extended from the slope at our feet to the base +of the cone-shaped peaks, and of the armed force that had frightened us so +badly the evening before we saw no sign; but when we looked at the marsh we +rubbed our eyes and stared anew. + +There was the rough hillside that we had climbed in terror; there was the +marsh with its still pools, its lush herbage, and the "road" that wound +from the muddy beach to the forest on our left. But in the marsh, scattered +here and there--! The truth dawned on us slowly. All at once Blodgett +slapped his thin legs and leaned back and laughed until tears started from +his faded eyes; Neddie Benson stared at him stupidly, then poured out a +flood of silly oaths. The cook burst into a hoarse guffaw, and Roger and +Davie Paine chuckled softly. We stopped and looked at each other and then +laughed together until we had to sit down on the ground and hold our aching +sides. + +In the midst of the marsh were feeding a great number of big, long-horned +water buffaloes. We now realized that the road we had followed was one of +their trails that the guttural calls and blasts from rude trumpets were +their snorts and blats, that the spears we had seen were their horns viewed +from lower ground. + +The ebbing tide had left our boat far from the water, and since we were +faint from our long fast, it was plain that, if we were to survive our +experience, we must find help soon. + +"If I was asked," Davie remarked thoughtfully, "I'd say the thing to do was +to follow along the edge of that there swamp to the forest, where maybe +we'll find a bit of a spring and some kind of an animal Mr. Hamlin can +shoot with that pistol of his." + +Roger drew the pistol from his belt and regarded it with a wry smile. +"Unfortunately," he said, "I have no powder." + +At all events there was no need to stay longer where we were; so, retracing +our steps of the evening before, we skirted the marsh and came to a place +where there were many cocoanut trees. We were bitterly disappointed to find +that our best efforts to climb them were of no avail. We dared not try to +fell them with the cook's cleaver, lest the noise of chopping attract +natives; for we were convinced by the light we had seen shining in the +jungle that the island was inhabited. So we set off cautiously into the +woods, and slowly tramped some distance through an undergrowth that +scratched our hands and faces and tore our clothes. On the banks of a small +stream we picked some yellow berries, which Blodgett ate with relish, but +which the rest of us found unpalatable. We all drank water from the hollows +of trees,--we dared not drink from the boggy stream,--and Neddie Benson ate +the leaves of some bushes and urged the rest of us to try them. That we +refused, we later had reason to be deeply thankful. + +Following the stream we crossed a well-marked path, which caused us +considerable uneasiness, and came at last to an open glade, at the other +end of which we saw a person moving. At that we bent double and retreated +as noiselessly as possible. Once out of sight in the woods, we hurried off +in single file till we thought we had put a safe distance behind us; but +when we stopped to rest we were terrified by a noise in the direction from +which we had come, and we hastened to conceal ourselves under the leaves +and bushes. + +The noise slowly drew nearer, as if men were walking about and beating the +undergrowth as they approached. Blodgett stared from his covert with beady +eyes; Neddie gripped my wrist; the cook rubbed his thumb along the blade of +the cleaver, and Roger fingered the useless pistol. Still the noises +approached. At the sight of something that moved I felt my heart leap and +stand still, then Blodgett laughed softly; a pair of great birds which flew +away as soon as they saw us stirring, had occasioned our fears. + +Having really seen a man in the glade by the stream, we were resolved to +incur no foolish risks; so we cautiously returned to the hill, whence we +could watch the beach and the broad marsh and catch between the mountains a +glimpse of a bay to the northeast where we now saw at a great distance some +men fishing from canoes. While the rest of us prepared another hiding-place +among the bushes, Roger and Blodgett sallied forth once more to reconnoitre +in a new direction. + +Although we no longer could see the ship, we were much perplexed that she +had lingered off the island, and we talked of it at intervals throughout +the day. Whatever her purpose, we were convinced that for us it augured +ill. + +Presently Roger and Blodgett returned in great excitement and reported that +the woods were full of Malays. Apparently the natives were unaware of our +presence but we dared not venture again in search of food, so we resumed +our regular watches and slept in our turns. As soon as the sun should set +we planned to skirt the mountains under the cover of darkness, in desperate +hope of finding somewhere food and water with which we could return to our +boat and defy death by putting out to sea; but ere the brief twilight of +the tropics had settled into night, Neddie Benson was writhing and groaning +in mortal agony. We were alarmed, and for a time could think of no +explanation; but after a while black Frank looked up from where he crouched +by the luckless Neddie and fiercely muttered:-- + +"What foh he done eat dem leaves? Hey? Tell me dat!" + +It was true that Neddie alone had eaten the leaves. A heavy price he was +paying for it! We all looked at Blodgett with an anxiety that it would have +been kinder, perhaps, to hide, and Blodgett himself seemed uneasy lest he +should be poisoned by the berries he had eaten. But no harm came of them, +and by the time the stars were shining again Neddie appeared to be over the +worst of his sickness and with the help of the rest of us managed to +stagger along. So we chose a constellation for our guide and set off +through the undergrowth. + +Even Blodgett by this time had got over his notion of robbing temples. + +"If only we was to run on a yam patch," he said to me as together we +stumbled forward, "or maybe some chickens or a little rice or a vegetable +garden or a spring of cold water--" + +But only a heavy sigh answered him, a grunt from the cook, and a moan from +Neddie. Our spirits were too low to be stirred even by Blodgett's visionary +tales. It was hard to believe that the moon above the mountains was the +same that had shone down upon us long before off the coast of Sumatra. + +The woods were so thick that we soon lost sight of our constellation, but +we kept on our way, stopping often to rest, and made what progress we +could. More than once we heard at a little distance noises that indicated +the presence of wild beasts; and the brambles and undergrowth tore our +clothes and scratched and cut our skin till blood ran from our hands and +faces. But the thing that alarmed us most we heard one time when we had +thrown ourselves on the ground to rest. Though it came from a great +distance it unmistakably was four distinct gunshots. + +Too weak and exhausted to talk, yet determined to carry through our +undertaking, we pushed on and on till we could go no farther; then we +dropped where we stood, side by side, and slept. + +Morning woke us. Through the trees we saw a cone-shaped peak and a great +marsh where buffalo were feeding. We unwittingly had circled in the night +and had come back to within a quarter of a mile of the very point from +which we had set forth. + + + +CHAPTER XX + +A STORY IN MELON SEEDS + + +We were all gaunt and unkempt after our hardships of the past two days, but +Neddie, poor fellow, looked more like a corpse than a living man and moaned +with thirst and scarcely could sit up without help. Finding about a pint of +water close at hand in the hollow of a tree, we carried him to it and he +sucked it up with a straw till it was all gone; but though it relieved his +misery, he was manifestly unable to walk, even had we dared stir abroad, so +we stayed where we were while the sun rose to the meridian. We could find +so little water that we all suffered from thirst, and with Neddie's +sickness in mind none of us dared eat more leaves or berries. + +The afternoon slowly wore away; the tide came in across the flats; the +shadows lengthened hour by hour. But no breath of wind cooled our hot +faces. Neddie lay in a heap, moaning fitfully; Blodgett and Davie Paine +slept; Roger sat with his back to a tree and watched the incoming tide; the +cook stirred about uneasily and muttered to himself. + +Coming over to me, he crouched at my side and spoke of Kipping. He was +savagely vindictive. "Hgh!" he grunted, "dat yeh crimp! He got dis nigger +once, yass, sah. Got me to dat boa'din' house what he was runner foh. Yass, +sah. Ah had one hunnerd dollahs in mah pants pocket, yass, sah. Nex' +mohnin' Ah woke up th'ee days lateh 'boa'd ship bound foh London. Ah ain' +got no hunnerd dollah in mah pants pocket. Dat yeh Kipping he didn't leave +me no pants pocket." The old black pulled open his shirt and revealed a +jagged scar on his great shoulder. "Look a' dat! Cap'n done dat--dat yeh +v'yage. Hgh!" + +At dusk Neddie's moaning woke the sleepers, and we held a council in which +we debated plans for the future. Daring neither to venture abroad nor to +eat the native fruits and leaves, exhausted by exposure, perishing of +hunger and thirst, we faced a future that was dark indeed. + +"As for me," said Davie calmly, "I can see only one way to end our misery." +He glanced at the cook's cleaver as he spoke. + +"No, no!" Roger cried sharply. "Let us have no such talk as that, Davie." +He hesitated, looking first at us,--his eyes rested longest on Neddie's +hollow face,--then at the marsh; then he leaned forward and looked from one +to another. "Men," he said, "I see no better way out of our difficulties +than to surrender to the natives." + +"Oh, no, no, sah! No, sah! Don' do dat, sah! No, no no!" With a yell black +Frank threw himself on his knees. "No, sah, no, sah! Dey's we'y devils, +sah, dey's wuss 'n red Injuns, sah!" + +"Fool." Roger cried. "Be still!" Seeming to hold the negro in contempt, he +turned to the rest of us and awaited our answer. + +At the time we were amazed at his harshness, and the poor cook was +completely overwhelmed; for little as Roger said, there was something in +his manner of saying it that burned like fire. But later, when we looked +back on that day and remembered how bitterly we were discouraged, we saw +reason to thank God that Roger Hamlin had had the wisdom and the power to +crush absolutely the first sign of insubordination. + +Staring in a curious way at the cook, who was fairly groveling on the +earth, Blodgett spoke up in a strangely listless voice. "I say yes, sir. If +we're to die, we're to die anyhow, and there's a bare chance they'll feed +us before they butcher us." + +"Ay," said Davie. "Me, too!" + +And Neddie made out to nod. + +The cook, watching the face of each man in turn, began to blubber; and when +I, the youngest and last, cast my vote with the rest, he literally rolled +on the ground and bellowed. + +"Get up!" Roger snapped out at him. + +He did so in a kind of stupid wonder. + +"Now then, cook, there's been enough of this nonsense. Come, let's sleep. +At daylight to-morrow we'll be on our way." + +Apparently the negro at first doubted his ears; but Roger's peremptory tone +brought him to his senses, and the frank disapproval of the others ended +his perversity. + +A certain confidence that our troubles were soon to be ended in one way or +another, coupled with exhaustion, enabled me to sleep deeply that night, +despite the numberless perils that beset us. + +I was aware that the cook continually moaned to himself and that at some +time in the night Roger and Blodgett were throwing stones at a wild beast +that was prowling about. Then the sun shone full on my face and I woke with +a start. + +Roger and Davie Paine each gave Neddie Benson an arm, Blodgett and I pushed +ahead to find the best footing, and the cook, once more palsied with fear, +again came last. To this day I have not been able to account for Frank's +strange weakness. In all other circumstances he was as brave as a lion. + +Staggering along as best we could, we arrived at the stream we had found +before--we dared not drink its water, even in our extremity--and followed +it to the glade, which this time we boldly entered. At first we saw no one, +but when we had advanced a few steps, we came upon three girls fishing from +the bank of the stream. As they darted off along the path that led up the +glade, we started after them, but we were so weak that, when we had gone +only a short distance, we had to sit down on the trunk of a large tree to +rest. + +About a quarter of an hour later we heard steps, and shortly seven men +appeared by the same path. + +Indicating by a motion of his hand that he wished the rest of us to remain +seated, Roger rose and went fearlessly to meet the seven. When he had +approached within a short distance, they stopped and drew their krises, or +knives with waved points. Never hesitating, Roger continued to advance +until he was within six feet of them, then falling on his knees and +extending his empty hands, he begged for mercy. + +For a long time they stood with drawn knives, staring at him and at us; +then one of them put up his kris, and knelt in front of him and offered him +both hands, which, it seemed, was a sign of friendship. + +When we indicated by gestures that we were hungry, they immediately gave us +each a cocoanut; but meanwhile some twenty or thirty more natives had +arrived at the spot where we were, and they now proceeded to take our hats +and handkerchiefs, and to cut the buttons from our coats. + +Presently they gave us what must have been an order to march. At all events +we walked with them at a brisk pace along a well-marked trail, between +great ferns and rank canes and grasses, and after a time we came to a +village composed of frail, low houses or bungalows, from which other +natives came running. Some of them shook their fists at us angrily; some +picked up sticks and clubs or armed themselves with knives and krises, and +came trailing along behind. Children began to throw clods and pebbles at +us. The mob was growing rapidly, and for some cause, their curiosity to see +the white men, the like of whom most of them probably never had seen +before, was unaccountably mixed with anger. + +If they were going to kill us, why did they not cut our throats and have it +done with? Still the people came running, till the whining of their voices +almost deafened us; and still they hustled us along, until at last we came +to a house larger than any we had passed. + +Here they all stopped, and our captors, with as many of the clamoring mob +as the place would hold, drove us through the open door into what appeared +to be the judgment-hall of the village. Completely at their mercy, we stood +by the judgment-seat in the centre of a large circle and waited until, at +the end of perhaps half an hour, an even greater uproar arose in the +distance. + +There was much stirring and talking and new faces continued to appear. From +where I stood I could see that the growing throng was armed with spears and +knives. More and more natives pressed into the ring that surrounded us and +listened intently to a brisk discussion, of which none of us could +understand a word. + +In one corner was a heap of melons; in another were spears and shields. I +was looking at them curiously when something familiar just above them +caught my eye and sent a stab of fear through my heart. In that array of +savage weapons were _three ship's cutlasses_. I was familiar enough with +the rife of those Eastern islands to know what that meant. + +Everywhere in the dim hall were bared knives, and muttering voices now and +then rose to loud shrieks. What with faintness and fatigue and fear, I felt +myself growing weak and dizzy. The circle of hostile faces and knives and +spears seemed suddenly dim and far-away. In all the hut I could see only +the three ship's cutlasses in the corner, and think only of what a grand +history theirs must have been. + +The distant roar that came slowly nearer seemed so much like a dream that I +thought I must be delirious, and rubbed my eyes and ears and tried to +compose myself; but the roar continued to grow louder, and now a more +intense clamor arose. The crowd parted and in through the open lane came a +wild, tall man, naked except for a pair of short breeches, a girdle, and a +red handkerchief on his head, who carried a drawn kris. Coming within the +circle, he stopped and stared at us. Then everything grew white and I found +myself lying on my back on the floor, looking up at them all and wondering +if they had killed me already. Small wonder that starvation and exposure +had proved too much for me! + +Roger was down on his knees beside me,--he told me long afterwards that +nothing ever gave him such a start as did my ghastly pallor,--and the +others, in the face of our common danger, gathered round me solicitously. +All, that is, except the cook; for, although our captors had exhibited a +lively curiosity about those of us who were white, they had frightened the +poor negro almost out of his wits by feeling of his cheeks and kinky hair +and by punching his ribs with their fingers, until now, having been +deprived of his beloved cleaver, he cowered like a scared puppy before the +gravely interested natives. "O Lo'd," he muttered between chattering teeth, +"O Lo'd, why am dis yeh nigger so popolous? O Lo'd, O Lo'd, dah comes +anotheh--dah comes anotheh!" + +Of the hostility of our captors there now could be no doubt. The sinister +motion of their weapons, the angry glances that they persistently darted at +us, the manner and inflection of their speech, all were threatening. But +Roger, having made sure that I was not injured, was on his feet and already +had faced boldly the angry throng. + +Though we could not understand the savages and they could not understand +us, Roger's earnestness when he began to speak commanded their attention, +and the chief fixed his eyes on him gravely. But some one else repeated it +twice a phrase that sounded like "Pom-pom, pom-pom!" And the rest burst +into angry yells. + +Roger indignantly threw his hands down,--palms toward the chief,--as if to +indicate that we had come in friendship; but the man laughed scornfully and +repeated the phrase, "Pom-pom!" + +Again Roger spoke indignantly; again he threw his hands down, palms out. +But once more the cry, "Pom-pom, pom-pom," rose fiercely, and the angry +throng pressed closer about us. The rest of us had long since despaired of +our lives, and for the moment even Roger was baffled. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" + +What the phrase meant we had not the remotest idea, but that our state now +was doubly perilous the renewed hubbub and the closing circle of weapons +convinced us. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" Again and again in all parts of the hall we heard the +mysterious words. + +Was there nothing that we could do to prove our good faith? Nothing to show +them that at least we did not come as enemies? + +Over Davie Fame's face an odd expression now passed. He was staring at the +heap of melons. + +"Mr. Hamlin," he said in a low voice, "if we was to cut a ship out of one +of them melons, and a boat and some men, we could show these 'ere heathen +how we didn't aim to bother them, and then maybe they'd let us go away +again." + +"Davie, Davie, man," Roger cried, "there's an idea!" + +I was completely bewildered. What could Davie mean, I wondered. Melons and +a ship? Were he and Roger mad? From Roger's actions I verily believed they +were. + +He faced our captors for a moment as if striving to think of some way to +impress them; then, with a quick gesture, he deliberately got down on the +floor and took the chief's foot and placed it on his head, to signify that +we were completely in the fellow's power. Next he rose and faced the man +boldly, and began a solemn and impressive speech. His grave air and stern +voice held their attention, though they could not understand a word he +said; and before their interest had time to fail, he drew from his pocket a +penknife, a weapon so small that it had escaped their prying fingers, and +walking deliberately to the corner where the melons were heaped up, took +one of them and began to cut it. + +At first they started forward; but when Roger made no hostile motion, they +gathered round him in silence to see what he was doing. + +"Here, men, is the ship," he said gravely, "and here the boats." Kneeling +and continuing his speech, he cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped +model of a ship, and stuck in it, to represent masts, three slivers of +bamboo, which he split from a piece that lay on the floor; then he cut a +smaller model, which he laid on the deck of the ship, to represent a boat. +On one side of the deck he upright six melon seeds, on the other twelve. +Pointing at the six seeds and holding up six fingers, he pointed at each +of us in turn. + +Suddenly one of the natives cried out in his own tongue; then another and +another seemed to understand Roger's meaning as they jabbered among +themselves and in turn pointed at the six seeds and at the six white men +whom they had captured. + +Roger then imitated a fight, shaking his fists and slashing as if with a +cutlass, and, last of all, he pointed his finger, and cried, "Bang! Bang!" + +At this the natives fairly yelled in excitement and repeated over and over, +"Pom--pom--pom--pom!" + +"Bang-bang!"--"Pom-pom!" We suddenly understood the phrase that they had +used so often. + +Now in dead silence, all in the hut, brown men and white, pressed close +around the melon-rind boat on the floor. So moving the melon seeds that it +was obvious that the six men represented by six seeds were being driven +overboard, Roger next set the boat on the floor and transferred them to it. +Lining up all the rest along the side of the ship, he cried loudly, "Bang +bang!" + +"Cook," he called, beckoning to black Frank, "come here!" + +As the negro reluctantly obeyed, Roger pointed to the long gash that +Kipping's bullet had cut in his kinky scalp. Crying again, "Bang-bang!" he +pointed at one of the seeds in the boat and then at the cook. + +Not one of them who could see the carved boats failed to understand what +Roger meant, and the brown men looked at Frank and laughed and talked more +loudly and excitedly than ever. Then the chief stood up and cried to some +one in the farthest corner of the room, and at that there was more laughing +and shouting. The man in the corner seemed much abashed; but those about +him pushed him forward, and he was shoved along through the crowd until he, +too, stood beside the table, where a dozen men pointed at his head and +cried "Bang-bang!" or "Pom-pom!" as the case might be. + +To our amazement we saw that just over his right temple there was torn the +path of a bullet, exactly that on the cook's head. + +[Illustration: +He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo.] + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +NEW ALLIES + + +Now the chief reached for Roger's knife and deftly whittled out the shape +of a native canoe. In it he placed several seeds, then, pushing it against +the carved ship, he pointed to the man with the bullet wound on his temple +and cried, "Pom-pom!" Next he pointed at two seeds in the boat and said, +"Pom-pom," and snapped them out of the canoe with his finger. + +"Would you believe it!" Blodgett gasped. "The heathens went out to the ship +in one o' them boats, and Falk fired on 'em!" + +"And two of 'em was killed!" Davie exclaimed unnecessarily. + +Roger now laid half a melon on the floor, its flat side down, and moved the +boat slowly over to it. + +That the half-melon represented the island was apparent to all. The natives +crowded round us, jabbering questions that we could not understand and of +course could not answer; they examined the cook's wound and compared it +with the wound their friend had suffered; they pointed at the little boats +cut out of melon-rind and laughed uproariously. + +Now one of them made a suggestion, the others took it up, and the chief +split melons and offered a half to each of us. + +We ate them like the starving men we were, and did not notice that the +chief had assembled his head men for a consultation, until he sent a man +running from the hall, returned shortly with six pieces of betel nut, which +the natives chew instead of tobacco, and gave them to the chief, who handed +one to each of us as a mark of friendship. Next, to our amazement, one of +the natives produced Roger's useless pistol and handed it back to him; and +as if that were a signal, one after another they restored our knives and +clubs, until, last of all, a funny little man with a squint handed the +cleaver back to the cook. + +With a tremendous sigh of relief, Frank seized the mighty weapon and laid +it on his knee and buried his big white teeth in half a melon. "Mah golly!" +he muttered, when he had swallowed the huge mouthful and had wiped his lips +and chin with the back of his hand, "Ah neveh 'spected to see dis yeh +felleh again. No, sah!" And he tapped the cleaver lovingly. + +The chief, who had been talking earnestly with his counselors, now made +signs to attract our attention. Obviously he wished to tell us a story of +his own. He cut out a number of slim canoes from the melon-rind and laid +them on the half-melon that represented the island; next, he pushed the +ship some distance away on the floor. Blowing on it through pursed lips, he +turned it about and drew it back toward the half-melon that represented the +island. When it was in the lee of the island, he stopped it and looked up +at us and smiled and pointed out of the door. We were puzzled. Seeing our +blank expressions, he repeated the process. Still we could not understand. + +Persisting in his efforts, he now launched three roughly carved canoes, in +which he placed a number of seeds, pointing at himself and various others; +then in each of the prows he placed two seeds and pointed at the six of us, +two at a time. Pointing next at the roof of the hut, he waved his hand from +east to west and closed his eyes as if in sleep, after which he placed his +finger on his lips, pushed the carved canoes very slowly across the floor +toward the ship, then, with a screech that made our hair stand on end, he +rushed them at the seeds that represented Captain Falk and his men, +yelling, "Pom-pom-pom-pom!" and snapped the seeds off on the floor. + +Leaning back, he bared his teeth and laughed ferociously. + +Here was a plot to take the ship! Although we probably had missed the fine +points of it, we could not mistake its general character. + +"Ay," said Blodgett, as if we had been discussing the matter for hours, +"but we'll be a pack of bloody pirates to be hanged from the yard-arms of +the first frigate that overhauls us." + +It was true. We should be liable as pirates in any port in Christendom. + +"Men," said Roger coolly, "there's no denying that in the eyes of the law +we'd be pirates as well as mutineers. But if we can take the ship and sail +it back to Salem, we'll be acquitted of any charge of mutiny or piracy, I +can promise you. It'll be easy to ship a new crew at Canton, and we can +settle affairs with the Websters' agents there so that at least we'll have +a chance at a fair trial if we are taken on our homeward voyage. Shall we +venture it?" + +The cook rolled his eyes. "Gimme dat yeh Kipping!" he cried, and with a +savage cackle he swung his cleaver. + +"Falk for me, curse him!" Davie Paine muttered with a neat that surprised +me. I had not realized that emotions as well as thoughts developed so +slowly in Davie's big, leisurely frame that he now was just coming to the +fullness of his wrath at the indignities he had undergone. + +Turning to the native chief, Roger cried, "We're with you!" And he +extended his hand to seal the bargain. + +Of course the man could not understand the words but in the nods we had +exchanged and in the cook's fierce glee, he had read our consent, and he +laughed and talked with the others, who laughed, too, and pointed at +Roger's pistol and cried, "Pom-pom!" and at the cook's cleaver and cried, +"Whish!" + +When by signs Roger indicated that we needed sleep the chief issued orders, +and half a dozen natives led us to a hut that seemed to be set apart for +our use. But although we were nearly perishing with fatigue, they urged by +signs that we follow them, and so insistent were they that we reluctantly +obeyed. + +Climbing a little hill beyond the village, we came to a cleared spot +surrounded by bushes through which we looked across between the mountains +to where we could just see the open ocean. There, not three miles away, the +Island Princess rode at anchor. + +I remember thinking, as I fell asleep, of the chance that Falk and Kipping +would sail away before it was dark enough to attack them, and I spoke of it +to Roger and the others, who shared my fear; but when our savage hosts +wakened us, we knew by their eagerness that the ship still lay at her +anchor. Why she remained, we could not agree. We hazarded a score of +conjectures and debated them with lively interest. + +Presently the natives brought us rice and sago-bread and peas. + +As I ate and looked out into the darkness where fires were twinkling, I +wondered which was the light I had seen that night when I watched from the +summit of the headland. + +Though a gentle rain was falling, the whole village was alive with people. +Men armed with spears and krises squatted in all parts of the hut. Boys +came and went in the narrow circle of light. Women and girls looked from +the door and from the farthest corners. Now and then some one would point +at Roger's pistol and cry, "Pom-pom!" or, to the pride and delight of the +cook, point at the cleaver and cry, "Whish!" and laugh loudly. + +Even black Frank had got over his terror of having natives come up without +warning and feel of his arm or his woolly head, though he muttered +doubtfully, "Ah ain't sayin' as Ah likes it. Dah's su'thin' so kind of +hongry de way dey comes munchin' an' proddin' round dis yeh ol' niggeh." + +At midnight we went out into the dark and the rain, and followed single +file after our leader along a narrow path that led through dripping ferns +and pools of mud and water, over roots and rocks, and under low branches, +which time and again swung back and struck our faces. + +We were drenched to the skin when we came at last to a sluggish, black +little stream, which ran slowly under thick overhanging trees, and in other +circumstances we should have been an unhappy and rebellious crew. But now +the spell of adventure was upon us. Our savage guides moved silently and +surely, and the forest was so mysterious and strange that I found its +allurement all but irresistible. The slow, silent stream, on which now and +then lights as faint and elusive as wisps of cloud played fitfully, +reflected from I knew not where, had a fascination that I am sure the +others felt as strongly as I. So we followed in silence and watched all +that the dense blackness of the night let us see. + +Now the natives launched canoes, which slipped out on the water and lay +side by side in the stream. Roger and Neddie Benson got into one; Blodgett +and Davie Paine another; the cook and I into a third, Whatever thoughts or +plans we six might have, we could not express them to the natives, and we +were too widely separated to put them into practice ourselves. We could +only join in the fight with good-will when the time came, and I assure you, +the thought made me very nervous indeed. Also, I now realized that the +natives had taken no chance of treachery on our part: _behind each of us +sat an armed man_. + +The canoes shot ahead so swiftly under the pressure of the paddles that +they seemed actually to have come to life. But they moved as noiselessly as +shadows. We glided down the stream and out in a long line into a little +bay, where we gathered, evidently to arrange the last details of the +attack. I heard Roger say in a low voice, "We'll reach the ship about three +bells and there couldn't be a better hour." Then, with a few low words of +command from the native chief, we spread out again into an irregular, +swiftly moving fleet, and swept away from the shore. + +As I looked back at the island I could see nothing, for the cloudy sky and +the drizzly rain completely obscured every object beyond a limited circle +of water; but as I looked ahead, my heart leaped and my breath came +quickly. We had passed the farthest point of land and there, dimly in the +offing, shone a single blurred light, which I knew was on the Island +Princess. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +WE ATTACK + + +In the darkness and rain we soon lost sight even of those nearest us on +each side, but we knew by the occasional almost imperceptible whisper of a +paddle in the water, or by the faintest murmur of speech, that the others +were keeping pace with us. + +To this day I do not understand how the paddlers maintained the proper +intervals in our line of attack; yet maintain them they did, by some means +or other, according to a preconcerted plan, for we advanced without hurry +or hesitation. + +Approaching the ship more closely, we made out the rigging, which the soft +yellow light of the lantern dimly revealed. We saw, too, a single dark +figure leaning on the taffrail, which became clear as we drew nearer. I was +surprised to perceive that we had come up astern of the ship--quite without +reason I had expected to find her lying bow on. Now we rode the gentle +swell without sound or motion. The slow paddles held us in the same place +with regard to the ship, and minutes passed in which my nervousness rose to +such a pitch that I felt as if I must scream or clap my hands simply to +shatter that oppressive, tantalizing, almost unendurable silence. But when +I started to turn and whisper to the cook, something sharp and cold pricked +through the back of my shirt and touched my skin, and from that time on I +sat as still as a wooden figurehead. + +After a short interval I made out other craft drawing in on our right and +left, and I later learned that, while we waited, the canoes were forming +about the ship a circle of hostile spears. But it then seemed at every +moment as if the man who was leaning on the taffrail must espy us,--it +always is hard for the person in the dark, who sees what is near the light, +to realize that he himself remains invisible,--and a thousand fears swept +over me. + +There came now from somewhere on our right a whisper no louder than a +mouse's hiss of warning or of threat. I scarcely was aware of it. It might +have been a ripple under the prow of the canoe, a slightest turn of a +paddle. Yet it conveyed a message that the natives instantly understood. +The man just behind me repeated it so softly that his repetition was +scarcely audible, even to me who sat so near that I could feel his breath, +and at once the canoe seemed silently to stir with life. Inch by inch we +floated forward, until I could see clearly the hat and coat-collar of the +man who was leaning against the rail. It was Kipping. + +From forward came the cautious voices of the watch. The light revealed the +masts and rigging of the ship for forty or fifty feet from the deck, but +beyond the cross-jack yard all was hazy, and the cabin seemed in the odd +shadows twice its real size. I wondered if Falk were asleep, too, or if we +should come on him sitting up in the cabin, busy with his books and charts. +I wondered who was in the galley, where I saw a light; who was standing +watch; who was asleep below. Still we moved noiselessly on under the stern +of the ship, until I almost could have put my hands on the carved letters, +"Island Princess." + +Besides things on deck, the light also revealed our own attacking party. +The man in front of me had laid his paddle in the bottom of the canoe and +held a spear across his knees. In the boat on our right were five natives +armed with spears and krises; in the one on our left, four. Beyond the +craft nearest to us I could see others less distinctly--silent shadows on +the water, each with her head toward our prey, like a school of giant fish. +In the lee of the ship, the pinnace floated at the end of its painter. + +Still the watch forward talked on in low, monotonous voices; still Kipping +leaned on the rail, his head bent, his arms folded, to all appearances fast +asleep. + +I had now forgotten my fears. I was keenly impatient for the word to +attack. + +A shrill wailing cry suddenly burst on the night air. The man in front of +me, holding his spear above his head with one hand, made a prodigious leap +from the boat, caught the planking with his fingers, got toe-hold on a +stern-port, and went up over the rail like a wild beast. With knives +between their teeth, men from the proas on my right and left boarded the +ship by the chains, by the rail, by the bulwark. + +I saw Kipping leap suddenly forward and whirl about like a weasel in his +tracks. His yell for all hands sounded high above the clamor of the +boarders. Then some one jabbed the butt of a spear into my back and, +realizing that mine was not to be a spectator's part in that weird battle, +I scrambled up the stern as best I could. + +The watch on deck, I instantly saw, had backed against the forecastle where +the watch below was joining it. Captain Falk and some one else, of whose +identity I could not be sure, rushed armed from the cabin. Then a missile +crashed through the lantern, and in the darkness I heard sea-boots banging +on the deck as those aft raced forward to join the crew. + +I clambered aboard, waving my arms and shouting; then I stood and listened +to the chorus of yells fore and aft, the _slip-slip-slip_ of bare feet, the +thud of boots as the Americans ran this way and that. I sometimes since +have wondered how I escaped death in that wild mêlée in the darkness. +Certainly I was preserved by no effort of my own, for not knowing which way +to turn, ignored by friend and foe alike, almost stunned by the terrible +sounds that rose on every side, I simply clutched the rail and was as +unlike the hero that my silly dreams had made me out to be--never had I +dreamed of such a night!--as is every half-grown lad who stands side by +side with violent death. + +Of Kipping I now saw nothing, but as a light momentarily flared up, I +caught a glimpse of Captain Falk and his party sidling along back to back, +fighting off their assailants while they struggled to launch a boat. Time +and time again I heard the spiteful crack of their guns and their oaths and +exclamations. Presently I also heard another sound that made my heart +throb; a man was moaning as if in great pain. + +Then another cried, with an oath, "They've got me! O Tom, haul out that +spear!" A scream followed and then silence. + +Some one very near me, who as yet was unaware of my presence, said, "He's +dead." + +"Look out!" cried another. "See! There behind you!" + +I was startled and instinctively dodged back. There was a crashing report +in my face; the flame of a musket singed my brows and hair, and powder +stung my skin. Then, as the man clubbed his gun, I dashed under his guard, +scarcely aware of the pain in my shoulder, and locking my right heel behind +his left, threw him hard to the deck, where we slipped and slid in a warm +slippery stream that was trickling across the planks. + +Back and forth we rolled, neither of us daring to give the other a moment's +breathing-space in which to draw knife or pistol; and all the time the +fight went on over our heads. I now heard Roger crying to the rest of us to +stand by. I heard what I supposed to be his pistol replying smartly to the +fire from Falk's party, and wondered where in that scene of violence he had +got powder and an opportunity to load. But for the most part I was rolling +and struggling on the slippery deck. + +When some one lighted a torch and the flame flared up and revealed the grim +scene, I saw that Falk and his remaining men were trying at the same time +to stand off the enemy and to scramble over the bulwark, and I realized +that they must have drawn up the pinnace. But I had only the briefest +glimpse of what was happening, for I was in deadly terror every minute lest +my antagonist thrust a knife between my ribs. I could hear him gasping now +as he strove to close his hands on my throat, and for a moment I thought he +had me; but I twisted away, got half on my knees with him under me, sprang +to my feet, then slipped once more on the slow stream across the planks, +and fell heavily. + +In that moment I had seen by torchlight that the pinnace was clear of the +ship and that the men with their guns and spikes were holding off the +natives. I had seen, too, a spear flash across the space of open water and +cut down one of the men. But already my adversary was at me again, and with +his two calloused hands he once more was gripping my throat. I exerted all +my strength to keep from being throttled. I tried to scream, but could only +gurgle. His head danced before me and seemed to swing in circles. I felt +myself losing strength. I rallied desperately, only to be thrown. + +Then, suddenly, I realized that he had let me go and had sat down beside me +breathing heavily. It was the man from Boston whose nose had been broken. +He eyed me curiously as if an idea had come upon him by surprise. + +"I didn't go to fight so hard, mate," he gasped, "but you did act so kind +of vicious that I just had to." + +"You what?" I exclaimed, not believing my ears. + +"It's the only way I had to come over to your side," he said with a +whimper. "Falk would 'a' killed me if I'd just up an' come, though I wanted +to, honest I did." + +I put my hand on my throbbing shoulder, and stared at him incredulously. + +"You don't need to look at me like that," he sniveled. "Didn't I stand by +Bill Hayden to the last along with you? Ain't I human? Ain't I got as much +appreciation as any man of what it means to have a murderin' pair of +officers like Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping? You don't suppose, do you, that +I'd stay by 'em without I had to?" + +I was somewhat impressed by his argument, and he, perceiving it, continued +vehemently, "I _had_ to fight with you. They'd 'a' killed you, too, if I +hadn't." + +There was truth in that. Unquestionably they would have shot me down +without hesitation if we two had not grappled in such a lively tussle that +they could not hit one without hitting the other. + +We got up and leaned on the bulwark and looked down at the boat, which rode +easily on the slow, oily swell. There in the stern-sheets the torchlight +now revealed Falk. + +"I'm lawful master of this vessel," he called back, looking up at the men +who lined the side. "I'll see you hanged from the yard-arm yet, you +white-livered wharf-rats, and you, too, you cabin-window popinjay!"--I knew +that he meant me.--"There'll come a day, by God! There'll come a day!" + +The men in the boat gave way, and it disappeared in the darkness and mist, +its sides bristling with weapons. + +But still Falk's voice came back to us shrilly, "I'll see you yet a-hanging +by your necks," until at last we could only hear him cursing. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +WHAT WE FOUND IN THE CABIN + + +Now some one called, "Ben! Ben Lathrop! Where are you?" + +"Here I am," I cried as loudly as I could. + +"Well, Ben, what's this? Are you wounded?" + +It was Roger, and when he saw with whom I was talking he smiled. + +"Well, Bennie," he cried, "so we've got a prisoner, have we?" + +"No, sir," whimpered the man from Boston, "not a prisoner. I come over, I +did." + +"You what?" + +"I come over--to your side, sir." + +"How about it, Ben?" + +"Why, so he says. We were having a pretty hard wrestling match, but he says +it was to cover up his escape from the other party." + +"How was I to get away, sir, if I didn't have a subterfoog," the prisoner +interposed eagerly. "I _had_ to wrastle. If I hadn't have, they'd 'a' shot +me down as sure as duff on Sunday." + +For my own part I was not yet convinced of his good faith. He had gripped +my throat quite too vindictively. To this very day, when I close my eyes I +can feel his hard fingers clenched about my windpipe and his knees forcing +my arms down on the bloody deck. He had let me go, too, only when we both +knew that Captain Falk and his men had put off from the ship. It seemed +very much as if he were trying to make the best of a bad bargain. But if, +on the other hand, he was entirely sincere in his protestations, it might +well be true that he did not dare come over openly to our side. The problem +had so many faces that it fairly made me dizzy, so I abandoned it and tore +open my clothes to examine the flesh wound on my shoulder. + +"Ay," I thought, when I saw where the musket-ball had cut me at close +range, "that was a friendly shot, was it not?" + +Roger himself was not yet willing to let the matter fall so readily. His +sharp questions stirred the man from Boston to one uneasy denial after +another. + +"But I tell you, sir, I come over as quick as I could." + +Again Roger spoke caustically. + +"But I tell you, sir, I did. And what's more, I can tell you a lot of +things you'd like to know. Perhaps you'd like to know--" He stopped short. + +Roger regarded him as if in doubt, but presently he said in a low voice, +"All right! Say nothing of this to the others. I'll see you later." + +Captain Falk and his crew, meanwhile, had moved away almost unmolested. +Their pikes and guns had held off the few natives who made a show of +pursuing them, and the great majority of our allies were running riot on +the ship, which was a sad sight when we turned to take account of the +situation. + +Three natives were killed and two were wounded, not to mention my injured +shoulder among our own casualties; and two members of the other party in +the crew were sprawled in grotesque attitudes on the deck. Counting the one +who was hit by a spear and who had fallen out of the boat, it meant that +Falk had lost three dead, and if blood on the deck was any sign, others +must have been badly slashed. In other words, our party was, numerically, +almost the equal of his. Considering the man from Boston as on our side, we +were seven to their eight. The lantern that we now lighted revealed more of +the gruesome spectacle, and it made me feel sick to see that both the man +from Boston and I were covered from head to foot with the gore in which we +had been rolling; but to the natives the sight was a stupendous triumph; +and the cook, when I next saw him, was walking down the deck, looking at +the face of one dead man after another. + +By and by he came to me where, overcome by a wave of nausea, I had sat down +on the deck with my back against the bulwark. "Dey ain't none of 'em +Kipping," he said grimly. Then he saw my bleeding shoulder and instantly +got down beside me. "You jest let dis yeh ol' nigger took a hand," he +cried. "Ah's gwine fix you all up. You jest come along o' me!" And helping +me to my feet, he led me to the galley, where once more he was supreme and +lawful master. + +In no time at all he had a kettle of water on the stove, in which the coals +of a good fire still lingered, and with a clean cloth he washed my wound so +gently that I scarcely could believe his great, coarse hands were actually +at work on me. "Dah you is," he murmured, bending over the red, shallow +gash that the bullet had cut, "dah you is. Don' you fret. Ah's gwine git +you all tied up clean an' han'some, yass, sah." + +The yells and cries of every description alarmed and agitated us both. It +was far from reassuring to know that that mob of natives was ranging the +ship at will. + +"Ef you was to ask me," Frank muttered, rolling his eyes till the whites +gleamed starkly, "Ah's gwine tell you dis yeh ship is sottin', so to speak, +on a bar'l of gunpowder. Yass, sah!" + +An islander uttered a shrill catcall just outside the galley and thrust his +head and half his naked body in the door. He vanished again almost +instantly, but Frank jumped and upset the kettle. "Yass, sah, you creepy +ol' sarpint," he gasped. "Yass, sah, we's sottin' on a bar'l of gunpowder." + +I am convinced, as I look back on that night from the pinnacle of more than +half a century, that not one man in ten thousand has ever spent one like +it. Allied with a horde whose language we could not speak, we had boarded +our own ship and now--mutineers, pirates, or loyal mariners, according to +your point of view--we shared her possession with a mob of howling heathens +whose goodwill depended on the whim of the moment, and who might at any +minute, by slaughtering us out of hand, get for their own godless purposes +the ship and all that was in her. + +The cook cautiously fingered the keen edge of his cleaver as we looked out +and saw that dawn was brightening in the east. + +"Dat Falk, he say he gwine git us yet," the cook muttered. "Maybe so--maybe +not. Maybe we ain't gwine last as long as dat." + +"All hands aft!" + +Frank and I looked at each other. The galley was as safe and comfortable as +any place aboard ship and we were reluctant to leave it. + +"_All hands aft!_" came the call again. + +"Ah reckon," Frank said thoughtfully, "me and you better be gwine. When +Mistah Hamlin he holler like dat, he want us." + +Light had come with amazing swiftness, and already we could see the deck +from stem to stern without help of the torches, which still flamed and sent +thin streamers of smoke drifting into the mist. + +As we emerged from the galley, I noticed that the after-hatch was half +open. That in itself did not surprise me; stranger things than that had +come to pass in the last hour or two; but when some one cautiously emerged +from the hold, with a quick, sly glance at those on the quarter-deck, I'll +confess that I was surprised. It was the man from Boston. + +Smiling broadly and turning his black rat-like eyes this way and that, the +chief of our wild allies, who held a naked kris from which drops of blood +were falling, stood beside Roger. Blodgett was at the wheel, nervously +fingering the spokes; Neddie Benson stood behind him, obviously ill at +ease, and Davie Paine, who had got from the cabin what few of his things +were left there, to take them forward, was a little at one side. But the +natives were swarming everywhere, aloft and alow, and we knew only too well +that no small movable object would escape their thieving fingers. + +"Ef on'y dem yeh heathen don't took to butcherin'!" the cook muttered. + +The prophetic words were scarcely spoken when what we most feared came to +pass. One of the islanders, by accident or design, bumped into Blodgett,-- +always erratic, never to be relied on in a crisis,--who, turning without a +thought of the consequences, struck the man with his fist a blow that +floored him, and flashed out his knife. + +That single spark threatened an explosion that would annihilate us. Spears +enclosed us from all sides; krises leaped at our throats. + +"Come on, lads! Stand together," Blodgett shrieked. + +With a yell of terror the cook sprang to join the others, and bellowing in +panic, swung his cleaver wildly. + +The man from Boston and Neddie Benson shrank back against the taffrail as a +multitude of moving brown figures seemed to swarm about us. Then I saw +Roger leap forward, his arms high in air, his hands extended. + +"Get back!" he cried, glancing at us over his shoulders. + +As all stopped and stared at him, he coolly turned to the chief and handed +him his pistol, butt foremost. Was Roger mad, I wondered? He was the sanest +man of all our crew. The chief gravely took the proffered weapon and looked +at Blodgett, whose face was contorted with fear, and at the Malay, who by +now was sitting up on deck blinking about him in a dazed way. Then he +smiled and raised his hand and the points of the weapons fell. + +In truth I was nearly mad myself, for now it all struck me as funny and I +laughed until I cried, and all the others looked at me, and soon the +natives began to point and laugh themselves. I suppose I was hysterical, +but it created a diversion and helped to save the day; and Neddie Benson +and the man from Boston, whom Roger had sent below, returned soon with +bolts of cloth and knives and pistols and threw them in a heap on the +quarter-deck. + +Some word that I suppose meant gifts, went from lip to lip and our allies +eagerly crowded around us. + +"Get behind me, men," Roger said in an undertone. "Whatever happens, guard +the companionway. I think we're safe, but since by grace of Providence +we're all here together, we'll take no chances that we can avoid." + +The first rays of sunlight shone on the heap of bright stuffs and polished +metal, but the sun itself was no brighter than the face of the chief when +Roger draped over him a length of bright cloth and presented him with a +handsome knife. He threw back his head, laughing aloud, and strutted across +the deck. Turning in grave farewell, he grasped his booty with one arm and, +after a few sharp words to his men, swung himself down by the chains with +the other. To man after man we gave gaudy cloths or knives or, when all +the knives were given away, a cutlass or a gun; and when at last the only +canoes in sight were speeding toward shore like comets with tails of red +flannel and purple calico, we breathed deeply our relief. + +"Now, men," said Roger, "we have a hard morning's work in front of us. +Cook, break out a cask of beef and a cask of bread, and get us something to +eat. Davie, you stand watch and keep your eye out either for a native canoe +or for any sign of Falk or his party. The rest of you--all except Lathrop-- +wash down the deck and sew those bodies up in a piece of old sail with +plenty of ballast. Ben, you and I have a little job in front of us. Come +into the cabin with me." + +I gladly followed him. He was as composed as if battle and death were all +in the routine of a day at sea, and I was full of admiration for his +coolness and courage. + +The cabin was in complete disorder, but comparatively few things had been +stolen. Apparently not many of the natives had found their way thither. + +"Fortunately," Roger said, unlocking Captain Whidden's chest of which he +had the key, "they've left the spare quadrant. We have instruments to +navigate with, so, when all's said and done, I suppose we're lucky." + +He closed the chest and locked it again; then he took from his pocket a +second key. "Benny, my lad," he said, "let's have a look at that one +hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +Going into the captain's stateroom, we shut the door and knelt beside the +iron safe. The key turned with difficulty. + +"It needs oil," Roger muttered, as he worked over it. "It turns as hard as +if some one has been tinkering with it." By using both hands he forced it +round and opened the door. + +The safe was empty. + +[Illustration: ] + + + + +VI + +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +FALK PROPOSES A TRUCE + + +As we faced each other in amazed silence, we could hear the men working on +deck and the sea rippling against the hull of the ship. I felt that strange +sensation of mingled reality and unreality which comes sometimes in dreams, +and I rather think that Roger felt it, too, for we turned simultaneously to +look again into the iron safe. But again only its painted walls met our +eyes. + +The gold actually was gone. + +Roger started up. "Now how did Falk manage that?" he cried. "I swear he +hadn't time to open the safe. We took them absolutely by surprise--I could +swear we did." + +I suggested that he might have hidden it somewhere else. + +"Not he," said Roger. + +"Would Kipping steal from Captain Falk?" + +"From Captain Falk!" Roger exclaimed. "If his mother were starving, he'd +steal her last crust. How about the bunk?" + +We took the bunk apart and ripped open the mattress. We sounded the +woodwork above and below. With knives we slit the cushion of Captain +Whidden's great arm-chair, and pulled out the curled hair that stuffed it. +We ransacked box, bag, cuddy, and stove; we forced our way into every +corner of the cabin and the staterooms. But we found no trace of the lost +money. + +It seemed like sacrilege to disturb little things that once had belonged +to that upright gentleman, Captain Joseph Whidden. His pipe, his +memorandum-book, and his pearl-handled penknife recalled him to my mind as +I had seen him so many times of old, sitting in my father's drawing-room, +with his hands folded on his knee and his firm mouth bent in a whimsical +smile. I thought of my parents, of my sister and Roger, of all the old +far-away life of Salem; I must have stood dreaming thus a long time when my +eyes fell on Nathan Falk's blue coat, which he had thrown carelessly on the +cabin table and had left there, and with a burst of anger I came back to +affairs of the moment. + +"They've got it away, Benny," said Roger, soberly. "How or when I don't +know, but there's no question that it's gone from the cabin. Come, let's +clear away the disorder." + +As well as we could we put back the numerous things we had thrown about, +and such litter as we could not replace we swept up. But wisps of hair +still lay on the tables and the chairs, and feathers floated in the air +like thistle-down. We had little time for housewifery. + +We found the others gathered round the galley, eating a hearty meal of salt +beef, ship's bread, and coffee, at which we were right glad to join them. +Roger had a way with the men that kept them from taking liberties, yet that +enabled him to mingle with them on terms far more familiar than those of a +ship's officer. I watched him as he sat down by Davie Paine, and grinned at +the cook, and asked Neddie Benson how his courage was and laughed heartily +at Blodgett who had spilled a cup of coffee down his shirt-front--yet in +such a way that Blodgett was pleased by his friendliness rather than +offended by his amusement. I suppose it was what we call "personality." +Certainly Roger was a born leader. After our many difficulties we felt so +jolly and so much at home,--all, that is, except the man from Boston, who +sat apart from the rest and stared soberly across the long, slow seas,-- +that our little party on deck was merrier by far than many a Salem +merrymaking before or since. + +I knew that Roger was deeply troubled by the loss of the money and I +marveled at his self-control. + +Presently I saw something moving off the eastern point of the island. +Thinking little of it, I watched it idly until suddenly it burst upon me +that it was a ship's boat. With a start I woke from my dream and shouted, +"Sail ho! Off the starboard bow!" + +In an instant our men were on their feet, staring at the newcomer. In all +the monotonous expanse of shining, silent ocean only the boat and the +island and the tiny sails of a junk which lay hull down miles away, were to +be seen. But the boat, which now had rounded the point, was approaching +steadily. + +"Ben, lay below to the cabin and fetch up muskets, powder, and balls," +Roger cried sharply. "Lend a hand, Davie, and bring back all the pikes and +cutlasses you can carry. You, cook, clear away the stern-chasers and stand +by to load them the minute the powder's up the companionway. Blodgett, you +do the same by the long gun. You, Neddie, bear a hand with me to trice up +the netting!" + +Spilling food, cups, pans, and kids in confusion on the deck, we sprang to +do as we were bid. In the sternsheets of the approaching boat we could make +out at a distance the slim form of Captain Nathan Falk. + +The rain had stopped long since, and the hot sun shining from a cloudless +sky was rapidly burning off the last vestige of the night mist as Captain +Falk's boat came slowly toward us under a white flag. A ground-swell gave +it a leisurely motion and the men approached so cautiously that their oars +seemed scarcely more than to dip in and out of the water. + +With double-charged cannon, with loaded muskets ready at hand, and with +pikes and cutlasses laid out on deck, one for each man, where we could +snatch them up as soon as we had spent our first fire, we grinned from +behind the nettings at our erstwhile shipmates. Tables had turned with a +vengeance since we had rowed away from the ship so short a time before. +They now were a sad-looking lot of men, some of them with bandages on their +limbs or round their heads, all of them disheveled, weary, and unkempt. But +they approached with an air of dignity, which Falk tried to keep up by +calling with a grand fling of his hand and his head, "Mr. Hamlin, we come +to parley under a flag of truce." + +I think we really were impressed for a moment. His face was pale, and he +had a blood-stained rag tied round his forehead, so that he looked very +much as if he were a wounded hero returning after a brave fight to arrange +terms of an honorable peace. But the cook, who heartily disapproved of +admitting the boat within gunshot, shattered any such illusion that we may +have entertained. + +"Mah golly!" he exclaimed in a voice audible to every man in both parties, +"ef dey ain't done h'ist up cap'n's unde'-clothes foh a flag of truce!" + +The remark came upon us so suddenly and we were all so keyed up that, +although it seems flat enough to tell about it now, then it struck us as +irresistibly funny and we laughed until tears started from our eyes. I +heard Blodgett's cat-yowl of glee, Davie Paine's deep guffaw, Neddie +Benson's shrill cackle of delight. But when, to clear my eyes, I wiped away +my tears, the men in the other boat were glaring at us in glum and angry +silence. + +"Ah, it's funny is it?" said Falk, and his voice me think of the times when +he had abused Bill Hayden. "Laugh, curse you, laugh! Well, that's all +right. There's no law against laughing. I've got a proposition to put up to +you. You've had your little fling and a costly one it's like to be. You've +mutinied and unlawfully confined the master of the ship, and for that +you're liable for a fine of one thousand dollars and five years in prison. +You've usurped the command of a vessel on the high seas unlawfully and by +force, and for that you're liable to a fine of two thousand dollars and ten +years in prison. Think about that, some o' you men that haven't a hundred +dollars in the world. The law'll strip and break you. But if that ain't +enough, we've got evidence to convict you in every court of the United +States of America of being pirates, felons, and robbers, and the punishment +for that is death. Think of that, you men." + +Falk lowered his head until his red scarf, which he had knotted about his +throat, made the ghastly pallor of his face seem even more chalky than it +was, and thrust his chin forward and leveled at us the index finger of his +right hand. The slowly rolling boat was so near us now that as we waited to +see what he would say next we could see his hand tremble. + +"Now, men," he continued, "you've had your little fling, and that's the +price you'll have to pay the piper. I'll get you, never you fear. Ah, by +the good Lord's help, I'll see you swinging from a frigate's yard-arm yet, +unless"--he stopped and glared at us significantly--"unless you do like I'm +going to tell you. + +"You've had your fling and there's a bad day of reckoning coming to you, +don't you forget it. But if you drop all this nonsense now, and go forward +where you belong and work the ship like good seamen and swear on the Book +to have no more mutinous talk, I'll forgive you everything and see that no +one prosecutes you for all you've done so far. How about it? Nothing could +be handsomer than that." + +"Oh, you always was a smooth-tongued scoundrel" Blodgett, just behind me, +murmured under his breath. + +The men in the two parties looked at each other in silence for a moment, +and if ever I had distrusted Captain Falk, I distrusted him four times more +when I saw the mild, sleek smile on Kipping's face. It was reassuring to +see the gleam in black Frank's eyes as he fingered the edge of his cleaver. + +I turned eagerly to Roger, upon whom we waited unanimously for a reply. + +"Yes, that's very handsome of you," he said reflectively. "But how do we +know you'll do all that you promise?" + +Falk's white face momentarily lighted. I thought that for an instant his +eyes shone like a tiger's. But he answered quietly, "Ain't my word good?" + +"Why, a _gentleman's_ word is always good security." + +There was just enough accent on the word "gentleman" to puzzle me. The +remark sounded innocent enough, certainly, and yet the stress--if stress +was intended--made it biting sarcasm. Obviously the men in the boat were +equally in doubt whether to take offense or to accept the statement in good +faith. + +"Well, you have my word," said Falk at last. + + +"Yes, we have your word. But there's one other thing to be settled. How +about the owners' money?" + +For a moment Falk seemed disconcerted, and I, thinking now that Roger was +merely badgering him, smiled with satisfaction. But Falk answered the +question after only brief hesitation, and Roger's next words plunged me +deep in a sea of doubt. + +"Why, I shall guard the owners' money with all possible care, Mr. Hamlin, +and expend it in their best interests," said Falk. + +"If that's the case," said Roger, "come alongside." + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +INCLUDING A CROSS-EXAMINATION + + +Falk tried, I was certain, to conceal a smile of joy at Roger's simplicity, +and I saw that others in the boat were averting their faces. Also I saw +that they were shifting their weapons to have them more readily available. + +Our own men, on the contrary, were remonstrating audibly, and to my lasting +shame I joined them. + +A queer expression appeared on Roger's face and he looked at us as if +incredulous. I suddenly perceived that our rebellious attitude hurt him +bitterly. He had led us so bravely through all our recent difficulties! And +now, when success seemed assured, we manifested in return doubt and +disloyalty! I literally hung my head. The others were abashed and silent, +but I knew that my own defection was more contemptible by far than theirs, +and had Roger reproached me sharply, I might have felt better for it. +Instead, he spoke without haste or anger in a voice pitched so low that +Falk could not possibly overhear him. + +"We simply _have_ to hold together, men. All to the gangway, now, and stand +by for orders." + +That was all he said, but it was enough. Thoroughly ashamed of ourselves, +we followed him to the gangway whither the boat was coming slowly. + +Roger assumed an air of neutral welcome as he reached for the bow of the +pinnace; but to us behind him he whispered sharply, "Stand ready, all +hands, with muskets and pikes." + +"Now, then, Captain Falk," he cried, "hand over the money first. We'll stow +it safe on board." + +"Come, come," Falk replied. "Belay that talk." He was +standing ready to climb on deck. + +"The money first," said Roger coolly. + +Suddenly he tried to hook the bow of the pinnace, but missed it as the +pinnace dipped in the trough. + +The rest of us, waiting breathlessly, for the first time comprehended +Roger's strategy. + +Falk looked up at him angrily. "That'll get you nowhere," he retorted. +"Come, stand away, or so help me, I'll see you hanged anyhow." + +Roger smiled at him coldly. "The word of a gentleman? The money first, +Captain Falk." + +"Well, if you are so stupid that you haven't discovered the truth yet, I +haven't the money." + +"Where is the money?" + +"In the safe in the cabin, as you very well know," replied Falk. + +"You lie!" Roger responded. + +With a ripping oath, Captain Falk whipped out his pistol. + +"You lie!" Roger cried again, hotly. "Put down that pistol or I'll blow you +to hell. Stand by, boys. We'll show them!" + +Though we were fewer than they, we had them at a tremendous disadvantage, +for we were protected by the bulwarks and could pour our musket-fire into +the open boat at will, and in a battle of cutlasses and pikes our advantage +would be even greater. + +"Don't a flag of truce give us no protection?" Kipping asked in that +accursedly mild voice--I could not hear it without thinking of poor Bill +Hayden, and to the others, they told me later, it brought the same bitter +memory. + + +"How long since Cap'n Falk's ol' unde' shirt done be a p'tection?" muttered +the cook grimly. + +"Yes, laugh! Laugh, you black baboon! Laugh, you silly little fool, +Lathrop!" Falk yelled. "I'll have you laughing another time one of these +days. Give way men! We'll have out their haslets yet." + +A hundred feet from the ship, the men rested on their oars, and Falk put on +a very different manner. "Roger Hamlin," he cried, "you ain't going to send +us away, are you?" + +I was astounded. As long as I had known Falk, I had never realized how many +different faces the man could assume at the shortest notice. But Roger +seemed not at all surprised. "Yes," he said, shortly, "we're going to send +you away, you black-hearted scoundrel." + +"Good God! We'll perish!" + +Although obvious retorts were many, Roger made no reply. + +Now Kipping spoke up mildly and innocently:-- + +"What'll we do? We can't land--the Malays was waiting for us on shore with +knives, all ready to cut our throats. We can't go to sea like this. What'll +we do?" + +"Supposing," cried old Blodgett, sarcastically, "supposing you row back to +Salem. It's only three thousand miles or more. You'll find it a pleasant +voyage, I'm sure, and you'd ought to run into enough Ladronesers and Malays +to make it interesting along the way." + +"Ain't we human?" Kipping whined, as if trying to wring pity from even +Blodgett. "Ain't you going at least to give us a keg o' water and some +bread?" + +"If you're not out of gunshot in five minutes," Roger cried, "I'll train +the long gun and blow you clean out of water." + +Without more ado they rowed slowly away, growing smaller and smaller, until +at last they passed out of sight round the point. + +"Ah me," sighed Neddie Benson, "I'm glad they're gone. It's funny Falk +ain't quite a light man nor yet a real dark man." + +"_Gone_!" Davie repeated ominously. "_I_ wish they was gone." He looked up +at the furled sails. "They ain't--and neither is we." + +"There's work to be done," said Roger, "and we must be about it. Leave the +nets as they are. Stack the muskets in the waist, pile the pikes handy by +the deckhouse, and all lay aft. We'd best have a few words together before +we begin." + +A moment later, as I was busy with the pikes, Roger came to me and +murmured, "There's something wrong afoot. The after-hatch has been pried +off." + +I noticed the hatch once more the next time I passed it, and I remembered +seeing the man from Boston emerge from the hold. But there was so much else +to be attended to that it was a long, long time before I thought of it +again. + +When we had done as Roger told us, we gathered round him where he waited, +leaning against the cabin, with his hands in his pockets. + +"We're all in the same boat together, men," he began. "We knew what the +chances were when we took them. If you wish to have it so, in the eyes of +the law we're pirates and mutineers, and since Falk seems to have got away +with what money there was on board, things may go hard with us. _But_--" he +spoke the word with stern emphasis--"_but_ we've acted for the best, and I +think there's no one here wants to try to square things up by putting Falk +in command again. How about it?" + +"Square things up, is it?" cried Blodgett. "The dirty villain would have us +hanged at the nearest gallows for all his buttery words." + +"Exactly!" Roger threw back his head. "And when we get to Salem, I can +promise you there's no man here but will be better off for doing as he's +done so far." + +"But whar's all dat money gone?" the cook demanded unexpectedly. + +"I don't know," said Roger. + +"What! Ain' dat yeh money heah?" + +"No." + +At that moment my eye chanced to fall on the man from Boston, who was +looking off at the island as if he had no interest whatever in our +conversation. The circumstances under which he had stayed with us were so +strange and his present preoccupation was so carefully assumed, that I was +suddenly exceedingly suspicious of him, although when I came to examine the +matter closely, I could find no very definite grounds for it. + +Blodgett was watching him, too, and I think that Roger followed our gaze +for suddenly he cried, "You there!" in a voice that brought the man from +Boston to his feet like the snap of a whip. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he replied briskly. + +"What are you doing here, anyway?" Roger demanded. The fellow, who had +begun to assume as many airs and as much self-confidence as if he had been +one of our own party from the very first, was sadly disconcerted. "Why I +come over to your side first chance I had," he replied with an aggrieved +air. + +"What were you doing in the cabin when the natives were running all over +the ship?" + +The five of us, startled by the quick, sharp questions, looked keenly at +the man from Boston. But he, recovering his self-possession, replied coolly +enough, "I was just a-keeping watch so they wouldn't steal--I kept them +from running off with the quadrant." + +"Keeping watch so _nobody'd_ steal, I suppose," said Roger. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir! That's it exactly." + +Suddenly my mind leaped back to the night when Bill Hayden had died, and +the man from Boston had made that cryptic remark, to which I called +attention long since. "He said he could tell something, Roger," I burst +out. But Roger silenced me with a glance. + +Turning on the fellow again, he said, "If I find that you are lying to me, +I'll shoot you where you stand. What do you know about who killed Captain +Whidden?" + +For once the fellow was taken completely off his guard. He glanced around +as if he wished to run away, but there was no escape. He saw only hostile +faces. + +"What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" + +"Mr. Kipping killed him," the fellow gasped, startled out of whatever +reticence he may have intended to maintain. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" + +"Do you expect me to believe that Kipping shot the captain? If you lie to +me--" Roger drew his pistol. By eyes and voice he held the man in a +hypnosis of terror. + +"He did! I swear he did. Don't shoot me, sir! I'm telling you the very +gospel truth. He cursed awful and said--don't point that pistol at me, sir! +I swear I'll tell the truth!--'Mr. Thomas is as good as done for,' he said. +'There's only one man between us and a hundred thousand dollars in gold.' +And Falk--Kipping was talking to Falk low-like and didn't know I was +anywhere about--and Falk says, 'No, that's too much.' Then he says, +wild-like, 'Shoot--go on and shoot.' Then Kipping laughs and says, 'So +you've got a little gumption, have you?' and he shot Captain Whidden and +killed him. Don't point that pistol at _me_, sir! I didn't do it." + +Roger had managed the situation well. His sudden and entirely unexpected +attack had got from the man a story that a month of ordinary +cross-examinations might not have elicited; for although the fellow had +volunteered to tell all he knew, his manner convinced me that under other +circumstances he would have told no more than he had to. Also he had +admitted being in the cabin while the natives were roaming over the ship! + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +AN ATTEMPT TO PLAY ON OUR SYMPATHY + + +For the time being we let the matter drop and, launching a quarter-boat for +work around the ship, turned our attention to straightening out the rigging +and the running gear so that we could get under way at the earliest +possible moment. Twice natives came aboard, and a number of canoes now and +then appeared in the distance; but we were left on the whole pretty much to +our own devices, and we had great hopes of tripping anchor in a few hours +at the latest. + +Roger meanwhile got out the quadrant and saw that it was adjusted to take +an observation at the first opportunity; for there was no doubt that by +faulty navigation or, more probably, by malicious intent, Falk had brought +us far astray from the usual routes across the China Sea. + +Occasionally bands of natives would come out from shore in their canoes and +circle the ship, but we gave them no further encouragement to come aboard, +and in the course of the morning Roger divided us anew into anchor watches. +All in all we worked as hard, I think, as I ever have worked, but we were +so well contented with the outcome of our adventures that there was almost +no grumbling at all. + +When at last I went below I was dead tired. Every nerve and weary muscle +throbbed and ached, and flinging myself on my bunk, I fell instantly into +the deepest sleep. When I woke with the echo of the call, "All hands on +deck," still lingering in my ears, it seemed as if I scarcely had closed my +eyes; but while I hesitated between sleeping and waking, the call sounded +again with a peremptory ring that brought me to my feet in spite of my +fatigue. + +"All hands on deck! Tumble up! Tumble up!" It was the third summons. + +When we staggered forth, blinded by the glaring sunlight, the other watch +already had snatched up muskets and pikes and all were staring to the +northeast. Thence, moving very slowly indeed, once more came the boat. + +Falk was sitting down now; his chin rested on his hands and his face was +ghastly pale; the bandage round his head appeared bloodier than ever and +dirtier. The men, too, were white and woe-begone, and Kipping was scowling +disagreeably. + +It seemed shameful to take arms against human beings in such a piteous +plight, but we stood with our muskets cocked and waited for them to speak +first. + +"Haven't you men hearts?" Falk cried when he had come within earshot. "Are +you going to sit there aboard ship with plenty of food and drink and see +your shipmates a-dying of starvation and thirst?" + +The men rested on their oars while he called to us; but when we did not +answer, he motioned with his hand and they again rowed toward us with +short, feeble strokes. + +"All we ask is food and water," Falk said, when he had come so near that we +could see the lines on the faces of the men and the worn, hunted look in +their eyes. + +They had laid their weapons on the bottom of the boat, and there was +nothing warlike about them now to remind us of the bloody fight they had +waged against us. With a boy's short memory of the past and short sight for +the future, I was ready to take the poor fellows aboard and to forgive them +everything; and though it undoubtedly was foolish of me, I am not ashamed +of my generous weakness. They seemed so utterly miserable! But fortunately +wiser counsels prevailed. + +"You ain't really going to leave us to perish of hunger and thirst, are +you?" Falk cried. "We can't go ashore, even to get water. Those cursed +heathen are laying to butcher us. Guns pointed at friends and shipmates is +no kind of a 'welcome home.'" + +"Give us the money, then--" Roger began. + +The cook interrupted him in an undertone that was plainly audible though +probably not intended for all ears. + +"Yeee-ah! Heah dat yeh man discribblate! He don't like guns pointed at +shipmates, hey? How about guns pointed at a cap'n when he ain't lookin'? +Hey?" + +Falk obviously overheard the cook's muttered sally and was disconcerted by +it; and the murmur of assent with which our men received it convinced me +that it went a long way to reinforce their determination to withstand the +other party at any cost whatsoever. + +After hesitating perceptibly, Falk decided to ignore it. "All we want's +bread and water," he whined. + +"Give us the money, then," Roger repeated, "and we'll see that you don't +starve." His voice was calm and incisive. He absolutely controlled the +situation. + +Falk threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. "But we ain't got the +money. So help me God, we ain't got a cent of it." + +"Hand over the money," Roger repeated, "and we'll give you food and water." +He pointed at the quarter-boat, which swung at the end of a long painter. +"Come no nearer. Put the money in that boat and we'll haul it up." + +"We _ain't got the money_, I tell you. I swear on my immortal soul, we +ain't got it." Falk seemed to be on the point of weeping. He was so weak +and white! + +When Roger did not reply, I turned to look at him. There was a thoughtful +expression on his face, and following the direction of his eyes, my own +gaze rested on the face of the man from Boston. He was smiling. But when +he saw us looking at him, he stopped and changed color. + +"I believe you," Roger declared suddenly. "You'll have to keep your +distance or I'll blow your boat to pieces; but if you obey orders, I'll +help you out as far as a few days' supply of food will go. Cook, haul in +that boat and put half a hundredweight of ship's bread and four buckets of +water in it. That'll keep 'em for a while." + +"You ain't gwine to feed dat yeh Kipping, sah, is you?" + +"Yes." + +The cook turned in silence to do Roger's bidding. + +Twice the man from Boston started forward as if to speak. The motion was so +slight that it almost escaped me, but the second time I was sure that I +really had detected such an impulse, and at the same moment I perceived +that Falk, whose fingers were twitching nervously, was shooting an angry +glance at him. This byplay to a considerable extent distracted my +attention; but when the fellow finally did get up courage to speak, I saw +that the eyes of every man in Falk's boat were on him and that Kipping had +clenched both fists. + +"Stop!" the man from Boston cried. "Stop!" He stepped toward Roger with one +hand raised. + +Roger soberly turned on him. "Be still," he said. + +"But, sir--" + +"Be still!" + +"But, sir, there ain't no--" + +Certainly as far as we could see, the man's feverish persistence was arrant +insubordination. What Roger would have done we had no time to learn, for +Blodgett, bursting with zeal for our common cause, grasped him by the +throat and choked his words into a gurgle. A queer expression of spite and +hatred passed over the man's face, and when he squirmed away from +Blodgett's grip I saw that he was muttering to himself as he rubbed his +bruised neck. But the others were paying him no attention and he presently +folded his arms with an air that continued to trouble me and stood apart +from the rest. + +And Falk and Kipping and all their men now were grinning broadly! + +The water slopped over the edges of the buckets and wet some of the bread +as the cook pushed the boat out toward Falk; but the men in the pinnace +watched it eagerly, and when it floated to the end of the painter, they +clutched for it so hastily that they almost upset the precious buckets. + +When they had got it, they looked at each other and laughed and slapped +their legs and laughed again in an uproarious, almost maudlin mirth that we +could not understand. + +We covered them with our muskets lest they try to seize the boat, which I +firmly believe they had contemplated before they realized how closely we +were watching them, and we smiled to see them cram their mouths with bread +and pass the buckets from hand to hand. When they had finished their +inexplicable laughter, they ate like animals and drew new strength and +courage from their food. Though Falk was still white under his bloody +bandage, his voice was stronger. + +"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace +before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of +sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your +piper." + +He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as +if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances. + +"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see +what we shall see." + +"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see +it, too, won't it, sir?" + +It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so +we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the +long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in +undertones we kept up an exchange of comments. + +After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to +row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that +a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their +air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our +compassion. We watched them suspiciously, but they now assumed a frank +manner, which they evidently hoped would put us off our guard. + +"Now you men listen to me," said Falk. "After all, what's the use of +behaving this way? You're just getting yourselves into trouble with the +law. We can send you to the gallows for this little spree, and what's more +we're going to do it--unless, that is, unless you come round sensible and +call it all off. Now what do you say? Why don't you be reasonable? You take +us on board and we'll use you right and hush all this up as best we can. +What do you say?" + +"What do we say?" said Roger, "We say that bread and water have gone to +your head. You were singing another time a while back." + +"Oh well, we _were_ a little down in the mouth then. But we're feeling a +sight better now. Come, ain't our plan reasonable?" + +All the time they were rowing slowly nearer to the ship. + +"Mistah Falk, O Mistah Falk!" + +"Well?" Falk received the cook's interruption with an ill temper that made +the darkey's eyes roll with joy. + +"Whar you git dat bootiful head-piece?" + + +A flush darkened Falk's pale face under the bandage, and with what dignity +he could muster, he ignored our snickers. + +"What do you say?" he cried to Roger. "Evidently you haven't found the +money yet." + +To us Roger said in an undertone, "Hold your fire." To Falk he +replied clearly, "You black-hearted villain, if you show your face in a +Christian port you'll go to the gallows for abetting the cold-blooded +murder of an able officer and an honorable gentleman, Captain Joseph +Whidden. Quid that over a while and stow your tales of piracy and mutiny. +Back water, you! Keep off!" + +Here was no subtle insinuation. Falk was stopped in his tracks by the flat +statement. He had a dazed, frightened look. But Kipping, who had kept +himself in the background up to this point, now assumed command. + +"Them's bad words," he said mildly, coldly. "Bad words. _But_--" he +slightly raised his voice--"we ain't a-goin' to eat 'em. Not we." All at +once he let out a yell that rang shrilly far over the water. "At 'em, men! +At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull! Out pikes and cutlasses! Take +'em by storm! Slash the netting and go over the side." + +"Hold your fire,"--Roger repeated,--"one minute--till I give the word." + +My heart was pounding at my ribs. I was breathing in fast gulps. With my +thumb on the hammer of the musket, I gave one glance to the priming, and +half raised it to my shoulder. + +From the bottom of the boat Falk's men had snatched up the weapons that +hitherto they had kept out of sight. I had no time then to wonder why they +did not shoot; afterwards we agreed that they probably were so short of +powder and balls that they dared not expend any except in gravest +emergency. Kipping was standing as they rowed, and so fiercely now did they +ply their oars, casting to the winds every pretence of weakness, that the +boat rocked from side to side. + +"At 'em!" Kipping snarled. "We'll show 'em! We'll show'em!" + +"Hold your fire, men," said Roger the third time. "I'll wing that bird." +And aiming deliberately, he shot. + +The report of his musket rang out sharply and was followed by a groan. +Kipping clutched his thigh with both hands and fell. The men stopped rowing +and the boat, gradually losing way, veered in a half circle and lay +broadside toward us. In the midst of the confusion aboard it, I saw Kipping +sitting up and cursing in a way that chilled my blood. "Oh," he moaned, +"I'll get you yet! I'll get you yet!" Then some one in the boat returned a +single shot that buried itself in our bulwark. + +"Yeeeehaha! Got Kipping!" the cook cackled. "He got Kipping!" + +"Now then," cried Roger, "bear off. We've had enough of you. If ever again +you come within gunshot of this ship, we'll shoot so much lead into you +that the weight will sink you. It's only a leg wound, Kipping. I was +careful where I aimed." + +In a disorderly way the men began to pull out of range, but still we could +hear Kipping shrieking a stream of oaths and maledictions, and now Falk +stood up and shook his fist at us and yelled with as much semblance of +dignity as he could muster, "I'll see you yet, all seven of you, I'll see +you a-swinging one after another from the game yard-arm!" Then, to our +amazement, one of them whispered to the others behind his hand, and they +all began to laugh again as if they had played some famous joke on us. + +Instead of going toward the island, they rowed out into the ocean. We could +not understand it. Surely they would not try to cross the China Sea in an +open boat! Were they so afraid of the natives? + +Still we could hear Kipping, faintly now, bawling wrath and blasphemy. We +could see Captain Falk shaking his fist at us, and very clearly we could +hear his faint voice calling, "I'll sack that ship, so help me! We'll see +then what's become of the money." + +Where in heaven's name could they be going? Suddenly the answer came to us. +Beyond them in the farthest offing were the tiny sails of the almost +becalmed junk. They were rowing toward it. Eight mariners from a Christian +land! + +In that broad expanse of land and sea and sky, the only moving object was +the boat bearing Captain Falk and his men, which minute after minute +labored across the gently tossing sea. + +Already the monsoon was weakening. The winds were variable, and for the +time being scarce a breath of air was stirring. + +From the masthead we watched the boat grow smaller and smaller until it +seemed no bigger than the point of a pin. The men were rowing with short, +slow strokes. They may have gone eight or ten miles before darkness closed +in upon them and blotted them out, and they must have got very near to the +junk. + +The moon, rising soon after sunset, flooded the world with a pale light +that made the sea shine like silver and made the island appear like a dark, +low shadow. But of the boat and the junk it revealed nothing. + +The cook and Blodgett and I were talking idly on the fore hatch when +faintly, but so distinctly that we could not mistake it, we heard far off +the report of a gun. + +"Listen!" cried Blodgett. + +It came again and then again. + +The cook laid his hand on my shoulder. "Boy," he gasped out, "don' you heah +dat yeh screechin'?" + +"No," said I. + +"Listen!" + +We sat for a long time silent, and presently we heard one more very distant +gunshot. + +Neither Blodgett nor I had heard anything else, but the cook insisted that +he had heard clearly the sound of some one far off shrieking and wailing in +the night. "Ah heah dat yeh noise, yass, sah. Ah ain't got none of dem +yamalgamations what heahs what ain't." + +He was so big and black and primitive, and his great ears spread so far out +from his head, that he reminded me of some wild beast. Certainly he had a +wild beast's keen ears. + +But now Blodgett raised his hand. "Here's wind," he said. + +And wind it was, a fresh breeze that seemed to gather up the waning +strength of the light airs that had been playing at hide and seek with our +ropes and canvas. + +At daybreak, cutting the cable and abandoning the working bower, we got +under way on the remainder of our voyage to China, bearing in a generally +northwesterly course to avoid the dangerous waters lying directly between +us and the port of our destination. + +As we hauled at halyard and sheet and brace, and sprang quickly about at +Roger's bidding, I found no leisure to watch the dawn, nor did I think of +aught save the duties of the moment, which in some ways was a blessed +relief; but I presently became aware that David Paine, who seemed able to +work without thought, had stopped and was staring intently across the heavy +seas that went rolling past us. Then, suddenly, he cried in his deep voice, +"Sail ho!" + +Hazily, in the silver light that intervened between moonset and sunrise, we +saw a junk with high poop and swinging batten sails bearing across our +course. She took the seas clumsily, her sails banging as she pitched, and +we gathered at the rail to watch her pass. + +"See there, men!" old Blodgett cried. + +He pointed his finger at the strange vessel. We drew closer and stared +incredulously. + +On the poop of the junk, beside the cumbersome rudder windlass, leaning +nonchalantly against the great carved rail, were Captain Nathan Falk and +Chief Mate Kipping. That the slow craft could not cross our bows, they saw +as well as we. Indeed, I question if they cared a farthing whether they +sighted us that day or not. But they and their men, who gathered forward to +stare sullenly as we drew near, shook fists and once more shouted curses. I +could see them distinctly, Falk and Kipping and the carpenter and the +steward and the sail-maker and the rest--angry, familiar faces. + +When we had swept by them, running before the wind, some one called after +us in a small, far-off voice, "We'll see you yet in Sunda Strait." + +There was a commotion on the deck of the junk and Blodgett declared that +Falk had hit a man. + +Were they changing their time for some reason that they did not want us to +suspect? _Did they really wish to cut us off on our return?_ + + +Speculating about the fate of the yellow mariners who once had manned those +clumsy sails, and about what scenes of bloody cruelty there must have been +when those eight mad desperadoes attacked the ancient Chinese vessel, we +sailed away and left them in their pirated junk. But I imagined, even when +the old junk was hull down beyond the horizon, that I could hear an angry +voice calling after us. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +WE REACH WHAMPOA, BUT NOT THE END OF OUR TROUBLES + + +We were only seven men to work that ship, and after all these years I +marvel at our temerity. Time and again the cry "All hands" would come down +the hatch and summon the three of us from below to make sail, or reef, or +furl, or man the braces. Weary and almost blind with sleep, we would +stagger on deck and pull and haul, or would swarm aloft and strive to cope +with the sails. The cook, and even Roger, served tricks at the wheel, turn +and turn about with the rest of us; and for three terrible weeks we forced +ourselves to the sheets and halyards, day and night, when we scarcely could +hold our eyes open or bend our stiffened fingers. + +A Divine Providence must have watched over us during the voyage and have +preserved us from danger; for though at that season bad storms are by no +means unknown, the weather remained settled and fine. With clear water +under our keel we passed shoal and reef and low-lying island. Now we saw a +Tonquinese trader running before the wind, a curious craft, with one mast +and a single sail bent to a yard at the head and stiffened by bamboo sprits +running from luff to leech; now a dingy nondescript junk; now in the offing +a fleet of proas, which caused us grave concern. But in all our passage +only one event was really worth noting. + +When we were safely beyond London Reefs and the Fiery Cross, we laid our +course north by east to pass west of Macclesfield Bank. All was going as +well as we had dared expect, so willing was every man of our little +company, except possibly the man from Boston, whom I suspected of a +tendency to shirk, when late one evening the cook came aft with a very long +face. + +"Well," said Roger, his eyes a-twinkle. "What's wrong in the galley, +doctor?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah! S'pose, sah, you don't' know dah's almost no mo' +wateh foh to drink, sah." + +"What's that you say?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah, we done share up with dat yeh Kipping and dah ain't +no mo' to speak of at all, sah." + +It was true. The casks below decks were empty. In the casks already broken +out there was enough for short rations to last until we made port, so our +predicament as yet was by no means desperate; but we remembered the +laughter of Falk and his men, and we were convinced that they knew the +trick they played when they persuaded us to divide the ship's bread and +water. By what mishap or mismanagement the supply of food had fallen +short--there had been abundant opportunity for either--we were never to +learn; but concerning the water-supply and Falk's duplicity, we were very +soon enlightened. + +"Our friend from Boston," Roger said slowly, when the cook had gone, "seems +to have played us double. We'll have him below, Ben, and give him a chance +to explain." + +I liked the fellow less than ever when he came into the cabin. He had a +certain triumphant air that consorted ill with his trick of evading one's +eyes. He came nervously, I thought; but to my surprise Roger's caustic +accusal seemed rather to put him at ease than to disconcert him further. + +"And so," Roger concluded, after stating the case in no mincing terms, "you +knew us to be short of water, yet you deliberately neglected to warn us." + +"Didn't I try to speak, sir? Didn't you cut me off, sir?" + +Roger looked at him gravely. Although the fellow flinched, he was telling +the truth. In justice we had to admit that Roger had given him no hearing. + +"Ay, and that skinny old money-chaser tried to throttle me," he continued. +"Falk lay off that island only because we needed water. Ay, we all knew we +needed it--Falk and all of us. But them murderin' natives was after our +heart's blood whenever we goes ashore, just because Chips and Kipping +drills a few bullet-holes in some of 'em. I knew what Falk was after when +he asks you for water, sir. The scuttlebutts with water in 'em was on deck +handy, and most of them below was empty where you wa'n't likely to trouble +'em for a while yet. He see how't would work out. Wasn't I going to tell +you, even though he killed me for it, until you cut me off and that 'un +choked me? It helps take the soreness--it--I tried to tell you, sir." + +In petty spite, the fellow had committed himself, along with the rest of +us, to privation at the very least. Yet he had a defense of a kind, +contemptible though it was, and Roger let him go. + +It was a weary voyage; but all things have an end, and in ten days we had +left Helen Shoal astern. Now we saw many junks and small native craft, +which we viewed with uncomfortable suspicion, for though our cannon were +double-charged and though loaded muskets were stacked around the +mizzenmast, we were very, very few to stand off an attack by those yellow +demons who swarmed the Eastern seas in the time of my boyhood and who, for +all I know, swarm them still. + +There came at last a day when we went aloft and saw with red eyes that +ached for sleep hills above the horizon and a ship in the offing with all +sails set. A splendid sight she was, for our own flag flew from the ensign +halyards, and less than three weeks before, any man of us would have given +his right hand to see that ship and that flag within hail; but now it was +the sight of land that thrilled us to the heart. Hungry, thirsty, worn out +with fatigue, we joyously stared at those low, distant hills. + +"Oh, mah golly, oh, mah golly!" the cook cried, in ecstasy, "jest once Ah +gits mah foots on dry land Ah's gwine be de happies' nigger eveh bo'n. Ah +ain' neveh gwine to sea agin, no sah, not neveh." + +"Ay, land's good," Davie Paine muttered, "but the sea holds a man." + +Blodgett said naught. What dreams of wealth were stirring in his head, I +never knew. He was so very pale! He more than any one else, I think, was +exhausted by the hardships of the voyage. + +Roger, gaunt and silent, stood with his arms crossed on the rail. He had +eaten almost nothing; he had slept scarcely at all. With unceasing courage +he had done his duty by day and by night, and I realized as I saw him +standing there, sternly indomitable, that his was the fibre of heroes. I +was proud of him--and when I thought of my sister, I was glad. Then it was +that I remembered my father's words when, as we walked toward Captain +Whidden's house, we heard our gate shut and he knew without looking back +who had entered. + +We came into the Canton River, or the Chu-Kiang as it is called, by the +Bocca-Tigris, and with the help of some sailing directions that Captain +Whidden had left in writing we passed safely through the first part of +the channel between Tiger Island and Towling Flat. Thence, keeping the +watch-tower on Chuen-pee Fort well away from the North Fort of Anung-hoy, +we worked up toward Towling Island in seven or eight fathoms. + +A thousand little boats and sampans clustered round us, and we were annoyed +and a little frightened by the gesticulations of the Chinese who manned +them, until it dawned on us that they wished to serve as pilots. By signs +we drove a bargain--a silver dollar and two fingers; three fingers; five +fingers--and got for seven silver dollars the services of several men in +four sampans, who took their places along the channel just ahead of us and +sounded the depth with bamboo poles, until by their guidance we crossed the +second bar on the flood tide, which providentially came at the very hour +when we most needed it, and proceeded safely on up the river. + +That night, too tired and weak to stand, we let the best bower go by the +run in Whampoa Roads, and threw ourselves on the deck. By and by--hours +later it seemed--we heard the sound of oars. + +"Island Princess ahoy!" came the hearty hail. + +"Ahoy," some one replied. + +"What's wrong? Come, look alive! What does this mean?" + +I now sat up and saw that Roger was standing in the stern just as he had +stood before, his feet spread far apart, his arms folded, his chin +out-thrust. "Do you, sir," he said slowly, "happen to have a bottle of wine +with you?" + +I heard the men talking together, but I could not tell what they were +saying. Next, I saw a head appear above the bulwark and realized that they +were coming aboard. + +"Bless my soul! What's happened? Where's Captain Whidden? Bless my soul! +Who are _you_?" The speaker was big, well dressed, comfortably well fed. He +stared at the six of us sprawled out grotesquely on the deck, where we had +thrown ourselves when the ship swung at her anchor. He looked up at the +loose, half-furled sails. He turned to Roger, who stood gaunt and silent +before him. "Bless my soul! _Who are you?_" + +"I," said Roger, "am Mr. Hamlin, supercargo of this ship." + +"But where--what in heaven's name has taken place? Where's Captain +Whidden?" + +"Captain Whidden," said Roger, "is dead." + +"But when--but what--" + +"_Who are you?_" Roger fired the words at him like a thunderclap. + +"I--I--I am Mr. Johnston, agent for Thomas Webster and Sons," the man +stammered. + +"Sir," cried Roger, "if you are agent for Thomas Webster and Sons, fetch us +food and water and get watchmen to guard this ship while we sleep. Then, +sir, I'll tell you such a story as you'll not often hear." + +The well-fed, comfortable man regarded him with a kind of frown. The +situation was so extraordinary that he simply could not comprehend it. For +a moment he hesitated, then, stepping to the side, he called down some +order, which I did not understand, but which evidently sent the boat +hurrying back to the landing. As he paced the deck, he repeated over and +over in a curiously helpless way, "Bless my soul! Bless my soul!" + +All this time I was aware of Roger still standing defiantly on the +quarter-deck. I know that I fell asleep, and that when I woke he was still +there. Shortly afterwards some one raised my head and gave me something hot +to drink and some one else repeated my name, and I saw that Roger was no +longer in sight. Then, as I was carried below, I vaguely heard some one +repeating over and over, "Bless my soul! It is awful! Why won't that young +man explain things? Bless my soul!" When I opened my eyes sunlight was +creeping through the hatch. + +"Is this not Mr. Lathrop?" a stranger asked, when I stepped out in the open +air--and virtually for the first time, so weary had I been the night +before, saw the pointed hills, the broad river, and the great fleet of +ships lying at anchor. + +"Yes," said I, surprised at the man's respectful manner. Immediately I was +aware that he was no sailor. + +"I thought as much. Mr. Hamlin says, will you go to the cabin. I was just +going to call you. Mr. Johnston has come aboard again and there's some kind +of a conference. Mr. Johnston does get so wrought up! If you'll hurry right +along--" + +As I turned, the strange landsman kept in step with me. "Mr. Johnston is so +wrought up!" he repeated interminably. "So wrought up! I never saw him so +upset before." + +When I entered the cabin, Roger sat in the captain's chair, with Mr. +Johnston on his right and a strange gentleman on his left. Opposite Roger +was a vacant seat, but I did not venture to sit down until the others +indicated that they wished me to do so. + +"This is a strange story I've been hearing, Mr. Lathrop," said Mr. +Johnston. His manner instantly revealed that my family connection carried +weight with him. "I thought it best you should join us. One never knows +when a witness will be needed. It's one of the most disturbing situations +I've met in all my experience." + +The stranger gravely nodded. + +"Certainly it is without precedent in my own experience," said Roger. + +Mr. Johnston tapped the table nervously. "Captain and chief mate killed by +a member of the crew; second mate--later, acting captain--accused of +abetting the murder. You must admit, sir, that you make that charge on +decidedly inadequate evidence. And one hundred thousand dollars in gold +gone, heaven knows where! Bless my soul, what shall I do?" + +"Do?" cried Roger. "Help us to make arrangements to unload the cargo, to +ship a new crew, and to get a return cargo. It seems to me obvious enough +what you 'shall do'!" + +"But, Mr. Hamlin, the situation is extraordinary. There are legal problems +involved. There is no captain--bless my soul! I never heard of such a +thing." + +"I've brought this ship across the China Sea with only six hands. I assure +you that I shall have no difficulty in taking her back to Salem when a +new crew is aboard." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "Here's your +captain--I'll do. Lathrop, here, will do good work as supercargo, I'm sure. +I'm told there's the crew of a wrecked brig in port. They'll fill up our +forecastle and maybe furnish me with a mate or two. You'll have to give us +papers of a kind." + +"Lathrop as supercargo? He's too young. He's only a lad." + +"We can get no one else off-hand who has so good an education," said Roger. +"He can write a fair-copy, cipher, and keep books. I'll warrant, Mr. +Johnston, that not even you can catch him napping with a problem in tare +and tret. Above all, the Websters know him well and will be glad to see him +climb." + +"Hm! I'm doubtful--well, very well. As you say. But one hundred thousand +dollars in gold--bless my soul! I was told nothing about that; the letters +barely mention it." Mr. Johnston beat a mad tattoo on the arm of his chair. + +"That, sir, is my affair and my responsibility. I will answer to the +owners." + +"Bless my soul! I'm afraid I'll be compounding piracy, murder, and heaven +knows what other crimes; but we shall see--we shall see." Mr. Johnston got +up and paced the cabin nervously. "Well, what's done's done. Nothing to do +but make the best of a bad bargain. Woolens are high now, praise the Lord, +and there's a lively demand for ginseng. Well, I've already had good +offers. I'll show you the figures, Captain Hamlin, if you'll come to the +factory. And you, too, Mr. Lathrop. If you daren't leave the ship, I'll +send ashore for them. I'm confident we can fill out your crew, and I +suppose I'll have to give you some kind of a statement to authorize your +retaining command--What if I am compounding a felony? Bless my soul! And +one hundred thousand dollars!" + +I was glad enough to see Mr. Johnston rowed away from the ship. Roger, +accompanying him, returned late in the evening with half a dozen new men +and a Mr. Cledd, formerly mate of the brig Essay, which had been wrecked a +few weeks before in a typhoon off Hainan. He was a pleasant fellow of about +Roger's age, and had a frank manner that we all liked. The new men, all of +whom had served under him on the Essay, reported him to be a smart officer, +a little severe perhaps, but perfectly fair in his dealings with the crew; +so we were almost as glad to have him in the place of Kipping, as we were +to have Roger in the place of Captain Falk. We had settled down in the +forecastle to talk things over when presently word came that Davie Paine +and I were wanted aft. + +"Ben," said Roger to me, cordially, "you can move your things into the +cabin. You are to be supercargo." He tapped his pencil on the table and +turned to Davie with a kindly smile. "You, Davie, can have your old +berth of second mate, if you wish it. I'll not degrade a faithful man. +You'd better move aft to-day, for the new crew is coming aboard to-morrow." + +Davie scratched his head and shifted his feet uneasily. "Thank you, sir," +he said at last. "It's good of you and I'm sure I appreciate it, but I +ain't no great shakes of a scholar and I--well, if it's all the same to +you, sir, I'll stay for'ard with the men, sir." + +I was surprised to find how hard it was to leave the forecastle. The others +were all so friendly and so glad of my good fortune, that they brought a +lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. It seemed as if I were taking leave +forever, instead of only moving the length of the ship; and, indeed, as I +had long since learned, the distance from forecastle to cabin is not to be +measured by feet and inches. + +"I knew't would come," Neddie Benson remarked. "You was a gentleman's son. +But we've had good times together--ay, and hard times, too." He shook his +head dolefully. + +All who were left of the old crew gathered round me while I closed my +chest, and Blodgett and Davie Paine seized the beckets before I knew what +they were about and carried it to my stateroom. + + +As I passed the galley the cook stopped me. "You ain't gwine far, sah, +praise de Lo'd!" he said. "Dah's a hot time ahead and we gotta stand one by +anotheh. Ah's gwine keep my eye on dat yeh man f'om Boston. Yass, sah! Ah's +gwine keep mah eye on him." + +Now what did the cook mean by that, I wondered. But no answer suggested +itself to me, and when I entered the cabin I heard things that drove the +cook and the man from Boston far out of my mind. + +"Kipping!" Mr. Cledd, the new chief mate was saying. "Not _William_ +Kipping?" + +Roger got down the attested copy of the articles and pointed at the neatly +written name: "William Kipping." + +Mr. Cledd looked very grave indeed. "I've heard of Falk--he's a vicious +scoundrel in some ways, although too weak to be dangerous of his own +devices But I _know_ Kipping." + +"Tell me about him,' said Roger. + +"Kipping is the meanest, doggonedest, low-down wharf-runner that ever +robbed poor Jack of his wages. That's Kipping. Furthermore, he never signed +a ship's articles unless he thought there was considerable money in it +somewhere. I tell you, Captain Hamlin, he's an angry, disappointed man at +this very minute. If you want to know what I think, he's out somewhere on +those seas yonder--_just_--_waiting_. We've not seen the last of Kipping." + +Roger got up, and walking over to the chest of ammunition, thoughtfully +regarded it. + +"No, sir!" Mr. Cledd reiterated, "if Kipping's Kipping, we've not seen the +last of him." + +[Illustration:] + + + + +VII + +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +A MYSTERY IS SOLVED, AND A THIEF GETS AWAY + + +Innumerable sampans were plying up and down the river, some with masts and +some without, and great junks with carved sterns lay side by side so +closely that their sails formed a patchwork as many-colored as Joseph's +coat. There were West River small craft with arched deck-houses, which had +beaten their way precariously far up and down the coast; tall, narrow sails +from the north, and web-peaked sails on curved yards from the south; Hainan +and Kwangtung trawlers working upstream with staysails set, and a few +storm-tossed craft with great holes gaping between their battens. All were +nameless when I saw them for the first time, and strange; but in the days +that followed I learned them rope and spar. + +Vessels from almost every western nation were there, too--bluff-bowed Dutch +craft with square-headed crews, brigantines from the Levant, and ships from +Spain, England, and America. + +The captains of three other American ships in port came aboard to inquire +about the state of the seas between the Si-Kiang and the Cape of Good Hope +and shook their heads gravely at what we told them. One, an old friend of +Captain Whidden, said that he knew my own father. "It's shameful that such +things should be--simply shameful," he declared, when he had heard the +story of our fight with the Arab ship. "What with Arabs and Malays on the +high seas, Ladronesers in port--ay, and British men-of-war everywhere!" + +He went briskly over the side, settled himself in the stern-sheets of his +boat, and gave us on the quarter-deck a wave of his hand; then his men +rowed him smartly away down-stream. + +"Ay, it is shameful," Roger repeated. He soberly watched the other +disappear among the shipping, then he turned to Mr. Cledd. "I shall go +ashore for the day," he said. "I have business that will take considerable +time, and I think that Mr. Lathrop had better come too, and bring his +books." + +As we left the ship we saw Mr. Cledd observing closely all that went +forward, and Roger gravely nodded when I remarked that our new mate knew +his business. + +At the end of some three weeks of hard work we had cleared the hold, +painted and overhauled the ship inside and out, and were ready to begin +loading at daylight on a Monday morning. However great was Mr. Johnston's +proclivity to get "wrought up," he had proved himself an excellent man of +business by the way he had conducted our affairs ashore when once he put +his hand to them; and we, too, had accomplished much, both in getting out +the cargo and in putting the ship in repair. We had stripped her to her +girt-lines, calked her, decks and all, from her hold up, and painted her +inside and out. She was a sight to be proud of, when, rigged once more, she +swung at her anchorage. + +That evening, as Roger and Mr. Cledd, the new second mate, and I were +sitting in the cabin and talking of our plans and prospects, we heard a +step on the companionway. + +"Who's that?" Mr. Cledd asked in an undertone. "I thought steward had gone +for the night." + +Roger motioned him to remain silent. We all turned. + +To our amazement it was the cook who suddenly appeared before us, rolling +his eyes wildly under his deep frown. + +"'Scuse me, gen'lems! 'Scuse me, Cap'n Hamlin! 'Scuse me, Mistah Cledd! +'Scuse me, ev'ybody! Ah knows Ah done didn't had ought to, but Ah says, +Frank, you ol' nigger, you jest up 'n' go. Don't you let dat feller git +away with all dat yeh money." + +"What's that?" Roger cried sharply. + +"Yass, sah! Yass, sah! Hun f'om Boston! He's got de chisel and de hammer +and de saw." + +We all stared. + +"Come, come, doctor," said Roger. "What's this cock-and-bull story?" + +"Yass, sah, he's got de chisel and de hammer and de saw. Ah was a-watchin', +yass, sah. He don't fool dis yeh ol' nigger. Ah see him sneakin' round when +Chips he ain't looking." + +For a moment Roger frowned, then in a low, calm voice he said, "Mr. Cledd, +you'll take command on deck. Have a few men with you. Better see that your +pistols are well primed. You two, come with me. Now, then, Frank, lead the +way." + +From the deck we could see the lanterns of all the ships lying at anchor, +the hills and the land-lights and a boat or two moving on the river. We +hurried close at the negro's heels to the main hatch. + +"Look dah!" The negro rested the blunt tip of one of his great fingers on +the deck. + +Some sharp tool had dropped beside the hatch and had cut a straight, thin +line where it fell. + +"Chisel done dat." + +We were communicating in whispers now, and with a finger at his lips the +cook gave us a warning glance. He then laid hold of the rope that was made +fast to a shears overhead, swung out, and slid down to the very keelson. +Silently, one at a time, we followed. The only sound was our sibilant +breathing and the very faint shuffle of feet. Now we could see, almost +midway between the hatches, the dim light of a candle and a man at work. +While we watched, the man cautiously struck several blows. Was he scuttling +the ship? Then, as Roger and the cook tiptoed forward, I suddenly tripped +over a piece of plank and sprawled headlong. + +As I fell, I saw Roger and the cook leap ahead, then the man doused the +light. There was a sound of scuffling, a crash, a splutter of angry words. +A moment later I heard the click of flint on steel, a tiny blaze sprang +from the tinder, and the candle again sent up its bright flame. + +"Come, Ben, hold the light," Roger called. He and Frank had the man from +Boston down on the limber board and were holding him fast. The fight, +though fierce while it lasted, already was over. + +The second mate now handed me the candle, and bent over and examined the +hole the man had cut in the ceiling. "Is the scoundrel trying to sink us?" +he asked hotly. + +Roger smiled. "I suspect there's more than that behind this little +project," he replied. + +The man from Boston groaned. "Don't--don't twist my arm," he begged. + +"Heee-ha-ha!" laughed the cook. "Guess Ah knows whar dat money is." + +"Open up the hole, Ben," said Roger. + +I saw now that there was a chalk-line, as true as the needle, from +somewhere above us in the darkness, drawn along the skin of the hold +perpendicular to the keelson, and that the man from Boston had begun to cut +at the bilge where the line crossed it. + +He blinked at me angrily as I sawed through the planks. But when with +chisel and saw I had removed a square yard of planking and revealed only +the bilge-water that had backed up from the pump well, he brightened. Had +the Island Princess not been as tight as you could wish, we should have had +a wetter time of it than we had. Our feet were wet as it was, and the man +from Boston was sadly drabbled. + +"There's nothing there?" said Roger, interrogatively. "Hm! Put your hand in +and feel around." + +I reluctantly obeyed. Finding nothing at first, I thrust my arm deeper, +then higher up beyond the curve. My fingers touched something hard that +slipped away from them. Regardless of the foul water, I thrust my arm in +still farther, and, securing my hold on a cord, drew out a leather bag. It +was black and slimy, and so heavy that I had to use both hands to lift it, +and it clinked when I set it down. + +"I thought so," said Roger. "There'll be more of them in there. Fish them +out, Bennie." + +While Roger and the cook sat on the man from Boston and forced him down +into the evil-smelling bilge-water, the second mate and I felt around under +the skin of the hold and drew out bag after bag, until the candle-light +showed eighteen lying side by side. + +"There ought to be two more," said Roger. + +"I can't find another one, sir," the second mate replied. + +I now hit upon an idea. "Here," said I, "here's what will do the work." I +had picked up a six-foot pole and the others eagerly seized upon my +suggestion. + +I worked the pole into the space between the inner and outer planking while +the man from Boston blinked at me angrily, and fished about with it until I +discovered and pried within reach two more leather bags. + +"Well done!" Roger cried. "Cook, suppose you take this fellow in +tow,--we've a good strong set of irons waiting for him,--and I'll help +carry these bags over under the hatch." + +Calling up to Mr. Cledd, Roger then instructed him to throw down a +tarpaulin, which he did, and this we made fast about the twenty bags. +Having taken several turns of a rope's end round the whole, Roger, carrying +the other end, climbed hand-over-hand the rope by which we had lowered +ourselves, and I followed at his heels; then we rigged a tackle and, with +several men to help us, hauled up the bundle. + +"Cap'n Hamlin, sah," the cook called, "how's we gwine send up dis yeh +scound'l?" + +"Let him come," said Roger. "We'll see to him. Prick his calves with a +knife if he's slow about it." + +We heard the cook say in a lower voice, "G'wan, you ol' scalliwaggle"; +then, "Heah he is, cap'n, heah he come! Watch out foh him. He's +nimble--yass, sah, he's nimble." + +The rope swayed in the darkness below the hatch, then the fellow's head and +shoulders appeared; but, as we reached to seize him, he evaded our +outstretched fingers by a quick wriggle, flung himself safely to the deck +on the far side of the hatch, and leaping to the bulwark, dove into the +river with scarcely a splash. + +Some one fired a musket at the water; the flash illuminated the side of the +ship, and an echo rolled solemnly back from the shore. Three or four men +pointed and called, "There he goes--there--there! See him swimming!" For a +moment I myself saw him, a dark spot at the apex of a V-shaped ripple, then +he disappeared. It was the last we ever knew of the man from Boston. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +HOMEWARD BOUND + + +We had the gold, though, twenty leather bags of it; and we carried it to +the cabin and packed it into the safe, which it just filled. + +"Now," said Roger, "we _have_ a story to tell Mr. Johnston." + +"So we have!" exclaimed Mr. Cledd, who had heard as yet but a small part of +this eventful history. "Will you tell me, though, how that beggar ever knew +those bags were just there?" + +"Certainly." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "He put them there. When the +islanders were everywhere aboard ship, and the rest of us were so much +taken up with them and with the fight we'd just been through that we +didn't know what was on foot,--it was still so dark that he could work +unnoticed,--he sneaked below and opened the safe, which he had the craft to +lock again behind him, and hauled the money forward to the hatch, a few +bags at a time. Eventually he found a chance to crawl over the cargo, start +a plank in the ceiling, drop the bags down inside the jacket one by one, +and mark the place. Then, holding his peace until the cargo was out of the +hold, he drew a chalk line straight down from his mark to the lower deck, +took bearings from the hatch, and continued the line from the beam-clamp to +the bilge, and cut on the curve. There, of course, was where the money had +fallen. He worked hard--and failed." + +Then I remembered the hatch that had been pried off when the natives were +ranging over the boat. + +Early next morning Roger, Mr. Cledd, and I, placing the money between us in +the boat and arming ourselves and our men, each with a brace of pistols, +went ashore. That brief trip seems a mere trifle as I write of it here and +now, so far in distance and in time from the river at Whampoa, but I truly +think it was as perilous a voyage as any I have made; for pirates, or +Ladronesers as they were called, could not be distinguished from ordinary +boatmen, and enough true stories of robbery and murder on that river passed +current among seafaring men in my boyhood to make the everlasting fortune +of one of those fellows who have nothing better to do than sit down and +spin out a yarn of hair-raising adventures. But we showed our cocked +pistols and passed unmolested through the press, and came at last safe to +the landing. + +Laboring under the weight of gold, we went by short stages up to the +factory, where Mr. Johnston in his dressing-gown met us, blessing his soul +and altogether upset. + +"Never in my life," he cried, clasping his hands, "have I seen such men as +you. And now, pray, what brings you here?" + +"We have come with one hundred thousand dollars," said Roger, "to be paid +to the Chinese gentleman of whom you and I have spoken together." + +Mr. Johnston looked at the lumpy bundles wrapped now in canvas and for once +rose to an emergency. "Come in," he said. "I'll dispatch a messenger +immediately. Come in and I'll join you at breakfast." + +We ate our breakfast that morning with a fortune in gold coin under the +table; and when the boat came down the river, bringing a quiet man whom Mr. +Johnston introduced as the very person we were seeking, and who himself in +quaint pidgin English corroborated the statement that he it was who had +sent to Thomas Webster the five teakwood chests, we paid him the money and +received in return his receipt beautifully written with small flourishes of +the brush. + +"That's done," said Roger, when all was over, "in spite of as rascally a +crew as ever sailed a Salem ship. I am, I fear, a pirate, a mutineer, and +various other unsavory things; but I declare, Mr. Cledd, in addition to +them all, I am an honest man." + +The coolies already had begun to pass chests of tea into the hold when we +came aboard; and under the eye of the second mate, who was proving himself +in every respect a competent officer,--in his own place the equal, perhaps, +of Mr. Cledd in his,--all hands were industriously working. The days passed +swiftly. Work aboard ship and business ashore crowded every hour; and so +our stay on the river drew to an end. + +Before that time, however, Blodgett hesitantly sought me out one night. +"Mr. Lathrop," he said with a bit of constraint, "I and Davie and Neddie +and cook was a-thinkin' we'd like to do something for poor Bill Hayden's +little girl. Of course we ain't got no great to give, but we've taken up a +little purse of money, and we wondered wouldn't you, seein' you was a good +friend to old Bill, like to come in with us?" + +That I was glad of the chance, I assured him. "And Captain Hamlin will come +in, too," I added. "Oh, I'm certain he will." + +Blodgett seemed pleased. "Thinks I, he's likely to, but it ain't fit I +should ask the captain." + +Promising to present the plea as if it were my own, I sent Blodgett away +reassured, and eventually we all raised a sum that bought such a royal doll +as probably no merchant in Newburyport ever gave his small daughter, and +enough silk to make the little maid, when she should reach the age for it, +as handsome a gown as ever woman wore. Nor was that the end. The night +before we sailed from China, Blodgett came to me secretly, after a +mysterious absence, and pressed a small package into my hand. + +"Don't tell," he said. "It's little enough. If we'd stopped off on some o' +them islands I might ha' done better. Thinks I last night, I'd like to send +her a bit of a gift all by myself as a kind of a keepsake, you know, sir, +seeing I never had a little lass o' my own. So I slips away from the others +and borrows a boat that was handy to the shore and drops down stream +quiet-like till I comes in sight of one of them temples where there's gongs +ringing and all manner of queer goings-on. Says I,--not aloud, you +understand,--'Here, my lad, 's the very place you're looking for, just +a-waiting for you!' So I sneaks up soft and easy,--it were a rare dark +night,--and looks in, and what do I see by the light o' them there crazy +lanterns? There was one o' them heathen idols! Yes, sir, a heathen idol as +handy as you please. 'Aha!' says I,--not aloud, you understand, sir,--'Aha! +I'll wager you've got a fine pair o' rubies in your old eye-sockets, you +blessed idol.' And with that I takes a squint at the lay o' the land and +sees my chance, and in I walks. The old priest, he gives a squawk, but I +cracks him with a brass pot full of incense, which scatters and nigh chokes +me, and I grabs the ear-rings and runs before they catches me, for all +there's a million of 'em a-yammering at my heels. I never had a chance at +the eyes--worse luck! But I fared well, when all's said and done. It was a +dark night, thank heaven, and the boat was handy. The rings is jade. She'll +like 'em some day." + +I restrained my chuckles until he had gone, and added the stolen treasures +to the rest of the gifts. What else could I do? Certainly it was beyond my +power to restore them to the rightful owners. + +The last chest of tea and the last roll of silk were swung into the hold, +the hatches were battened down, and all was cleared for sailing as soon as +wind and tide should favor us. + +That morning Mr. Johnston came aboard, more brisk and pompous than ever, +and having critically inspected the ship, met us in the cabin for a final +word. My new duties as supercargo had kept me busy and my papers were +scattered over the table; but when I started to gather them up and +withdraw, he motioned me to stay. + +"Never in all my experience has such a problem as this arisen," he +exclaimed, rubbing his chin lugubriously. "Bless my soul! Who ever heard of +such a thing? Captain and chief mate murdered--crew mutinied--bless my +soul! Well, Captain Hamlin--I suppose you've noticed before, that I give +you the title of master?--well, Captain Hamlin, I fear I'm compounding +felony, but after all that's a matter to be settled in the courts. I'm +confident that I cannot be held criminally responsible for not +understanding a nice point in admiralty. Whatever else happens, the ship +must go home to Salem, and you, sir, are the logical man to take her home. +Well, sir, although in a way you represent the owners more directly than I +do, still your authority is vicariously acquired and I've that here +which'll protect you against interruption in the course of the voyage by +any lawful process. I doubt, from all I've heard, if Falk will go to law; +but here's a paper--" he drew it out of his pocket and laid it on the +table--"signed, sealed and witnessed, stating that I, Walter Johnston, +agent in China for Thomas Webster and Sons, do hereby recognize you as +master of the ship Island Princess, and do invest you, as far as my +authority goes, with whatever privileges and responsibilities are attached +to the office. All questions legal and otherwise, ensuing from this +investure, must be settled on your arrival at the United States of America. +That, sir, is the best I can do for you, and I assure you that I hope +sincerely you may not be hanged as a pirate but that I am by no means +certain of it." + +Thus he left-handedly concluded his remarks, and murmuring under his +breath, "Bless my soul," as if in final protest against everything without +precedent, folded his fat hands over his expansive waist-band. + +"I thank you, Mr. Johnston," Roger replied gravely, though he could not +completely hide the amusement in his eyes. "I'm sure it is handsome of you +to do so much for us, and I certainly hope no act of piracy or violence, of +which we may have been guilty, will compromise you in the slightest +degree." + +"Thank _you_, Captain Hamlin. I hope so myself." + +If I had met Roger's glance, I must have laughed outright. The man was so +unconscious of any double edge to Roger's words, and so complacent, that +our meeting was all but farce, when he bethought himself of another subject +of which he had intended to speak. + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "I well nigh forgot. Shall you--but of +course you will not!--go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +Mr. Cledd, who hitherto had sat with a slight smile on his lean Yankee +face, now looked at Roger with keener interest. + +"Yes," said Roger, "I shall go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"Now surely, Captain Hamlin, that would be folly; there are other courses." + +"But none so direct." + +"A long way round is often the shortest way home. Why, bless my soul, that +would be to back your sails in the face of Providence." + +Roger leaned forward. "Why should I not go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +"Why, my dear sir, if any one were--er-er--to wish you harm,--and if your +own story is to be believed, there are those who do wish you harm,--Sunda +Strait, of all places in the world, is the easiest to cut you off." + +"Mr. Johnston, that is nonsense," said Roger. "Such things don't happen. I +will go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"But, Captain Hamlin,--" the good man rubbed his hands more nervously than +ever,--"but, Captain Hamlin, bless my soul, I consider it highly +inadvisable." + +Roger smiled. "Sir, I will not back down. By Sunda Strait we came. By Sunda +Strait we'll return. If any man wishes to see us there--" He finished the +sentence with another smile. + +Mr. Cledd spoke up sharply. "Ay, and if a certain man we all know of should +appear, I'm thinking he'd be unpleasantly surprised to find me aboard." + +Mr. Johnston rubbed his hands and tapped the table and rubbed his hands +again. So comfortable did he appear, and so well-fed, that he seemed quite +out of place in that severely plain cabin, beside Roger and Mr. Cledd. That +he had a certain mercantile shrewdness I was ready to admit; but the others +were men fearless and quick to act. + +"Bless my soul!" he said at last, beating a tattoo on the table with his +soft fingers. "Bless my soul!" + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THROUGH SUNDA STRAIT + + +Laden deep with tea and silk, we dropped down the Chu-Kiang, past Macao and +the Ladrone Islands, and out through the Great West Channel. Since the +northeast monsoon now had set in and the winds were constant, we soon +passed the tide-rips of St. Esprit, and sighting only a few small islands +covered with brush and mangroves, where the seas broke in long lines of +silver under an occasional cocoanut palm, we left astern in due time the +treacherous water of the Paracel Reefs. + +Each day was much like every other until we had put the China Sea behind +us. We touched at the mouth of the Saigon, but found no promise of trade, +and weighed anchor again with the intention of visiting Singapore. Among +other curious things, we saw a number of pink porpoises and some that were +mottled pink and white and brown. Porpoises not infrequently are spotted by +disease; but those that we saw appeared to be in excellent health, and +although we remarked on their odd appearance, we believed their strange +colors to be entirely natural. A fleet of galleys, too, which we saw in the +offing, helped break the monotony of our life. There must have been fifty +of them, with flags a-flutter and arms bristling. Although we did not +approach them near enough to learn more about them, it seemed probable that +they were conveying some great mandarin or chief on affairs of state. + +"That man Blodgett is telling stories of one kind or another," Mr. Cledd +remarked one afternoon, after watching a little group that had gathered by +the forecastle-hatch during the first dog-watch. "The fortuneteller fellow, +too, Benson, is stirring up the men." + +As I looked across the water at the small island of palms where the waves +were rolling with a sullen roar, which carried far on the evening air, I +saw a native boat lying off the land, and dimly through the mists I saw the +sail of an old junk. I watched the junk uneasily. Small wonder that the men +were apprehensive, I thought. + +After leaving Singapore, we passed the familiar shores of eastern Sumatra, +Banka Island and Banka Strait, and the mouths of the Palambang, but in an +inverted order, which made them seem as strange as if we never before had +sighted them. Then one night, heading west against the tide, we anchored in +a rolling swell, with Kodang Island to the northeast and Sindo Island to +the north. On the one hand were the Zutphen Islands; on the other was Hog +Point; and almost abeam of us the Sumatran coast rose to the steep bluff +that across some miles of sea faces the Java shore. We lay in Sunda Strait. + +I came on deck after a while and saw the men stirring about. + +"They're uneasy," said Mr. Cledd. + +"I'm not surprised," I replied. + +The trees on the high summit of the island off which we lay were +silhouetted clearly against the sky. What spying eyes might not look down +upon us from those wooded heights? What lawless craft might not lurk beyond +its abrupt headlands? + +"No, I don't wonder, either," said Mr. Cledd, thoughtfully. + +At daybreak we again weighed anchor and set sail. Three or four times a +far-away vessel set my heart leaping, but each in turn passed and we saw it +no more. A score of native proas manoeuvring at a distance singly or by +twos caused Roger to call up the watch and prepare for any eventuality; but +they vanished as silently as they had appeared. At nightfall we once more +hove to, having made but little progress, and lay at anchor until dawn. + +In the darkness that night the cook came up to me in the waist whither I +had wandered, unable to sleep. "Mistah Lathrop," he muttered, "Ah don't +like dis yeh nosing and prying roun' islands whar a ship's got to lay up +all night jes' like an ol' hen with a mess of chickens." + +We watched phosphorescent waves play around the anchor cable. The spell of +uneasiness weighed heavily on us both. + +The next evening, still beating our way against adverse winds, we rounded +Java Head, which seemed so low by moonlight that I scarcely could believe +it was the famous promontory beyond which lay the open sea. I went to my +stateroom, expecting once again to sleep soundly all night long. Certainly +it seemed now that all our troubles must be over. Yet I could not compose +myself. After a time I came on deck, and found topsails and royals set and +Mr. Cledd in command. + +"All goes well, Mr. Lathrop," he said with a smile, "but that darky cook +seems not to believe it. He's prowling about like an old owl." + +"Which is he?" I asked; for several of the men were pacing the deck and at +the moment I could not distinguish between them. + +"They do seem to be astir. That nearest man walks like Blodgett. Has the +negro scared them all?" + +When, just after Mr. Cledd had spoken, Blodgett came aft, we were +surprised; but he approached us with an air of suppressed excitement, which +averted any reprimand Mr. Cledd may have had in mind. + +"If you please, sir," he said, "there's a sail to windward." + +"To windward? You're mistaken. You ought to call out if you see a sail, but +it's just as well you didn't this time." + +Mr. Cledd turned his back on Blodgett after looking hard up the wind. + +"If you please, sir, I've got good eyes." Blodgett's manner was such that +no one could be seriously offended by his persistence. + +"My eyes are good, too," Mr. Cledd replied rather sharply. "I see no +sail." + +Nor did I. + +Blodgett leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness like a cat. "If +you please, sir," he said, "I beg your pardon, but I _can_ see a sail." + +Now, for the first time I thought that I myself saw something moving. "I +see a bank of fog blowing westward," I remarked, "but I don't think it's a +sail." + +After a moment, Mr. Cledd spoke up frankly. "I'll take back what I've just +said. I see it too. It's only a junk, but I suppose we'd better call the +captain." + +"Only a junk!" Blodgett repeated sharply. "When last we saw 'em, a junk was +all they had." + +"What's that?" Mr. Cledd demanded. + +"Ay, ay, sir, they was sailing away in a junk, sir." + +Mr. Cledd stepped to the companionway. "Captain Hamlin," he called. + +The junk was running free when we first sighted her, but just as she was +passing astern of us, she began to come slowly about. I could see a great +number of men swaying in unison against the helm that controlled the +gigantic rudder. Others were bracing the curious old sails. + +"I wish she were near enough for us to watch them handle the sails on the +after masts," I said. + +She had a pair of mizzen-masts, one on the larboard side, one on the +starboard, and I was puzzled to know how they were used. + +"She'll pass close aboard on this next tack," Mr. Cledd replied. "I think +we'll be able to see." He had paused to watch her manoeuvres. + +"Here's the doctor," Blodgett murmured. + +Black Frank was coming aft with a quick humpy walk. "'Scuse me, sah, 'scuse +me!" he said. "But I's skeered that we--" + +Mr. Cledd now had gone to the companion. "Captain Hamlin," he called again, +"there's a junk passing close aboard." + +I heard Roger's step on the companion-way. It later transpired that he had +not heard the first summons. + +"Mah golly! Look dah!" the cook exclaimed. + +The junk was looming up dangerously. + +Mr. Cledd caught my arm. "Run forward quick--quick--call up all hands," he +cried. Then raising the trumpet, "Half a dozen of you men loose the +cannon." + +Leaping to the spar deck, I ran to do his bidding, for the junk now was +bearing swiftly down upon us. On my way to the forecastle-hatch I noted the +stacked pikes and loaded muskets by the mainmast, and picked out the most +likely cover from which to fire on possible boarders. That my voice was +shaking with excitement, I did not realize until I had sent my summons +trembling down into the darkness. + +I heard the men leaping from their bunks; I heard Roger giving sharp +commands from the quarter-deck; I heard voices on the junk. By accident or +by malice, she inevitably was going to collide with the Island Princess. As +we came up into the wind with sails a-shiver, I scurried back to the stack +of muskets. + +Neddie Benson was puffing away just behind me. "I didn't ought to 'ave +come," he moaned. "I had my warning. Oh, it serves me right--I might 'a' +married the lady." + +"Bah, that's no way for a _man_ to talk," cried Davie Paine. + +It all was so unreal that I felt as if I were looking at a picture. It did +not seem as if it could be Ben Lathrop who was standing shoulder to +shoulder with Neddie Benson and old Davie. There was running and calling on +all sides and aloft. Blocks were creaking as the men hauled at braces and +halyards; and when the ship rolled I saw that the men on the yard-arms were +shaking the courses from the gaskets. Although our crew was really too +small to work the ship and fight at the same time, it was evident that +Roger intended so far as possible to do both. + +But meanwhile the junk had worn ship and she still held her position to +windward. Suddenly there came from her deck the flash of a musket and a +loud report. Then another and another. Then Roger's voice sounded sharply +above the sudden clamor and our own long gun replied. + +Flame from its muzzle burst in the faces of the men at the bow of the junk, +and the ball, mainly by chance, I suppose, hit her foremast and brought +down mast and sail. Then the junk came about and bumped into us abreast, +with a terrific crash that stove in the larboard bulwark and showered us +with fragments of carved and gilded wood broken from her towering bow. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +PIKES, CUTLASSES, AND GUNS + + +As I hastily poured powder into the pan of my musket, a man sprang to our +deck and dashed at Davie Paine, who thrust out a pike and impaled him as if +he were a fowl on a spit, then reached for a musket. Another came and +another; I saw them leap down singly. One of our new men whom we had signed +at Canton raised his cutlass and sliced down the third man to board us; +then they came on in an overwhelming stream. + +Seeing that it would be suicide to attempt to maintain our ground, and that +we already were cut off from the party on the quarter-deck, we retreated +forward, fighting off the enemy as we went, and ten or a dozen of us took +our stand on the forecastle. + +Kipping and Falk and the beach-combers they had gathered together had +conducted their campaign well. Some half of us were forward, half aft, so +that we could not fire on the boarders without danger of hitting our own +men. Davie Paine clubbed his musket and felled a strange white man, and +Neddie Benson went down with a bullet through his thigh; then the pirates +surged forward and almost around us. Before we realized what was happening, +we had been forced back away from Neddie and had retreated to the +knightheads. We saw a beast of a yellow ruffian stab Neddie with a kris, +then one of our own men saw a chance to dart back under the very feet of +our enemies and lay hold of Neddie's collar and drag him groaning up to us. + +They came at us hotly, and we fought them off with pikes and cutlasses; but +we were breathing hard now and our arms ached and our feet slipped. The +circle of steel blades was steadily drawing closer. + +That the end of our voyage had come, I was convinced, but I truly was not +afraid to die. It was no credit to me; simply in the heat of action I found +no time for fear. Parry and slash! Slash and parry! Blood was in my eyes. A +cut burned across my right hand. My musket had fallen underfoot and I +wielded a rusty blade that some one else had dropped. Fortunately the flesh +wound I got from the musket-ball in our other battle had healed cleanly, +and no lameness handicapped me. + +We had no idea what was going on aft, and for my own part I supposed that +Roger and the rest were in straits as sore as our own; but suddenly a +tremendous report almost deafened us, and when our opponents turned to see +what had happened we got an instant's breathing-space. + +"It's the stern-chasers," Davie gasped. "They've faced 'em round!" + +The light of a torch flared up and I saw shadowy shapes darting this way +and that. + +There were two cannon; but only one shot had been fired. + +Suddenly Davie seized me by the shoulder. "See! See there!" he cried +hoarsely in my ear. + +I turned and followed his finger with my eyes. High on the stern of the +junk, black against the starlit sky, I saw the unmistakable figure of +Kipping. He was laughing--mildly. The outline of his body and the posture +and motion of his head and shoulders all showed it. Then he leaped to the +deck and we lost sight of him. Where he had mustered that horde of +slant-eyed pirates, we never stopped to wonder. We had no time for idle +questions. + +I know that I, for one, finding time during the lull in the fighting to +appraise our chances, expected to die there and then. A vastly greater +force was attacking us, and we were divided as well as outnumbered. But if +we were to die, we were determined to die fighting; so with our backs to +the bulwark and with whatever weapons we had been able to snatch up in our +hands, we defended ourselves as best we could and had no more respite to +think of what was going on aft. + +Only one stern gun, you remember, had been fired. Now the second spoke. + +There was a yell of anguish as the ball cut through the midst of the +pirates, a tremendous crash that followed almost instantly the report of +the cannon, a sort of brooding hush, then a thunderous reverberation +compared with which all other noises of the night had been as nothing. + +Tongues of flame sprang skyward and a ghastly light shot far out on the +sea. The junk heaved back, settled, turned slowly over and seemed to spread +out into a great mass of wreckage. Pieces of timber and plank and spar came +tumbling down and a few men scrambled to our decks. We could hear others +crying out in the water, as they swam here and there or grasped at planks +and beams to keep themselves afloat. + + +The cannon ball had penetrated the side of the junk and had exploded a +great store of gunpowder. + +Part of the wreckage of the junk was burning, and the flames threw a red +glare over the strange scene aboard the ship, where the odds had been so +suddenly altered. Our assailants, who but a moment before had had us at +their mercy, now were confounded by the terrific blow they had received; +instead of fighting the more bravely because no retreat was left them, they +were confused and did not know which way to turn. + +Davie Paine, sometimes so slow-witted, seemed now to grasp the situation +with extraordinary quickness. "Come on, lads," he bellowed, "we've got 'em +by the run." + +Again clubbing his musket, he leaped into the gangway so ferociously that +the pirates scrambled over the side, brown men and white, preferring to +take their chances in the sea. As he charged on, I lost sight of him in the +maelstrom of struggling figures. On my left a Lascar was fighting for his +life against one of our new crew. On every side men were splashing and +shouting and cursing. + +Now, high above the uproar, I heard a voice, at once familiar and strange. +For a moment I could not place it; it had a wild note that baffled me. Then +I saw black Frank, cleaver in hand, come bounding out of the darkness. His +arms and legs, like the legs of some huge tarantula, flew out at all angles +as he ran, and in fierce gutturals he was yelling over and over again:-- + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +He peered this way and that. + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +Out of the corner of my eye I saw some one stir by the deck-house, and the +negro, seeing him at the same moment, leaped at my own conclusion. + +In doubt whither to flee, too much of a coward at heart either to throw +himself overboard or to face his enemy if there was any chance of escape, +the unhappy Kipping hesitated one second too long. With a mighty lunge the +negro caught him by the throat, and for a moment the two swayed back and +forth in the open space between us and our enemies. + +I thought of the night when they had fought together in the galley door. +Momentarily Kipping seemed actually to hold his own against the mad negro; +but his strength was of despair and almost at once we saw that it was +failing. + +"Stop!" Kipping cried. "I'll yield! Stop--stop! Don't kill me!" + +For a moment the negro hesitated. He seemed bewildered; his very passion +seemed to waver. Then I saw that Kipping, all the while holding the negro's +wrist with his left hand, was fumbling for his sheath-knife with his right. +With basest treachery he was about to knife his assailant at the very +instant when he himself was crying for quarter. My shout of warning was +lost in the general uproar; but the negro, though taken off his guard, had +himself perceived Kipping's intentions. + +By a sudden jerk he shook Kipping's hand off his wrist and raised high his +sharp weapon. + +From the shadow of the deck-house one of Kipping's own adherents sprang to +his rescue, but Davie Paine--blundering old Davie!--knocked him flat. + +For an instant the cook's weapon shone bright in the glare of the torches. +Kipping snatched vainly at the black wrist above him, then jerked his knife +clean out of the sheath--but too late. + +"Ah got you now, you pow'ful fighter, you! Ah got you now, you dirty scut!" +the cook yelled, and with one blow of his cleaver he split Kipping's skull +to the chin. + + + * * * * * + + +When at last we braced the yards and drew away from the shattered fragments +of the junk, which were drifting out to sea, we found that of the lawless +company that so confidently had expected to murder us all, only five living +men, one of whom was Captain Nathan Falk, were left aboard. They were a +glum and angry little band of prisoners. + +Lights and voices ashore indicated that some of our assailants had saved +themselves, and by their cries and confused orders we knew that they in +turn were rescuing others. Of their dead we had no record, but the number +must have been large. + +Of us six who had defied Falk in that time long ago, which we had come to +regard almost as ancient history, only Neddie Benson had fallen. Although +we had laughed time and again at the charming plump lady who had prophesied +such terrible events, it had proved in bitter earnest a sad last voyage for +Neddie. + +From the low and distant land there continued to come what seemed to be +only faint whispers of sound, yet we knew that they really were the cries +of men fighting for their lives where the sea beat against the shore. + +"Ah wonder," said the cook, grimly, "how dem yeh scalliwaggles gwine git +along come Judgment when Gab'el blows his ho'n and Peter rattles his keys +and all de wicked is a-wailin' and a-weepin' and a-gnashin' and can't git +in nohow. Yass, sah. Ah guess dis yeh ol' nigger, he's gwine sit on de +pearly gate and twiddle his toes at 'em." + +He folded his arms and stood in the lantern light, with a dreamy expression +on his grotesque face such as I had seen there once or twice before. When +he glanced at me with that strange affection shining from his great eyes, +he seemed like some big, benign dog. Never had I seen a calmer man. It +seemed impossible that passion ever had contorted those homely black +features. + +But the others were discussing the fate of our prisoners. I heard Roger +say, "Let me look at them, Mr. Cledd. I'll know them--some of them anyway. +Ah, Captain Falk? And the carpenter? Well, well, well! We hadn't dared hope +for the pleasure of your company on the return voyage. In fact, we'd quite +given it up. I may add that we'd reconciled ourselves to the loss of it." + +I now edged toward them, followed by the cook. + +"Ay, Mr. Hamlin, it's all very well for you to talk like that," Falk +replied in a trembling voice from which all arrogance had not yet vanished. +"I'm lawful master of this here vessel, as you very well know. You're +nothing but a mutineer and a pirate. Go ahead and kill me! Why don't you? +You know I can tell a story that will send you to the gallows. What have I +done, but try to get back the owners' property and defend it? To think that +I could have knocked you and that addle-pated Ben Lathrop on the head any +day I wished! And I wished it, too, but Kipping he said--" + +Falk stopped suddenly. + +"So Kipping had a finger in the pie, did he?" said Roger. "Well, Mr. Falk, +what did Kipping say?" + +Falk bit his lip sullenly and remained silent. + +There really was something pathetic in the man's plight. He had been +ambitious, and ambition alone, which often is a virtue, had gone far to +contribute to his downfall. In many ways he was so weak! A quality that in +other men might have led to almost anything good, in him had bred +resentment and trickery and at last downright crime. He stood there now, +ruined in his profession, the leader of a defeated band of criminals and +vagabonds. Yet if he had succeeded in capturing the ship and putting the +rest of us to death, he could have sailed her home to Salem, and by +spreading his own version of the mutiny have gained great credit, and +probably promotion, for himself. + +"Well, Chips," said Roger, "I hope you, at least, are pleased with your +prospects." + +The carpenter likewise made no reply. + +"Hm, Mr. Cledd, they haven't a great deal to say, have they?" + +"Aha," the negro murmured just behind me, "dey's got fine prospec's, dey +has. Dey's gwine dance, dey is, yass, sah, on de end of a rope, and after +dey's done dance a while dey's gwine be leetle che'ubs, dey is, and flap +dey wings and sing sweet on a golden harp. Yass, sah." + +The carpenter shot an angry glance at the cook, but no one else paid him +any attention. + +A fire was flaming now on the distant shore. The seas rushed and gurgled +along the side of the ship. Our lights dipped with the rigging as the ship +rolled and tossed, now lifting her dripping sides high out of water, now +plunging them again deep into the trough. + +"Mr. Cledd, I think we can spare those five men a boat," Roger said, after +a time. + +"You're not going to let them go!" Mr. Cledd exclaimed. + +"Yes." + +Mr. Cledd raised his eyebrows, but silently acceded. + +I thought that an expression of relief crossed Falk's face, yet dismay was +mingled with it. Those were dark, inhospitable lands to leeward. The +carpenter opened his mouth as if to speak, closed it without a word, and +vacantly stared at Roger. The rest of us exchanged glances of surprise. + +When we had hove to, they lowered the boat, fumbling at the falls while +they did so, as if they were afraid to leave the ship. The seas caught the +boat and bumped it against the side, but Falk still lingered, even when +Roger indicated by a gesture that he was to go. + +"Ay," he cried, "it's over the side and away. You're sending us to our +death, Mr. Hamlin." + +"To your death?" said Roger. "Sir, do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Falk glared sullenly, but made no reply. + +"Sir," Roger repeated sharply, "do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Still there was no response. + +"Ah, I thought not. Stay here, if you wish. I shall have you put in irons; +I should not be justified in any other course. But in Salem we'll lay our +two stories before the owners--ay, and before the law. Then, sir, if you +are in the right and I am in the wrong, your triumph will repay you many +times over for the discomforts of a few months in irons. No? Will you not +come?" + +Still Falk did not reply. + +"Sir," Roger sternly cried, "if I were to take you back a prisoner to +Salem, you'd go to the gallows by way of the courts. Here you can steer +your own course--though in all probability the port will be the same." + +Without another word Falk went over the side, and down by the chains to the +boat that was bumping below. But before we cast off the painter, he looked +up at us in the light of a lantern that some one held over the bulwark and +cried bitterly, "I hope, Mr. Hamlin, you're satisfied now. I'm rightful +master of that vessel in spite of all your high-handed tricks." + +For the first time I noticed the marks of wounds that he had got in the +fight off the island. His face was white and his eyes were at once fierce +and hunted. + +"You're mistaken," Roger replied. "I have papers from the firm's agent that +appoint me as master." Then he laughed softly and added, "But any time you +wish to carry our little dispute to the courts, you'll find me ready and +willing to meet you there. Too ready, Mr. Falk, for your own good. No, Mr. +Falk, it's better for you that you leave us here. Go your own gait. May you +fare better than you deserve!" + +We cast off the painter, and they rowed into the dark toward the shore of +Java. They were men of broken fortunes, whose only hope for life lay in a +land infested with cut-throat desperadoes. I thought of Kipping who lay +dead on our deck. It seemed to me after all that Falk had got the worse +punishment; he had aspired to better things; weak though he was, there had +been the possibility of much good in his future. Now his career was +shattered; never again could he go home to his own country. + +Yet when all was said and done, it was more merciful to set him adrift than +to bring him home to trial. Though he must suffer, he would suffer alone. +The punishment that he so fully deserved would not be made more bitter by +his knowing that all who knew him knew of his ruined life. + +"Poor Falk!" I thought, and was amazed at myself for thinking almost kindly +of him. + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +"SO ENDS" + + +Through the watches that followed I passed as if everything were unreal; +they were like a succession of nightmares, and to this day they are no more +than shadows on my memory. Working in silence, the men laid the dead on +clean canvas and washed down the decks; cut away wreckage, cleared the +running rigging, and replaced with new sails those that had been cut or +burned in battle. Then came the new day with its new duties; and a sad day +it was for those of us who had stood together through so many hardships, +when Neddie Benson went over the side with a prayer to speed him. We were +homeward bound with all sail set, but things that actually had happened +already seemed incredible, and concerning the future we could only +speculate. + +We had gone a long way on our journey toward the Cape of Good Hope before +our new carpenter had repaired the broken bulwark and the various other +damages the ship had suffered, and before the rigging was thoroughly +restored. Weeks passed, their monotony broken only by the sight of an +occasional sail; days piled on end, morning and night, night and morning, +until weeks had become months. In the fullness of time we rounded Good +Hope, and now swiftly with fair winds, now slowly with foul, we worked up +to the equator, then home across the North Atlantic. + +On the afternoon of a bright day in the fall, more than a year after we +first had set sail, we passed Baker Island and stood up Salem Harbor. + +Bleak and bare though they were, the rough, rocky shores were home. To +those of us who hailed from Salem, every roof and tree gave welcome after +an absence of eighteen months. Already, we knew, reports of our approach +would have spread far and wide. Probably a dozen good old captains, +sweeping the sea, each with his glass on his "captain's walk," had sighted +our topsails while we were hull down and had cried out that Joseph Whidden +was home again. Such was the penetration of seafaring men in those good old +days when they recognized a ship and its master while as yet they could spy +nothing more than topgallantsails. + +We could see the people gathering along the shore and lining the wharf and +calling and cheering and waving hands. We thought of our comrades whom we +had left in far seas; we longed and feared to ask a thousand questions +about those at home, of whom we had thought so tenderly and so often. + +Already boats were putting out to greet us; and now, in the foremost of +them, one of the younger Websters stood up. "Mr. Hamlin, ahoy!" he called, +seeing Roger on the quarter-deck. "Where is Captain Whidden?" + +Roger did not answer until the boat had come fairly close under the rail, +and meanwhile young Webster stood looking up at him as if more than half +expecting bad news. + +Only when the boat was so near that each could see the other's expression +and hear every inflection of the other's voice, did Roger reply. + +"He is dead." + +"We heard a story," young Webster cried in great excitement, coming briskly +aboard. "One Captain Craigie, brig Eve late from Bencoolen, brought it. An +appalling tale of murder and mutiny. As he had it, the men mutinied against +Mr. Thomas and against Mr. Falk when he assumed command. They seized the +ship and killed Mr. Thomas and marooned Mr. Falk, who, while Captain +Craigie was thereabouts, hustled a crew of fire-eating Malays and white +adventurers and bought a dozen barrels of powder and set sail with a fleet +of junks to retake the ship. But that, of course, is stuff and nonsense. +Where's Falk?" + +"Falk," said Roger with a wry smile, "decided to spend the rest of his days +at the Straits." + +"Oh!" Young Webster looked hard at Roger and then looked around the deck. +All was ship-shape, but there were many strange faces. + +"Oh," he said again. "And you--" He stopped short. + +"And I?" Roger repeated. + +Again young Webster looked around the ship. He bit his lip. "What is _your_ +story, Mr. Hamlin?" he said sharply. + +"Is your father here, Mr. Webster?" Roger asked. + +"No," the young man replied stiffly, "he is at Newburyport, but I have no +doubt whatsoever that he will return at once when he hears you have +arrived. This seems to be a strange situation, Mr. Hamlin. Who is in +command here?" + +"I am, sir." + +"Oh!" After a time he added, "I heard rumors, but I refused to credit +them." + +"What do you mean by that, sir?" Roger asked. + +"Oh, nothing much, sir. You evaded my question. What is _your_ story?" + +"_My_ story?" Roger looked him squarely in the eye. In Roger's own eyes +there was the glint of his old humorous twinkle, and I knew that the young +man's bustling self-importance amused him. + +"My story?" Roger repeated. "Why, such a story as I have to tell, I'll tell +your father when I report to him." + +Young Webster reddened. "Oh!" he said with a sarcastic turn of his voice. +"Stuff and nonsense! It may be--or it may not." And with that he stationed +himself by the rail and said no more. + +When at last we had come to anchor and young Webster had gone hastily +ashore and we had exchanged greetings at a distance with a number of +acquaintances, Roger and Mr. Cledd and I sat down--perhaps more promptly +than need be--over our accounts in the great cabin. I felt bitterly +disappointed that none of my own people had come to welcome me; but +realizing how silly it was to think that they surely must know of our +arrival, I jumped at Roger's suggestion that we gather up our various +documents and then leave Mr. Cledd in charge--he was not a Salem man--and +hurry home as fast as we could go. + +As we bent to our work, Mr. Cledd remarked with a dry smile, "I'm thinking, +sir, there's going to be more of a sting to this pirate-and-mutiny business +than I'd believed. That smug, sarcastic young man means trouble or I've no +eye for weather." + +"He's the worst of all the Websters," Roger replied thoughtfully. "And I'll +confess that Captain Craigie's story knocks the wind out of _my_ canvas. +Who'd have looked for a garbled story of our misfortunes to outsail us? +However,--" he shook his head and brushed away all such anxieties,--"time +will tell. Now, gentlemen, to our accounts." + +Before we had more than got well started, I heard a voice on deck that +brought me to my feet. + +There was a step on the companionway, and then, "Father!" I cried, and +leaped up with an eagerness that, boy-like, I thought I concealed with +painstaking dignity when I shook his hand. + +"Come, come, come, you young rascals!" my father cried. "What's the meaning +of this? First hour in the home port and you are as busy at your books as +if you were old students like myself. Come, put by your big books and your +ledgers, lads. Roger, much as I hate to have to break bad news, your family +are all in Boston, so--more joy to us!--there's nothing left but you shall +come straight home with Benny here. Unless, that is--" my father's eyes +twinkled just as Roger's sometimes did--"unless you've more urgent business +elsewhere." + +"I thank you, sir," said Roger, "but I have _no_ more urgent business, and +I shall be--well, delighted doesn't half express it." + +His manner was collected enough, but at my father's smile he reddened and +his own eyes danced. + +"Pack away your books and come along, then. There's some one will be glad +to see you besides Benny's mother. Leave work till morning. I'll wager come +sun-up you'll be glad enough to get to your tasks if you've had a little +home life meanwhile. Come, lads, come." + +Almost before we fully could realize what it meant, we were walking up to +the door of my own home, and there was my mother standing on the threshold, +and my sister, her face as pink now as it had been white on the day long +ago when she had heard that Roger was to sail as supercargo. + +Many times more embarrassed than Roger, whom I never had suspected of such +shamelessness, I promptly turned my back on him and my sister; where upon +my father laughed aloud and drew me into the house. From the hall I saw +the dining-table laid with our grandest silver, and, over all, the +towering candle-sticks that were brought forth only on state occasions. + +"And now, lads," said my father, when we sat before such a meal as only +returning prodigals can know, "what's this tale of mutiny and piracy with +which the town's been buzzing these two weeks past? Trash, of course." + +"Why, sir, I think we've done the right thing," said Roger, "and yet I +can't say that it's trash." + +When my father had heard the story he said so little that he frightened me; +and my mother and sister exchanged anxious glances. + +"Of course," Roger added, "we are convinced absolutely, and if that fellow +hadn't got away at Whampoa, we'd have proof of Kipping's part in it--" + +"But he got away," my father interposed, "and I question if his word is +good for much, in any event. Poor Joseph Whidden! We were boys together." + +He shortly left the table, and a shadow seemed to have fallen over us. We +ate in silence, and after supper Roger and my sister went into the garden +together. What, I wondered, was to become of us now? + +That night I dreamed of courts and judges and goodness knows what penalties +of the law, and woke, and dreamed again, and slept uneasily until the +unaccustomed sound of some one pounding on our street door waked me in the +early morning. + +After a time a servant answered the loudly repeated summons. Low voices +followed, then I heard my father open his own door and go out into the +hall. + +"Is that you, Tom Webster?" he called. + +"It is. I'm told you've two of my men here in hiding. Rout 'em out. What +brand of discipline do you call this? All hands laying a-bed at four in the +morning. I've been up all night. Called by messenger just as I turned in at +that confounded tavern, charged full price for a night's lodging,--curse +that skinflint Hodges!--and took a coach that brought me to Salem as fast +as it could clip over the road. I'm too fat to straddle a horse. Come, +where's Hamlin and that young scamp of yours?" + +I scrambled out of bed and was dressing as fast as I could, when I heard +Roger also in the hall. + +"Aha! Here he is," Mr. Webster cried. "Fine sea-captain you are, you young +mutineer, laying abed at cockcrow! Come, stir a leg there. I've been aboard +ship this morning, after a ride that was like to shake my liver into my +boots. Where's Ben Lathrop? Come, come, you fine-young-gentleman +supercargo." + +Crying, "Here I am," I pulled on my boots and joined the others in the +lower hall, and the three of us, Mr. Webster, Roger, and I, hurried down +the street in time to the old man's testy exclamations, which burst out +fervently and often profanely whenever his lame foot struck the +ground harder than usual. "Pirates--mutineers--young cubs--laying abed-- +cockcrow--" and so on, until we were in a boat and out on the harbor, where +the Island Princess towered above the morning mist. + +"Lathrop'll row us," the old man snapped out. "Good for him--stretch his +muscles." + +Coming aboard the ship, we hailed the watch and went directly to the cabin. + +"Now," the old man cried, "bring out your log-book and your papers." + +He slowly scanned the pages of the log and looked at our accounts with a +searching gaze that noted every figure, dot and comma. After a time he +said, "Tell me everything." + +It was indeed a strange story that Roger told, and I thought that I read +incredulity in the old man's eyes; but he did not interrupt the narrative +from beginning to end. When it was done, he spread his great hands on the +table and shot question after question, first at one of us, then at the +other, indicating by his glance which he wished to answer him. + +"When first did you suspect Falk?--What proof had you?--Did Captain Whidden +know anything from the start?--How do you know that Falk was laying for Mr. +Thomas?--Do you know the penalty for mutiny?--Do you know the penalty for +piracy?--Hand out your receipts for all money paid over at Canton.--Who in +thunder gave you command of my ship?--Do you appreciate the seriousness of +overthrowing the lawful captain?--How in thunder did you force that paper +out of Johnston?" + +His vehemence and anger seemed to grow as he went on, and for twenty +minutes he snapped out his questions till it seemed as if we were facing a +running fire of musketry. His square, smooth-shaven chin was thrust out +between his bushy side-whiskers, and his eyes shot fiercely, first at +Roger, then at me. + +A small swinging lantern lighted the scene. Its rays made the corners seem +dark and remote. They fell on the rough features of the old merchant +mariner who owned the ship and who so largely controlled our fortunes, +making him seem more irascible than ever, and faded out in the early +morning light that came in through the deadlights. + +At last he placed his hands each on the opposite shoulder, planted his +elbows on the table, and fiercely glared at us while he demanded, "Have you +two young men stopped yet to think how it'll seem to be hanged?" + +The lantern swung slowly during the silence that followed. The shadows +swayed haltingly from side to side. + +"No," cried Roger hotly, "we have not, Captain Webster. We've been too busy +looking after _your_ interests." + +The scar where the case-knife had slashed his cheek so long ago stood +starkly out from the dull red of his face. + +At that the old man threw back his head and burst into a great guffaw of +laughter. He laughed until the lantern trembled, until his chair leaned so +far back that I feared he was about to fall,--or hoped he was,--until it +seemed as if the echoes must come booming back from the farthest shore. + +"Lads, lads!" he cried, "you're good lads. You're the delight of an old +man's heart! You've done fine! Roger Hamlin, I've a new ship to be finished +this summer. You shall be master, if you'll be so kind, for an old man that +wishes you well, and"--here he slyly winked at me--"on the day you take a +wife, there'll come to your bride a kiss and a thousand dollars in gold +from Thomas Webster. As for Ben, here, he's done fine as supercargo of the +old Island Princess,--them are good accounts, boy,--and I'll recommend he +sails in the new ship with you." + +He stopped short then and looked away as if through the bulkhead and over +the sea as far, perhaps, as Sunda Strait, and the long line of Sunda +Islands bending like a curved blade to guard the mysteries of the East +against such young adventurers as we. + +After a time he said in a very different voice, "I was warned of one man in +the crew, just after you sailed." His fingers beat a dull tattoo on the +polished table. "It was too late then to help matters, so I said never a +word--not even to my own sons. But--" the old man's voice hardened--"if +Nathan Falk ever again sets foot on American soil he'll hang higher than +ever Haman hung, if I have to build the gallows with my own two hands, Mr. +Hamlin--ay, he or any man of his crew. The law and I'll work together to +that end, Mr. Hamlin." + +So for a long time we sat and talked of one thing and another. + +When at last we went on deck, Mr. Cledd spoke to Roger of something that +had happened early in the watch. I approached them idly, overheard a phrase +or two and joined them. + +"It was the cook," Mr. Cledd was saying. "He was trying to sneak aboard in +the dark. I don't think he had been drinking. I can't understand it. He had +a big bag of dried apples and said that was all he went for. I don't like +to discipline a man so late in the voyage." + +"Let it pass," Roger replied. "Cook's done good work for us." + +I didn't understand then what it meant; but later in the day I heard some +one say softly, "Mistah Lathrop, Ah done got an apple pie, yass, sah. Young +gen'lems dey jest got to have pie. You jest come long with dis yeh ol' +nigger." + +There were tears in my eyes when I saw the great pie that the old African +had baked. I urged him to share it with me, and though for a time he +refused, at last he hesitantly consented. "Ah dunno," he remarked, "Ah +dunno as Ah had ought to. Pies, dey's foh young gen'lems and officers, but +dis yeh is a kind of ambigoo-cous pie--yass, sah, seeing you say so, Ah +will." + +Never did eating bread and salt together pledge a stronger or more enduring +friendship. To this very day I have the tenderest regard for the old man +with whom I had passed so many desperate hours. + +That old Blodgett and Davie Paine should take our gifts to "the tiny wee +girl" at Newburyport we all agreed, when they asked the privilege. "It +ain't but a wee bit to do for a good ship-mate," Blodgett remarked with a +deprecatory wave of his hand. "I'd do more 'n that for the memory of old +Bill Hayden." And just before he left for the journey he cautiously +confided to me, "I've got a few more little tricks I picked up at that 'ere +temple. It don't do to talk about such trinkets,--not that I'm +superstitious,--but she'll never tell if she don't know where they come +from. Ah, Mr. Lathrop, it's sad to lose a fortune, and that's what we done +when we let all them heathen islands go without a good Christian expedition +to destroy the idols and relieve them of their ill-gotten gains." + +The two departed side by side, with their bundles swung over their +shoulders. They and the cook had received double wages to reward their +loyal service, and they carried handsome presents for the little girl of +whom we had heard so much; but it was a sad mission for which they had +offered themselves. No gift on all the green earth could take the place of +poor, faithful old Bill, the father who was never coming home. + +That night, when Roger and I again went together to my own father's house, +eager to tell the news of our good fortune, we found my mother and my +sister in the garden waiting for us. I was not wise enough then to +understand that the tears in my mother's eyes were for a young boy and a +young girl whom she had had but yesterday, but of whom now only memories +remained--memories, and a youth and a woman grown. Nor could I read the +future and see the ships of the firm of Hamlin and Lathrop sailing every +sea. I only thought to myself, as I saw Roger stand straight and tall +beside my sister, with the white scar on his face, that _there_ was a +brother of whom I could be proud. + + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mutineers, by Charles Boardman Hawes + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + +***** This file should be named 9657-8.txt or 9657-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/9/6/5/9657/ + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu and the PG +Distributed Proofreaders + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Mutineers + +Author: Charles Boardman Hawes + +Posting Date: December 5, 2011 [EBook #9657] +Release Date: January 2006 +First Posted: October 13, 2003 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu and the PG +Distributed Proofreaders + + + + + + + + + + +THE MUTINEERS + + + +_A tale of old days at sea and of adventures in the Far East as Benjamin +Lathrop set it down some sixty years ago_ + + + +by Charles Boardman Hawes + + + + + +_Illustrated_ + + + + +_To_ D.C.H. + + + + +_TO PAY MY SHOT_ + + +_To master, mate, and men of the ship Hunter, whose voyage is the backbone +of my story; to Captain David Woodard, English mariner, who more than a +hundred and twenty years ago was wrecked on the island of Celebes; to +Captain R.G.F. Candage of Brookline, Massachusetts, who was party to the +original contract in melon seeds; and to certain blue-water skippers who +have left sailing directions for eastern ports and seas, I am grateful for +fascinating narratives and journals, and indebted for incidents in this +tale of an earlier generation._ + +_C.B.H._ + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + I My Father and I Call on Captain Whidden + II Bill Hayden + III The Man Outside the Galley + IV A Piece of Pie + V Kipping + + +II +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + + VI The Council in the Cabin + VII The Sail with a Lozenge-Shaped Patch + VIII Attacked + IX Bad Signs + X The Treasure-Seeker + + + +III +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + + XI A Hundred Thousand Dollars in Gold + XII A Strange Tale + XIII Trouble Forward + XIV Bill Hayden Comes to the End of His Voyage + + + +IV +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + + XV Mr. Falk Tries to Cover His Tracks + XVI A Prayer for the Dead + XVII Marooned +XVIII Adventures Ashore + + + +V +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + + XIX In Last Resort + XX A Story in Melon Seeds + XXI New Allies + XXII We Attack +XXIII What We Found in the Cabin + + + +VI +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + + XXIV Falk Proposes a Truce + XXV Including a Cross-Examination + XXVI An Attempt to Play on Our Sympathy +XXVII We Reach Whampoa, but Not the End of Our Troubles + + + +VII +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +XXVIII A Mystery Is Solved and a Thief Gets Away + XXIX Homeward Bound + XXX Through Sunda Strait + XXXI Pikes, Cutlasses, and Guns + XXXII "So Ends" + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + +"_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!" + +_Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a +pistol shot rang out sharply, and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and +fall_. + +_We helped him pile his belongings into his chest ... and gave him a hand +on deck_. + +"_Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk_. + +_He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo_. + + + + +[Illustration: "_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!"] + + + + +I + +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + + +CHAPTER I + +MY FATHER AND I CALL ON CAPTAIN WHIDDEN + + +My father's study, as I entered it on an April morning in 1809, to learn +his decision regarding a matter that was to determine the course of all my +life, was dim and spacious and far removed from the bustle and clamor of +the harbor-side. It was a large room paneled with dark wood. There were +books along the walls, and paintings of ships, and over the fireplace there +stood a beautiful model of a Burmese junk, carved by some brown artist on +the bank of the Irawadi. + +My father sat by the open window and looked out into the warm sunshine, +which was swiftly driving the last snow from the hollows under the +shrubbery. + +Already crocuses were blossoming in the grass of the year before, which was +still green in patches, and the bright sun and the blue sky made the study +seem to me, entering, dark and sombre. It was characteristic of my father, +I thought with a flash of fancy, to sit there and look out into a warm, gay +world where springtime was quickening the blood and sunshine lay warm on +the flowers; he always had lived in old Salem, and as he wrote his sermons, +he always had looked out through study windows on a world of commerce +bright with adventure. For my own part, I was of no mind to play the +spectator in so stirring a drama. + +With a smile he turned at my step. "So, my son, you wish to ship before the +mast," he said, in a repressed voice and manner that seemed in keeping with +the dim, quiet room. "Pray what do you know of the sea?" + +I thought the question idle, for all my life I had lived where I could look +from my window out on the harbor. + +"Why, sir," I replied, "I know enough to realize that I want to follow the +sea." + +"To follow the sea?" + +There was something in my father's eyes that I could not understand. He +seemed to be dreaming, as if of voyages that he himself had made. Yet I +knew he never had sailed blue water. "Well, why not?" he asked suddenly. +"There was a time--" + +I was too young to realize then what has come to me since: that my father's +manner revealed a side of his nature that I never had known; that in his +own heart was a love of adventure that he never had let me see. My sixteen +years had given me a big, strong body, but no great insight, and I thought +only of my own urgent desire of the moment. + +"Many a boy of ten or twelve has gone to sea," I said, "and the Island +Princess will sail in a fortnight. If you were to speak to Captain +Whidden--" + +My father sternly turned on me. "No son of mine shall climb through the +cabin windows." + +"But Captain Whidden--" + +"I thought you desired to follow the sea--to ship before the mast." + +"I do." + +"Then say no more of Captain Whidden. If you wish to go to sea, well and +good. I'll not stand in your way. But we'll seek no favoritism, you and I. +You'll ship as boy, but you'll take your medicine like a man." + +"Yes, sir," I said, trying perversely to conceal my joy. + +"And as for Captain Whidden," my father added, "you'll find he cuts a very +different figure aboard ship from that he shows in our drawing-room." + +Then a smile twinkled through his severity, and he laid his hand firmly on +my shoulder. + +"Son, you have my permission ungrudgingly given. There was a time--well, +your grandfather didn't see things as I did." + +"But some day," I cried, "I'll have a counting-house of my own-- +some day--" + +My father laughed kindly, and I, taken aback, blushed at my own eagerness. + +"Anyway," I persisted, "Roger Hamlin is to go as supercargo." + +"Roger--as supercargo?" exclaimed a low voice. + +I turned and saw that my sister stood in the door. + +"Where--when is he going?" + +"To Canton on the Island Princess! And so am I," I cried. + +"Oh!" she said. And she stood there, silent and a little pale. + +"You'll not see much of Roger," my father remarked to me, still smiling. He +had a way of enjoying a quiet joke at my expense, to him the more pleasing +because I never was quite sure just wherein the humor lay. + +"But I'm going," I cried. "I'm going--I'm going--I'm going!" + +"At the end of the voyage," said my father, "we'll find out whether you +still wish to follow the sea. After all, I'll go with you this evening, +when supper is done, to see Joseph Whidden." + +The lamps were lighted when we left the house, and long beams from the +windows fell on the walk and on the road. We went down the street side by +side, my father absently swinging his cane, I wondering if it were not +beneath the dignity of a young man about to go to sea that his parent +should accompany him on such an errand. + +Just as we reached the corner, a man who had come up the street a little +distance behind us turned in at our own front gate, and my father, seeing +me look back when the gate slammed, smiled and said, "I'll venture a guess, +Bennie-my-lad, that some one named Roger is calling at our house this +evening." + +Afterwards--long, long afterwards--I remembered the incident. + +When my father let the knocker fall against Captain Whidden's great front +door, my heart, it seemed to me, echoed the sound and then danced away at a +lively pace. A servant, whom I watched coming from somewhere behind the +stairs, admitted us to the quiet hall; then another door opened silently, a +brighter light shone out upon us, and a big, grave man appeared. He +welcomed us with a few thoughtful words and, by a motion of his hand, sent +us before him into the room where he had been sitting. + +"And so," said Captain Whidden, when we had explained our errand, "I am to +have this young man aboard my ship." + +"If you will, sir," I cried eagerly, yet anxiously, too, for he did not +seem nearly so well pleased as I had expected. + +"Yes, Ben, you may come with us to Canton; but as your father says, you +must fill your own boots and stand on your own two feet. And will you, +friend Lathrop,"--he turned to my father,--"hazard a venture on the +voyage?" + + +My father smiled. "I think, Joe," he said, "that I've placed a considerable +venture in your hands already." + +Captain Whidden nodded. "So you have, so you have. I'll watch it as best I +can, too, though of course I'll see little of the boy. Let him go now. I'll +talk with you a while if I may." + +My father glanced at me, and I got up. + +Captain Whidden rose, too. "Come down in the morning," he said. "You can +sign with us at the Websters' counting-house.--And good-bye, Ben," he +added, extending his hand. + +"Good-bye? You don't mean--that I'm not to go with you?" + +He smiled. "It'll be a long time, Ben, before you and I meet again on quite +such terms as these." + +Then I saw what he meant, and shook his hand and walked away without +looking back. Nor did I ever learn what he and my father talked about after +I left them there together. + + + +CHAPTER II + +BILL HAYDEN + + +More than two-score years and ten have come and gone since that day when I, +Benjamin Lathrop, put out from Salem harbor, a green hand on the ship +Island Princess, and in them I have achieved, I think I can say with due +modesty, a position of some importance in my own world. But although +innumerable activities have crowded to the full each intervening year, +neither the aspirations of youth nor the successes of maturity nor the +dignities of later life have effaced from my memory the picture of myself, +a boy on the deck of the Island Princess in April, 1809. + +I thought myself very grand as the wind whipped my pantaloons against my +ankles and flapped the ribbons of the sailor hat that I had pulled snugly +down; and I imagined myself the hero of a thousand stirring adventures in +the South Seas, which I should relate when I came back an able seaman at +the very least. Never was sun so bright; never were seas so blue; never was +ship so smart as the Island Princess. + +On her black hull a nicely laid band of white ran sheer from stem to stern; +her bows swelled to meet the seas in a gentle curve that hinted the swift +lines of our clippers of more recent years. From mainmast heel to truck, +from ensign halyard to tip of flying jib-boom, her well-proportioned masts +and spars and taut rigging stood up so trimly in one splendidly +coordinating structure, that the veriest lubber must have acknowledged her +the finest handiwork of man. + +It was like a play to watch the men sitting here and there on deck, or +talking idly around the forecastle, while Captain Whidden and the chief +mate conferred together aft. I was so much taken with it all that I had no +eyes for my own people who were there to see me off, until straight out +from the crowded wharf there came a young man whom I knew well. His gray +eyes, firm lips, square chin, and broad shoulders had been familiar to me +ever since I could remember. + +As he was rowed briskly to the ship, I waved to him and called out, "O +Roger--ahoy!" + +I thought, when he glanced up from the boat, that his gray eyes twinkled +and that there was the flutter of a smile on his well-formed lips; but he +looked at me and through me and seemed not to see me, and it came over me +all at once that from the cabin to the forecastle was many, many times the +length of the ship. + +With a quick survey of the deck, as if to see who had spoken, yet seeming +not to see me at all, Roger, who had lived all his life within a cable's +length of the house where I was born, who had taught me to box the compass +before I learned my ABC's, whose interest in my own sister had partly +mystified, partly amused her younger brother--that very Roger climbed +aboard the Island Princess and went on into the cabin without word or sign +of recognition. + +It was not the first time, of course, that I had realized what my chosen +apprenticeship involved; but the incident brought it home to me more +clearly than ever before. No longer was I to be known as the son of Thomas +Lathrop. In my idle dreams I had been the hero of a thousand imaginary +adventures; instead, in the strange experiences I am about to relate, I was +to be only the ship's "boy"--the youngest and least important member of +that little isolated community banded together for a journey to the other +side of the world. But I was to see things happen such as most men have +never dreamed of; and now, after fifty years, when the others are dead and +gone, I may write the story. + +When I saw that my father, who had watched Roger Hamlin with twinkling eyes +ignore my greeting, was chuckling in great amusement, I bit my lip. What if +Roger _was_ supercargo, I thought: he needn't feel so big. + +Now on the wharf there was a flutter of activity and a stir of color; now a +louder hum of voices drifted across the intervening water. Captain Whidden +lifted his hand in farewell to his invalid wife, who had come in her +carriage to see him sail. The mate went forward on the forecastle and the +second mate took his position in the waist. + +"Now then, Mr. Thomas," Captain Whidden called in a deep voice, "is all +clear forward?" + +"All clear, sir," the mate replied; and then, with all eyes upon him, he +took charge, as was the custom, and proceeded to work the ship. + +While the men paid out the riding cable and tripped it, and hove in the +slack of the other, I stood, carried away--foolish boy!--by the thought +that here at last I was a seaman among seamen, until at my ear the second +mate cried sharply, "Lay forward, there, and lend a hand to cat the +anchor." + +The sails flapped loose overhead; orders boomed back and forth; there was +running and racing and hauling and swarming up the rigging; and from the +windlass came the chanteyman's solo with its thunderous chorus:-- + + "Pull one and all! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + On this catfall! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Answer the call! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Hoy! Haulee! + Hoy! Hoy!!! + Oh, cheery men!" + +As the second anchor rose to the pull of the creaking windlass, we sheeted +home the topsails, topgallantsails and royals and hoisted them up, braced +head-yards aback and after-yards full for the port tack, hoisted the jib +and put over the helm. Thus the Island Princess fell off by the head, as we +catted and fished the anchor; then took the wind in her sails and slipped +slowly out toward the open sea. + +Aft, by the lee rail, I saw Roger Hamlin watching the group, a little apart +from the others, where my own people had gathered. My father stood half a +head above the crowd, and beside him were my mother and my sister. When I, +too, looked back at them, my father waved his hat and I knew his eyes were +following me; I saw the flutter of white from my mother's hand, and I knew +that her heart was going out with me to the uttermost parts of the earth. + +Then, almost timidly, my sister waved her handkerchief. But I saw that she +was looking at the quarter-deck. + +As land fell astern until it became a thin blue line on the western +horizon, and as the Island Princess ran free with the wind full in her +sails, I took occasion, while I jumped back and forth in response to the +mate's quick orders, to study curiously my shipmates in our little kingdom. +Now that we had no means of communication with that already distant shore, +we were a city unto ourselves. + +Yonder was the cook, a man as black as the bottom of his iron pot, whose +frown, engraved deeply in his low forehead, might have marked him in my +eyes as the villain of some melodrama of the sea, had I not known him for +many years to be one of the most generous darkies, so far as hungry small +boys were concerned, that ever ruled a galley. The second mate, who was now +in the waist, I had never seen before--to tell the truth, I was glad that +he held no better berth, for I disliked the turn of his too full lips. +Captain Whidden and the chief mate, Mr. Thomas, I had known a long time, +and I had thought myself on terms of friendship with them, even +familiarity; but so far as any outward sign was concerned, I might now have +been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate. + +We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin--Captain Whidden, Mr. +Thomas, Mr. Falk, and Roger, whose duties included oversight of the cargo, +supervision of matters purely of business and trade in foreign ports, and a +deal of clerical work that Captain Whidden had no mind to be bothered with; +three in the steerage--the cook (contrary, perhaps, to the more usual +custom), the steward, and the carpenter; and fourteen in the forecastle. + +All in all I was well pleased with my prospects, and promised myself that I +would "show them a thing or two," particularly Roger Hamlin. I'd make a +name for myself aboard the Island Princess. I'd let all the men know that +it would not take Benjamin Lathrop long to become as smart a seaman as +they'd hope to see. + +Silly lad that I was! + +Within twenty minutes of that idle dream the chain of circumstances had +begun that was to bring every man aboard the Island Princess face to face +with death. Like the small dark cloud that foreruns a typhoon, the first +act in the wild drama that came near to costing me my own life was so +slight, so insignificant relatively, that no man of us then dreamed of the +hidden forces that brought it to pass. + +On the forecastle by the larboard rigging stood a big, broad-shouldered +fellow, who nodded familiarly at the second mate, cast a bit of a leer at +the captain as if to impress on the rest of us his own daring and +independence, and gave me, when I caught his eye, a cold, noncommittal +stare. His name, I shortly learned, was Kipping. Undeniably he was +impudent; but he had, nevertheless, a mild face and a mild manner, and when +I heard him talk, I discovered that he had a mild voice; I could find no +place for him in the imaginary adventures that filled my mind--he was quite +too mild a man. + +I perceived that he was soldiering at his work, and almost at the same +moment I saw the mate come striding down on him. + +"You there," Mr. Thomas snapped out, "bear a hand! Do you think you're +waiting for the cows to come home?" + +"No-o-o, sir," the mild man drawled, starting to walk across the deck. + +The slow reply, delivered with a mocking inflection, fanned to sudden +laughter chuckles that the mate's words had caused. + + +Mr. Thomas reddened and, stepping out, thrust his face close to the +other's. "You try any of your slick tricks on me, my man," he said slowly +and significantly, "you try any of your slick tricks on me, and so help me, +I'll show you." + +"Ye-e-es, sir," the man replied with the same inflection, though not so +pronounced this time. + +Suddenly the deck became very still. The listeners checked their laughter. +Behind me I heard some one mutter, "Hear that, will you?" Glancing around, +I saw that Captain Whidden had gone below and that Mr. Thomas was in +command. I was confident that the mild seaman was mocking the mate, yet so +subtle was his challenge, you could not be sure that he actually was +defiant. + +Although Mr. Thomas obviously shared the opinion of the men, there was so +little on which to base a charge of insubordination or affront that he +momentarily hesitated. + +"What is your name?" he suddenly demanded. + +"Kipping, sir," the mild man replied. + +This time there was only the faintest suggestion of the derisive +inflection. After all, it might have been but a mannerism. The man had such +a mild face and such a mild manner! + +"Well, Kipping, you go about your work, and after this, let me warn you, +keep busy and keep a civil tongue in your head. We'll have no slick tricks +aboard this ship, and the sooner you men realize it, the easier it will be +for all hands." + +Turning, the mate went back to the quarter-deck and resumed his station by +the weather rail. + +While his back was toward us, however, and just as I myself, who had +listened, all ears, to the exchange of words between them, was turning to +the forecastle, I saw--or thought I saw--on Kipping's almost averted face +just such a leer as I had seen him cast at the captain, followed, I could +have taken my oath, by a shameless wink. When he noticed me gazing at him, +open-mouthed, he gave me such another cold stare as he had given me before +and, muttering something under his breath, walked away. + +I looked aft to discover at whom he could have winked, but I saw only the +second mate, who scowled at me angrily. + +"Now what," thought I, "can all this mean?" Then, being unable to make +anything of it, I forgot it and devoted myself industriously to my own +affairs until the hoarse call of "All hands on deck" brought the men who +were below tumbling up, to be summoned aft and addressed by the captain. + +Apparently Captain Whidden was not aware that there was a soul on board +ship except himself. With his eyes on the sea and his hands clasped behind +him, he paced the deck, while we fidgeted and twisted and grew more and +more impatient. At last, with a sort of a start, as if he had just seen +that we were waiting, he stopped and surveyed us closely. He was a fine +figure of a man and he affected the fashions of a somewhat earlier day. +A beaver with sweeping brim surmounted his strong, smooth-shaven face, and +a white stock, deftly folded, swathed his throat to his resolute chin. Trim +waistcoat, ample coat, and calmly folded arms completed his picture as he +stood there, grave yet not severe, waiting to address us. + +What he said to us in his slow, even voice was the usual speech of a +captain in those times; and except for a finer dignity than common, he did +not deviate from the well-worn customary phrases until he had outlined the +voyage that lay before us and had summed up the advantages of prompt, +willing obedience and the penalties of any other course. His tone then +suddenly changed. "If any man here thinks that he can give me slovenly work +or back talk and arguing," he said, "it'll be better for that man if he +jumps overboard and swims for shore." I was certain--and I still am--that +he glanced sharply at Kipping, who stood with a faint, nervous smile, +looking at no one in particular. "Well, Mr. Thomas," he said at last, +"we'll divide the watches. Choose your first man." + +When we went forward, I found myself, as the green hand of the voyage, one +of six men in the starboard watch. I liked the arrangement little enough, +for the second mate commanded us and Kipping was the first man he had +chosen; but it was all in the day's work, so I went below to get my jacket +before eight bells should strike. + +The voices in the forecastle suddenly stopped when my feet sounded on the +steps; but as soon as the men saw that it was only the boy, they resumed +their discussion without restraint. + +"I tell you," some one proclaimed from the darkest corner, "the second +mate, he had it all planned to get the chief mate's berth this voyage, and +the captain, he put him out no end because he wouldn't let him have it. +Yes, sir. And he bears a grudge against the mate, he does, him and that sly +friend of his, Kipping. Perhaps you didn't see Kipping wink at the second +mate after he was called down. I did, and I says to myself then, says I, +'There's going to be troublous times ere this voyage is over.' Yes, sir." + +"Right you are, Davie!" a higher, thinner voice proclaimed, "right you are. +I was having my future told, I was, and the lady--" + +A roar of laughter drowned the words of the luckless second speaker, and +some one yelled vociferously, "Neddie the fortune-teller! Don't tell me +he's shipped with us again!" + +"But I tell you," Neddie persisted shrilly, "I tell you they hit it right, +they do, often. And the lady, she says, 'Neddie Benson, don't you go +reckless on this next voyage. There's trouble in store,' she says. +'There'll be a dark man and a light man, and a terrible danger.' And I paid +the lady two dollars and I--" + +Again laughter thundered in the forecastle. + +"All the same," the deep-voiced Davie growled, "that sly, slippery--" + +"Hist!" A man raised his hand against the light that came faintly from on +deck. + +Then a mild voice asked, "What are you men quidding about anyway? One of +you's sitting on my chest." + +"Listen to them talk," some one close beside me whispered. "You'd think +this voyage was all of life, the way they run on about it. Now it don't +mean so much to me. My name's Bill Hayden, and I've got a little wee girl, +I have, over to Newburyport, that will be looking for her dad to come home. +Two feet long she is, and cute as they make them." + +Aware that the speaker was watching me closely, I perfunctorily nodded. At +that he edged nearer. "Now I'm glad we're in the same watch," he said. "So +many men just cut a fellow off with a curse." + +I observed him more sharply, and saw that he was a stupid-looking but +rather kindly soul whose hair was just turning gray. + +"Now I wish you could see that little girl of mine," he continued. "Cute? +there ain't no word to tell you how cute she is. All a-laughing and +gurgling and as good as gold. Why, she ain't but a little old, and yet she +can stand right up on her two little legs as cute as you please." + +I listened with mild interest as he rambled on. He seemed such a friendly, +homely soul that I could but regard him more kindly than I did some of our +keener-witted fellow seamen. + +Now we heard faintly the bell as it struck, _clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang-clang_. Feet scuffled overhead, and some one called down the hatch, +"Eight bells, starbow-lines ahoy!" + +Davie's deep voice replied sonorously, "Ay-ay!" And one after another we +climbed out on deck, where the wind from the sea blew cool on our faces. + +I had mounted the first rung of the ladder, and was regularly signed as a +member of the crew of the Island Princess, bound for Canton with a cargo of +woolen goods and ginseng. There was much that puzzled me aboard-ship--the +discontent of the second mate, the perversity of the man Kipping (others +besides myself had seen that wink), and a certain undercurrent of +pessimism. But although I was separated a long, long way from my old +friends in the cabin, I felt that in Bill Hayden I had found a friend of a +sort; then, as I began my first real watch on deck at sea, I fell to +thinking of my sister and Roger Hamlin. + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MAN OUTSIDE THE GALLEY + + +Strange events happened in our first month at sea--events so subtle as +perhaps to seem an unimportant part of this narrative of a strange voyage, +yet really as necessary to the foundation of the story as the single bricks +and the single dabs of mortar at the base of a tall chimney are necessary +to the completed structure. I later had cause to remember each trivial +incident as if it had been written in letters of fire. + +In the first dog watch one afternoon, when we were a few days out of port, +I was sitting with my back against the forward deck-house, practising +splices and knots with a bit of rope that I had saved for the purpose. I +was only a couple of feet from the corner, so of course I heard what was +going on just out of sight. + +The voices were low but distinct. + +"Now leave me alone!" It was Bill Hayden who spoke. "I ain't never troubled +you." + +"Ah, so you ain't troubled me, have you, you whimpering old dog?" + +"No, I ain't troubled you." + +"Oh, no! You was so glad to let me take your nice dry boots, you was, when +mine was filled with water." + +The slow, mild, ostensibly patient voice could be none other than +Kipping's. + +"I had to wear 'em myself." + +"Oh, had to wear 'em yourself, did you?" + +"Let go o' my arm!" + +"So?" + +"Let go, I tell you; let go or I'll--I swear I'll hammer you good." + +"Oh, you'll hammer me good, will you?" + +"Let go!" + +There was a sudden scuffle, then out from the corner of the deck-house +danced Kipping with both hands pressed over his jaw. + +"You bloody scoundrel!" he snarled, meek no longer. "You wait--I'll get +you. I'll--" Seeing me sitting there with my bit of rope, he stopped short; +then, with a sneer, he walked away. + +Amazed at the sudden departure of his tormentor, Bill Hayden stuck his own +head round the corner and in turn discovered me in my unintentional +hiding-place. + +Bill, however, instead of departing in chagrin, joined me with a puzzled +expression on his kind, stupid face. + +"I don't understand that Kipping," he said sadly. "I've tried to use him +right. I've done everything I can to help him out and I'm sure I don't want +to quarrel with him, yet for all he goes around as meek as a cat that's +been in the cream, he's always pecking at me and pestering me, till just +now I was fair drove to give him a smart larrup." + +Why, indeed, should Kipping or any one else molest good, dull old Bill +Hayden? + +"I'm a family man, I am," Bill continued, "with a little girl at home. I +ain't a-bothering no one. I'm sure all I want is to be left alone." + +For a time we sat in silence, watching the succession of blue waves through +which the Island Princess cut her swift and almost silent passage. A man +must have been a cowardly bully to annoy harmless old Bill. Yet even then, +young though I was, I realized that sometimes there is no more dangerous +man than a coward and a bully, "He's great friends with the second mate," +Bill remarked at last. "And the second mate has got no use at all for Mr. +Thomas because he thought he was going to get Mr. Thomas's berth and +didn't; and for the same reason he don't like the captain. Well, I'm glad +he's only _second mate_. He ain't got his hands out of the tar-bucket yet, +my boy." + +"How do you know he expected to get the mate's berth?" I asked. + +"It's common talk, my boy. The supercargo's the only man aft he's got any +manner of use for, and cook says the steward says Mr. Hamlin ain't got no +manner of use for him. There you are." + +"No," I thought,--though I discreetly said nothing,--"Roger Hamlin is not +the man to be on friendly terms with a fellow of the second mate's +calibre." + +And from that time on I watched Mr. Falk, the second mate, and the +mild-voiced Kipping more closely than ever--so closely that one night I +stumbled on a surprising discovery. + +Ours was the middle watch, and Mr. Falk as usual was on the quarter-deck. +By moonlight I saw him leaning on the weather rail as haughtily as if he +were the master. His slim, slightly stooped figure, silhouetted against the +moonlit sea, was unmistakable. But the winds were inconstant and drifting +clouds occasionally obscured the moon. Watching, I saw him distinctly; +then, as the moonlight darkened, the after part of the ship became as a +single shadow against a sea almost as black. While I still watched, there +came through a small fissure in the clouds a single moonbeam that swept +from the sea across the quarter-deck and on over the sea again. By that +momentary light I saw that Mr. Falk had left the weather rail. + +Certainly it was a trifling thing to consider twice, but you must remember, +in the first place, that I was only a boy, with all a boy's curiosity about +trifles, and in the second place that of the four men in the cabin no other +derived such obvious satisfaction from the minor prerogatives of office as +Mr. Falk. He fairly swelled like a frog in the sun as he basked in the +prestige that he attributed to himself when, left in command, he occupied +the captain's place at the weather rail. + +Immediately I decided that under the cover of darkness I would see what had +become of him. So I ran lightly along in the shelter of the lee bulwark, +dodging past the galley, the scuttle-butt, and the cabin in turn. At the +quarter-deck I hesitated, knowing well that a sound thrashing was the least +I could expect if Mr. Falk discovered me trespassing on his own territory, +yet lured by a curiosity that was the stronger for the vague rumors on +which it had fed. + +On hands and knees I stopped by the farther corner of the cabin. Clouds +still hid the moon and low voices came to my ears. Very cautiously I peeked +from my hiding-place, and saw that Mr. Falk and the helmsman had put their +heads together and were talking earnestly. + +While they talked, the helmsman suddenly laughed and prodded Mr. Falk in +the ribs with his thumb. Like a flash it came over me that it was Kipping's +trick at the wheel. Here was absolute proof that, when the second mate and +the mild man thought no one was spying upon them, they were on uncommonly +friendly terms. Yet I did not dream that I had stumbled on anything graver +than to confirm one of those idle rumors that set tongues wagging in the +forecastle, but that really are too trifling to be worth a second thought. + +When the crew of a ship is cut off from all communication with the world at +large, it is bound, for want of greater interests, to find in the +monotonous daily round something about which to weave a pretty tale. + +At that moment, to my consternation, the bell struck four times. As the two +dark figures separated, I started back out of sight. Kipping's trick at the +wheel was over, and his relief would come immediately along the very route +that I had chosen; unless I got away at once I should in all probability be +discovered on the quarterdeck and trounced within an inch of my life. Then +suddenly, as if to punish my temerity, the cloud passed and the moonlight +streamed down on deck. + +Darting lightly back to the companion-ladder, I slipped down it and was on +the point of escaping forward when I heard slow steps. In terror lest the +relief spy me and reveal my presence by some exclamation that Kipping or +the second mate would overhear, I threw myself down flat on the deck just +forward of the scuttle-butt, where the moon cast a shadow; and with the +fervent hope that I should appear to be only a heap of old sail, I lay +without moving a muscle. + +The steps came slowly nearer. They had passed, I thought, when a pause set +my heart to jumping madly. Then came a low, cautious whisper:-- + +"You boy, what you doin' dah?" + +It was not the relief after all. It was the good old villainous-looking +black cook, with a cup of coffee for Mr. Falk. + +"Put yo' head down dah," he whispered, "put yo' head down, boy." + +With a quick motion of his hand he jerked some canvas from the butt so that +it concealed me, and went on, followed by the quick steps of the real +relief. + +Now I heard voices, but the only words I could distinguish were in the +cook's deep drawl. + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah. Ah brought yo' coffee, sah, Yass, sah, Ah'll wait +fo' yo' cup, sah." + +Next came Kipping's step--a mild step, if there is such a thing; even in +his bullying the man was mild. Then came the slow, heavy tread of the +returning African. + +Flicking the canvas off me, he muttered, "All's cleah fo' you to git away, +boy. How you done come to git in dis yeh scrape sho' am excruciatin'. You +just go 'long with you while dey's a chanst." + +So, carrying with me the very unimportant discovery that I had made, I ran +cautiously forward, away from the place where I had no business to be. + +When, in the morning, just before eight bells, I was sent to the galley +with the empty kids, I found the worthy cook in a solemn mood. + +"You boy," he said, fixing on me a stare, which his deeply graven frown +rendered the more severe, "you boy, what you think you gwine do, prowlin' +round all hours? Hey? You tell dis nigger dat. Heah Ah's been and put you +onto all de ropes and give you more infohmative disco'se about ships and +how to behave on 'em dan eveh Ah give a green hand befo' in all de years Ah +been gwine to sea, and heah you's so tarnation foolish as go prowlin' round +de quarter-deck whar you's like to git skun alive if Mistah Falk ketches +you." + +I don't remember what I replied, but I am sure it was flippant; to the day +of my death I shall never forget the stinging, good-natured cuff with which +the cook knocked my head against the wall. "Sho' now," he growled, "go +'long!" + +I was not yet ready to go. "Tell me, doctor," I said, "does the second mate +get on well with the others in the cabin?" + +The title mollified him somewhat, but he still felt that he must uphold the +dignity of his office. "Sho' now, what kind of a question is dat fo' a +ship's boy to be askin' de cook?" He glanced at me suspiciously, then +challenged me directly, "Who put dose idea' in yo' head?" + +By the tone of the second question, which was quite too straightforward to +be confused with the bantering that we usually exchanged, I knew that he +was willing, if diplomatically coaxed, to talk frankly. I then said +cautiously, "Every one thinks so, but you're the only man forward that's +likely to know." + +"Now ain't dat jest like de assumptivity of dem dah men in de forecastle. +How'd Ah know dat kind of contraptiveness, tell me?" + +Looking closely at me he began to rattle his pans at a great rate while I +waited in silence. He was not accomplishing much; indeed, he really was +throwing things into a state of general disorder. But I observed that he +was working methodically round the galley toward where I stood, until at +last he bumped into me and started as if he hadn't known that I was there +at all. + +"You boy," he cried, "you still heah?" He scowled at me with a particularly +savage intensity, then suddenly leaned over and tapped me on the shoulder. +"You's right, boy," he whispered. "He ain't got no manner of use foh dem +other gen'lems, and what's mo', dey ain't got no manner of use foh him. +Ah's telling you, boy, it's darn lucky, you bet, dat Mistah Falk he eats at +second table. Yass, sah. Hark! dah's de bell--eight bells! Yo' watch on +deck, hey?" After a short pause, he whispered, "Boy, you come sneakin' +round to-morrow night when dat yeh stew'd done gone to bed, an' Ah'll jest +gadder you up a piece of pie f'om Cap'n's table--yass, sah! Eight bells is +struck. Go 'long, you." And shoving me out of his little kingdom, the +villainous-looking darky sent after me a savage scowl, which I translated +rightly as a token of his high regard and sincere friendship. + +In my delight at the promised treat, and in my haste to join the watch, I +gave too little heed to where I was going, and shot like a bullet squarely +against a man who had been standing just abaft the galley window. He +collapsed with a grunt. My shoulder had knocked the wind completely out of +him. + +"Ugh!--" he gasped--"ugh! You son of perdition--ugh! Why in thunder don't +you look where you're running--ugh!--I'll break your rascally young +neck--ugh--when I get my wind." + +It was Kipping, and for the second time he had lost his mildness. + +As he clutched at me fiercely, I dodged and fled. Later, when I was hauling +at his side, he seemed to have forgotten the accident; but I knew well +enough that he had not. He was not the kind that forgets accidents. His +silence troubled me. How much, I wondered, had he heard of what was going +on in the galley? + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A PIECE OF PIE + + +At two bells there sounded the sonorous call, "Sail ho!" + +"Where away?" cried Mr. Falk. + +"One point off the larboard bow." + +In all the days since we had lost sight of land, we had seen but one other +sail, which had appeared only to disappear again beyond the horizon. It +seemed probable, however, that we should speak this second vessel, a brig +whose course crossed our own. Captain Whidden came on deck and assumed +command, and the men below, getting wind of the excitement, trooped up and +lined the bulwarks forward. Our interest, which was already considerable, +became even keener when the stranger hove out a signal of distress. We took +in all studding-sails and topgallantsails fore and aft, and lay by for her +about an hour after we first had sighted her. + +Over the water, when we were within hailing distance, came the cry: "Ship +ahoy!" + +Captain Whidden held the speaking trumpet. "Hullo!" + +"What ship is that, pray?" + +"The ship Island Princess, from Salem, bound to Canton. Where are you +from?" + +"The brig Adventure, bound from the Straits to Boston. Our foretopmast was +carried away four hours ago. Beware of--" + +Losing the next words, the Captain called, "I didn't hear that last." + +"Beware,"--came again the warning cry, booming deeply over the sea while +one and all we strained to hear it--"beware of any Arab ship. Arabs have +captured the English ship Alert and have murdered her captain and fifteen +men." + +Squaring her head-yards, the brig dropped her mainsail, braced her cross +jack-yard sharp aback, put her helm a-weather and got sternway, while her +after sails and helm kept her to the wind. So she fell off from us and the +two vessels passed, perhaps never to meet again. + +Both forward and aft, we aboard the Island Princess were sober men. Kipping +and the second mate were talking quietly together, I saw (I saw, too, that +Captain Whidden and some of the others were watching them sharply) Mr. +Thomas and Roger Hamlin were leaning side by side upon the rail, and +forward the men were gathering in groups. It was indeed an ominous message +that the brig had given us. But supper broke the tension, and afterwards a +more cheerful atmosphere prevailed. + +As I was sweeping down the deck next day, Roger, to my great surprise,--for +by now I was accustomed to his amused silence,--came and spoke to me with +something of the old, humorous freedom that was so characteristic of him. + +"Well, Bennie," said he, "we're quite a man now, are we not?" + +"We are," I replied shortly. Although I would not for a great deal have +given him the satisfaction of knowing it, I had been much vexed, secretly, +by his rigidly ignoring me. + +"Bennie," he said in a low voice, "is there trouble brewing in the +forecastle?" + +I was startled. "Why, no. I've seen no sign of trouble." + +"No one has talked to you, then?" + +"Not in such a way as you imply." + +"Hm! Keep your eyes and ears open, anyway, and if you hear anything that +sounds like trouble, let me know--quietly, mind you, even secretly." + +"What do you mean?" + +"We are carrying a valuable cargo, and we have very particular orders. All +must be thus and so,--exactly thus and so,--and it means more to the +owners, Bennie, than I think you realize. Now you go on with your work. But +remember--eyes and ears open." + +That night, as I watched the restless sea and the silent stars, my +imagination was stirred as never before. I felt the mystery and wonder of +great distances and far places. We were so utterly alone! Except for the +passing hail of some stranger, we had cut ourselves off for months from all +communication with the larger world. Whatever happened aboard ship, in +whatever straits we found ourselves, we must depend solely upon our own +resources; and already it appeared that some of our shipmates were scheming +and intriguing against one another. Thus I meditated, until the boyish and +more natural, perhaps more wholesome, thought of the cook's promise came to +me. + +Pie! My remembrance of pie was almost as intangible as a pleasant dream +might be some two days later. With care to escape observation, I made my +way to the galley and knocked cautiously. + +"Who's dah?" asked softly the old cook, who had barricaded himself for the +night according to his custom, and was smoking a villainously rank pipe. + +"It's Ben Lathrop," I whispered. + +"What you want heah?" the cook demanded. + +"The pie you promised me," I answered. + +"Humph! Ain't you fo'got dat pie yet? You got de most miraculous memorizer +eveh Ah heared of. You wait." + +I heard him fumbling inside the galley; then he opened the door and stepped +out on deck as if he had just decided to take a breath of fresh air. Upon +seeing me, he pretended to start with great surprise, and exclaimed rather +more loudly than before:-- + +"What you doin' heah, boy, at dis yeh hour o' night?" + +But all this was only crafty by-play. Having made sure, so he thought, +that no one was in sight, he grabbed me by the collar and yanked me into +the galley, at the same time shutting the door so that I almost stifled in +the rank smoke with which he had filled the place. + +Scowling fiercely, he reached into a little cupboard and drew out half an +apple pie that to my eager eyes seemed as big as a half moon on a clear +night. + + +"Dah," he said. "Eat it up. Mistah Falk, he tell stew'd he want pie and he +gotta have pie, and stew'd he come and he say, 'Frank,' says he, 'dat +Mistah Falk, his langwidge is like he is in liquo'. He _gotta_ have pie.' +'All right,' Ah say, 'if he gotta have pie, he gotta wait twill Ah make +pie. Cap'n, he et hearty o' pie lately.' Stew'd he say, 'Cap'n ain't had +but one piece and Mistah Thomas, he ain't had but one piece, and Mistah +Hamlin, he ain't had any. Dah's gotta be pie. You done et dat pie yo'se'f,' +says he. 'Oh, no,' says Ah. 'Ah never et no pie. You fo'get 'bout dat pie +you give Cap'n foh breakfas'.' Den stew'd he done crawl out. He don' know +Ah make two pies yestidday. Dat's how come Ah have pie foh de boy. Boys dey +need pie to make 'em grow. It's won'erful foh de indignation, pie is." + +I was appalled by the hue and cry that my half-circle of pastry had +occasioned, and more than a little fearful of the consequences if the truth +ever should transpire; but the pie in hand was compensation for many such +intangible difficulties in the future, and I was making great inroads on a +wedge of it, when I thought I heard a sound outside the window, which the +cook had masked with a piece of paper. + +I stopped to listen and saw that Frank had heard it too. It was a scratchy +sound as if some one were trying to unship the glass. + +"Massy sake!" my host gasped, taking his vile pipe out of his mouth. + +Although it was quite impossible for pallor to make any visible impression +on his surpassing blackness, he obviously was much disturbed. + +"Gobble dat pie, boy," he gasped, "gobble up ev'y crumb an' splinter." + +Now, as the scratchy noise sounded at the door, the cook laid his pipe on a +shelf and glanced up at a big carving-knife that hung from a rack above his +head. + +"Who's dah?" he demanded cautiously. + +"Lemme in," said a mild, low voice, "I want some o' that pie." + +"Massy sake!" the cook gasped in disgust, "ef it ain't dat no 'count +Kipping." + +"Lemme in," persisted the mild, plaintive voice. "Lemme in." + +"Aw, go 'long! Dah ain't no pie in heah," the cook retorted. "You's +dreamin', dat's what you is. You needs a good dose of medicine, dat's what +you needs." + +"I'm dreaming, am I?" the mild voice repeated. "Oh, yes, I'm dreaming I am, +ain't I? I didn't sneak around the galley yesterday morning and hear you +tell that cocky little fool to come and get a piece of pie tonight. Oh, no! +I didn't see him come prowling around when he thought no one was looking. +Oh, no! I didn't see you come out of the galley like you didn't know there +was anybody on deck, and walk right under the rigging where I was waiting +for just such tricks. Oh, no! I was dreaming, I was. Oh, yes." + + +"Dat Kipping," the cook whispered, "he's hand and foot with Mistah Falk." + +"Lemme in, you woolly-headed son of perdition, or I swear I'll take the +kinky scalp right off your round old head." + +"He's gettin' violenter," the cook whispered, eyeing me questioningly. + +Saying nothing, I swallowed the last bit of pie. I had made the most of my +opportunity. + +Kipping now shook the door and swore angrily. Finally he kicked it with the +full weight of his heel. + +It rattled on its hinges and a long crack appeared in the lower panel. + +"He's sho' coming in," the African said slowly and reflectively. "He's sho' +coming in and when he don't get no pie, he's gwine tell Mistah Falk, and +you and me's gwine have trouble." Putting his scowling face close to my +ear, the cook whispered, "Ah's gwine scare him good." + +Amazed by the dramatic turn that events were taking, I drew back into a +corner. + +From the rack above his head the cook took down the carving-knife. Dropping +on hands and knees and creeping across the floor, he held the weapon +between his even white teeth, sat up on his haunches, and noiselessly +drew the bolt that locked the door. Then with a deft motion of an +extraordinarily long arm he put out the lantern behind him and threw the +galley into darkness. + + + +CHAPTER V + +KIPPING + + +I thought that Kipping must have abandoned his quest. In the darkness of +the galley the silence seemed hours long. The coals in the stove glowed +redly, and the almost imperceptible light of the starry sky came in here +and there around the door. Otherwise not a thing was visible in the +absolute blackness that shrouded my strange host, who seemed for the moment +to have reverted to the savage craft of his Slave Coast ancestors. Surely +Kipping must have gone away, I thought. He was so mild a man, one could +expect nothing else. Then somewhere I heard the faint sigh of indrawn +breath. + +"You blasted nigger, open that door," said the mild, sad voice. "If you +don't, I'm going to kick it in on top of you and cut your heart out right +where you stand." + +The silence, heavy and pregnant, was broken by the shuffling of feet. +Evidently Kipping drew off to kick the door a second time. His boot struck +it a terrific blow, but the door, instead of breaking, flew open and +crashed against the pans behind it. + +Then the cook, who so carefully had prepared the simple trap, swinging the +carving-knife like a cutlass, sprang with a fierce, guttural grunt full in +Kipping's face. Concealed in the dark galley, I saw it all silhouetted +against the starlit deck. With the quickness of a weasel, Kipping evaded +the black's clutching left hand and threw himself down and forward. Had the +cook really intended to kill Kipping, the weapon scarcely could have failed +to cut flesh in its terrific swing, but he gave it an upward turn that +carried it safely above Kipping's head. When Kipping, however, dived under +Frank's feet, Frank, who had expected him to turn and run, tripped and +fell, dropping the carving-knife, and instantly black man and white +wriggled toward the weapon. + +It would have been funny if it hadn't been so dramatic. The two men +sprawled on their bellies like snakes, neither of them daring to take time +to stand, each, in the snap of a finger, striving with every tendon and +muscle to reach something that lay just beyond his finger-tips. I found +myself actually laughing--they looked so like two fish just out of water. + +But the fight suddenly had become bitter earnest, Kipping unquestionably +feared for his life, and the cook knew well that the weapon for which they +fought would be turned against him if his antagonist once got possession of +it. + +As Kipping closed his fingers on the handle, the cook grabbed the blade. +Then the mate appeared out of the dark. + + +"Here, what's this?" he demanded, looming on the scene of the struggle. + +I saw starlight flash on the knife as it flew over the bulwark, then I +heard it splash. Kipping got away by a quick twist and vanished. The cook +remained alone to face the mate, for you can be very sure that I had every +discreet intention not to reveal my presence in the dark galley. + +"Yass, sah," said the cook, "yass, sah. Please to 'scuse me, sah, but Ah +didn't go foh no premeditation of disturbance. It is quite unintelligible, +sah, but one of de men, sah, he come round, sah, and says Ah gotta give him +a pie, sah, and of co'se Ah can't do nothin' like dat, sah. Pies is foh de +officers and gen'lems, sah, and of co'se Ah don't give pie to de men, sah, +not even in dey vittles, sah, even if dey was pie, which dey wa'n't, sah, +fob dis we'y day Mistah Falk he wants pie and stew'd he come, and me and +he, sah, we sho' ransack dis galley, sah, and try like we can, not even two +of us togetheh, sah, can sca' up a piece of pie foh Mistah Falk, sah, and +he--" + +Unwilling to listen longer, the mate turned with a grunt of disgust and +walked away. + +After he had gone, the cook stood for a time by the galley, looking +pensively at the stars. Long-armed, broad-shouldered, bullet-headed, he +seemed a typical savage. Yet in spite of his thick lips and protruding +chin, his face had a certain thoughtful quality, and not even that deeply +graven scowl could hide the dog-like faithfulness of his dark eyes. + +After all, I wondered, was he not like a faithful dog: loyal to the last +breath, equally ready to succor his friend or to fight for him? + +"Boy," he said, when he came in, "Ah done fool 'em. Dey ain' gwine believe +no gammon dat yeh Kipping tells 'em--leastwise, no one ain't onless it's +Mistah Falk. Now you go 'long with you and don't you come neah me foh a +week without you act like Ah ain't got no use foh you. And boy," he +whispered, "you jest look out and keep clear of dat Kipping. Foh all he +talk' like he got a mouth full of butter, he's an uncommon fighter, he is, +yass sah, an uncommon fighter." + +He paused for a moment, then added in such a way that I remembered it long +afterward, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +I reached the forecastle unobserved, and as I started to climb into my +bunk, I felt very well satisfied with myself indeed. Not even Kipping had +seen me come. But a disagreeable surprise awaited me; my hand encountered a +man lying wrapped in my blankets. + +It was Kipping! + +He rolled out with a sly smile, looked at me in silence a long time, and +then pretended to shake with silent laughter. + +"Well," I whispered, "what's the matter with you?" + +"There wasn't any pie," he sighed--so mildly. "How sad that there wasn't +any pie." + +He then climbed into his own bunk and almost immediately, I judged, went to +sleep. + +If he desired to make me exceedingly uncomfortable, he had accomplished his +purpose. For days I puzzled over his queer behavior. I wondered how much he +knew, how much he had told Mr. Falk; and I recalled, sometimes, the cook's +remark, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +Of one thing I was sure: both Kipping and Mr. Falk heartily disliked me. +Kipping took every occasion to annoy me in petty ways, and sometimes I +discovered Mr. Falk watching me sharply and ill-naturedly. But he always +looked away quickly when he knew that I saw him. + +We still lacked several days of having been at sea a month when we sighted +Madeira, bearing west southwest about ten leagues distant. Taking a fresh +departure the next day from latitude 32 deg. 22' North, and longitude 16 deg. 36' +West of London, we laid our course south southwest, and swung far enough +away from the outshouldering curve of the Rio de Oro coast to pass clear of +the Canary Islands. + + + * * * * * + + +"Do you know," said Bill Hayden one day, some five weeks later, when we +were aloft side by side, "they don't like you any better than they do me." + +It was true; both Kipping and Mr. Falk showed it constantly. + +"And there's others that don't like us, too," Bill added. "I told 'em, +though, that if they got funny with me or you, I'd show 'em what was what." + +"Who are they?" I asked, suddenly remembering Roger Hamlin's warning. + +"Davie Paine is one." + +"But I thought he didn't like Kipping or Mr. Falk!" + +"He didn't for a while; but there was something happened that turned his +mind about them." + +I worked away with the tar-bucket and reflected on this unexpected change +in the attitude of the deep-voiced seaman who, on our first day aboard +ship, had seen Kipping wink at the second mate. It was all so trivial that +I was ready to laugh at myself for thinking of it twice, and yet stupid +old Bill Hayden had noticed it. A new suspicion startled me. "Bill, did +any one say anything to you about any plan or scheme that Kipping is +concerned in?" I asked. + +"Why, yes. Didn't they speak to you about it?" + +"About what?" + +"Why, about a voyage that all the men was to have a venture in. I thought +they talked to every one. I didn't want anything to do with it if Kipping +was to have a finger in the pie. I told 'em 'No!' and they swore at me +something awful, and said that if ever I blabbed I'd never see my little +wee girl at Newburyport again. So I never said nothing." He looked at me +with a frightened expression. "It's funny they never said nothing to you. +Don't you tell 'em I talked. If they thought I'd split, they'd knock me in +the head, that's what they' d do." + +"Who's in it besides Kipping and Davie Paine?" + +"The two men from Boston and Chips and the steward. Them's all I know, but +there may be others. The men have been talking about it quiet like for a +good while now." + +As Mr. Falk came forward on some errand or other, we stopped talking and +worked harder than ever at tarring down the rigging. + +Presently Bill repeated without turning his head, "Don't you tell 'em I +said anything, will you, Bennie? Don't you tell 'em." + +And I replied, "No." + +We then had passed the Canaries and the Cape Verdes, and had crossed the +Line; from the most western curve of Africa we had weathered the narrows of +the Atlantic almost to Pernambuco, and thence, driven by fair winds, we had +swept east again in a long arc, past Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha, +and on south of the Cape of Good Hope. + +The routine of a sailor's life is full of hard work and petty detail. Week +follows week, each like every other. The men complain about their duties +and their food and the officers grow irritable. There are few stories worth +telling in the drudgery of life at sea, but now and then in a long, long +time fate and coincidence conspire to unite in a single voyage, such as +that which I am chronicling, enough plots and crimes and untoward incidents +to season a dozen ordinary lifetimes spent before the mast. + +I could not, of course, even begin as yet to comprehend the magnitude that +the tiny whirlpool of discontented and lawless schemers would attain. But +boy though I was, in those first months of the voyage I had learned +enough about the different members of the crew to realize that serious +consequences might grow from such a clique. + +Kipping, whom I had thought at first a mild, harmless man, had proved +himself a vengeful bully, cowardly in a sense, yet apparently courageous +enough so far as physical combat was concerned. Also, he had disclosed an +unexpected subtlety, a cat-like craft in eavesdropping and underhanded +contrivances. The steward I believed a mercenary soul, tricky so far as his +own comfort and gain were concerned, who, according to common report, had +ingratiated himself with the second mate by sympathizing with him on every +occasion because he had not been given the chief mate's berth. The two men +from Boston I cared even less for; they were slipshod workmen and +ill-tempered, and their bearing convinced me that, from the point of view +of our officers and of the owners of the ship, they were a most undesirable +addition to such a coterie as Kipping seemed to be forming. Davie Paine and +the carpenter prided themselves on being always affable, and each, although +slow to make up his mind, would throw himself heart and body into whatever +course of action he finally decided on. But significant above all else was +Kipping's familiarity with Mr. Falk. + +The question now was, how to communicate my suspicions secretly to Roger +Hamlin. After thinking the matter over in all its details, I wrote a few +letters on a piece of white paper, and found opportunity to take counsel +with my friend the cook, when I, as the youngest in the crew, was left in +the galley to bring the kids forward to the men in the forecastle. + +"Doctor," I said, "if I wanted to get a note to Mr. Hamlin without +anybody's knowing,--particularly the steward or Mr. Falk,--how should I go +about it?" + +The perpetually frowning black heaped salt beef on the kids. "Dah's enough +grub foh a hun'erd o'nary men. Dey's enough meat dah to feed a whole +regiment of Sigambeezel cavalry--yass, sah, ho'ses and all. And yet Ah'll +bet you foh dollahs right out of mah pay, doze pesky cable-scrapers fo'ward +'ll eat all dat meat and cuss me in good shape 'cause it ain't mo', and +den, mah golly, dey'll sot up all night, Ah'll bet you, yass, sah, +a-kicking dey heads off 'cause dey ain't fed f'om de cabin table. Boy, if +you was to set beefsteak and bake' 'taters and ham and eggs down befo' dem +fool men ev'y mo'ning foh breakfas', dey'd come heah hollerin' and cussin' +and tellin' me dey wah n't gwine have dey innards spiled on all dat yeh +truck jest 'cause dem aft can't eat it." + +Turning his ferocious scowl full upon me, the savage-looking darky handed +me the kids. "Dah! you take doze straight along fo'ward." Then, dropping +his voice to a whisper, he said, "Gimme yo' note." + +Knowing now that the cook approached every important matter by an +extraordinarily indirect route, I had expected some such conclusion, and I +held the note ready. + +"Go long," he said, when I had slipped it into his huge black hand. "Ah'll +do it right." + +So I departed with all confidence that my message would go secretly and +safely to its destination. Even if it should fall into other hands than +those for which it was intended, I felt that I had not committed myself +dangerously. I had written only one word: "News." + + +[Illustration] + + + + +II + +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COUNCIL IN THE CABIN + + +Sometimes in the night I dream of the forecastle of the Island Princess, +and see the crew sitting on chests and bunks, as vividly as if only +yesterday I had come through the hatchway and down the steps with a kid of +"salt horse" for the mess, and had found them waiting, each with his pan +and spoon and the great tin dipper of tea that he himself had brought from +the galley. There was Chips, the carpenter, who had descended for the +moment from the dignity of the steerage; calmly he helped himself to twice +his share, ignoring the oaths of the others, and washed down his first +mouthful with a great gulp of tea. Once upon a time Chips came down just +too late to get any meat, and tried to kill the cook; but as the cook +remarked to me afterwards, "Foh a drea'ful impulsive pusson, he wah n't +ve'y handy with his fists." There was Bill Hayden, who always got last +chance at the meat, and took whatever the doubtful generosity of his +shipmates had left him--poor Bill, as happy in the thought of his little +wee girl at Newburyport as if all the wealth of the khans of Tartary were +waiting for him at the end of the voyage. There was the deep-voiced Davie, +almost out of sight in the darkest corner, who chose his food carefully, +pretending the while to be considerate of the others, and growled amiably +about his hard lot. Also there was Kipping, mild and evasive, yet amply +able to look out for his own interests, as I, who so often brought down the +kids, well knew. + +When, that evening, Bill Hayden had scraped up the last poor slivers of +meat, he sat down beside me on my chest. + +"If I didn't have my little wee girl at Newburyport," he said, "I might +be as gloomy as Neddie Benson. Do you suppose if I went to see a +fortune-teller I'd be as gloomy as Neddie is? I never used to be gloomy, +even before I married, and I married late. I was older than Neddie is +now when I married. Neddie ought to get a wife and stop going to see +fortune-tellers, and then he wouldn't be so gloomy." + +Bill would run on indefinitely in his stupid, kindly way, for I was almost +the only person aboard ship who listened to him at all, and, to tell the +truth, even I seldom more than half listened. But already he had given me +valuable information that day, and now something in the tone of his +rambling words caught my attention. + +"Has Neddie Benson been talking about the fortuneteller again?" I asked. + +"He's had a lot to say about her. He says the lady said to him--" + +"But what started him off?" + +"He says things is bound to come to a bad end." + +"What things?" + +As I have said before, I had a normal boy's curiosity about all that was +going on around us. Perhaps, I have come to think, I had more than the +ordinary boy's sense for important information. Roger Hamlin's warning had +put me on my guard, and I intended to learn all I could and to keep my +mouth shut where certain people were concerned. + +"It's queer they don't say nothing to you about what's going on," Bill +remarked. + +For my own part I understood very well why they should say nothing of any +underhanded trickery to one who ashore was so intimately acquainted with +Captain Whidden and Roger Hamlin. But I kept my thoughts to myself and +persisted in my questions. + +"What is going on?" + +"Oh, I don't just make out what." Bill's stupidity was exasperating at +times. "It's something about Mr. Falk. Kipping, he--" + +"Yes?" said that eternally mild voice. "Mr. Falk? And Kipping? What else +please?" + +Both Bill and I were startled to find Kipping at our elbows. But before +either of us could answer, some one called down the hatch:-- + +"Lathrop is wanted aft." + +Relieved at escaping from an embarrassing situation, I jumped up so +promptly that my knife fell with a clatter, and hastened on deck, calling +"Ay, ay," to the man who had summoned me. I knew very well why I was wanted +aft. + +Mr. Falk, who was on duty on the quarter-deck, completely ignored me as I +passed him and went down the companionway. + +"At least," I thought, "he can't come below now." + +The steward, when I appeared, raised his eyebrows and almost dropped his +tray; then he paused in the door, inconspicuously, as if to linger. But +Captain Whidden glanced round and dismissed him by a sharp nod, and I found +myself alone in the cabin with the captain, Mr. Thomas, and Roger Hamlin. + +"I understand there's news forward, Lathrop," said Captain Whidden. + +Roger looked at me with that humorous, exasperating twinkle of his eyes,--I +thought of my sister and of how she had looked when she learned that he was +to sail for Canton,--and Mr. Thomas folded his arms and leaned back in his +chair. + +"Yes, sir," I replied, "although it seems pretty unimportant to be worth +much as news." + +"Tell us about it." + +To all that I had gathered from Bill Hayden I added what I had learned by +my own observations, and it seemed to interest them, although for my own +part I doubted whether it was of much account. + +"Has any one approached you directly about these things?" Captain Whidden +asked when I was through. + +"No, sir." + +"Have you heard any one say just what this little group is trying to +accomplish, or just when it is going to act?" + +"No, sir." + +"Do you, Lathrop, know anything about the cargo of the Island Princess? Or +anything about the terms under which it is carried?" + +"Only in a general way, sir, that it is made up of ginseng and woolen goods +shipped to Canton." + +Captain Whidden looked at me very sharply indeed. "You are positive that +that is all you know?" + +"Yes, sir--except, in a general way, that the cargo is uncommonly +important." + +The three men exchanged glances, and Roger Hamlin nodded as if to +corroborate my reply. + +"Lathrop," Captain Whidden began again, "I want you to say nothing about +this interview after you leave the cabin. It is more important that you +hold your peace than you may ever realize--than, I trust, you ever _will_ +realize. I am going to ask you to give me your word of honor to that +effect." + +It seemed to me then that I saw Captain Whidden in a new light. We of the +younger generation had inclined to belittle him because he continued to +follow the sea at an age when more successful men had established their +counting-houses or had retired from active business altogether. But twice +his mercantile adventures had proved unfortunate, and now, though nearly +sixty years old and worth a very comfortable fortune, he refused to leave +again for a less familiar occupation the profession by which he had amassed +his competence. I noticed that his hair was gray on his temples, and that +his weathered face revealed a certain stern sadness. I felt as if suddenly, +in spite of my minor importance on board his ship, I had come closer to the +straightforward gentleman, the true Joseph Whidden, than in all the years +that I had known him, almost intimately, it had seemed at the time, in my +father's house. + +"I promise, sir," I said. + +He took up a pencil and with the point tapped a piece of paper. + +"Tell me who of all the men forward absolutely are not influenced by this +man Kipping." + +"The cook," I returned, "and Bill Hayden, and, I think, Neddie Benson. +Probably there are a number of others, but only of those three am I +absolutely sure." + +"That's what I want--the men you are absolutely sure of. Hm! The cook, +useful but not particularly quick-witted. Hayden, a harmless, negative +body. Benson, a gloomy soul if ever there was one. It might be better +but--" He looked at Mr. Thomas and smiled. "That is all, Lathrop; you may +go now. Just one moment more, though: be cautious, keep your eyes and ears +open, and if anything else comes up, communicate with Mr. Hamlin or,--" he +hesitated, but finally said it,--"or directly with me." + +As I went up on deck, I again passed Mr. Falk and again he pretended not to +see me. But although he seemed to be intent on the rolling seas to +windward, I was very confident that, when I had left the quarter-deck, he +turned and looked after me as earnestly as if he hoped to read in my step +and carriage everything that had occurred in the cabin. + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE SAIL WITH A LOZENGE-SHAPED PATCH + + +It was not long before we got another warning even more ominous than the +one from the captain of the Adventure. On Friday, July 28, in latitude +19 deg. 50' South, longitude 101 deg. 53' East,--the log of the voyage, kept beyond +this point in Mr. Thomas's own hand, gives me the dates and figures to the +very day for it still is preserved in the vaults of Hamlin, Lathrop & +Company,--we sighted a bark to the south, and at the captain's orders wore +ship to speak her. When she also came about, we served out pikes and +muskets as a precaution against treachery, and Mr. Falk saw that our guns +were shotted. But she proved to be in good faith, and in answer to our hail +she declared herself the Adrienne of Liverpool, eight days from the +Straits, homeward bound. Her master, it appeared, wished to compare notes +on longitude, and a long, dull discussion followed; but in parting Captain +Whidden asked if there was news of pirates or marauders. + +"Yes," was the reply. "Much news and bad news." And the master of the +Adrienne thereupon launched into a tale of piracy and treachery such, as I +never had heard before. Leaning over the taffrail, his elbows out-thrust +and his big hands folded, he roared the story at us in a great booming +voice that at times seemed to drown the words in its own volume. Now, as +the waves and the wind snatched it away, it grew momentarily fainter and +clearer; now it came bellowing back again, loud, hoarse, and indistinct. + +It was all about an Arab ship off Benkulen; Ladronesers and the havoc they +had wrought among the American ships in the China Sea; a warning not to +sail from Macao for Whampoa without a fleet of four or five sail; and +again, about the depredations of the Malays. The grizzled old captain +seemed to delight in repeating horrible yarns of the seas whence he came, +whither we were going. He roared them after us until we had left him far +astern; and at the last we heard him laughing long and hoarsely. + +"What dat yeh man think we all am? He think we all gwine believe dat yeh? +Hgh!" the cook growled. + +But Neddie Benson dolefully shook his head. + +Parting, the Adrienne and the Island Princess continued, each on her +course, the one back round the Cape of Good Hope and north again to +Liverpool, the other on into strange oceans beset with a thousand dangers. + +We sailed now a sea of opalescent greens and purples that shimmered and +changed with the changing lights. Strange shadows played across it, even +when the sky was cloudless, and it rolled past the ship in great, regular +swells, ruffled by favoring breezes and bright beneath the clear sun. + +At daylight on August 3 we saw land about nine miles away, bearing from +east by south to north, a long line of rugged hills, which appeared to be +piled one above another, and which our last lunar observations indicated +were in longitude 107 deg. 15' East; and we made out a single sail lying off +the coast to the north. + +The sail caught and held our attention--not that, so far as we then could +see, that particular sail was at all remarkable: any sail, at that time and +in that place, would have interested us unusually. Mindful of the warnings +we had received, we paused in our work to watch it. Kipping, with a sly +glance aft, left the winch with which he was occupied and leaned on the +rail. Here and there the crew conversed cautiously, and on the quarter-deck +a lively discussion, I could see, was in progress. + +We were so intent on that distant spot of canvas which pricked the horizon, +that a fierce squall, sweeping down upon us, almost took us aback. + +The cry, "All hands on deck!" brought the sleeping watch from the bunks +below, and the carpenter, steward, and sailmaker from the steerage. The +foresail ripped from its bolt ropes with a deafening crack, and tore to +ribbons in the gale. As the ship lay into the wind, I could hear the +captain's voice louder than the very storm, "Meet her!--Meet her!--Ease her +off!" But the reply of the man at the wheel was lost in the rush of wind +and rain. + +I had been well drilled long since in furling the royals, for on them the +green hands were oftenest practised; and now, from his post on the +forecastle, Mr. Thomas spied me as I slipped and fell half across the deck. +I alone at that moment was not hard at work, and, in obedience to the +captain's orders, during a lull that gave us a momentary respite, he sent +me aloft. + +It was quite a different thing from furling a royal in a light breeze. When +I had got to the topgallant masthead, the yard was well down by the lifts +and steadied by the braces, but the clews were not hauled chock up to the +blocks. Leaning out precariously, I won Mr. Thomas's attention with +greatest difficulty, and shrieked to have it done. This he did. Then, +casting the yard-arm gaskets off from the tye and laying them across +between the tye and the mast, I stretched out on the weather yard-arm and, +getting hold of the weather leech, brought it in to the slings taut along +the yard. Mind you, all this time I, only a boy, was working in a gale of +wind and driven rain, and was clinging to a yard that was sweeping from +side to side in lurching, unsteady flight far above the deck and the angry +sea. Hauling the sail through the clew, and letting it fall in the bunt, I +drew the weather clew a little abaft the yard, and held it with my knee +while I brought in the lee leech in, the same manner. Then, making up my +bunt and putting into it the slack of the clews, the leech and footrope and +the body of the sail, I hauled it well up on the yard, smoothed the skin, +brought it down abaft, and made fast the bunt-gasket round the mast. +Passing the weather and lee yard-arm gaskets round the yard in turn, and +hauling them taut and making them fast, I left all snug and trim. + +From aft came faintly the clear command, "Full and by!" And promptly, for +by this time the force of the squall was already spent, the answer of the +man at the wheel, "Full and by, sir." + +In this first moment of leisure I instinctively turned, as did virtually +every man aboard ship, to look for the sail that had been reported to the +north of us. But although we looked long and anxiously, we saw no sail, no +trace of any floating craft. It had disappeared during the squall, utterly +and completely. Only the wild dark sea and the wild succession of mountain +piled on mountain met our searching eyes. + +A sail there had been, beyond all question, where now there was none. +Driven by the storm, it had vanished completely from our sight. + +As well as we could judge by our lunar observations, the land was between +Paga River and Stony Point, and when we had sailed along some forty miles, +the shore, as it should be according to our reckoning, was less +mountainous. + +It was my first glimpse of the Sunda Islands, of which I had heard so much, +and I well remember that I stood by the forward rigging watching the +distant land from where it seemed on my right to rise from the sea, to +where it seemed on my left to go down beyond the horizon into the sea +again, and that I murmured to myself in a small, awed voice:-- + +"This is Java!" + +The very name had magic in it. Already from those islands our Salem +mariners had accumulated great wealth. Not yet are the old days forgotten, +when Elias Hasket Derby's ships brought back fortunes from Batavia, and +when Captain Carnes, by one voyage in Jonathan Peele's schooner Rajah to +the northern coast of Sumatra for wild pepper, made a profit of seven +hundred per cent of both the total cost of the schooner itself and the +whole expense of the entire expedition. I who lived in the exhilarating +atmosphere of those adventurous times was thrilled to the heart by my first +sight of lands to which hundreds of Salem ships had sailed. + +It really was Java, and night was falling on its shores. Far to the +northeast some tiny object pricked above the skyline, and a point of light +gleamed clearly, low against the blue heavens in which the stars had just +begun to shine. + +"A sail!" I cried. + +Before the words had left my lips a deep voice aloft sonorously +proclaimed:-- + +"Sa-a-ail ho!" + +"Where away?" Mr. Thomas cried. + +"Two points off the larboard bow, sir." + +The little knot of officers on the quarter-deck already were intent on the +tiny spot of almost invisible canvas, and we forward were crowding one +another for a better sight of it. Then in the gathering darkness it faded +and was gone. Could it have been the same that we had seen before? + +There was much talk of the mysterious ship that night, and many strange +theories were offered to account for it. Davie Paine, in his deep, rolling +voice, sent shivers down our backs by his story of a ghost-ship manned by +dead men with bony fingers and hollow eyes, which had sailed the seas in +the days of his great-uncle, a stout old mariner who seemed from Davie's +account to have been a hard drinker. Kipping was reminded of yarns about +Malay pirates, which he told so quietly, so mildly, that they seemed by +contrast thrice as terrible. Neddie Benson lugubriously recalled the +prophecy of the charming fortune-teller and argued the worst of our +mysterious stranger. "The lady said," he repeated, "that there'd be a dark +man and a light man and no end o' trouble. She was a nice lady, too." But +Neddie and his doleful fortune-teller as usual banished our gloom, and the +forecastle reechoed with hoarse laughter, which grew louder and louder when +Neddie once again narrated the lady's charms, and at last cried angrily +that she was as plump as a nice young chicken. + +"If you was to ask me," Bill Hayden murmured, "I'd say it was just a sail." +But no one asked Bill Hayden, and with a few words about his "little wee +girl at Newburyport," he buried himself in his old blankets and was soon +asleep. + +During the mid-watch that same night, the cook prowled the deck forward +like a dog sneaking along the wharves. Silently, the whites of his eyes +gleaming out of the darkness, he moved hither and thither, careful always +to avoid the second mate's observation. As I watched him, I became more and +more curious, for I could make nothing of his veering course. He went now +to starboard, now to larboard, now to the forecastle, now to the steerage, +always silently, always deliberately. After a while he came over and stood +beside me. + +"It ain't right," he whispered. "Ah tell you, boy, it ain't right." + +"What's not right?" I asked. + +"De goin's on aboa'd dis ship." + +"What goings on?" + +"Boy, Ah's been a long time to sea and Ah's cooked foh some bad crews in my +time, yass, sah, but Ah's gwine tell you, boy, 'cause Ah done took a fancy +to you, dis am de most iniquitous crew Ah eveh done cook salt hoss foh. +Yass, sah." + +"What do you mean?" + +The negro ignored my question. + +"Ah's gwine tell you, boy, dis yeh crew am bad 'nough, but when dah come a +ha'nt boat a-sailin' oveh yondeh jest at dahk, boy, Ah wish Ah was back +home whar Ah could somehow come to shoot a rabbit what got a lef' +hind-foot. Yass, sah." + +For a long time he silently paced up and down by the bulwark; but finally I +saw him momentarily against the light of his dim lantern as he entered his +own quarters. + +Morning came with fine breezes and pleasant weather. At half-past four we +saw Winerow Point bearing northwest by west. At seven o'clock we took in +all studding-sails and staysails, and the fore and mizzen topgallant-sails. +So another day passed and another night. An hour after midnight we took in +the main topgallantsail, and lay by with our head to the south until six +bells, when we wore ship, proceeding north again, and saw Java Head at nine +o'clock to the minute. + +We now faced Sunda Strait, the channel that separates Java from Sumatra and +unites the Indian Ocean with the Java Sea. From the bow of our ship there +stretched out on one hand and on the other, far beyond the horizon, Borneo, +Celebes, Banka and Billiton; the Little Sunda Islands--Bali and Lombok, +Simbawa, Flores and Timor; the China Sea, the Philippines, and farther and +greater than them all, the mainland of Asia. + +While we were still intent on Java Head there came once more the cry, "Sail +ho!" + +This time the sail was not to be mistaken. Captain Whidden trained on it +the glass, which he shortly handed to Mr. Thomas. "See her go!" the men +cried. It was true. She was running away from us easily. Now she was hull +down. Now we could see only her topgallant-sails. Now she again had +disappeared. But this time we had found, besides her general appearance and +the cut of her sails, which no seaman could mistake, a mark by which any +landsman must recognize her: on her fore-topsail there was a white +lozenge-shaped patch. + +At eleven o'clock in the morning, with Prince's Island bearing from north +to west by south, we entered the Straits of Sunda. At noon we were due east +of Prince's Island beach and had sighted the third Point of Java and the +Isle of Cracato. + +Fine breezes and a clear sky favored us, and the islands, green and blue +according to their distance, were beautiful to see. Occasionally we had +glimpses of little native craft, or descried villages sleeping amid the +drowsy green of the cocoanut trees. It was a peaceful, beautiful world +that met our eyes as the Island Princess stood through the Straits and up +the east coast of Sumatra; the air was warm and pleasant, and the leaves of +the tufted palms, lacily interwoven, were small in the distance like the +fronds of ferns in our own land. But Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas +remained on deck and constantly searched the horizon with the glass; and +the men worked uneasily, glancing up apprehensively every minute or two, +and starting at slight sounds. There was reason to be apprehensive, we +all knew. + +On the evening of Friday, August 11, beyond possibility of doubt we sighted +a ship; and that it was the same which we already had seen at least once, +the lozenge-shaped patch on the foresail proved to the satisfaction +of officers and men. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +ATTACKED + + +In the morning we were mystified to see that the sail once again had +disappeared. But to distract us from idle speculations, need of fresh water +now added to our uneasiness, and we anchored on a mud bottom while the +captain and Mr. Thomas went ashore and searched in vain for a +watering-place. + +During the day we saw a number of natives fishing in their boats a short +distance away; but when our own boat approached them, they pulled for the +shore with all speed and fled into the woods like wild men. Thus the day +passed,--so quietly and uneventfully that it lulled us into confidence that +we were safe from harm,--and a new day dawned. + +That morning, as we lay at anchor, the strange ship, with the sun shining +brightly on her sails, boldly reappeared from beyond a distant point, and +hove to about three miles to the north-northeast. As she lay in plain sight +and almost within earshot, she seemed no more out of the ordinary than any +vessel that we might have passed off the coast of New England. But on her +great foresail, which hung loose now with the wind shaken out of it, there +was a lozenge-shaped patch of clean new canvas. + +Soon word passed from mouth to mouth that the captain and Mr. Falk would go +in the gig to learn the stranger's name and port. + +To a certain extent we were relieved to find that our phantom ship was +built of solid wood and iron; yet we were decidedly apprehensive as we +watched the men pull away in the bright sun. The boat became smaller and +smaller, and the dipping oars flashed like gold. + +With his head out-thrust and his chin sunk below the level of his +shoulders, the cook stood by the galley, in doubt and foreboding, and +watched the boat pull away. + +His voice, when he spoke, gave me a start. + +"Look dah, boy! Look dah! Dey's sumpin' funny, yass, sah. 'Tain't safe foh +to truck with ha'nts, no sah! You can't make dis yeh nigger think a winkin' +fire-bug of a fly-by-night ship ain't a ha'nt." + +"Ha'nts," said Kipping mildly, "ha'nts is bad things for niggers, but they +don't hurt white men." + +"Lemme tell you, you Kipping, it ain't gwine pay you to be disrespectable +to de cook." Frank stuck his angry face in front of the mild man's. "Ef you +think--ha!"--He stopped suddenly, his eyes fixed on something far beyond +Kipping, over whose shoulder he now was looking. "Look dah! Look dah! What +Ah say? Hey? What Ah say? Look dah! Look dah!" + +Startled by the cook's fierce yell, we turned as if a gun had been fired; +but we saw only that the boat was coming about. + +"Look dah! Look dah! See 'em row! Don' tell me dat ain't no ha'nt!" Jumping +up and down, waving his arms wildly, contorting his irregular features till +he resembled a gorilla, he continued to yell in frenzy. + +Although there seemed to be no cause for any such outburst, the rest of us +now were alarmed by the behavior of the men in the boat. Having come about, +they were racing back to the Island Princess as fast as ever they could, +and the captain and Mr. Falk, if we could judge by their gestures, were +urging them to even greater efforts. + +"Look dah! Look dah! Don't you tell me dey ain't seen a ha'nt, you +Kipping!" + +As they approached, I heard Roger Hamlin say sharply to the mate, "Mr. +Thomas, that ship yonder is drifting down on us rapidly. See! They're +sheeting home the topsail." + +I could see that Mr. Thomas, who evidently thought Roger's fear groundless, +was laughing, but I could not hear his reply. In any case he gave no order +to prepare for action until the boat came within earshot and the captain +abruptly hailed him and ordered him to trip anchor and prepare to make +sail. + +As the boat came aboard, we heard news that thrilled us. "She's an Arab +ship," spread the word. "They were waiting for our boat, with no sign of +hostility until Mr. Falk saw the sunlight strike on a gun-barrel that was +intended to be hidden behind the bulwark. As the boat veered away, the man +with the gun started to fire, but another prevented him, probably because +the distance was so great." + +Instantly there was wild activity on the Island Princess. While we loosed +the sails and sheeted them home and, with anchor aweigh, braced the yards +and began to move ahead, the idlers were tricing up the boarding nettings +and double-charging our cannon, of which we carried three--a long gun +amidships and a pair of stern chasers. Men to work the ship were ordered to +the ropes. The rest were served pikes and loaded muskets. + +We accomplished the various preparations in an incredibly short time, and, +gathering way, stood ready to receive the stranger should she force us to +fight. + +For the time being we were doubtful of her intentions, and seeing us armed +and ready, she stood off as if still unwilling to press us more closely. +But some one aboard her, if I guess aright, resented so tame an end to a +long pursuit and insisted on at least an exchange of volleys. + +[Illustration: Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two +thunderous reports, a pistol shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain +Whidden spin around and fall.] + +Now she came down on us, running easily with the wind on her quarter, and +gave us a round from her muskets. + +"Hold your fire," Captain Whidden ordered. "They're feeling their way." + +Emboldened by our silence, she wore ship and came nearer. It seemed now +that she would attempt to board us, for we spied men waiting with +grapnels, and she came steadily on while our own men fretted at their +guns, not daring to fire without the captain's orders, till we could see +the triumphant sneer on the dark face of her commander. + +Now her muskets spoke again. I heard a bullet sing over my head and saw one +of our own seamen in the waist fall and lie quite still. Should we never +answer her in kind? In three minutes, it seemed, we should have to meet her +men hand to hand. + +Now our helmsman luffed, and we came closer into the wind, which gave our +guns a chance. + +"Now, then," Captain Whidden cried, "let them have the long gun and hold +the rest." + +With a crash our cannon swept the deck of the Arab, splintering the cabin +and accomplishing ten times as much damage as all her muskets had done to +us. But she in turn, exasperated by the havoc we had wrought, fired +simultaneously her two largest guns at point-blank range. + +I ducked behind the bulwark and looked back along the deck. One ball had +hit the scuttle-butt and had splashed the water fifteen feet in every +direction. Another had splintered the cross jack-yard. Suddenly, in the +brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a single +pistol-shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and fall. + +Our own guns, as we came about, sent an answer that cut the Arab's lower +sail to ribbons, disabled many men and, I am confident, killed several. But +there was no time to load again. Although by now we showed our stern to the +enemy, and had a fair--chance to outstrip her in a long race, her greater +momentum was bringing her down upon us rapidly. From aft came the order--it +was Mr. Thomas who gave it,--"All hands to the pikes and repel boarders!" + +There was, however, no more fighting. Our assailants took measure of the +stout nets and the strong battery of pikes, and, abandoning the whole +unlucky adventure, bore away on a new course. + +One man forward was killed and four were badly hurt. Mr. Thomas sat with +his back against the cabin, very white of face, with streams of red running +from his nostrils and his mouth; and Captain Whidden lay dead on the deck. +An hour later word passed through the ship that Mr. Thomas, too, had died. + + + +CHAPTER IX + +BAD SIGNS + + +It was strange that, while some of us in the forecastle were much cast down +by the tragic events of the day, others should seem to be put in really +good humor by it all. Neddie Benson soberly shook his head from time to +time; old Bill Hayden lay in his bunk without even a word about his "little +wee girl in Newburyport," and occasionally complained of not feeling well; +and various others of the crew faced the future with frank hopelessness. + +For my own part, it seemed to me as unreal as a nightmare that Captain +Joseph Whidden actually had been shot dead by a band of Arab pirates. I was +bewildered--indeed, stunned--by the incredible suddenness of the calamity. +It was so complete, so appallingly final! To me, a boy still in his 'teens, +that first intimate association with violent death would have been in +itself terrible, and I keenly felt the loss of our chief mate. But Captain +Whidden to me was far more than master of the ship. He had been my father's +friend since long before I was born; and from the days when I first +discriminated between the guests at my father's house, I had counted him as +also a friend of mine. Never had I dreamed that so sad an hour would darken +my first voyage. + +Kipping, on the other hand, and Davie Paine and the carpenter seemed +actually well pleased with what had happened. They lolled around with an +air of exasperating superiority when they saw any of the rest of us looking +at them; and now and then they exchanged glances that I was at a loss to +understand until all at once a new thought dawned on me: since the captain +and the first mate were dead, the command of the ship devolved upon +Mr. Falk, the second mate. + +No wonder that Kipping and Davie and the carpenter and all the rest of that +lawless clique were well pleased. No wonder that old Bill Hayden and some +of the others, for whom Kipping and his friends had not a particle of use +were downcast by the prospect. + +I was amazed at my own stupidity in not realizing it before, and above all +else I now longed to talk with someone whom I could trust--Roger Hamlin by +preference; as second choice, my friend the cook. But for the time being I +was disappointed in this. Almost immediately Mr. Falk summoned all hands +aft. + +"Men," he said, putting on a grave face that seemed to me assumed for the +occasion, "men, we've come through a dangerous time, and we are lucky to +have come alive out of the bad scrape that we were in. Some of us haven't +come through so well. It's a sad thing for a ship to lose an officer, and +it is twice as sad to lose two fine officers like Captain Whidden and Mr. +Thomas. I'll now read the service for the burial of the dead, and after +that I'll have something more to say to you." + +One of the men spoke in an undertone, and Mr. Falk cried, "What's that?" + +"If you please, sir," the man said, fidgeting nervously, "couldn't we go +ashore and bury them decently?" + +Others had thought of the same thing, and they showed it by their faces; +but Mr. Falk scowled and replied, "Nonsense! We'd be murdered in cold +blood." + +So we stood there, bareheaded, silent, sad at heart, and heard the droning +voice of the second mate,--even then he could not hide his unrighteous +satisfaction,--who read from a worn prayer-book, that had belonged to +Captain Whidden himself, the words committing the bodies of three men to +the deep, their souls to God. + +When the brief, perfunctory service was over, Mr. Falk put away the +prayer-book,--I verily believe he put away with it all fear of the +Lord,--folded his arms and faced us arrogantly. + +"By the death of Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas," he said, "I have become +the rightful master of this ship. Now I've got a few things to say to you, +and I'm going to have them understood. If you heed them and work smartly, +you'll get along as well as you deserve. If you don't heed them, you'd +better be dead and done with it. If you don't heed them--" he sneered +disagreeably--"if you don't heed them I'll lash the skin off the back of +every bloody mother's son of ye. This voyage from now on is to be carried +out for the best interests of all concerned." He stopped and smiled and +repeated significantly, "_Of_ ALL _concerned_." After another pause, in +which some of the men exchanged knowing glances, he went on, "I have no +doubt that the most of us will get along as well as need be. So far, well +and good. But if there's those that try to cross my bows,"--he swore +roundly,--"heaven help'em! They'll need it. That's all. Wait! One thing +more: we've got to have officers, and as I know you'll not be bold to pick +from among yourselves, I'll save you the trouble. Kipping from this time on +will be chief mate. You'll take his things aft, and you'll obey him from +now on and put the handle to his name. Paine will be second mate. That's +all. Go forward." + +Kipping and Davie Paine! I was thunderstruck. But some of the men exchanged +glances and smiles as before, and I saw by his expression that Roger, +although ill pleased, was by no means so amazed as I should have expected +him to be. + +For the last time as seaman, Kipping, mild and quiet, came to the +forecastle. But as he packed his bag and prepared to leave us, he smiled +constantly with a detestable quirk of his mouth, and before going he +stopped beside downcast old Bill Hayden. "Straighten up, be a man," he said +softly; "I'll see that you're treated right." He fairly drawled the words, +so mildly did he speak; but when he had finished, his manner instantly +changed. Thrusting out his chin and narrowing his eyes, he deliberately +drew back his foot and gave old Bill one savage kick. + +I was right glad that chance had placed me in the second mate's watch. + +As for Davie Paine, he was so overcome by the stroke of fortune that had +resulted in his promotion, that he could not even collect his belongings. +We helped him pile them into his chest, which he fastened with trembling +fingers, and gave him a hand on deck. But even his deep voice had failed +him for the time being, and when he took leave of us, he whispered +piteously, '"Fore the Lord, I dunno how it happened. I ain't never learned +to figger and I can't no more than write my name." + +What was to become of us? Our captain was a weak officer. Our present chief +mate no man of us trusted. + +Our second mate was inexperienced, incompetent, illiterate. More than ever +I longed to talk with Roger Hamlin, but there was no opportunity that +night. + +Our watch on deck was a farce, for old Davie was so unfamiliar with his new +duties and so confused by his sudden eminence that, according to the men at +the wheel, he didn't know north from south or aloft from alow. Evading his +confused glances, I sought the galley, and without any of the usual +complicated formalities was admitted to where the cook was smoking his rank +pipe. + +Rolling his eyes until the whites gleamed, he told me the following +astounding story. + +"Boy," he said, "dis am de most unmitigated day ol' Frank ever see. Cap'n, +he am a good man and now he's a dead un. Mistah Thomas he am a good man and +now _he's_ a dead un. What Ah tell you about dem ha'nts? Ef Ah could have +kotched a rabbit with a lef' hind-leg, Ah guess we'd be better off. Hey? +Mistah Falk, he am cap'n--Lo'd have mercy on us! Dat Kipping, he am chief +mate--Lo'd have mercy on us mis'able sinners! Davie Paine, he am second +mate--Lo'd perserve ou' souls! Ah guess you don't know what Ah heah Mistah +Falk say to stew'd! He says, 'Stew'd, we got ev'ything--ev'ything. And we +ain't broke a single law!' Now tell me what he mean by dat? What's stew'd +got, Ah want to know? But dat ain't all--no, sah, dat ain't all." + +He leaned forward, the whites of his eyes rolling, his fixed frown more +ominous than ever. "Boy, Ah see 'em when dey's dead, Ah did. Ah see 'em +all. Mistah Thomas, he have a big hole in de middle of his front, and dat +po' old sailo' man he have a big hole in de middle of his front. Yass, sah, +Ah see 'em! But cap'n, he have a little roun' hole in the back of his +head.--Yass, sah--_he was shot f'om behine_!" + +The sea that night was as calm and as untroubled as if the day had passed +in Sabbath quiet. It seemed impossible that we had endured so much, that +Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas were dead, that the space of only +twenty-four hours had wrought such a change in the fortunes of all on +board. + +[Illustration: We helped him pile his belongings into his chest +and gave him a hand on deck.] + +I could not believe that one of our own men had shot our captain. Surely +the bullet must have hit him when he was turning to give an order or to +oversee some particular duty. And yet I could not forget the cook's words. +They hummed in my ears. They sounded in the strumming of the rigging, in +the "talking" of the ship:-- + +"A little roun' hole in the back of his head--yass, sah--he was shot f'om +behine." + +Without the captain and Mr. Thomas the Island Princess was like a strange +vessel. Both Kipping and Davie Paine had been promoted from the starboard +watch, leaving us shorthanded; so a queer, self-confident fellow named +Blodgett was transferred from the chief mate's watch to ours. But even so +there were fewer hands and more work, and the spirit of the crew seemed to +have changed. Whereas earlier in the voyage most of the men had gone +smartly about their duties, always glad to lend a hand or join in a +chantey, and with an eye for the profit and welfare of the owners as well +as of themselves, now there came over the ship, silently, imperceptibly, +yet so swiftly and completely that, although no man saw it come, in +twenty-four hours it was with us and upon us in all its deadening and +discouraging weight, a spirit of lassitude and procrastination. You would +have expected some of the men to find it hard to give old Davie Paine quite +all the respect to which his new berth entitled him, and for my own part I +liked Kipping less even than I had liked Mr. Falk. But although my own +prejudice should have enabled me to understand any minor lapses from the +strict discipline of life aboard ship, much occurred in the next +twenty-four hours that puzzled me. + +For one thing, those men whom I had thought most likely to accord Kipping +and Mr. Falk due respect were most careless in their work and in the small +formalities observed between officers and crew. The carpenter and the +steward, for example, spent a long time in the galley at an hour when they +should have been busy with their own duties. I was near when they came out, +and heard the cook's parting words: "Yass, sah, yass, sah, it ain't +neveh no discombobilation to help out gen'lems, sah. Yass, sah, no, sah." + +And when, a little later, I myself knocked at the door, I got a reception +that surprised me beyond measure. + +"Who dah," the cook cried in his usual brusque voice. "Who dah knockin' at +mah door?" + +Coming out, he brushed past me, and stood staring fiercely from side to +side. I knew, of course, his curiously indirect methods, and I expected him +by some quick motion or muttered command to summon me, as always before, +into his hot little cubby-hole. Never was boy more taken aback! "Who dah +knockin' at mah door?" he said again, standing within two feet of my elbow, +looking past me not two inches from my nose. "Humph! Somebody knockin' at +mah door better look at what dey doin' or dey gwine git into a peck of +trouble." + +He turned his back on me and reentered the galley. + +Then I looked aft, and saw Kipping and the steward grinning broadly. +Before, I had been disconcerted. Now I was enraged. How had they turned old +black Frank against me, I wondered? Kipping and the steward, whom the negro +disliked above all people on board! So the steward and the carpenter and +Kipping were working hand in glove! And Mr. Falk probably was in the same +boat with them. Where was Roger Hamlin, and what was he doing as supercargo +to protect the goods below decks? Then I laughed shortly, though a little +angrily, at my own childish impatience. + +Certainly any suspicions of danger to the cargo were entirely without +foundations. Mr. Falk--Captain Falk, I must call him now--might have a +disagreeable personality, but there was nothing to indicate that he was not +in most respects a competent officer, or that the ship and cargo would +suffer at his hands. The cook had been companionable in his own peculiar +way and a very convenient friend indeed; but, after all, I could get along +very well on my own resources. + +The difference that a change of officers makes in the life and spirit of a +ship's crew is surprising to one unfamiliar with the sea. Captain Whidden +had been a gentleman and a first-class sailor; by ordering our life +strictly, though not harshly or severely, he had maintained that efficient, +smoothly working organization which is best and pleasantest for all +concerned. But Captain Falk was a master whose sails were cut on another +pattern. He lacked Captain Whidden's straightforward, searching gaze. From +the corners of his mouth lines drooped unpleasantly around his chin. His +voice was not forceful and commanding. I was confident that under ordinary +conditions he never would have been given a ship; I doubted even if he +would have got a chief mate's berth. But fortune had played into his hands, +and he now was our lawful master, resistance to whom could be construed as +mutiny and punished in any court in the land. + +Never, while Captain Whidden commanded the ship, would the steward and the +carpenter have deserted their work and have hidden themselves away in the +cook's galley. Never, I was positive, would such a pair of officers as +Kipping and old Davie Paine have been promoted from the forecastle. To be +sure, the transgressions of the carpenter and the steward were only petty +as yet, and if no worse came of our new situation, I should be very foolish +to take it all so seriously. But it was not easy to regard our situation +lightly. There were too many straws to show the direction of the wind. + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE TREASURE-SEEKER + + +It was a starlit night while we still lingered off the coast of Sumatra for +water and fresh vegetables. The land was low and black against the steely +green of the sky, and a young moon like a silver thread shone in the west. +Blodgett, the new man in our watch, was the centre of a little group on the +forecastle. + +He was small and wrinkled and very wise. The more I saw and heard of him, +the more I marveled that he had not attracted my attention before; but up +to this point in the voyage it was only by night that he had appeared +different from other men, and I thought of him only as a prowler in the +dark. + +In some ways he was like a cat. By day he would sit in corners in the sun +when opportunity offered, or lurk around the galley, shirking so brazenly, +that the men were amused rather than angry. Even at work he was as slow and +drowsy as an old cat, half opening his sleepy eyes when the officers called +him to account, and receiving an occasional kick or cuff with the same mild +surprise that a favorite cat might show. But once darkness had fallen, +Blodgett was a different man. He became nervously wakeful. His eyes +distended and his face lighted with strange animation. He walked hither and +yon. He fairly arched his neck. And sometimes, when some ordinary incident +struck his peculiar humor, he would throw back his head, open his great +mouth, and utter a screech of wild laughter for all the world like the yowl +of a tom-cat. + +On that particular night he walked the forecastle, keeping close to the +bulwarks, till the rest of us assembled by the rigging and watched him with +a kind of fascination. After a time he saw us gathered there and came over +to where we were. His eyes were large and his wrinkled features twitched +with eagerness. He seemed very old; he had traveled to the farthest lands. + +"Men," he cried in his thin, windy voice, "yonder's the moon." + +The moon indeed was there. There was no reason to gainsay him. He stood +with it over his left shoulder and extended his arms before him, one +pointing somewhat to the right, the other to the left. "The right hand is +the right way," he cried, "but the left we'll never leave." + +We stared at the man and wondered if he were mad. + +"No," he said, smiling at our puzzled glances, "we'll never leave the +left." + +"Belay that talk," said one of the men sharply. "Ye'll have to steer a +clearer course than that if you want us to follow you." + +Blodgett smiled. "The course is clear," he replied. "Yonder"--he waved his +right hand--"is Singapore and the Chinese Sea and Whampoa. It's the right +course. Our orders is for that course. Our cargo is for that course. It's +the course that will make money for the owners. It's the right--you +understand?--my right hand and the right course according to orders. But +yonder"--this time he waved his left hand--"is the course that won't be +left. And yet it's the left you know--my left hand." + +He explained his feeble little joke with an air of pride. + +"Why won't it be left?" the gruff seaman demanded. + +"Because," said Blodgett, "we ain't going to leave it. There's gold there +and no end of treasure. Do you suppose Captain Falk is going to leave it +all for some one else to get? He's going to sail through Malacca Strait and +across the Bay of Bengal to Calcutta. That's what he's going to do. I've +been in India myself and seen the heaps of gold lying on the ground by the +money-changer's door and no body watching it but a sleepy Gentoo." + +"But what's this treasure you're talking about," some one asked. + +"Sure," said Blodgett in a husky whisper, "it's a treasure such as never +was heard of before. There's barrels and barrels of gold and diamonds and +emeralds and rubies and no end of such gear. There's idols with crowns of +precious stones, and eyes in their carved heads that would pay a king's +ransom. There's money enough in gold mohurs and rupees to buy the Bank of +England." + +It was a cock-and-bull story that the little old man told us; but, absurd +though it was, he had an air of impressive sincerity; and although every +one of us would have laughed the yarn out of meeting had it been told of +Captain Whidden, affairs had changed in the last days aboard ship. +Certainly we did not trust Captain Falk. I thought of the cook's dark +words, "A little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine!" As we followed the direction of Blodgett's two hands,--the right +to the northeast and the Chinese shore, the left to the northwest and the +dim lowlands of Sumatra that lay along the road to Burma,--anything seemed +possible. Moon-madness was upon us, and we were carried away by the mystery +of the night. + +Such madness is not uncommon. Of tales in the fore-castle during a long +voyage there is no end. Extraordinary significance is attributed to trivial +happenings in the daily life of the crew, and the wonders of the sea and +the land are overshadowed completely by simple incidents that superstitious +shipmates are sure to exaggerate and to dwell upon. + +After a time, though, as Blodgett walked back and forth along the bulwark, +like a cat that will not go into the open, my sanity came back to me. + +"That's all nonsense," I said--perhaps too sharply; "Mr. Falk is an honest +seaman. His whole future would be ruined if he attempted any such thing as +that." + +"Ay, hear the boy," Blodgett muttered sarcastically. "What does the boy +think a man rich enough to buy all the ships in the king's navy will care +for such a future as Captain Falk has in front of him? Hgh! A boy that +don't know enough to call his captain by his proper title!" + +Blodgett fairly bristled in his indignation, and I said no more, although I +knew well enough--or thought I did--that such a scheme was quite too wild +to be plausible. Captain Falk might play a double game, but not such a +silly double game as that. + +"No," said Bill Hayden solemnly, as if voicing my own thought, "the captain +ain't going to spoil his good name like that." Poor, stupid old Bill! + +Blodgett snorted angrily, but the others laughed at Bill--silly old butt of +the forecastle, daft about his little girl!--and after speculating at +length concerning the treasure that Blodgett had described so vaguely, fell +at last into a hot argument about how far a skipper could disobey the +orders of his owners without committing piracy. + +Thus began the rumor that revealed the scatterwitted convictions so +characteristic of the strange, cat-like Blodgett, which later were to lead +almost to death certain simple members of the crew; which served, by a +freak of chance, to involve poor Bill Hayden in an affair that came to a +tragic end; and which, by a whim of fortune almost as remote, though +happier, placed me in closer touch with Roger Hamlin than I had been since +the Island Princess sailed from Salem harbor. + +An hour later I saw the cook standing silently by his galley. He gave me +neither look nor word, although he must have known that I was watching him, +but only puffed at his rank old pipe and stared at the stars and the hills. +I wondered if the jungle growth reminded him of his own African tropics; if +behind his grim, seamed face an unsuspected sense of poetry lurked, a sort +of half-beast, half-human imagination. + +Never glancing at me, never indicating by so much as a quiver of his black +features that he had perceived my presence, he sighed deeply, walked to the +rail and knocked the dead ashes from his pipe into the water. He then +turned and went into the galley and barricaded himself against intruders, +there to stay until, some time in the night, he should seek his berth in +the steerage for the few hours of deep sleep that were all his great body +required. But as he passed me I heard him murmuring to himself, "Dat Bill +Hayden, he betteh look out, yass, sah. He say Mistah Captain Falk don't +want to go to spoil his good name. Dat Hay den he betteh look out." + +With a bang of his plank door the old darky shut himself away from all of +us in the darkness of his little kingdom of pots and pans. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +III + +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XI + +A HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS IN GOLD + + +Unquestionably the negro had known that I was there. Never otherwise could +he have ignored me so completely. I was certain too, that his cryptic +remarks about Bill Hayden were intended for my ears, for he never acted +without a reason, obscure, perhaps, and far-fetched, but always, according +to his own queer notions, sufficient. + +Sometimes it seemed as if he despised me; sometimes, as if he were +concealing a warm, friendly regard for me. + +An hour later, hearing the murmer of low voices, I discovered a little +group of men by the mainmast; and moved by the curiosity that more than +once had led me where I had no business to go, I silently approached. + +"Ah," said one of the men, "so you're keeping a weather eye out for my good +name, are you?" It was Captain Falk. + +I was startled. It seemed as if the old African were standing at my +shoulder, saying, "What did Ah told you, hey?" The cook had used almost +those very words. Where, I wondered, had he got them? It was almost +uncanny. + +"No, sir," came the reply,--it was poor Bill Hayden's voice,--"no, sir, I +didn't say that. I said--" + +"Well, what _did_ you say? Speak up!" + +"Why, sir, it--well, it wasn't that, I know. I wouldn't never ha' said +that. I--well, sir, it sounded something like that, I got to admit--I--I +ain't so good at remembering, sir, as I might be." + +The shadowy figures moved closer together. + +"You'll admit, then, that it _sounded_ like that?" There was the thud of a +quick blow. "I'll show you. I don't care what you _said_, as long as that +was what you _meant_. Take that! I'll show you." + +"Oh!--I--that's just it, sir, don't hit me!--It may have sounded like that, +but--Oh!--it never meant anything like that. I can't remember just how the +words was put together--I ain't so good at remembering but--Oh!--" + +The scene made me feel sick, it was so brutal; yet there was nothing that +the rest of us could do to stop it. + +Captain Falk was in command of the ship. + +I heard a mild laugh that filled me with rage. "That's the way to make 'em +take back their talk, captain. Give him a good one," said the mild voice. +"He ain't the only one that 'll be better for a sound beating." + + +There was a scuffle of footsteps, then I heard Bill cry out, "Oh--oh!--oh!" + +Suddenly a man broke from the group and fled along the deck. + +"Come back here, you scoundrel!" the captain cried with vile oaths; "come +back here, or I swear I'll seize you up and lash you to a bloody pulp." + +The fugitive now stood in the bow, trembling, and faced those who were +approaching him. "Don't," he cried piteously, "I didn't go to do nothing." + +"Oh, no, not you!" said the mild voice, followed by a mild laugh. "He +didn't do nothing, captain." + +"Not he!" Captain Falk muttered. "I'll show him who's captain here." + +There was no escape for the unfortunate man. They closed in on him and +roughly dragged him from his retreat straight aft to the quarter-deck, and +there I heard their brief discussion. + +"Hadn't you better call up the men, captain?" asked the mild voice. "It'll +do 'em good, I'll warrant you." + +"No," the captain replied, hotly. "This is a personal affair. Strip him and +seize him up." + +I heard nothing more for a few minutes, but I could see them moving about, +and presently I distinguished Bill's bare back and arms as they +spread-eagled him to the rigging. + +Then the rope whistled in the air and Bill moaned. + +Unable to endure the sight, I was turning away, when some one coming from +the cabin broke in upon the scene. + +"Well," said Roger Hamlin, "what's all this about?" + +Roger's calm voice and composed manner were so characteristic of him that +for the moment I could almost imagine myself at home in Salem and merely +passing him on the street. + +"I'll have you know, sir," said Captain Falk, "that I'm master here." + +"Evidently, sir." + +"Then what do you mean, sir, by challenging me like that?" + +"From what I have heard, I judge that the punishment is out of proportion +to the offense, even if the steward's yarn was true." + +"I'll have you know, that I'm the only man aboard this ship that has any +judgment," Falk snarled. + +"Judgment ?" Roger exclaimed; and the twist he gave the word was so funny +that some one actually snickered. + +"Yes, judgment !" Falk roared; and he turned on Roger with all the anger of +his mean nature choking his voice. "I'll--I'll beat you, you young upstart, +you! I'll beat you in that man's place," he cried, with a string of oaths. + +"No," said Roger very coolly, "I think you won't." + +"By heaven, I will!" + +The two men faced each other like two cocks in the pit at the instant +before the battle. There was a deathly silence on deck. + +Such a scene, as I saw it there, if put on the stage in a theatre, would be +a drama in itself without word or action. The sky was bright with stars; +the land lay low and dark against the horizon; the sea whispered round the +ship and sparkled with golden phosphorescence. Over our heads the masts +towered to slender black shafts, which at that lofty height seemed far too +frail to support the great network of rigging and spars and close-furled +canvas. Dwarfed by the tall masts, by the distances of the sea, and by the +vastness of the heavens, the small black figures stood silent on the +quarter-deck. But one of those men was bound half-naked to the rigging, and +two faced each other in attitudes that by outline alone, for we could +discern the features of neither, revealed antagonism and defiance. + +"No," said Roger once more, very coolly, "I think you won't." + +As the captain lifted his rope to hit Bill again, Roger stepped forward. + +The captain looked sharply at him; then with a shrug he said, "Oh, well, +the fellow's had enough. Cut him down, cut him down." + +So they unlashed Bill, and he came forward with his clothes in his arms and +one long, raw welt across his back. + +"Now, what did I say?" he whimpered. "What did I say to make 'em do like +that?" + +What had he said, indeed? Certainly nothing culpable. Some one had twisted +his innocent remarks in such a way as to irritate the captain and had +carried tales to the cabin. With decent officers such a thing never would +have happened. Affairs had run a sad course since Captain Falk had read the +burial service over Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas, both of whom had been +strict, fair, honorable gentlemen. There was a sober time in the forecastle +that night, and none of us had much to say. + +Next day we sent a boat ashore again, and got information that led us to +sail along five miles farther, where there was a settlement from which we +got a good supply of water and vegetables. This took another day, and on +the morning of the day following we made sail once more and laid our course +west of Lingga Island, which convinced us for a time that we really were +about to bear away through Malacca Strait and on to Burma, at the very +least. + +I almost believed it myself, India seemed so near; and Blodgett, sleepy by +day, wakeful by night, prowled about with an air of triumph. But in the +forenoon watch Roger Hamlin came forward openly and told me certain things +that were more momentous than any treasure-hunting trip to India that +Blodgett ever dreamed of. + +Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping--I suppose they must be given their titles +now--watched him, and I could see that they didn't like it. They exchanged +glances and stared after him suspiciously, even resentfully; but there +was nothing that they could do or say. So he came on slowly and +confidently, looking keenly from one man to another as he passed. + +By this time the two parties on board were sharply divided, and from the +attitude of the men as they met Roger's glance their partisanship was +pretty plainly revealed. The two from Boston, who were, I was confident, +on friendly and even familiar terms with Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping, gave +him a half-concealed sneer. There was no doubt where their sympathies would +lie, should Roger cross courses with our new master. The carpenter, working +on a plank laid on deck, heard him coming, glanced up, and seeing who it +was, continued at his labor without moving so much as a hair's breadth to +let him by; the steward looked him in the eye brazenly and impersonally; +and others of the crew, among them the strange Blodgett, treated him with a +certain subtle rudeness, even contempt. Yet here and there a man was glad +to see him coming and gave him a cordial nod, or a cheerful "Ay, ay, sir," +in answer to whatever observation he let fall. + +The cook alone, as I watched the scene with close interest, I could not +understand. To a certain extent he seemed surly, to a certain extent, +subservient. Perhaps he intended that we--and others--should be mystified. + +One thing I now realized for the first time: although the crew was divided +into two cliques, the understanding was much more complete on the side of +Captain Falk. Among those who enjoyed the favor of our new officers there +was, I felt sure, some secret agreement, perhaps even some definite +organization. There seemed to be a unity of thought and manner that only a +common purpose could explain, whereas the rest drifted as the wind blew. + +"Ben," Roger said, coming to me where I sat on the forecastle, "I want to +talk to you. Step over by the mast." + +I followed him, though surprised. + +"Here we can see on all sides," he said. "There are no hiding-places within +earshot. Ben"--He hesitated as if to find the right words. + +All were watching us now, the captain and the mate from the quarter-deck, +the others from wherever they happened to be. + +"I am loath to draw your sister's younger brother into danger," Roger +began. His adjective was tactfully chosen. "I am almost equally reluctant +to implicate you in what seems likely to confront us, because you are an +old friend of mine and a good deal younger than I am. But when the time +comes to go home, Ben, I'm sure we want to be able to look your sister and +all the others squarely in the eyes, with our hands clean and our +consciences clear--if we go home. How about it, Ben?" + + +I was too bewildered to answer, and in Roger's eyes something of his old +twinkle appeared. + +"Ultimately," he continued, grave once more and speaking still in enigmas, +"we shall be vindicated in any case. But I fear that, before then, I, for +one, shall have to clasp hands with mutiny, perhaps with piracy. How would +you like that, Ben, with a thundering old fight against odds, a fight that +likely enough will leave us to sleep forever on one of these green islands +hereabouts?" + +Still I did not understand. + +Roger regarded me thoughtfully. "Tell me all that you know about our +cargo." + +"Why," said I, finding my tongue at last, "it's ginseng and woollen goods +for Canton. That's all I know." + +"Then you don't know that at this moment there is one hundred thousand +dollars in gold in the hold of the Island Princess?" + +"What?" I gasped. + +"One hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +I could not believe my ears. Certainly, so far as I was concerned, the +secret had been well kept. + +Then a new thought came to me, "Does Captain Falk know?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Roger, "Captain Falk knows." + + + +CHAPTER XII + +A STRANGE TALE + + +Roger Hamlin's words were to linger a long time in my ears, and so far as I +then could see, there was little to say in reply. A hundred thousand +dollars in gold had bought, soul and body, many a better man than Captain +Falk. At that very moment Falk was watching us from the quarter-deck with +an expression on his face that was partly an amused smile, partly a sneer. +Weak and conceited though he was, he was master of that ship and crew in +more ways than one. + +But Roger had not finished. "Do you remember, Ben," he continued in a low +voice, but otherwise unmindful of those about us, "that some half a dozen +years ago, when Thomas Webster was sore put to it for enough money to +square his debts and make a clean start, the brig Vesper, on which he had +sent a venture, returned him a profit so unbelievably great that he was +able to pay his creditors and buy from the Shattucks the old Eastern +Empress, which he fitted out for the voyage to Sumatra that saved his +fortunes?" + +I remembered it vaguely--I had been only a small boy when it happened--and +I listened with keenest interest. The Websters owned the Island Princess. + +"Not a dozen people know all the story of that voyage. It's been a kind of +family secret with the Websters. Perhaps they're ashamed to be so deeply +indebted to a Chinese merchant. Well, it's a story I shouldn't tell under +other conditions, but in the light of all that's come to pass, it's best +you should hear the whole tale, Ben; and in some ways it's a fine tale, +too. The Websters, as you probably know, had had bad luck, what with three +wrecks and pirates in the West Indies. They were pretty much by the head in +those days, and it was a dark outlook before them, when young Webster +signed the Vesper's articles as first officer and went aboard, with all +that the old man could scrape together for a venture, and with the future +of his family hanging in the balance. At Whampoa young Webster went up to +the Hong along with the others, and drove what bargains he could, and +cleared a tidy little sum. But it was nowhere near enough to save the +family. If only they could get the money to tide them over, they'd weather +the gale. If not, they'd go on a lee shore. Certain men--you'd know their +names, but such things are better forgotten--were waiting to attach the +ships the Websters had on the ways, and if the ships were attached there +would be nothing left for the Websters but stools in somebody's +counting-house. + +"As I've heard the story, young Webster was waiting by the river for his +boat, with a face as long as you'd hope to see, when a Chinese who'd been +watching him from a little distance came up and addressed him in such +pidgin English as he could muster and asked after his father. Of course +young Webster was taken by surprise, but he returned a civil answer, and +the two fell to talking together. It seemed that, once upon a time, when +the Chinese was involved, head and heels, with some rascally down-east +Yankee, old man Webster had come to the rescue and had got him out of the +scrape with his yellow hide whole and his moneybags untapped. + +"The Chinaman seemed to suspect from the boy's long face that all was not +as it should be, and he squeezed more or less of the truth out of the +young fellow, had him up to the Hong again, gave him various gifts, and +sent him back to America with five teak-wood chests. Just five ordinary +teak-wood chests--but in those teak-wood chests, Ben, was the money that +put the Websters on their feet again. The hundred thousand dollars below +is for that Chinese merchant." + +It was a strange tale, but stranger tales than that were told in the old +town from which we had sailed. + +"And Captain Falk--?" I began questioningly. + +"Captain Falk was never thought of as a possible master of this ship." + +"Will he try to steal the money?" + +Roger raised his brows. "Steal it? Steal is a disagreeable word. He thinks +he has a grievance because he was not given the chief mate's berth to begin +with. He says, at all events, that he will not hand over any such sum to a +yellow heathen. He thinks he can return it to the owners two-fold. Although +he seldom reads his Bible, I believe he referred to the man who was given +ten talents." + +"But the owners' orders!" I exclaimed. + +"The owners' orders in that respect were secret. They were issued to +Captain Whidden and to me, and Captain Falk refuses to accept my version of +them." + +"And you?" + +Roger smiled and looked me hard in the eye. "I am going to see that they +are carried out," he said. "The Websters would be grievously disappointed +if this commission were not discharged. Also--" his eyes twinkled in the +old way--"I am not convinced that Captain Falk is in all respects an +honest--no, let us not speak too harshly--let us say, a _reliable_ man." + +"So there'll be a fight," I mused. + +"We'll see," Roger replied. "In any case, you know the story. Are you with +me?" + +After fifty years I can confess without shame that I was frightened when +Roger asked me that question, for Roger and I were only two, and Falk, by +hook or by crook, had won most of the others to his side. There was Bill +Hayden, to be sure, on whom we could count; but he was a weak soul at best, +and of the cook's loyalty to Roger and whatever cause he might espouse I +now held grave doubts. Yet I managed to reply, "Yes, Roger, I am with you." + +I thought of my sister when I said it, and of the white flutter of her +handkerchief, which had waved so bravely from the old wharf when Roger and +I sailed out of Salem harbor. After all, I was glad even then that I had +answered as I did. + +"I'll have more to say later," said Roger; "but if I stay here much longer +now, Falk and Kipping will be breaking in upon us." And, turning, he coolly +walked aft. + +Falk and Kipping were still watching us with sneers, and not a few of the +crew gave us hostile glances as we separated. But I looked after Roger with +an affection and a confidence that I was too young fully to appreciate. I +only realized that he was upright and fearless, and that I was ready to +follow him anywhere. + +More and more I was afraid of the influence that Captain Falk had +established in the forecastle. More and more it seemed as if he actually +had entered into some lawless conspiracy with the men. Certainly they +grumbled less than before, and accepted greater discomforts with better +grace; and although I found myself excluded from their councils without any +apparent reason, I overheard occasional snatches of talk from which I +gathered that they derived great satisfaction from their scheme, whatever +it was. Even the cook would have none of me in the galley of an evening; +and Roger in the cabin where no doubt he was fighting his own battles, was +far away from the green hand in the forecastle. I was left to my own +devices and to Bill Hayden. + +To a great extent, I suppose, it counted against me that I was the son of a +gentleman. But if I was left alone forward, so Roger, I learned now and +then, was left alone aft. + +Continually I puzzled over the complacency of the men. They would nod and +smile and glance at me pityingly, even when I was getting my meat from the +same kids and my tea from the same pot; and chance phrases, which I caught +now and then, added to my uneasiness. + +Once old Blodgett, prowling like a cat in the night, was telling how he was +going to "take his money and buy a little place over Ipswich way. There's +nice little places over Ipswich way where a man can settle snug as you +please and buy him a wife and end his days in comfort. We'll go home by way +of India, too, I'll warrant you, and take each of us our handful of round +red rubies. Right's right, but right'll be left--mind what I tell you." +Another time--on the same day, as I now recall it--I overheard the +carpenter saying that he was going to build a brick house in Boston up on +Temple Place. "And there'll be fan-lights over the door," he said, "their +panels as thin as rose-leaves, and leaded glass in a fine pattern." The +carpenter was a craftsman who aspired to be an artist. + +But where did old Blodgett or the carpenter hope to get the money to +indulge the tastes of a prosperous merchant? I suspected well enough the +answer to that question, and I was not far wrong. + +The cook remained inscrutable. I could not fathom the expressions of his +black frowning face. Although Captain Falk of course had no direct +communication with him openly, I learned through Bill Hayden that +indirectly he treated him with tolerant and friendly patronage. It even did +not surprise me greatly to be told that sometimes he secretly visited the +galley after dark and actually hobnobbed with black Frank in his own +quarters. It was almost incredible, to be sure; but so was much else in +which Captain Falk was implicated, and I could see revealed now in the game +that he was playing his desire to win and hold the men until they had +served his ends, whatever those ends might be. + +"Yass, sah," black Frank would growl absently as he passed me without a +glance, "dis am de most appetizin' crew eveh Ah cooked foh. Dey's got no +mo' bottom to dey innards dan a sponge has. Ah's a-cookin' mah head off to +feed dat bunch of wuthless man-critters, a-a-a-a-h!" And he would stump to +the galley with a brimming pail of water in each hand. + +I came sadly to conclude that old Frank had found other friends more to his +taste than the boy in the forecastle, and that Captain Falk, by trickery +and favoritism, really was securing his grip on the crew. In all his petty +manoeuvres and childish efforts to please the men and flatter them and make +them think him a good officer to have over them, he had made up to this +point only one or two false steps. + +Working our way north by west to the Straits of Singapore, and thence on +into the China Sea, where we expected to take advantage of the last weeks +of the southwest monsoon, we left far astern the low, feverous shores of +Sumatra. There were other games than a raid on India to be played for +money, and the men thought less and less now of the rubies of Burma and the +gold mohurs and rupees of Calcutta. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +TROUBLE FORWARD + + +In the starboard watch, one fine day when there was neither land nor sail +in sight, Davie Paine was overseeing the work on the rigging and badly +botching it. The old fellow was a fair seaman himself, but for all his deep +voice and big body, his best friend must have acknowledged that as an +officer he was hopelessly incompetent. "Now unlay the strands so," he would +say. "No, that ain't right. No, so! No, that ain't right either. Supposing +you form the eye so. No, that ain't right either." + +After a time we were smiling so broadly at his confused orders that we +caught the captain's eye. + +He came forward quickly--say what you would against Captain Falk as an +officer, no one could deny that he knew his business--and instantly he took +in the whole unfortunate situation. "Well, _Mister_ Paine," he cried, +sarcastically stressing the title, "are n't you man enough to unlay a bit +of rope and make a Flemish eye?" + +Old Davie flushed in hopeless embarrassment, and even the men who had been +chuckling most openly were sorry for him. That the captain had reason to be +dissatisfied with the second mate's work, we were ready enough to admit; +but he should have called him aside and rebuked him privately. We all, I +think, regarded such open interference as unnecessary and unkind. + +"Why--y-yes, sir," Davie stammered. + +"To make you a Flemish eye," Captain Falk continued in cold sarcasm, "you +unlay the end of the rope and open up the yarns. Then you half-knot some +half the inside yarns over that bit of wood you have there, and scrape the +rest of them down over the others, and marl, parcel, and serve them +together. That's the way you go to make a Flemish eye. Now then, _Mister_ +Paine, see that you get a smart job done here and keep your eyes open, you +old lubber. I thought you shipped for able seaman. A fine picture of an +able seaman you are, you doddering old fool!" + +It is impossible to reproduce the meanness with which he gave his little +lecture, or the patronizing air with which he walked away. Old Davie was +quite taken aback by it and for a time he could not control his voice +enough to speak. It was pitiful to see him drop all the pretensions of his +office and, as if desiring only some friendly word, try to get back on the +old familiar footing of the forecastle. + +"I know I ain't no great shakes of a scholar," he managed to mutter at +last, "and I ain't no great shakes of a second mate. But he made me second +mate, he did, and he hadn't ought to shame me in front of all the men, now +had he? It was him that gave me the berth. If he don't like me in it, now +why don't he take it away from me? I didn't want to be second mate when he +made me do it, and I can't read figures good nor nothing. Now why don't he +send me forrard if he don't like the way I do things?" + +The old man ran on in a pathetic monologue, for none of us felt exactly at +liberty to put in our own oars, and he could find relief only in his +incoherent talk. It had been a needless and unkind thing and the men almost +unanimously disapproved of it. Why indeed should Captain Falk not send +Davie back to the forecastle rather than make his life miserable aft? The +captain was responsible only to himself for the appointment, and its tenure +depended only on his own whims; but that, apparently, he had no intention +of doing. + +"'Tain't right," old Blodgett murmured, careful not to let Captain Falk see +him talking. "He didn't ought to use a man like that." + +"No, he didn't," Neddie Benson said in his squeaky voice, turning his face +so that neither Davie nor Captain Falk should see the motion of his lips. +"I didn't ought to ship for this voyage, either. The fortune teller--she +was a lady, she was, a nice lady--she says, 'Neddie, there'll be a dark man +and a light man and a store of trouble.' She kind of liked me, I think. But +I up and come. I'm always reckless." + +A ripple of low, mild laughter, which only Kipping could have uttered, +drifted forward, and the men exchanged glances and looked furtively at old +Davie. + +The murmur of disapproval went from mouth to mouth, until for a time I +dared hope that Captain Falk had quite destroyed the popularity that he had +tried so hard to win. But, though Davie was grieved by the injustice and +though the men were angry, they seemed soon to forget it in the excitement +of that mysterious plot from which Roger and I were virtually the only ones +excluded. + +Nevertheless, like certain other very trivial happenings aboard the Island +Princess, Captain Falk's unwarrantable insult to Davie Paine--it seems +incongruous to call him "mister"--was to play its part later in events that +as yet were only gathering way. + +We had not seen much of Kipping for a time, and perhaps it was because he +had kept so much to himself that to a certain extent we forgot his sly, +tricky ways. His laugh, mild and insinuating, was enough to call them to +mind, but we were to have a yet more disagreeable reminder. + +All day Bill Hayden had complained of not feeling well and now he leaned +against the deck-house, looking white and sick. Old Davie would never have +troubled him, I am sure, but Kipping was built by quite another mould. + +Unaware of what was brewing, I turned away, sorry for poor Bill, who seemed +to be in much pain, and in response to a command from Kipping, I went aloft +with an "Ay, ay sir," to loose the fore-royal. Having accomplished my +errand, I was on my way down again, when I heard a sharp sound as of +slapping. + +Startled, I looked at the deck-house. I was aware at the same time that the +men below me were looking in the same direction. + +The sound of slapping was repeated; then I heard a mild, gentle voice +saying, "Oh, he's sick, is he? Poor fellow! Ain't it hard to be sick away +from home?" Slap--slap. "Well, I declare, what do you suppose we'd better +do about it? Shan't we send for the doctor? Poor fellow!" Slap--slap. "Ah! +ah! ah!" Kipping's voice hardened. "You blinking, bloody old fool. You +would turn on me, would you? You would give me one, would you? You would +sojer round the deck and say you're sick, would you? I 'll show you--take +that--I'll show you!" + +Now, as I sprang on deck and ran out where I could see what was going +forward, I heard Bill's feeble reply. "Don't hit me, sir. I didn't go to do +nothing. I'm sick. I've got a pain in my innards. I _can't_ work--so help +me, I _can't_ work." + +"Aha!" Again Kipping laughed mildly. "Aha! _Can't_ work, eh? I'll teach you +a lesson." + +Bill staggered against the deck-house and clumsily fell, pressing his hands +against his side and moaning. + +"Hgh!" Kipping grunted. "Hgh!" + +At that moment the day flashed upon my memory when I had sat on one side of +that very corner while Kipping attempted to bully Bill on the other side of +it--the day when Bill had turned on his tormentor. I now understood some of +Kipping's veiled references, and a great contempt for the man who would use +the power and security of his office to revenge himself on a fellow seaman +who merely had stood up bravely for his rights swept over me. But what +could I or the others do? Kipping now was mate, and to strike him would be +open mutiny. Although thus far, in spite of the dislike with which he and +Captain Falk regarded me, my good behavior and my family connections had +protected me from abuse, I gladly would have forfeited such security to +help Bill; but mutiny was quite another affair. + +We all stood silent, while Kipping berated Bill with many oaths, though +poor Bill was so white and miserable that it was almost more than we could +endure. I, for one, thought of his little girl in Newburyport, and I +remember that I hoped she might never know of what her loving, stupid old +father was suffering. + +Enraged to fury by nothing more or less than Bill's yielding to his +attacks, Kipping turned suddenly and reached for the carpenter's mallet, +which lay where Chips had been working nearby. With a round oath, he +yelled, "I'll make you grovel and ask me to stop." + +Kipping had moved quickly, but old Bill moved more quickly still. Springing +to his feet like a flash, with a look of anguish on his face such as I hope +I never shall see again, he warded off a blow of the mallet with his hand +and, running to the side, scrambled clean over the bulwark into the sea. + +We stood there like men in a waxwork for a good minute at the very least; +and if you think a minute is not a long time, try it with your eyes shut. +Kipping's angry snarl was frozen on his mean features,--it would have been +ludicrous if the scene had not been so tragic,--and his outstretched hand +still held the mallet at the end of the blow. The carpenter's mouth was +open in amazement. Neddie Benson, the first to move or break the silence, +had spread his hands as if he were about to clutch at a butterfly or a +beetle; dropping them to his side, he gasped huskily, "She said there'd be +a light man and a dark man--I--oh, Lord!" + +It was the cook, as black as midnight and as inscrutable as a figurehead, +who brought us to our senses. Silently observing all that had happened, he +had stood by the galley, without lifting his hand or changing the +expression of a single feature; but now, taking his pipe from his mouth, he +roared, "Man ovehboa'd!" Then, snatching up the carpenter's bench with one +hand and gathering his great body for the effort, he gave a heave of his +shoulders and tossed the bench far out on the water. + +As if waking from a dream, Mr. Kipping turned aft, smiling scornfully, and +said with a deliberation that seemed to me criminal, "Put down the helm!" + +So carelessly did he speak, that the man at the wheel did not hear him, and +he was obliged to repeat the order a little more loudly. "Didn't you hear +me? I say, put down the helm." + +"Put down the helm, sir," came the reply; and the ship began to head up in +the wind. + +At this moment Captain Falk, having heard the cook's shout, appeared on +deck, breathing hard, and took command. However little I liked Captain +Falk, I must confess in justice to him that he did all any man could have +done under the circumstances. While two or three hands cleared away a +quarter-boat, we hauled up the mainsail, braced the after yards and raised +the head sheets, so that the ship, with her main yards aback, drifted down +in the general direction in which we thought Bill must be. + +Not a man of us expected ever to see Bill again. He had flung himself +overboard so suddenly, and so much time had elapsed, that there seemed to +be no chance of his keeping himself afloat. I saw that the smile actually +still hovered on Kipping's mean, mild mouth. But all at once the cook, near +whom I was standing, grasped my arm and muttered almost inaudibly, "If dey +was to look behine, dey'd get ahead, yass, sah." + +Taking his hint, I looked astern and cried out loudly. Something was +bobbing at the end of the log line. It was Bill clinging desperately. + +When we got him on board, he was nearer dead than alive, and even the stiff +drink that the captain poured between his blue lips did not really revive +him. He moaned continually and now and then he cried out in pain. +Occasionally, too, he tried to tell us about his little girl at +Newburyport, and rambled on about how he had married late in life and had a +good wife and a comfortable home, and before long, God willing, he would be +back with them once more and would never sail the seas again. It was all so +natural and homely that I didn't realize at the time that Bill was +delirious; but when I helped the men carry him below, I was startled to +find his face so hot, and presently it came over me that he did not +recognize me. + +Poor old stupid Bill! He meant so well, and he wished so well for all of +us! It was hard that he should be the one who could not keep out of harm's +way. + +But there were other things to think of, more important even than the fate +of Bill Hayden, and one of them was an extraordinary interview with the +cook. + +I heard laughter in the galley that night, and lingered near as long as I +dared, with a boy's jealous desire to learn who was enjoying the cook's +hospitality. By his voice I soon knew that it was the steward, and +remembering how black Frank once was ready to deceive him for the sake of +giving me a piece of pie, I was more disconsolate than ever. After a while +I saw him leave, but I thought little of that. I still had two more hours +to stand watch, so I paced along in the darkness, listening to the sound of +the waves and watching the bright stars. + +When presently I again passed the galley I thought I heard a suspicious +sound there. Later I saw something move by the door. But neither time did I +go nearer. I had no desire for further rebuffs from the old negro. + +When I passed a third time, at a distance of only a foot or two, I was +badly startled. A long black arm reached out from the apparently closed +door; a black hand grasped me, lifted me bodily from the floor, and +silently drew me into the galley, which was as dark as Egypt. I heard the +cook close the door behind me and bolt it and cover the deadlight with a +tin pan. What he was up to, I had not the remotest idea; but when he had +barricaded and sealed every crack and cranny, he lighted a candle and set +it on a saucer and glared at me ferociously. + +"Mind you, boy," he said in a very low voice, "don't you think Ah'm any +friend of yo's. No, sah. Don't you think Ah'm doing nothin' foh you. No, +sah. 'Cause Ah ain't. No, sah. Ah'm gwine make a fo'tune dis yeh trip, Ah +am. Yass, sah. Dis yeh nigger's gwine go home putty darn well off. Yass, +sah. So don't you think dis yeh nigger's gwine do nothin' foh you. No, +sah." + +For a moment I was completely bewildered; then, as I recalled the darky's +crafty and indirect ways, my confidence returned and I had the keenest +curiosity to see what would be forthcoming. + +"Boys, dey's a pest," he grumbled. "Dey didn't had ought to have boys +aboa'd ship. No, sah. Cap'n Falk, he say so, too." + +The negro was looking at me so intently that I searched his words for some +hidden meaning; but I could find none. + +"No, sah, boys am de mos' discombobulationest eveh was nohow. Yass, sah. +Dey's been su'thin' happen aft. Yass, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy, +nohow. No, sah. 'Taint dis nigger would go tell a boy dat Mistah Hamlin he +have a riot with Mistah Cap'n Falk, no sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat +Mistah Hamlin, he say dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he ain't holdin' to de right +co'se, no, sah; nor dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he bristle up like a guinea +gander and he say, while he's swearin' most amazin', dat he know what co'se +he's sailin', no, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat Mistah Hamlin, he say +he am supercargo, an' dat he reckon he got orders f'om de owners; and +Mistah Cap'n Falk, he say he am cap'n and he cuss su'thin' awful 'bout dem +orders; and Mistah Roger Hamlin he say Mistah Cap'n Falk his clock am a +hour wrong and no wonder Mistah Kipping am writing in de log-book dat de +ship am whar she ain't; and Mistah Kipping he swear dre'ful pious and he +say by golly he am writer of dat log-book and he reckon he know what's what +ain't. No, sah, Ah ain't gwine tell a boy dem things 'cause Ah tell stew'd +Ah ain't, an' stew'd, him an' me is great friends, what's gwine make a +fo'tune _when Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +He said those last words in a whisper, and stared at me intently; in that +same whisper, he repeated them, "When Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +Then, in a strangely meditative way, as if an unfamiliar process of thought +suddenly occupied all his attention, he muttered absently, letting his eyes +fall, "Seem like Ah done see dat Kipping befo'; Ah jes' can't put mah +finger on him." It was the second time that he had made such a remark in my +hearing. + +The candle guttered in the saucer that served for a candlestick, and its +crazy, wavering light shone unsteadily on the black face of the cook, who +continued to stare at me grimly and apparently in anger. A pan rattled as +the ship rolled. Water splashed from a bucket. I watched the drops falling +from the shelf. One--two--three--four--five--six--seven! Each with its +_pht_, its little splash. They continued to drip interminably. I lost all +count of them. And still the black face, motionless except for the wildly +rolling eyes, stared at me across the galley stove. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +BILL HAYDEN COMES TO THE END OF HIS VOYAGE + + +I was ejected from the galley as abruptly and strangely as I had been drawn +into it. The candle went out at a breath from the great round lips; the big +hand again closed on my shoulder and lifted me bodily from my chair. The +door opened and shut, and there was I, dazed by my strange experience and +bewildered by the story I had heard, outside on the identical spot from +which I had been snatched ten minutes before. + +In my ears the negro's parting message still sounded, "Dis nigger wouldn't +tell a boy one word, no sah, not dis nigger. If he was to tell a boy jest +one leetle word, dat boy, he might lay hisself out ready foh a fight. Yass, +sah." + +For a long time I puzzled over the whole extraordinary experience. It was +so like a dream, that only the numbness of my arm where the negro's great +fist had gripped it convinced me that the happenings of the night were +real. But as I pondered, I found more and more significance in the cook's +incoherent remarks, and became more and more convinced that their +incoherence was entirely artful. Obviously, first of all, he was trying to +pacify his conscience, which troubled him for breaking the promise of +secrecy that he probably had given the steward, from whom he must have +learned the things at which he had hinted. Also he had established for +himself an alibi of a kind, if ever he should be accused of tattling about +affairs in the cabin. + +That Captain Falk had promised to divide the money among the crew, I long +had suspected; consequently that part of the cook's revelations did not +surprise me. But the picture he gave of affairs in the cabin, disconnected +though it was, caused me grave concern. After all, what could Roger do to +preserve the owners' property or to carry out their orders? Captain Falk +had all the men on his side, except me and perhaps poor old Bill Hayden. +Indeed, I feared for Roger's own safety if he had detected that rascally +pair in falsifying the log; he then would be a dangerous man when we all +went back to Salem together. I stopped as if struck: what assurance had I +that we should go back to Salem together--or singly, for that matter? There +was no assurance whatever, that all, or any one of us, would ever go back +to Salem. If they wished to make way with Roger, and with me too, for that +matter, the green tropical seas would keep the secret until the end of +time. + +I am not ashamed that I frankly was white with fear of what the future +might bring. You can forgive in a boy weaknesses of which a man grown might +have been guilty. But as I watched the phosphorescent sea and the stars +from which I tried to read our course, I gradually overcame the terror that +had seized me. I think that remembering my father and mother, and my +sister, for whom I suspected that Roger cared more than I, perhaps, could +fully realize, helped to compose me; and I am sure that the thought of the +Roger I had known so long,--cool, bold, resourceful, with that twinkle in +his steady eyes--did much to renew my courage. When eight bells struck and +some one called down the hatch, "Larbowlines ahoy," and the dim figures of +the new watch appeared on deck, and we of the old watch went below, I was +fairly ready to face whatever the next hours might bring. + +"Roger and I against them all," I thought, feeling very much a martyr, +"unless," I mentally added, "Bill Hayden joins us." At that I actually +laughed, so that Blodgett, prowling restlessly in the darkness, asked me +crossly what was the matter. I should have been amazed and incredulous if +anyone had told me that poor Bill Hayden was to play the deciding part in +our affairs. + +He lay now in his bunk, tossing restlessly and muttering once in a while to +himself. When I went over and asked if there was anything that I could do +for him, he raised himself on his elbow and stared at me more stupidly than +ever. It seemed to come to him slowly who I was. After a while he made out +my face by the light of the dim, swinging lantern, and thanked me, and said +if I would be so good as to give him a drink of water--He never completed +the sentence; but I brought him a drink carefully, and when he had finished +it, he thanked me again and leaned wearily back. + +His face seemed dark by the lantern-light, and I judged that it was still +flushed. Muttering something about a "pain in his innards," he apparently +went to sleep, and I climbed into my own bunk. The lantern swung more and +more irregularly, and Bill tossed with ever-increasing uneasiness. When at +last I dozed off, my own sleep was fitful, and shortly I woke with a start. + +Others, too, had waked, and I heard questions flung back and forth:-- + +"Who was that yelled?" + +"Did you hear that? Tell me, did you hear it?" + +Some one spoke of ghosts,--none of us laughed,--and Neddie Benson whimpered +something about the lady who told fortunes. "She said the light man and the +dark man would make no end o' trouble," he cried; "and he--" + +"Keep still," another voice exclaimed angrily. "It was Bill Hayden," the +voice continued. "He hollered." + +Getting out of my bunk, I crossed the forecastle. "Bill," I said, "are you +all right?" + +He started up wildly. "Don't hit me!" he cried. "That wasn't what I said-- +it--I don't remember _just_ what I said, because I ain't good at +remembering, but it wasn't that--don't-oh! oh!--I _know_ it wasn't that." + +Two of the men joined me, moving cautiously for the ship was pitching now +in short, heavy seas. + +"What's that he's saying?" one of them asked. + +Before I could answer, Bill seemed suddenly to get control of himself. +"Oh," he moaned. "I've got such a pain in my innards! I've got a rolling, +howling old pain in my innards." + +There was little that we could do, so we smoothed his blankets and went +back to our own. The Island Princess was pitching more fiercely than ever +now, and while I watched the lantern swing and toss before I went to sleep, +I heard old Blodgett saying something about squalls and cross seas. There +was not much rest for us that night. No sooner had I hauled the blankets to +my chin and closed my eyes, than a shout came faintly down to us, +"All-hands--on deck!" + +Some one called, "Ay, ay," and we rolled out again wearily--all except Bill +Hayden whose fitful tossing seemed to have settled at last into deep sleep. + +Coming on deck, we found the ship scudding under close-reefed maintopsail +and reefed foresail, with the wind on her larboard quarter. A heavy sea +having blown up, all signs indicated that a bad night was before us; and +just as we emerged from the hatch, she came about suddenly, which brought +the wind on the starboard quarter and laid all aback. + +In the darkness and rain and wind, we sprang to the ropes. Mr. Kipping was +forward at his post on the forecastle and Captain Falk was on the +quarter-deck. As the man at the wheel put the helm hard-a-starboard, we +raised the fore tack and sheet, filled the foresail and shivered the +mainsail, thus bringing the wind aft again, where we met her with the helm +and trimmed the yards for her course. For the moment we were safe, but +already it was blowing a gale, and shortly we lay to, close-reefed, under +what sails we were carrying. + +In a lull I heard Blodgett, who was pulling at the ropes by my side, say to +a man just beyond him, "Ay, it's a good thing for _us_ that Captain Falk +got command. We'd never make our bloody fortunes under the old officers." + +As the wind came again and drowned whatever else may have been said, I +thought to myself that they never would have. Plainly, Captain Falk and +Kipping had won over the simple-minded crew, which was ready to follow them +with never a thought of the chance that that precious pair might run off +with the spoils themselves and leave the others in the lurch. + +But now Kipping's indescribably disagreeable voice, which we all by this +time knew so well, asked, "Has anybody seen that sojering old lubber, +Hayden?" + +"Ay, ay, sir," Blodgett replied. "He's below sick." + +"Sick?" said the mild voice. "Sick is he? Supposing Blodgett, you go below +and bring him on deck. He ain't sick, he's sojering." + +"But, sir,--" Blodgett began. + +"But what?" roared Kipping. His mildness changed to fierceness. "_You go_!" +He snapped out the words, and Blodgett went. + +Poor stupid old Bill! + +When he appeared, Blodgett had him by the arm to help him. + +"You sojering, bloody fool," Kipping cried; "do you think I'm so blind I +can't see through such tricks as yours?" + +A murmur of remonstrance came from the men, but Kipping paid no attention +to it. + +"You think, do you, that I ain't on to your slick tricks? Take that." + +Bill never flinched. + +"So!" Kipping muttered. "So! Bring him aft." + +Though heavy seas had blown up, the squalls had subsided, and some of the +men, for the moment unoccupied, trailed at a cautious distance after the +luckless Bill. We could not hear what those on the quarterdeck said; but +Blodgett, who stood beside me and stared into the darkness with eyes that I +was convinced could see by night, cried suddenly, "He's fallen!" + +Then Captain Falk called, "Come here, two or three of you, and take this +man below." + +Old Bill was moaning when we got there. "Sure," he groaned, "I've got a +rolling--howling--old Barney's bull of a pain in my innards." But when we +laid him in his bunk, he began to laugh queerly, and he seemed to pretend +that he was talking to his little wee girl; for we heard him saying that +her old father had come to her and that he was never going to leave her +again. + +To me--only a boy, you must remember--it was a horrible experience, even +though I did not completely understand all that was happening; and to the +others old Bill's rambling talk seemed to bring an unnamed terror. + +All night he restlessly tossed, though he soon ceased his wild talking and +slept lightly and fitfully. The men watching him were wakeful, too, and as +I lay trying to sleep and trying not to see the swaying lantern and the +fantastic shadows, I heard at intervals snatches of their low conversation. + +"They hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. It warn't human. A sick man has +got _some_ rights," one of the men from Boston repeated interminably. He +seemed unable to hold more than one idea at a time. + +Then Blodgett would say, "Ay, it don't seem right. But we've all got to +stand by the skipper. That's how we'll serve our ends best. It don't do to +get too much excited." + +I imagined that Blodgett's voice did not sound as if he were fully +convinced of the doctrine he was preaching. + +"Ay," the other would return, "but they hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. +It warn't human. A sick man has got _some_ rights, and he was allers +quiet." + +They talked on endlessly, while I tried in vain to sleep and while poor +Bill tossed away, getting no good from the troubled slumber that the Lord +sent him. + +No sooner, it seemed to me, did I actually close my eyes than I woke and +heard him moaning, "Water--a--drink--of--water." + +The others by then had left him, so I got up and fetched water, and he +muttered something more about the "pain in his innards." Then my watch was +called and I went on deck with the rest. + +For the most part it was a day of coarse weather. Now intermittent squalls +from the southwest swept upon us with lightning and thunder, driving before +them rain in solid sheets; now the ship danced in choppy waves, with barely +enough wind to give her steerage-way and with a warm, gentle drizzle that +wet us to the skin and penetrated into the forecastle, where blankets and +clothing soon became soggy and uncomfortable. But the greater part of the +time we lurched along in a gale of wind, with an occasional dash of rain, +which we accepted as a compromise between those two worse alternatives, the +cloudbursts that accompanied the squalls, and the enervating warm drizzle. + +That Bill Hayden did not stand watch with the others, no one, apparently, +noticed. The men were glad enough to forget him, I think, and the officers +let his absence pass, except Davie Paine, who found opportunity to inquire +of me secretly about him and sadly shook his gray head at the tidings I +gave. + +Below we could not forget him. I heard the larboard watch talking of it +when they relieved us; and no sooner had we gone below in turn than +Blodgett cried, "Look at old Bill! His face is all of a sweat." + +He was up on his elbow when we came down, staring as if he had expected +some one; and when he saw who it was, he kept his eyes on the hatch as if +waiting for still another to come. Presently he fell back in his bunk. "Oh, +I've got such a pain in my innards," he moaned. + +By and by he began to talk again, but he seemed to have forgotten his pain +completely, for he talked about doughnuts and duff, and Sundays ashore when +he was a little shaver, and going to church, and about the tiny wee girl on +the bank of the Merrimac who would be looking for her dad to come home, and +lots of things that no one would have thought he knew. He seemed so natural +now and so cheerful that I was much relieved about him, and I whispered to +Blodgett that I thought Bill was better. But Blodgett shook his head so +gravely that I was frightened in spite of my hopes, and we lay there, some +of us awake, some asleep, while Bill rambled cheerily on and the lantern +swung with the motion of the ship. + +To-day I remember those watches below at +that time in the voyage as a succession of short unrestful snatches of +sleep broken by vivid pictures of the most trivial things--the swinging +lantern, the distorted shadows the muttered comments of the men, Bill +leaning on his elbow at the edge of his bunk and staring toward the hatch +as if some one long expected were just about to come. I do not pretend to +understand the reason, but in my experience it is the trifling unimportant +things that after a time of stress or tragedy are most clearly remembered. + +When next I woke I heard the bell--_clang-clang, clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang_--faint and far off. Then I saw that Blodgett was sitting on the edge +of his bunk, counting the strokes on his fingers. When he had finished he +gravely shook his head and nodded toward Bill who was breathing harder now. +"He's far gone," Blodgett whispered. "He ain't going to share in no +split-up at Manila. He ain't going to put back again to India when we've +got rid of the cargo. His time's come." + +I didn't believe a word that Blodgett said then, but I sat beside him as +still as the grave while the forecastle lantern nodded and swung as +casually as if old Bill were not, for all we knew, dying. By and by we +heard the bell again, and some one called from the hatch, "Eight bells! +Roll out!" + +The very monotony of our life--the watches below and on deck, each like +every other, marked off by the faint clanging of the ship's bell--made +Bill's sickness seem less dreadful. There is little to thrill a lad or +even, after a time, to interest him, in the interminable routine of a long +voyage. + +When we came on deck Davie Paine looked us over and said, "Where's Bill?" + +Blodgett shook his head. Even this simple motion had a sleepy quality that +made me think of a cat. + +"I'm afraid, sir," he replied, "that Bill has stood his last watch." + +"So!" said old Davie, reflectively, in his deep voice, "so!--I was afraid +of that." Ignorant though Davie was, and hopelessly incompetent as an +officer, he had a certain kindly tolerance, increased, perhaps, by his own +recent difficulties, that made him more approachable than any other man in +the cabin. After a time he added, "I cal'ate I got to tell the captain." +Davie's manner implied that he was taking us into his confidence. + +"Yes," Neddie Benson muttered under his breath, "tell the captain! If it +wasn't for Mr. Kipping and the captain, Bill would be as able a man this +minute as any one of us here. It didn't do to abuse him. He ain't got the +spirit to stand up under it." + +Davie shuffled away without hearing what was said, and soon, instead of +Captain Falk, Mr. Kipping appeared, bristling with anger. + +"What's all this?" he snapped, with none of the mildness that he usually +affected. "Who says Bill Hayden has stood his last watch? Is mutiny +brewing? I'll have you know I'm mate here, legal and lawful, and what's +more I'll show you I'm mate in a way that none of you won't forget if he +thinks he can try any more of his sojering on me. I'll fix him. You go +forward, Blodgett, and drag him out by the scalp-lock." + +Blodgett walked off, keeping close to the bulwark, and five minutes later +he was back again. + +Mr. Kipping grew very red. "Well, my man," he said in a way that made my +skin creep, "are you a party to this little mutiny?" + +"N-no, sir," Blodgett stammered. "I--he-it ain't no use, he _can't_ come." + +The mate looked sternly at Blodgett, and I thought he was going to hit +him; but instead, after a moment of hesitation, he started forward alone. + +We scarcely believed our eyes. + +By and by he came back again, but to us he said nothing. He went into the +cabin, and when next we saw him Captain Falk was by his side. + +"I don't like the looks of it," Kipping was saying, "I don't at all." + +As the captain passed me he called, "Lathrop, go to the galley and get a +bucket of hot water." + +Running to the deck-house, I thrust my head into the galley and made known +my want with so little ceremony that the cook was exasperated. Or so at +least his manner intimated. + +"You boy," he roared in a voice that easily carried to where the others +stood and grinned at my discomfiture, "you boy, what foh you come +promulgatin' in on me with 'gimme dis' and 'gimme dat' like Ah wahn't ol' +enough to be yo' pa? Ain't you got no manners nohow? You vex me, yass, sah, +you vex me. If we gotta have a boy on boa'd ship, why don' dey keep him out +of de galley?" + +Then with a change of voice that startled me, he demanded in an undertone +that must have been inaudible a dozen feet away, "Have things broke? Is de +fight on? Has de row started?" + +Bewildered, I replied, "Why, no--it's only Bill Hayden." + +Instantly he resumed his loud and abusive tone. "Well, if dey gwine send a +boy heah foh wateh, wateh he's gotta have. Heah, you wuthless boy, git! Git +out of heah!" + +Filling a bucket with boiling water, he thrust it into my hand and shoved +me half across the deck so roughly that I narrowly escaped scalding myself, +then returned to his work, muttering imprecations on the whole race of +boys. He was too much of a strategist for me. + +When I took the bucket to the forecastle, I found the captain and Mr. +Kipping looking at poor old Bill. + +"Dip a cloth in the water," the captain said carelessly, "and pull his +clothes off and lay the cloth on where it hurts." + +I obeyed as well as I could, letting the cloth cool a bit first; and +although Bill cried out sharply when it touched his skin, the heat eased +him of pain, and by and by he opened his eyes for all the world as if he +had been asleep and looked at Captain Falk and said in a scared voice, "In +heaven's name, what's happened?" + +The captain and Mr. Kipping laughed coldly. It seemed to me that they +didn't care whether he lived or died. + +Certainly the men of the larboard watch, who were lying in their bunks at +the time, didn't like the way the two behaved. I caught the word +"heartless" twice repeated. + +"Well," said Captain Falk at last, "either he'll live or he'll not. How +about it, Mr. Kipping?" + +The mate laughed as if he had heard a good joke. "That's one of the truest +things ever was said aboard a ship," he replied, in his slow, insincere +way. "Yes, sir, it hits the nail on the head going up and coming down." + +"Well, then, let's leave him to make up his mind." + +So the two went aft together as if they had done a good day's work. But +there was a buzz of disapproval in the forecastle when they had gone, and +one of the men from Boston, of whom I hitherto had had a very poor opinion, +actually got out of his blankets and came over to help me minister to poor +Bill's needs. + +"It ain't right," he said dipping the cloth in the hot water; "they never +so much as gave him a dose of medicine. A man may be only a sailor, but +he's worth a dose of medicine. There never come no good of denying poor +Jack his pill when he's sick." + +"Ay, heartless!" one of the others exclaimed. _"I could tell things if I +would."_ + +That remark, I ask you to remember. The man who made it, the other of the +two from Boston, had black hair and a black beard, and a nose that +protruded in a big hook where he had broken it years before. It was easy to +recognize his profile a long way off because of the peculiar shape of the +nose. The remark itself is of little importance, of course; but a story is +made up of things that seem to be of little importance, yet really are more +significant by far than matters that for the moment are startling. + +It was touching to see the solicitude of the men and the clumsy kindness of +their efforts to help poor Bill when the captain and the mate had left him. +They crowded up to his bunk and smoothed out his blankets and spoke to him +more gently than I should have believed possible. So angry were they at the +brutality of the two officers, that the coldest and hardest of them all +gave the sick man a muttered word of sympathy or an awkward helping hand. + +We worked over him, easing him as best we could, while the bell struck the +half hours and the hours; and for a while he seemed more comfortable. In a +moment of sanity he looked up at me with a sad smile and said, "I wish, +lad, I surely wish I could do something for _you_." But long before the +watch was over he once more began to talk about the tiny wee girl at +Newburyport--"Cute she is as they make 'em," he reiterated weakly, +"a-waiting for her dad to come home." And by and by he spoke of his wife, +--"a good wife," he called her,--and then he made a little noise in his +throat and lay for a long time without moving. + +"He's dead," the man from Boston said at last; there was no sound in the +forecastle except the rattle of the swinging lantern and the chug-chug of +waves. + +I was younger than the others and more sensitive, so I went on deck and +leaned on the bulwark, looking at the ocean and seeing nothing. + + [Illustration] + + + + +IV + +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XV + +MR. FALK TRIES TO COVER HIS TRACKS + + +How long I leaned on the bulwark I do not know; I had no sense of passing +time. But after a while some one told me that the captain wished to see me +in the cabin, and I went aft with other tragic memories in mind. I had not +entered the cabin since Captain Whidden died--"_shot f'om behine_." The +negro's phrase now flashed upon my memory and rang over and over again in +my ears. + +The cabin itself was much as it had been that other day: I suppose no +article of its furnishings had been changed. But when I saw Captain Falk in +the place of Captain Whidden and Kipping in the place of Mr. Thomas, I felt +sick at heart. All that encouraged me was the sight of Roger Hamlin, and I +suspected that he attended uninvited, for he came into the cabin from his +stateroom at the same moment when I came down the companionway, and there +was no twinkle now in his steady eyes. + +Captain Falk glanced at him sharply. "Well, sir?" he exclaimed testily. + +"I have decided to join you, sir," Roger said, and calmly seated himself. + +For a moment Falk hesitated, then, obviously unwilling, he assented with a +grimace. + +"Lathrop," he said, turning to me, "you were present when Hayden died, and +also you had helped care for him previously. Mr. Kipping has written a +statement of the circumstances in the log and you are to sign it, Here's +the place for your name. Here's a pen and ink. Be careful not to blot or +smudge it." + +He pushed the big, canvas-covered book over to me and placed his finger on +a vacant line. All that preceded it was covered with paper. + +"Of course," said Roger, coldly, "Lathrop will read the statement before +signing it." He was looking the captain squarely in the eye. + +Falk scowled as he replied, "I consider that quite unnecessary." + +"A great many of the ordinary decencies of life seem to be considered +unnecessary aboard this ship." + +"If you are making any insinuations at me, Mr. Hamlin, I'll show you who's +captain here." + +"You needn't. You've done it sufficiently already. Anyhow, if Lathrop were +foolish enough to sign the statement without reading it, I should know that +he hadn't read it and I assure you that it wouldn't pass muster in any +court of law." + +As Captain Falk was about to retort even more angrily, Kipping touched his +arm and whispered to him. + +"Oh, well," he said with ill grace, "as you wish, Mr. Kipping. There's +nothing underhanded about this. Of course the account is absolutely true +and the whole world could read it; only I don't intend a silly young fop +shall think he can bully me on my own ship. Show Lathrop the statement." + +Kipping withdrew the paper and I began to read what was written in the log, +but Roger now interrupted again. + +"Read it aloud," he said. + +"What in heaven's name do you think you are, you young fool? If you think +you can bully Nathan Falk like that, I'll lash you to skin and pulp." + +"Oh, well," said Roger comically, in imitation of the captain's own air of +concession, "since you feel so warmly on the subject, I'm quite willing to +yield the point. It's enough that Lathrop should read it before he signs." +Then, turning to me suddenly, he cried, "Ben, what's the course according +to the log?" + +The angry red of Captain Talk's face deepened, but before he could speak, I +had seen and repeated it:-- + +"Northeast by north." + +Roger smiled. "Go on," he said. "Read the statement." + +The statement was straightforward enough for the most part--more +straightforward, it seemed to me, than either of the two men who probably +had collaborated in writing it; but one sentence caught my attention and I +hesitated. + +"Well," said Roger who was watching me closely, "is anything wrong?" + +"Why, perhaps not exactly wrong," I replied, "though I do think most of the +men forward would deny it." + +"See here," cried Captain Falk, cutting off Kipping, who tried to speak at +the same moment, "I tell you, Mr. Hamlin, if you thrust your oar in here +again I'll thrash you within an inch of your life! I'll keelhaul you, so +help me! I'll--" He wrinkled up his nose and twisted his lips into a sneer +before he added, almost in a whisper, "I'll do worse than that." + +"No," said Roger calmly, "I don't think you will. What's the sentence, +Benny?" + +Without waiting for another word from anyone I read aloud as follows:-- + +"'And the captain and the chief mate tended Hayden carefully and did what +they might to make his last hours comfortable.'" + +"Well," said Falk, "didn't we?" + +"No, by heaven, you didn't," Roger cried suddenly, taking the floor from +me. "I know how you beat Hayden. I know how you two drove him to throw +himself overboard. You're a precious pair! And what's more, all the men +forward know it. While we're about it, Captain Falk, here's something else +I know. According to the log, which you consistently have refused to let me +see the course is northeast by north. According to the men at the wheel,--I +will not be still! I will not close my mouth! If you assault me, sir, I +will break your shallow head,--according to the men at the wheel, of whom I +have inquired, according to the ship's compass when I've taken a chance to +look at it, according to the tell-tale that you yourself can see at this +very minute and--" Roger laid on the table a little box of hard wood bound +with brass--"according to this compass of my own, which I know is a good +one, our course is now and has been for two days east-northeast. Captain +Falk, do you think you can make us believe that Manila is Canton?" + +"It may be that I do, and it may be that I do not," Falk retorted hotly. +"As for you, Mr. Hamlin, I'll attend to your case later. Now sign that +statement, Lathrop." + +Falk was standing. His hands, a moment before lifted for a blow, rested on +the table; but the knuckles were streaked with red along the creases, and +the nails of his fingers, which were bent under, he had pressed hard +against the dull mahogany. When he had finished speaking, he sat down +heavily. + +"Sign it, Ben," said Roger; "but first draw your pen through that +particular sentence." + +Quick as thought I did what Roger told me, leaving a single broad line +through the words "and did what they might to make his last hours +comfortable"; then I wrote my name and laid the pen on the table. + +[Illustration: "Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk.] + +Leaning over to see what I had done, Falk leaped up white with passion. +"Good God!" he yelled, "that's worse than nothing." + +"Yes," said Roger coolly, "I think it is." + +"What--" Falk stopped suddenly. Kipping had touched his sleeve. "Well?" + +Kipping whispered to him. + +"No," Falk snarled, glancing at me, "I'm going to take that young pup's +hide off his back and salt it." + +Again Kipping whispered to him. + +This time he seemed half persuaded. He was a weak man, even in his +passions. "All right," he said, after reflecting briefly. "As you say, it +don't make so much odds. Myself, I'm for slitting the young pup's ears--but +later on, later on. And though I'd like to straighten out the record as far +as it goes--Well, as you say." + +For all of Captain Falk's bluster and pretension, I was becoming more and +more aware that the subtle Kipping could twist him around his little +finger, and that for some end of his own Kipping did not wish affairs to +come yet to a head. + +He leaned back in his chair, twirling his thumbs behind his interlocked +fingers, and smiled at us mildly. His whole bearing was odious. He fairly +exhaled hypocrisy. I remembered a dozen episodes of his career aboard the +Island Princess--the wink he had given Captain Falk, then second mate; his +coming to the cook's galley for part of my pie; his bullying poor old Bill +Hayden; his cold selfishness in taking the best meat from the kids, and +many other offensive incidents. Was it possible that Captain Falk was not +at the bottom of all our troubles? that Captain Falk had been from the +first only somebody's tool? + +We left the cabin in single file, the captain first, Kipping second, then +Roger, then I. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +A PRAYER FOR THE DEAD + + +In the last few hours we had sighted an island, which lay now off the +starboard bow; and as I had had no opportunity hitherto to observe it +closely, I regarded it with much interest when I came on deck. Inland there +were several cone-shaped mountains thickly wooded about the base; to the +south the shore was low and apparently marshy; to the north a bold and +rugged promontory extended. Along the shore and for some distance beyond it +there were open spaces that might have been great tracts of cleared land; +and a report prevailed among the men that a fishing boat had been sighted +far off, which seemed to put back incontinently to the shore. Otherwise +there was no sign of human habitation, but we knew the character of the +natives of such islands thereabouts too well to approach land with any +sense of security. + +Captain Falk and Kipping were deep in consultation, and the rest were +intent upon the sad duty that awaited us. On the deck there lay now a shape +sewed in canvas. The men, glancing occasionally at the captain, stood a +little way off, bare-headed and ill at ease, and conversed in whispers. For +the moment I had forgotten that we were to do honor for the last time--and, +I fear me, for the first--to poor Bill Hayden. Poor, stupid Bill! He had +meant so well by us all, and life had dealt so hardly with him! Even in +death he was neglected. + +As time passed, the island became gradually clearer, so that now we could +see its mountains more distinctly and pick out each separate peak. Although +the wind was light and unsteady, we were making fair progress; but Captain +Falk and Mr. Kipping remained intent on their conference. + +I could see that Roger Hamlin, who was leaning on the taffrail, was +imperturbable; but Davie Paine grew nervous and walked back and forth, +looking now and then at the still shape in canvas, and the men began to +murmur among themselves. + +"Well," said the captain at last, "what does all this mean, Mr. Paine? What +in thunder do you mean by letting the men stand around like this?" + +He knew well enough what it meant, though, for all his bluster. If he had +not, he would have been ranting up the deck the instant he laid eyes on +that scene of idleness such as no competent officer could countenance. + +Old Davie, who was as confused as the captain had intended that he should +be, stammered a while and finally managed to say, "If you please, sir, Bill +Hayden's dead." + +"Yes," said the captain, "it looks like he's dead." + +We all heard him and more than one of us breathed hard with anger. + +"Well, why don't you heave him over and be done with it?" he asked shortly, +and turned away. + + +The men exchanged glances. + + +"If you please, sir,--" it was Davie, and a different Davie from the one we +had known before,--"if you please, sir, ain't you goin' to read the service +and say the words?" + +I turned and stared at Davie in amazement. His voice was sharper now than +ever I had heard it and there was a challenge in his eyes as well. + +"What?" Falk snapped out angrily. + +"Ain't you goin' to read the Bible and say the words, sir?" + +I am convinced that up to this point Captain Falk had intended, after +badgering Davie enough to suit his own unkind humor, to read the service +with all the solemnity that the occasion demanded. He was too eager for +every prerogative of his office to think of doing otherwise. But his was +the way of a weak man; at Davie's challenge he instantly made up his mind +not to do what was desired, and having set himself on record thus, his +mulish obstinacy held him to his decision in spite of whatever better +judgment he may have had. + +"Not I!" he cried. "Toss him over to suit yourself." + +When an angry murmur rose on every side, he faced about again. "Well," he +said, "what do you want, anyway? I'm captain here, and if you wish I'll +_show_ you I'm captain here. I'll read the service or I'll not read it, +just as I please. If any man here's got anything to say about it, I'll do +some saying myself. If any man here wants to read the service over that +lump of clay, let him read it." Then, turning with an air of indifference, +he leaned on the rail with a sneer, and smiled at Kipping. + +What would have happened next I do not know, so angry were the men at this +wretched exhibition on the part of the captain, if Roger had not stepped +forward. + +"Very well, sir," he said facing the captain, "since you put it that way, +_I'll read the service_." And without ceremony he took from the captain's +hand the prayer-book that Falk had brought on deck. + +Disconcerted by this unexpected act and angered by the murmur of approval +from the men, Falk started to speak, then thought better of it and sidled +over beside Kipping, to whom he whispered something at which they both +laughed heartily. Then they stood smiling scornfully while Roger went down +beside poor Bill's body. + +Roger opened the prayer-book, turned the pages deliberately, and began to +read the service slowly and with feeling. He was younger and more slender +than many of the men, but straight and tall and handsome, and I remember +how proud of him I felt for taking affairs in his own hands and making the +best of a bad situation. + +"We therefore commit his body to the deep," he read "looking for the +general Resurrection in the last day, and the life of the world to come, +through our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in glorious majesty +to judge the world, the sea shall give up her dead; and the corruptible +bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed and made like unto his +glorious body; according to the mighty working whereby He is able to subdue +all things unto Himself." + +Then Blodgett, Davie Paine, the cook, and the man from Boston lifted the +plank and inclined it over the bulwark, and so passed all that was mortal +of poor Bill Hayden. + +Suddenly, in the absolute silence that ensued when Roger closed the +prayer-book, I became aware that he was signaling me to come nearer, and I +stepped over beside him. At the same instant the reason for it burst upon +me. Now, if ever, was the time to turn against Captain Falk. + +"Men," said Roger in a low voice, "are you going to stand by without +lifting a hand and see a shipmate's dead body insulted?" + +The crew came together in a close group about their supercargo. With stern +faces and with the heavy breathing of men who contemplate some rash or +daring deed, they were, I could see, intent on what Roger had to say. + +He looked from one to another of them as if to appraise their spirit and +determination. "I represent the owners," he continued tersely. "The owners' +orders are not being obeyed. Mind what I tell you--_the owners' orders are +not being obeyed._ You know why as well as I do, and you remember this: +though it may seem on the face of it that I advocate mutiny or even piracy, +if we take the ship from the present captain and carry out the voyage and +obey the owners' orders, I can promise you that there'll be a fine rich +reward waiting at Salem for every man here. What's more, it'll be an honest +reward, with credit from the owners and all law-abiding men. But enough of +that! It's a matter of ordinary decency--of common honesty! The man who +will conspire against the owners of this ship is a contemptible cur, a fit +shipmate with the brute who horsed poor Bill to death." + +I never had lacked faith in Roger, but never before had I appreciated to +the full his reckless courage and his unyielding sense of personal honor. + +He paused and again glanced from face to face. "What say, men? Are you with +me?" he cried, raising his voice. + +Meanwhile Captain Falk, aware that something was going on forward, shouted +angrily, "Here, here! What's all this! Come, lay to your work, you sons of +perdition, or I'll show you what's what. You, Blodgett, go forward and +heave that lead as you were told." + +In his hand Blodgett held the seven-pound dipsey lead, but he stood his +ground. + +"Well?" Falk came down on us like a whirlwind. "Well? You, Hamlin, what in +Tophet are you backing and hauling about?" + +"I? Backing and hauling?" Roger spoke as calmly as you please. "I am merely +advocating that the men take charge of the ship in the name of the lawful +owners and according to their orders." + +As Captain Falk sprang forward to strike him down, there came a thin, windy +cry, "No you don't; no, you don't!" + +To my amazement I saw that it was old Blodgett. + +"It don't do to insult the dead," he cried in a voice like the yowl of a +tom-cat. "You can kill us all you like. It's captain's rights. But, by the +holy, you ain't got no rights whatsoever to refuse a poor sailor a decent +burial." + +With a vile oath, Captain Falk contemplated this new factor in the +situation. Suddenly he yelled, "Kipping! It's mutiny! Help!" And with a +clutch at his hip he drew his pistol. + +"'Heave the lead' is it?" Blodgett muttered. "Ay, I'll heave the lead." He +whipped up his arm and hurled the missile straight at Captain Falk's head. + +The captain dodged, but the lead struck his shoulder and felled him. + +Seeing Kipping coming silently with a pistol in each hand, I ducked and +tried to pull Roger over beside Blodgett; but Roger, instantly aware of +Kipping's move, spun on his heel as the first bullet flew harmlessly past +us, and lithely stepped aside. With a single swing of his right arm he cut +Kipping across the face with a rope's end and stopped him dead. + +As the welt reddened on his face, Kipping staggered, leveled his other +pistol point-blank and pulled the trigger. + +For the moment I could not draw breath, but the pistol missed fire. + +"Flashed in the pan!" Roger cried, and tugged at his own pistol, which had +caught inside his shirt where he had carried it out of sight. "That's not +all--that's flashed in the pan!" + +"Now then, you fools," Kipping shrieked. "Go for 'em! Go for'em! The bell's +struck! Now's the time!" + +So far it all had happened so suddenly and so extraordinarily swiftly, with +one event fairly leaping at the heels of another, that the men were +completely dazed. + +Captain Falk sat on the deck with his hand pressed against his injured +shoulder and with his pistol lying beside him where he had dropped it when +he fell. Kipping, the red bruise showing across his face, confronted us +with one pistol smoking, the other raised; Blodgett, having thrown the +lead, was drawing his knife from the sheath; Roger was pulling desperately +at his own pistol; and for my part I was in a state of such complete +confusion that to this day I don't know what I did or said. In the moments +that followed we were to learn once and for all the allegiance of every man +aboard the Island Princess. + +One of the men from Boston, evidently picking me out as the least +formidable of the trio, shot a quick glance back at Kipping as if to be +sure of his approval, and springing at me, knocked me flat on my back. I +felt sure he was going to kill me when he reached for my throat. But I +heard behind me a thunderous roar, "Heah Ah is! Heah Ah is!" And out of the +corner of my eye I saw the cook, the meat-cleaver in his hand, leaping to +my rescue, with Roger, one hand still inside his shirt, scarcely a foot +behind him. + +The man from Boston scrambled off me and fled. + +"Ah's with you-all foh one," the cook cried, swinging his cleaver. "Ah +ain't gwine see no po' sailor man done to death and me not say 'What foh!'" + +"You fool! You black fool!" Chips shrieked, shaking his fist, "Stand by and +share up! Stand by and share up!" + + +Neddie Benson jumped over beside the cook. "Me too!" he called shrilly. +"Bad luck or good luck, old Bill he done his best and was fair murdered." + +Poor Bill! His martyrdom stood us in good stead in our hour of need. + +On the other side of the deck there was a lively struggle from which came +fierce yells as each man sought to persuade his friends to his own way of +thinking: + +"Stand by, lads, stand by--" + +"----the bloody money!--" + +"Hanged for mutiny--" + +"I know where my bed's made soft--" + +The greater part of the men, it seemed, were lining up behind Kipping and +Captain Falk, when a scornful shout rose and I was aware that some one else +had come over to our side. It was old Davie Paine. "He didn't ought to +shame me in front of all the men," Davie muttered. "No, sir, it wa'n't +right. And what's more, there's lots o' things aboard this ship that ain't +as they should be. I may be poor and ignorant and no shakes of a scholar, +but I ain't goin' to put up with 'em." + +So we six faced the other twelve with as good grace as we could +muster,--Roger, the cook, Blodgett, Neddie Benson, Davie, and I,--and there +was a long silence. But Roger had got out his pistol now, and the lull in +the storm was ominous. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +MAROONED + + +That it was important to control the after part of the ship, I was well +aware, and though we were outnumbered two to one, I hoped that by good +fortune we might win it. + +I was not long in doubt of Roger's sharing my hope. He analyzed our +opponents' position at a single glance, and ignoring their advantage in +numbers, seized upon the only chance of taking them by surprise. Swinging +his arm and crying, "Come, men! All for the cabin!" he flung himself +headlong at Falk. I followed close at his heels--I was afraid to be left +behind. I heard the cook grunt hoarsely as he apprehended the situation and +sprang after us. Then the others met us with knives and pistols. + +Our attack was futile and soon over, but while it lasted there was a merry +little fight. As a man slashed at Roger with a case-knife, laying open a +long gash in his cheek, Roger fired a shot from his pistol, and the fellow +pitched forward and lay still except for his limbs, which twitched +sickeningly. For my own part, seeing another who had run aft for a weapon +swing at me with a cutlass, I threw myself under his guard and got my arms +round both his knees. As something crashed above me, I threw the fellow +back and discovered that the cook had met the cutlass in full swing with +the cleaver and had shattered it completely. Barely in time to escape a +murderous blow that the carpenter aimed at me with his hammer, I scrambled +to my feet and leaped back beside Roger, who held his cheek with his hand. + +I believe it was the cook's cleaver that saved our lives for the time +being. Falk and Kipping had fired the charges in their pistols, and no one +was willing to venture within reach of the black's long arm and brutal +weapon. So, having spent our own last charge of powder, we backed away into +the bow with our faces to the enemy, and the only sounds to be heard were +flapping sails and rattling blocks, the groans of the poor fellow Roger had +shot, and the click of a powder-flask as Falk reloaded and passed his +ammunition to Kipping. + +"So," said Falk at last, "we have a fine little mutiny brewing, have we?" +He looked first at us, then at those who remained true to him and his +schemes. "Well, Mr. Kipping, with the help of Chips here, we can make out +to work the ship at a pinch. Yes, I think we can dispense with these young +cocks altogether. Yes,--" he raised his voice and swore roundly--"yes, we +can follow our own gait and fare a damned sight better without them. We'll +let them have a boat and row back to Salem. A voyage of a few thousand +miles at the oars will be a rare good thing to tone down a pair of young +fighting cocks." Then he added, smiling, "If they meet with no Ladronesers +or Malays to clip their spurs." + +Captain Falk looked at Kipping and his men, and they all laughed. + +"Ay, so it will," cried Kipping. "And old Davie Paine 'll never have a +mister to his name again. You old lubber, you, your bones will be rotting +at the bottom of the sea when we're dividing up the gold." + +Again the men laughed loudly. + +Davie flushed and stammered, but Blodgett spoke out bitterly. + +"So they will, before you or Captain Falk divide with any of the rest. Ah! +Red in the face, are ye? That shot told. Davie 'd rather take his chances +with a gentleman than be second mate under either one o' you two. He may +not know when he's well off, but he knows well when he ain't." + +For all Blodgett spoke so boldly, I could see that Davie in his own heart +was still afraid of Kipping. But Kipping merely smiled in his mean way and +slowly looked us over. + +"If we was to walk them over a plank," he suggested, deferentially, to the +captain, "there would be an end to all bother with them." + +"No," said Falk, "give them a boat. It's all the same in the long run, and +I ain't got the stomach to watch six of them drown one after another." + +Kipping raised his eyebrows at such weakness; then a new thought seemed to +dawn on him. His accursed smile grew broader and he began to laugh softly. +For the moment I could not imagine what he was laughing at, but his next +words answered my unspoken question. "Ha ha ha! Right you are, captain! +Just think of 'em, a-sailing home in a ship's boat! Oh, won't they have a +pretty time?" + +The predicament of six fellow men set adrift in an open boat pleased the +man's vile humor. We knew that he believed he was sending us to certain +death, and that he delighted in it. + +"This fine talk is all very well," said Roger, "and I've no doubt you think +yourselves very witty, but let that be as it may. As matters stand now, +you've got the upper hand--though I wish you joy of working the ship. +However, if you give us the long-boat and a fair allowance of water and +bread, we'll ask nothing more." + +"Ah," said Falk, with a leer at Kipping who was smiling quietly, "the +long-boat and a fair allowance of water and bread! Ay, next they'll be +wanting us to set 'em up in their own ship." He changed suddenly from a +leer to a snarl. "You'll take what I give you and nothing more nor less. +Now then, men, we'll just herd these hearties overboard and bid them a gay +farewell." + +He stood there, pointing the way with a grand gesture and the late +afternoon sun sparkled on the buttons of his coat and shone brightly on the +fine white shirt he wore, which in better days had belonged to Captain +Whidden. "Murderer and thief!" I thought. For although about Captain +Whidden's death I knew nothing more than the cook's never-to-be-forgotten +words, "a little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine," I laid Bill Hayden's death at Captain Falk's door, and I knew well +by now that our worthy skipper would not scruple at stealing more than +shirts. + +When Falk pointed to the quarter-boat, the men, laughing harshly, closed in +on us and drove us along by threatening us with pistols and pikes, which +the bustling steward by now had distributed. And all the while Kipping +stood just behind the captain, smiling as if no unkind thought had ever +ruffled his placid nature. I could not help but be aware of his meanness, +and I suppose it was because I was only a boy and not given to looking +under the surface that I did not yet completely recognize in him the real +leader of all that had gone astray aboard the Island Princess. + +We let ourselves be driven toward the boat. Since we were outnumbered now +eleven to six,--not counting the wounded man of course,--and since, +compared with the others, we were virtually unarmed, we ought, I suppose, +to have been thankful that we were not murdered in cold blood, as doubtless +we should have been if our dangerous plight had not so delighted Kipping's +cruel humor, and if both Falk and Kipping had not felt certain that they +would never see or hear of us again. But we found little comfort in +realizing that, as matters stood, although in our own minds we were +convinced absolutely that Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping had conspired with +the crew to rob the owners, by the cold light of fact we could be proved in +the wrong in any court of admiralty. + +So far as Roger and I were concerned, our belief was based after all +chiefly on supposition; and so craftily had the whole scheme been phrased +and manoeuvred that, if you got down to categorical testimony, even +Blodgett and Davie Paine would have been hard put to it to prove anything +culpable against the other party. Actually we were guilty of mutiny, if +nothing more. + +The cook still carried his great cleaver and Blodgett unobtrusively had +drawn and opened a big dirk knife; but Neddie Benson, Davie, and I had no +weapons of any kind, and Roger's pistol was empty. + +We worked the boat outboard in silence and made no further resistance, +though I knew from Roger's expression as he watched Falk and Kipping and +their men, that, if he had seen a fair chance to turn the scales in our +favor, he would have seized it at any cost. + +Meanwhile the sails were flapping so loudly that it was hard to hear +Roger's voice when he again said, "Surely you'll give us food and water." + +"Why--no," said Falk. "I don't think you'll need it. You won't want to row +right home without stopping to say how-d'y'-do to the natives." + +Again a roar of laughter came from the men on deck. + +As the boat lay under the side of the ship, they crowded to the rail and +stared down at us with all sorts of rough gibes at our expense. +Particularly they aimed then-taunts at Davie Paine and Blodgett, who a +short time before had been hand-in-glove with them; and I was no little +relieved to see that their words seemed only to confirm the two in their +determination, come what might, never to join forces again with Falk and +Kipping. But Kipping singled out the cook and berated him with a stream of +disgusting oaths. + +"You crawling black nigger, you," he yelled. "Now what'll _you_ give _me_ +for a piece of pie?" + +Holding the cleaver close at his side, the negro looked up at the fox who +was abusing him, and burst into wild vituperation. Although Kipping only +laughed in reply, there was a savage and intense vindictiveness in the +negro's impassioned jargon that chilled my blood. I remember thinking then +that I should dread being in Kipping's shoes if ever those two met again. + +As we cast off, we six in that little boat soon to be left alone in the +wastes of the China Sea, we looked up at the cold, laughing faces on which +the low sun shone with an orange-yellow light, and saw in them neither pity +nor mercy. The hands resting on the bulwark, the hands of our own +shipmates, were turned against us. + +The ship was coming back to her course now, and some of us were looking at +the distant island with the cone-shaped peaks, toward which by common +consent we had turned our bow, when the cook, who still stared back at +Kipping, seemed to get a new view of his features. Springing up suddenly, +he yelled in a great voice that must have carried far across the sea:-- + +"You Kipping, Ah got you--Ah got you--Ah knows who you is--Ah knows who you +is--you crimp's runner, you! You blood-money sucker, you! Ah seen you in +Boston! Ah seen you befo' now! A-a-a-ah!--a-a-a-ah!" And he shook his great +black fist at the mate. + +The smile on Kipping's face was swept away by a look of consternation. With +a quick motion he raised his loaded pistol, which he had primed anew, and +fired on us; then, snatching another from one of the crew, he fired again, +and stood with the smoking weapons, one in each hand, and a snarl fixed on +his face. + +Captain Falk was staring at the negro in wrath and amazement, and there was +a stir on the deck that aroused my strong curiosity. But the cook was +groaning so loudly that we could hear no word of what was said, so we bent +to the oars with all our strength and rowed out of range toward the distant +island. + +Kipping's second ball had grazed the negro's head and had left a deep +furrow from which blood was running freely. But for the thickness of his +skull I believe it would have killed him. + +Once again the sails of the Island Princess, as we watched her, filled with +wind and she bore away across the sapphire blue of the sea with all her +canvas spread, as beautiful a sight as I have ever seen. The changing +lights in the sky painted the water with opalescent colors and tinted the +sails gold and crimson and purple, and by and by, when the sun had set and +the stars had come out and the ocean had darkened, we still could make her +out, smaller and ghostlike in the distance, sailing away before light winds +with the money and goods all under her hatches. + +Laboring at the oars, we rowed on and on and on. Stars, by which we now +held our course, grew bright overhead, and after a time we again saw dimly +the shores of the island. We dared not stay at sea in a small open boat +without food or water, and the island was our only refuge. + +Presently we heard breakers and saw once more the bluff headlands that we +had seen from the deck of the Island Princess. Remembering that there had +been low shores farther south, we rowed on and on, interminably and at +last, faint and weary, felt the keel of the boat grate on a muddy beach. + +At all events we had come safely to land. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +ADVENTURES ASHORE + + +As we rested on our oars by the strange island, and smelled the warm odor +of the marsh and the fragrance of unseen flowers, and listened to the +_wheekle_ of a night-hawk that circled above us, we talked of one thing and +another, chiefly of the men aboard the Island Princess and how glad we were +to be done with them forever. + +"Ay," said Davie Paine sadly, "never again 'll I have the handle before my +name. But what of that? It's a deal sight jollier in the fo'castle than in +the cabin and I ain't the scholar to be an officer." He sighed heavily. + +"It warn't so jolly this voyage," Neddie Benson muttered, "what with Bill +Hayden passing on, like he done." + +We were silent for a time. For my own part, I was thinking about old Bill's +"little wee girl at Newbury-port" waiting for her stupid old dad to come +back to her, and I have an idea that the others were thinking much the same +thoughts. But soon Blodgett stirred restlessly, and the cook, the cleaver +on his knees, cleared his throat and after a premonitory grunt or two began +to speak. + +"Boy, he think Ah ain't got no use foh boys," he chuckled. "Hee-ha ha! Ah +fool 'em. Stew'd, he say, 'Frank, am you with us o' without us?' He say, +'Am you gwine like one ol' lobscozzle idjut git cook's pay all yo' life?' + +"'Well,' Ah says, 'what pay you think Ah'm gwine fob to git? Cap'n's pay, +maybe? 0' gin'ral's pay? Yass, sah. Ef Ah'm cook Ah'm gwine git cook's +pay.' + +"Den he laff hearty and slap his knee and he say 'Ef you come in with us, +you won't git cook's pay, no' sah. You is gwine git pay like no admiral +don't git if you come in with us. Dah's money 'board dis yeh ol' +ship.' + +"'Yass, sah,' says I, suspicionin' su'thin' was like what it didn't had +ought to be. 'But dat's owner's money.' + +"Den stew'd, he say, 'Listen! You come in with me and Cap'n Falk and Mistah +Kipping, and we's gwine split dat yeh money all up'twix' one another. Yass, +sah! But you all gotta have nothin' to do with dat yeh Mistah Hamlin and +dat yeh cocky li'le Ben Lathrop.' + +"'Oh no,' Ah says inside, so stew'd he don't heah me. 'Guess you all don't +know me and dat yeh Ben Lathrop is friends.' + +"Den Ah stop sudden. 'Mah golly,' Ah think, 'dey's a conspiration a-foot, +yass, sah, and if dis yeh ol' nigger don't look out dey gwine hu't de boy.' +If Ah gits into dat yeh conspiration, den Ah guess Ah'll snoop roun' and +learn what Ah didn't had ought to, and when time come, den mah golly, Ah'll +took good keer of dat boy. So Ah done like Ah'm sayin' now, and Ah says to +stew'd, 'Yass, sah, yass, sah,' and Ah don't let boy come neah de galley +and Ah don't give him no pie nor cake, but when time come Ah take good keer +of him, and Ah's tellin' you, Ah knows a lot 'bout what dem crawlin' +critters yonder on ship think dey gwine foh to do." + +With a glance toward me in the darkness that I verily believe expressed as +much genuine affection as so villainous a black countenance could show, +Frank got out his rank pipe and began packing it full of tobacco. + +Here was further evidence of what we so long had suspected. But as I +reflected on it, with forgiveness in my heart for every snub the faithful, +crafty old darky had given me and with amusement at the simple way he had +tricked the steward and Falk and Kipping, I recalled his parting remarks to +our worthy mate. + +"What was that you said to Mr. Kipping just as we gave way this afternoon?" +I asked. + +"Hey, what dat?" Frank growled. + +"When had you seen Kipping before?" + +There was a long silence, then Frank spoke quietly and yet with obvious +feeling. "Ah got a bone to pick with Kipping," he said, "but dat yeh's a +matter 'twix' him and me." + +All this time Roger had watched and listened with a kindly smile. + +"Well, men," he now said, "we've had a chance to rest and get our wind. +It's time we set to work. What do you say, hadn't we better haul the boat +out?" + +Although we tacitly had accepted Roger as commander of our expedition, he +spoke always with a certain deference to the greater age and experience of +Blodgett and Davie Paine, which won them so completely that they would have +followed him anywhere. + +They both looked at the sky and at the darkly rolling sea on which there +now rested a low incoming mist; but Davie left the burden of reply to old +Blodgett, who spoke nervously in his thin, windy voice. + +"Ay, sir, that we had. There's not much wind, nor is there, I think, likely +to be much; but if we was to haul up into some bushes like those yonder, +there won't be a thousand savages scouring the coast, come daylight, +a-hunting for the men that came in the boat." + +That was sound common sense. + +We got out and, standing three on a side, hauled the boat by great effort +clean out of water. Then we bent ropes to each end of three thwarts, and +thrust an oar through the bights of each pair of ropes. Thus, with one of +us at each end of an oar, holding it in the crooks of his elbows, we made +out to lift the boat and drag it along till we got it safely hidden in the +bushes with the oars tucked away under it. We then smoothed out our tracks +and restored the branches as well as we could, and held a counsel in which +every man had an equal voice. + +That it would be folly to remain on the beach until daylight, we were all +agreed. Immediately beyond the muddy shore there was, so far as we could +tell, only a salt marsh overgrown with rank grass and scattered clumps of +vegetation, which might conceal us after a fashion if we were willing to +lie all day long in mud that probably swarmed with reptile life, but which +would afford us no real security and would give us no opportunity to forage +for fresh water and food. + +Blodgett, wide-eyed and restless, urged that we set out inland and travel +as far as possible before daybreak. "You can't tell about a country like +this," he said. "Might be we'd stumble on a temple with a lot of heathen +idols full of gold and precious stones to make our everlasting fortunes, or +a nigger or two with a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string." + +"Yeah!" the cook grunted, irritated by Blodgett's free use of the word +"nigger," "and Ah's tellin' you he'll have a Malay kris what'll slit yo' +vitals and chop off yo' head; and nex' time when you gwine come to say +howdy, you'll find yo' ol' skull a-setting in de temple, chockfull of dem +rubies and grinnin' like he was glad to see you back again. Ah ain't gwine +on no such promulgation, no sah! What Ah wants is a good, cool drink and a +piece of pie. Yass, sah," + +"Now that's like I feel," said Neddie Benson. "I never thought when the +lady was tellin' me about trouble in store, that there warn't goin' to be +enough victuals to go round--" + +"Ah, you make me tired," Blodgett snapped out. "Food, food, food! And +here's a chance to find a nice little temple an' better our fortunes. Of +course it ain't like India, but if these here slant-eyed pirates have stole +any gold at all, it'll be in the temples." + +"What I'd like"--it was Davie Paine's heavy, slow voice--"is just a drink +of water and some ship's bread." + +"Well," said Roger, "we'll find neither bread nor rubies lying on the +beach, and since we're agreed that it's best to get out of sight, let's set +off." + +He was about to plunge blindly into the marsh, when Blodgett, who had been +ranging restlessly while we talked, cried, "Here's a road! As I'm alive +here's a road!" + +We trooped over to where he stood, and saw, sure enough, an opening in the +brush and grass where the ground was beaten hard as if by the passing of +many feet. + +"Well, let's be on our way," said Blodgett, starting forward. + +"No, sah, dat ain't no way foh to go!" the cook exclaimed. He stood there, +head thrown forward, chin out-thrust, the cleaver, which he had carried all +the time since we left the ship, hanging at his side. + +"Why not?" asked Roger. + +"'Cause, sah, whar dey's a road dey's humans and humans heahbouts on dese +yeh islands is liable to be drefful free with strangers. Yass, sah, if we +go a-walkin' along dat yeh road, fust thing we know we's gwine walk into a +whole mob of dem yeh heathens. Den whar'll we be?" In answer to his +question, the negro thrust out his left hand and, grasping an imaginary +opponent by the throat, raised the cleaver, and swept it through the air +with a slicing motion. Looking keenly at us to be sure that we grasped the +significance of his pantomime he remarked, "Ah want mah ol' head to stay +put." + +"There ain't going to be no village till we come to trees," said Davie +Paine slowly. "If there is, we can see it anyhow, and if there isn't, this +road'll take us across the marsh. Once we're on the other side, we can +leave the road and take to the hills." + +"There's an idea," Roger cried. "How about it, Bennie?" + +I nodded. + +Blodgett eagerly went first and the cook, apparently fearing that he was on +his way to be served as a particularly choice tidbit at somebody else's +banquet, came last. The rest of us just jostled along together. But Davie +Paine, I noticed, held his head higher than I ever had seen it before; for +Roger's appreciation of his sound common sense had pleased him beyond +measure and had done wonders to restore his self-confidence. + +First there were interwoven bushes and vines beside the road, and then tall +reeds and marsh grasses; now there was sand underfoot, now mud. But it was +a better path by far than any we could have beaten out for ourselves, and +we all--except the cook--were well pleased that we had taken it. + +The bushes and tall grasses, which shut us in, prevented our seeing the +ocean behind us or the hills ahead, and the miasmic mist that we had +noticed some time since billowed around our knees. But the stars were very +bright above us, and phosphorescent creatures like fire-flies fluttered +here and there, and, all things considered, we made excellent progress. + +As it had been Blodgett in his eternal peering and prowling who had found +the path, so now it was Blodgett, bending low as he hurried at the head of +our irregular line, who twice stopped suddenly and said that he had heard +hoarse, distant calls. + +Each time, when the rest of us came up to him and listened, they had died +away, but Blodgett now had lost his confident air. He bent lower as he +walked and he peered ahead in a way that seemed to me more prowling and +catlike than ever. As we advanced his uneasiness grew on him, until +presently he turned and raised his hand. The five of us crowded close +together behind him and listened intently. + +For a while, as before, we heard nothing; then suddenly a new, strange +noise came to our ears. It was an indistinct sound of trampling, and it +certainly was approaching. + +The cook grasped my arm. "'Fo' de good Lo'd!" he muttered, "dey's voices!" + +Now I, too, and all the others heard occasional grunts and gutturals. We +dared not flee back to the beach, for there or in the open marshy land we +could not escape observation, and since it had taken us a good half hour to +carry our boat to its hiding-place, it would be utter folly to try to +launch it and put out to sea. + +Not knowing which way to turn, the six of us stood huddled together like +frightened sheep, in the starlight, in the centre of that great marsh, with +the white mist sweeping up around the bushes, and waited for we knew not +what. + +As the noise of tramping and the guttural voices grew louder, Blodgett +gasped, "Look! In heaven's name, look there!" + +Where the path wound over a gentle rise, which was blurred to our eyes by +the mist, there appeared a moving black mass above which swayed and rose +and fell what seemed to our excited vision the points of a great number of +spears. + +With one accord we turned and plunged from the path straight into the marsh +and ran with all our might and main. The cook, who hitherto had brought up +the rear, now forged to the front, springing ahead with long jumps. +Occasionally, as he leaped even higher to clear a bush or a stump, I could +see his kinky round head against the sky, and catch the flash of starlight +on his cleaver, which he still carried. Close behind him ran Neddie Benson, +who saw in the adventures of the night a more terrible fulfillment of the +plump lady's prophecies than ever he had dreamed of; then came Roger and I, +and at my shoulder I heard Davie's heavy breathing and Blodgett's hard +gasps. + +To snakes or other reptiles that may have inhabited the warm pools through +which we splashed, we gave no thought. Somewhere ahead of us there was high +land--had we not rowed close enough to the promontory to hear breakers? +When Davie and Blodgett fairly panted to us to stop for breath, the cook +and Neddie Benson with one voice urged us on to the hills where we could +find rocks or trees for a shelter from which to stand off whatever savages +might pursue us. + +Though we tried to make as little noise as possible, our splashing and +crashing as we raced now in single file, now six abreast, now as +irregularly as half a dozen sheep, must have been audible to keen ears a +mile away. When we came at last to woods and drier ground, we settled down +to a steady jog, which was much less noisy, but even then we stumbled and +fell and clattered and thrashed as we labored on. + +At first we had heard in the night behind us, repeated over and over again, +those hoarse, unintelligible calls and certain raucous blasts, which we +imagined came from some crude native trumpet; but as we climbed, the rising +mist floated about us, and hearing less of the calling and the blasts, we +slowed down to a hard walk and went on up, up, up, through trees and over +rocks, with the mist in our faces and obscuring the way until we could not +see three feet in front of us, but had to keep together by calling +cautiously now and then. + +Blodgett, coming first to a ridge of rock, stopped high above us like a +shadow cast by the moonlight on the mist. + +"Here's the place to make a stand," he cried in his thin voice. "A nat'ral +fort to lay behind. Come, lads, over we go!" + +Up on the rock we scrambled, all of us ready to jump down on the other +side, when Neddie Benson called on us to stop, and with a queer cry let +himself fall back the way he had come. Fearing that he was injured, we +paused reluctantly. + +"Don't go over that rock," he cried. + +"Why not?" Roger asked. + +"It gives me a sick feeling inside." + +"Stuff!" exclaimed Blodgett. "Behind that rock we'll be safe from all the +heathen in the Chinese Sea." + +"The lady she said there'd be trouble," Neddie wailed insistently, "and I +ain't going over that rock. No, sir, not when I feel squeamish like I do +now." + +With an angry snort Blodgett hesitated on the very summit of the ledge. +"Come on, come on," he said. + +"Listen dah!" the cook whispered. + +I thought of savage yells and trampling feet when, crouching on hands and +knees, I listened; but I heard none of them. The sound that came to my ears +was the faint, distant rumble of surf breaking on rocks. + +Now Roger spoke sharply: "Steady, men, go slow." + +"The sea's somewhere beyond us," I said. + +"Come, come," Blodgett repeated tiresomely in his thin windy voice, "over +these rocks and we'll be safe." He was so confident and eager that we were +on the very point of following him. I actually leaned out over the edge +ready to leap down. Never did a man's strange delusion come nearer to +leading his comrades to disaster! + +The cook raised his hand. "Look--look dah!" + +He was staring past Blodgett's feet, past my hands, down at the rocks +whither we were about to drop. The mist was opening slowly. There was +nothing for more than six feet below us--for more than twelve feet. Now the +mist eddied up to the rock again; now it curled away and opened out until +we could look down to the ghostly, phosphorescent whiteness of waves +breaking on rough stones almost directly under us. Blodgett, with a queer, +frightened expression, crawled back to Neddie Benson. + +We were sitting at the brink of a sheer precipice, which fell away more +than two hundred feet to a mass of jagged rock on which the sea was booming +with a hollow sound like the voice of a great bell. + +"Well, here we'll have to make our stand if they follow us," said Davie. + +Although the rest were white with horror at the death we so narrowly had +avoided, old Davie did not even breathe more quickly. The man had no more +imagination than a porpoise. + +Gathering in the lee of the rocky ridge, we took stock of our weapons and +recovered our self-possession. The cook again ran his thumb-nail along the +edge of the cleaver; Roger examined the lock of his pistol--I saw a queer +expression on his face at the time, but he said nothing; Blodgett sharpened +his knife on his calloused palm and the rest of us found clubs and stones. +We could flee no farther. Here, if we were pursued, we must fight. But +although we waited a long time, no one came. The mist gradually passed off; +the stars again shone brightly, and the moon presently peeped out from +between the cone-shaped mountains on our eastern horizon. + +[Illustration] + + + + +V + +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN LAST RESORT + + +"They're not on our heels at all events," said Roger, when we had sat +silent and motionless until we were cramped from head to foot. Of our +little band, he was by far the least perturbed. "If we should set an anchor +watch, we could sleep, turn and turn about. What do you say to that?" + + +He had a way with him, partly the quiet humor that twinkled in his eyes, +partly his courteous manner toward all of us, particularly the older men, +that already had endeared him to every member of our company, and a general +murmur of assent answered him. + +"Blodgett, Neddie, and I'll stand first watch, then. We'll make the watches +three hours on deck and three below, if you say so. You others had best +hunt out an easy place to sleep, but let every man keep his knife or club +where he can snatch it up in case of attack." + +Remembering his comfortable quarters in the steerage of the Island +Princess, the cook groaned; but we found a spot where there was some +sun-baked earth, which we covered with such moss as we could lay our hands +on, threw ourselves down, and fell asleep forthwith. + +We were so stiff when the other three waked us that we scarcely could stand +without help; but we gradually worked new life into our sore muscles and +took our stations with as much good-will as we could muster. Roger gave us +his watch to tell the time by, and we agreed on separate posts from which +to guard against surprise--the cook a little way down the hill to the +right, Davie Paine farther to the left, and I on the summit of the rocks +whence I could see in all directions. + +The wild view from that rock would have been a rare sight for old and +experienced voyagers, and to me, a boy in years and in travels, it was +fascinating both for its uncommon beauty and for the thousand perils that +it might conceal. Who could say what savages were sleeping or prowling +about under the dark branches of yonder shadowy woods? What wild creatures +lurked in their depths? What pirate prows were steering their course by +yonder cone-shaped peaks or by those same bright stars that twinkled +overhead? + +I studied the outline of the island, with its miles of flat marshland deep +in grass and tangled vines, its palms and dense forests, its romantic +mountains, and its jagged northern cliffs; I watched the moonbeams +sparkling on the water; I watched a single light shining far out at sea. By +and by I saw inland, on the side of one of the hills, a light shining in +the jungle, and stared at it with a sort of unwilling fascination. + +A light in the jungle could mean so many things! + +Startled by a sound down in our own camp, I quickly turned and saw old +Blodgett scrambling up to where I sat. + +"It ain't no use," he said in an undertone. "I can't sleep." He twisted his +back and writhed like a cat that wants to scratch itself against a +doorpost. "What an island for temples! Ah, Benny, here's our chance to make +our everlasting fortunes." + +I touched him and pointed at the distant light shining out of the darkness. + +Sitting down beside me, he watched it intently. "I tell ye, Benny," he +murmured thoughtfully, "either me and you and the rest of us is going to +make our everlasting fortunes out o' these here natives, or we're going to +lay out under these here trees until the trumpet blows for Judgment." + +After a time he spoke again. "Ah, but it's a night to be stirring! I'll +stake all my pay for this unlucky voyage that there's not a native on the +island who hasn't a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string, or +maybe emeralds--there's a stone for you! Emeralds are green as the sea by a +sandy shore and bright as a cat's eyes in the dark." + +Morning came quickly. Pink and gold tinted the cone-shaped peaks, the sky +brightened from the color of steel to a clear cobalt, and all at once the +world lay before us in the cool morning air, which the sun was soon to warm +to a vapid heat. As we gathered at the summit of the cliff over which +Blodgett nearly had let us into eternity, we could see below, flying in and +out, birds of the variety, as I afterwards learned, that make edible nests. + +It now was apparent that the light I had seen at sea was that of a ship's +lantern, for to our amazement the Island Princess lay in the offing. +Landward unbroken verdure extended from the slope at our feet to the base +of the cone-shaped peaks, and of the armed force that had frightened us so +badly the evening before we saw no sign; but when we looked at the marsh we +rubbed our eyes and stared anew. + +There was the rough hillside that we had climbed in terror; there was the +marsh with its still pools, its lush herbage, and the "road" that wound +from the muddy beach to the forest on our left. But in the marsh, scattered +here and there--! The truth dawned on us slowly. All at once Blodgett +slapped his thin legs and leaned back and laughed until tears started from +his faded eyes; Neddie Benson stared at him stupidly, then poured out a +flood of silly oaths. The cook burst into a hoarse guffaw, and Roger and +Davie Paine chuckled softly. We stopped and looked at each other and then +laughed together until we had to sit down on the ground and hold our aching +sides. + +In the midst of the marsh were feeding a great number of big, long-horned +water buffaloes. We now realized that the road we had followed was one of +their trails that the guttural calls and blasts from rude trumpets were +their snorts and blats, that the spears we had seen were their horns viewed +from lower ground. + +The ebbing tide had left our boat far from the water, and since we were +faint from our long fast, it was plain that, if we were to survive our +experience, we must find help soon. + +"If I was asked," Davie remarked thoughtfully, "I'd say the thing to do was +to follow along the edge of that there swamp to the forest, where maybe +we'll find a bit of a spring and some kind of an animal Mr. Hamlin can +shoot with that pistol of his." + +Roger drew the pistol from his belt and regarded it with a wry smile. +"Unfortunately," he said, "I have no powder." + +At all events there was no need to stay longer where we were; so, retracing +our steps of the evening before, we skirted the marsh and came to a place +where there were many cocoanut trees. We were bitterly disappointed to find +that our best efforts to climb them were of no avail. We dared not try to +fell them with the cook's cleaver, lest the noise of chopping attract +natives; for we were convinced by the light we had seen shining in the +jungle that the island was inhabited. So we set off cautiously into the +woods, and slowly tramped some distance through an undergrowth that +scratched our hands and faces and tore our clothes. On the banks of a small +stream we picked some yellow berries, which Blodgett ate with relish, but +which the rest of us found unpalatable. We all drank water from the hollows +of trees,--we dared not drink from the boggy stream,--and Neddie Benson ate +the leaves of some bushes and urged the rest of us to try them. That we +refused, we later had reason to be deeply thankful. + +Following the stream we crossed a well-marked path, which caused us +considerable uneasiness, and came at last to an open glade, at the other +end of which we saw a person moving. At that we bent double and retreated +as noiselessly as possible. Once out of sight in the woods, we hurried off +in single file till we thought we had put a safe distance behind us; but +when we stopped to rest we were terrified by a noise in the direction from +which we had come, and we hastened to conceal ourselves under the leaves +and bushes. + +The noise slowly drew nearer, as if men were walking about and beating the +undergrowth as they approached. Blodgett stared from his covert with beady +eyes; Neddie gripped my wrist; the cook rubbed his thumb along the blade of +the cleaver, and Roger fingered the useless pistol. Still the noises +approached. At the sight of something that moved I felt my heart leap and +stand still, then Blodgett laughed softly; a pair of great birds which flew +away as soon as they saw us stirring, had occasioned our fears. + +Having really seen a man in the glade by the stream, we were resolved to +incur no foolish risks; so we cautiously returned to the hill, whence we +could watch the beach and the broad marsh and catch between the mountains a +glimpse of a bay to the northeast where we now saw at a great distance some +men fishing from canoes. While the rest of us prepared another hiding-place +among the bushes, Roger and Blodgett sallied forth once more to reconnoitre +in a new direction. + +Although we no longer could see the ship, we were much perplexed that she +had lingered off the island, and we talked of it at intervals throughout +the day. Whatever her purpose, we were convinced that for us it augured +ill. + +Presently Roger and Blodgett returned in great excitement and reported that +the woods were full of Malays. Apparently the natives were unaware of our +presence but we dared not venture again in search of food, so we resumed +our regular watches and slept in our turns. As soon as the sun should set +we planned to skirt the mountains under the cover of darkness, in desperate +hope of finding somewhere food and water with which we could return to our +boat and defy death by putting out to sea; but ere the brief twilight of +the tropics had settled into night, Neddie Benson was writhing and groaning +in mortal agony. We were alarmed, and for a time could think of no +explanation; but after a while black Frank looked up from where he crouched +by the luckless Neddie and fiercely muttered:-- + +"What foh he done eat dem leaves? Hey? Tell me dat!" + +It was true that Neddie alone had eaten the leaves. A heavy price he was +paying for it! We all looked at Blodgett with an anxiety that it would have +been kinder, perhaps, to hide, and Blodgett himself seemed uneasy lest he +should be poisoned by the berries he had eaten. But no harm came of them, +and by the time the stars were shining again Neddie appeared to be over the +worst of his sickness and with the help of the rest of us managed to +stagger along. So we chose a constellation for our guide and set off +through the undergrowth. + +Even Blodgett by this time had got over his notion of robbing temples. + +"If only we was to run on a yam patch," he said to me as together we +stumbled forward, "or maybe some chickens or a little rice or a vegetable +garden or a spring of cold water--" + +But only a heavy sigh answered him, a grunt from the cook, and a moan from +Neddie. Our spirits were too low to be stirred even by Blodgett's visionary +tales. It was hard to believe that the moon above the mountains was the +same that had shone down upon us long before off the coast of Sumatra. + +The woods were so thick that we soon lost sight of our constellation, but +we kept on our way, stopping often to rest, and made what progress we +could. More than once we heard at a little distance noises that indicated +the presence of wild beasts; and the brambles and undergrowth tore our +clothes and scratched and cut our skin till blood ran from our hands and +faces. But the thing that alarmed us most we heard one time when we had +thrown ourselves on the ground to rest. Though it came from a great +distance it unmistakably was four distinct gunshots. + +Too weak and exhausted to talk, yet determined to carry through our +undertaking, we pushed on and on till we could go no farther; then we +dropped where we stood, side by side, and slept. + +Morning woke us. Through the trees we saw a cone-shaped peak and a great +marsh where buffalo were feeding. We unwittingly had circled in the night +and had come back to within a quarter of a mile of the very point from +which we had set forth. + + + +CHAPTER XX + +A STORY IN MELON SEEDS + + +We were all gaunt and unkempt after our hardships of the past two days, but +Neddie, poor fellow, looked more like a corpse than a living man and moaned +with thirst and scarcely could sit up without help. Finding about a pint of +water close at hand in the hollow of a tree, we carried him to it and he +sucked it up with a straw till it was all gone; but though it relieved his +misery, he was manifestly unable to walk, even had we dared stir abroad, so +we stayed where we were while the sun rose to the meridian. We could find +so little water that we all suffered from thirst, and with Neddie's +sickness in mind none of us dared eat more leaves or berries. + +The afternoon slowly wore away; the tide came in across the flats; the +shadows lengthened hour by hour. But no breath of wind cooled our hot +faces. Neddie lay in a heap, moaning fitfully; Blodgett and Davie Paine +slept; Roger sat with his back to a tree and watched the incoming tide; the +cook stirred about uneasily and muttered to himself. + +Coming over to me, he crouched at my side and spoke of Kipping. He was +savagely vindictive. "Hgh!" he grunted, "dat yeh crimp! He got dis nigger +once, yass, sah. Got me to dat boa'din' house what he was runner foh. Yass, +sah. Ah had one hunnerd dollahs in mah pants pocket, yass, sah. Nex' +mohnin' Ah woke up th'ee days lateh 'boa'd ship bound foh London. Ah ain' +got no hunnerd dollah in mah pants pocket. Dat yeh Kipping he didn't leave +me no pants pocket." The old black pulled open his shirt and revealed a +jagged scar on his great shoulder. "Look a' dat! Cap'n done dat--dat yeh +v'yage. Hgh!" + +At dusk Neddie's moaning woke the sleepers, and we held a council in which +we debated plans for the future. Daring neither to venture abroad nor to +eat the native fruits and leaves, exhausted by exposure, perishing of +hunger and thirst, we faced a future that was dark indeed. + +"As for me," said Davie calmly, "I can see only one way to end our misery." +He glanced at the cook's cleaver as he spoke. + +"No, no!" Roger cried sharply. "Let us have no such talk as that, Davie." +He hesitated, looking first at us,--his eyes rested longest on Neddie's +hollow face,--then at the marsh; then he leaned forward and looked from one +to another. "Men," he said, "I see no better way out of our difficulties +than to surrender to the natives." + +"Oh, no, no, sah! No, sah! Don' do dat, sah! No, no no!" With a yell black +Frank threw himself on his knees. "No, sah, no, sah! Dey's we'y devils, +sah, dey's wuss 'n red Injuns, sah!" + +"Fool." Roger cried. "Be still!" Seeming to hold the negro in contempt, he +turned to the rest of us and awaited our answer. + +At the time we were amazed at his harshness, and the poor cook was +completely overwhelmed; for little as Roger said, there was something in +his manner of saying it that burned like fire. But later, when we looked +back on that day and remembered how bitterly we were discouraged, we saw +reason to thank God that Roger Hamlin had had the wisdom and the power to +crush absolutely the first sign of insubordination. + +Staring in a curious way at the cook, who was fairly groveling on the +earth, Blodgett spoke up in a strangely listless voice. "I say yes, sir. If +we're to die, we're to die anyhow, and there's a bare chance they'll feed +us before they butcher us." + +"Ay," said Davie. "Me, too!" + +And Neddie made out to nod. + +The cook, watching the face of each man in turn, began to blubber; and when +I, the youngest and last, cast my vote with the rest, he literally rolled +on the ground and bellowed. + +"Get up!" Roger snapped out at him. + +He did so in a kind of stupid wonder. + +"Now then, cook, there's been enough of this nonsense. Come, let's sleep. +At daylight to-morrow we'll be on our way." + +Apparently the negro at first doubted his ears; but Roger's peremptory tone +brought him to his senses, and the frank disapproval of the others ended +his perversity. + +A certain confidence that our troubles were soon to be ended in one way or +another, coupled with exhaustion, enabled me to sleep deeply that night, +despite the numberless perils that beset us. + +I was aware that the cook continually moaned to himself and that at some +time in the night Roger and Blodgett were throwing stones at a wild beast +that was prowling about. Then the sun shone full on my face and I woke with +a start. + +Roger and Davie Paine each gave Neddie Benson an arm, Blodgett and I pushed +ahead to find the best footing, and the cook, once more palsied with fear, +again came last. To this day I have not been able to account for Frank's +strange weakness. In all other circumstances he was as brave as a lion. + +Staggering along as best we could, we arrived at the stream we had found +before--we dared not drink its water, even in our extremity--and followed +it to the glade, which this time we boldly entered. At first we saw no one, +but when we had advanced a few steps, we came upon three girls fishing from +the bank of the stream. As they darted off along the path that led up the +glade, we started after them, but we were so weak that, when we had gone +only a short distance, we had to sit down on the trunk of a large tree to +rest. + +About a quarter of an hour later we heard steps, and shortly seven men +appeared by the same path. + +Indicating by a motion of his hand that he wished the rest of us to remain +seated, Roger rose and went fearlessly to meet the seven. When he had +approached within a short distance, they stopped and drew their krises, or +knives with waved points. Never hesitating, Roger continued to advance +until he was within six feet of them, then falling on his knees and +extending his empty hands, he begged for mercy. + +For a long time they stood with drawn knives, staring at him and at us; +then one of them put up his kris, and knelt in front of him and offered him +both hands, which, it seemed, was a sign of friendship. + +When we indicated by gestures that we were hungry, they immediately gave us +each a cocoanut; but meanwhile some twenty or thirty more natives had +arrived at the spot where we were, and they now proceeded to take our hats +and handkerchiefs, and to cut the buttons from our coats. + +Presently they gave us what must have been an order to march. At all events +we walked with them at a brisk pace along a well-marked trail, between +great ferns and rank canes and grasses, and after a time we came to a +village composed of frail, low houses or bungalows, from which other +natives came running. Some of them shook their fists at us angrily; some +picked up sticks and clubs or armed themselves with knives and krises, and +came trailing along behind. Children began to throw clods and pebbles at +us. The mob was growing rapidly, and for some cause, their curiosity to see +the white men, the like of whom most of them probably never had seen +before, was unaccountably mixed with anger. + +If they were going to kill us, why did they not cut our throats and have it +done with? Still the people came running, till the whining of their voices +almost deafened us; and still they hustled us along, until at last we came +to a house larger than any we had passed. + +Here they all stopped, and our captors, with as many of the clamoring mob +as the place would hold, drove us through the open door into what appeared +to be the judgment-hall of the village. Completely at their mercy, we stood +by the judgment-seat in the centre of a large circle and waited until, at +the end of perhaps half an hour, an even greater uproar arose in the +distance. + +There was much stirring and talking and new faces continued to appear. From +where I stood I could see that the growing throng was armed with spears and +knives. More and more natives pressed into the ring that surrounded us and +listened intently to a brisk discussion, of which none of us could +understand a word. + +In one corner was a heap of melons; in another were spears and shields. I +was looking at them curiously when something familiar just above them +caught my eye and sent a stab of fear through my heart. In that array of +savage weapons were _three ship's cutlasses_. I was familiar enough with +the rife of those Eastern islands to know what that meant. + +Everywhere in the dim hall were bared knives, and muttering voices now and +then rose to loud shrieks. What with faintness and fatigue and fear, I felt +myself growing weak and dizzy. The circle of hostile faces and knives and +spears seemed suddenly dim and far-away. In all the hut I could see only +the three ship's cutlasses in the corner, and think only of what a grand +history theirs must have been. + +The distant roar that came slowly nearer seemed so much like a dream that I +thought I must be delirious, and rubbed my eyes and ears and tried to +compose myself; but the roar continued to grow louder, and now a more +intense clamor arose. The crowd parted and in through the open lane came a +wild, tall man, naked except for a pair of short breeches, a girdle, and a +red handkerchief on his head, who carried a drawn kris. Coming within the +circle, he stopped and stared at us. Then everything grew white and I found +myself lying on my back on the floor, looking up at them all and wondering +if they had killed me already. Small wonder that starvation and exposure +had proved too much for me! + +Roger was down on his knees beside me,--he told me long afterwards that +nothing ever gave him such a start as did my ghastly pallor,--and the +others, in the face of our common danger, gathered round me solicitously. +All, that is, except the cook; for, although our captors had exhibited a +lively curiosity about those of us who were white, they had frightened the +poor negro almost out of his wits by feeling of his cheeks and kinky hair +and by punching his ribs with their fingers, until now, having been +deprived of his beloved cleaver, he cowered like a scared puppy before the +gravely interested natives. "O Lo'd," he muttered between chattering teeth, +"O Lo'd, why am dis yeh nigger so popolous? O Lo'd, O Lo'd, dah comes +anotheh--dah comes anotheh!" + +Of the hostility of our captors there now could be no doubt. The sinister +motion of their weapons, the angry glances that they persistently darted at +us, the manner and inflection of their speech, all were threatening. But +Roger, having made sure that I was not injured, was on his feet and already +had faced boldly the angry throng. + +Though we could not understand the savages and they could not understand +us, Roger's earnestness when he began to speak commanded their attention, +and the chief fixed his eyes on him gravely. But some one else repeated it +twice a phrase that sounded like "Pom-pom, pom-pom!" And the rest burst +into angry yells. + +Roger indignantly threw his hands down,--palms toward the chief,--as if to +indicate that we had come in friendship; but the man laughed scornfully and +repeated the phrase, "Pom-pom!" + +Again Roger spoke indignantly; again he threw his hands down, palms out. +But once more the cry, "Pom-pom, pom-pom," rose fiercely, and the angry +throng pressed closer about us. The rest of us had long since despaired of +our lives, and for the moment even Roger was baffled. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" + +What the phrase meant we had not the remotest idea, but that our state now +was doubly perilous the renewed hubbub and the closing circle of weapons +convinced us. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" Again and again in all parts of the hall we heard the +mysterious words. + +Was there nothing that we could do to prove our good faith? Nothing to show +them that at least we did not come as enemies? + +Over Davie Fame's face an odd expression now passed. He was staring at the +heap of melons. + +"Mr. Hamlin," he said in a low voice, "if we was to cut a ship out of one +of them melons, and a boat and some men, we could show these 'ere heathen +how we didn't aim to bother them, and then maybe they'd let us go away +again." + +"Davie, Davie, man," Roger cried, "there's an idea!" + +I was completely bewildered. What could Davie mean, I wondered. Melons and +a ship? Were he and Roger mad? From Roger's actions I verily believed they +were. + +He faced our captors for a moment as if striving to think of some way to +impress them; then, with a quick gesture, he deliberately got down on the +floor and took the chief's foot and placed it on his head, to signify that +we were completely in the fellow's power. Next he rose and faced the man +boldly, and began a solemn and impressive speech. His grave air and stern +voice held their attention, though they could not understand a word he +said; and before their interest had time to fail, he drew from his pocket a +penknife, a weapon so small that it had escaped their prying fingers, and +walking deliberately to the corner where the melons were heaped up, took +one of them and began to cut it. + +At first they started forward; but when Roger made no hostile motion, they +gathered round him in silence to see what he was doing. + +"Here, men, is the ship," he said gravely, "and here the boats." Kneeling +and continuing his speech, he cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped +model of a ship, and stuck in it, to represent masts, three slivers of +bamboo, which he split from a piece that lay on the floor; then he cut a +smaller model, which he laid on the deck of the ship, to represent a boat. +On one side of the deck he upright six melon seeds, on the other twelve. +Pointing at the six seeds and holding up six fingers, he pointed at each +of us in turn. + +Suddenly one of the natives cried out in his own tongue; then another and +another seemed to understand Roger's meaning as they jabbered among +themselves and in turn pointed at the six seeds and at the six white men +whom they had captured. + +Roger then imitated a fight, shaking his fists and slashing as if with a +cutlass, and, last of all, he pointed his finger, and cried, "Bang! Bang!" + +At this the natives fairly yelled in excitement and repeated over and over, +"Pom--pom--pom--pom!" + +"Bang-bang!"--"Pom-pom!" We suddenly understood the phrase that they had +used so often. + +Now in dead silence, all in the hut, brown men and white, pressed close +around the melon-rind boat on the floor. So moving the melon seeds that it +was obvious that the six men represented by six seeds were being driven +overboard, Roger next set the boat on the floor and transferred them to it. +Lining up all the rest along the side of the ship, he cried loudly, "Bang +bang!" + +"Cook," he called, beckoning to black Frank, "come here!" + +As the negro reluctantly obeyed, Roger pointed to the long gash that +Kipping's bullet had cut in his kinky scalp. Crying again, "Bang-bang!" he +pointed at one of the seeds in the boat and then at the cook. + +Not one of them who could see the carved boats failed to understand what +Roger meant, and the brown men looked at Frank and laughed and talked more +loudly and excitedly than ever. Then the chief stood up and cried to some +one in the farthest corner of the room, and at that there was more laughing +and shouting. The man in the corner seemed much abashed; but those about +him pushed him forward, and he was shoved along through the crowd until he, +too, stood beside the table, where a dozen men pointed at his head and +cried "Bang-bang!" or "Pom-pom!" as the case might be. + +To our amazement we saw that just over his right temple there was torn the +path of a bullet, exactly that on the cook's head. + +[Illustration: +He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo.] + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +NEW ALLIES + + +Now the chief reached for Roger's knife and deftly whittled out the shape +of a native canoe. In it he placed several seeds, then, pushing it against +the carved ship, he pointed to the man with the bullet wound on his temple +and cried, "Pom-pom!" Next he pointed at two seeds in the boat and said, +"Pom-pom," and snapped them out of the canoe with his finger. + +"Would you believe it!" Blodgett gasped. "The heathens went out to the ship +in one o' them boats, and Falk fired on 'em!" + +"And two of 'em was killed!" Davie exclaimed unnecessarily. + +Roger now laid half a melon on the floor, its flat side down, and moved the +boat slowly over to it. + +That the half-melon represented the island was apparent to all. The natives +crowded round us, jabbering questions that we could not understand and of +course could not answer; they examined the cook's wound and compared it +with the wound their friend had suffered; they pointed at the little boats +cut out of melon-rind and laughed uproariously. + +Now one of them made a suggestion, the others took it up, and the chief +split melons and offered a half to each of us. + +We ate them like the starving men we were, and did not notice that the +chief had assembled his head men for a consultation, until he sent a man +running from the hall, returned shortly with six pieces of betel nut, which +the natives chew instead of tobacco, and gave them to the chief, who handed +one to each of us as a mark of friendship. Next, to our amazement, one of +the natives produced Roger's useless pistol and handed it back to him; and +as if that were a signal, one after another they restored our knives and +clubs, until, last of all, a funny little man with a squint handed the +cleaver back to the cook. + +With a tremendous sigh of relief, Frank seized the mighty weapon and laid +it on his knee and buried his big white teeth in half a melon. "Mah golly!" +he muttered, when he had swallowed the huge mouthful and had wiped his lips +and chin with the back of his hand, "Ah neveh 'spected to see dis yeh +felleh again. No, sah!" And he tapped the cleaver lovingly. + +The chief, who had been talking earnestly with his counselors, now made +signs to attract our attention. Obviously he wished to tell us a story of +his own. He cut out a number of slim canoes from the melon-rind and laid +them on the half-melon that represented the island; next, he pushed the +ship some distance away on the floor. Blowing on it through pursed lips, he +turned it about and drew it back toward the half-melon that represented the +island. When it was in the lee of the island, he stopped it and looked up +at us and smiled and pointed out of the door. We were puzzled. Seeing our +blank expressions, he repeated the process. Still we could not understand. + +Persisting in his efforts, he now launched three roughly carved canoes, in +which he placed a number of seeds, pointing at himself and various others; +then in each of the prows he placed two seeds and pointed at the six of us, +two at a time. Pointing next at the roof of the hut, he waved his hand from +east to west and closed his eyes as if in sleep, after which he placed his +finger on his lips, pushed the carved canoes very slowly across the floor +toward the ship, then, with a screech that made our hair stand on end, he +rushed them at the seeds that represented Captain Falk and his men, +yelling, "Pom-pom-pom-pom!" and snapped the seeds off on the floor. + +Leaning back, he bared his teeth and laughed ferociously. + +Here was a plot to take the ship! Although we probably had missed the fine +points of it, we could not mistake its general character. + +"Ay," said Blodgett, as if we had been discussing the matter for hours, +"but we'll be a pack of bloody pirates to be hanged from the yard-arms of +the first frigate that overhauls us." + +It was true. We should be liable as pirates in any port in Christendom. + +"Men," said Roger coolly, "there's no denying that in the eyes of the law +we'd be pirates as well as mutineers. But if we can take the ship and sail +it back to Salem, we'll be acquitted of any charge of mutiny or piracy, I +can promise you. It'll be easy to ship a new crew at Canton, and we can +settle affairs with the Websters' agents there so that at least we'll have +a chance at a fair trial if we are taken on our homeward voyage. Shall we +venture it?" + +The cook rolled his eyes. "Gimme dat yeh Kipping!" he cried, and with a +savage cackle he swung his cleaver. + +"Falk for me, curse him!" Davie Paine muttered with a neat that surprised +me. I had not realized that emotions as well as thoughts developed so +slowly in Davie's big, leisurely frame that he now was just coming to the +fullness of his wrath at the indignities he had undergone. + +Turning to the native chief, Roger cried, "We're with you!" And he +extended his hand to seal the bargain. + +Of course the man could not understand the words but in the nods we had +exchanged and in the cook's fierce glee, he had read our consent, and he +laughed and talked with the others, who laughed, too, and pointed at +Roger's pistol and cried, "Pom-pom!" and at the cook's cleaver and cried, +"Whish!" + +When by signs Roger indicated that we needed sleep the chief issued orders, +and half a dozen natives led us to a hut that seemed to be set apart for +our use. But although we were nearly perishing with fatigue, they urged by +signs that we follow them, and so insistent were they that we reluctantly +obeyed. + +Climbing a little hill beyond the village, we came to a cleared spot +surrounded by bushes through which we looked across between the mountains +to where we could just see the open ocean. There, not three miles away, the +Island Princess rode at anchor. + +I remember thinking, as I fell asleep, of the chance that Falk and Kipping +would sail away before it was dark enough to attack them, and I spoke of it +to Roger and the others, who shared my fear; but when our savage hosts +wakened us, we knew by their eagerness that the ship still lay at her +anchor. Why she remained, we could not agree. We hazarded a score of +conjectures and debated them with lively interest. + +Presently the natives brought us rice and sago-bread and peas. + +As I ate and looked out into the darkness where fires were twinkling, I +wondered which was the light I had seen that night when I watched from the +summit of the headland. + +Though a gentle rain was falling, the whole village was alive with people. +Men armed with spears and krises squatted in all parts of the hut. Boys +came and went in the narrow circle of light. Women and girls looked from +the door and from the farthest corners. Now and then some one would point +at Roger's pistol and cry, "Pom-pom!" or, to the pride and delight of the +cook, point at the cleaver and cry, "Whish!" and laugh loudly. + +Even black Frank had got over his terror of having natives come up without +warning and feel of his arm or his woolly head, though he muttered +doubtfully, "Ah ain't sayin' as Ah likes it. Dah's su'thin' so kind of +hongry de way dey comes munchin' an' proddin' round dis yeh ol' niggeh." + +At midnight we went out into the dark and the rain, and followed single +file after our leader along a narrow path that led through dripping ferns +and pools of mud and water, over roots and rocks, and under low branches, +which time and again swung back and struck our faces. + +We were drenched to the skin when we came at last to a sluggish, black +little stream, which ran slowly under thick overhanging trees, and in other +circumstances we should have been an unhappy and rebellious crew. But now +the spell of adventure was upon us. Our savage guides moved silently and +surely, and the forest was so mysterious and strange that I found its +allurement all but irresistible. The slow, silent stream, on which now and +then lights as faint and elusive as wisps of cloud played fitfully, +reflected from I knew not where, had a fascination that I am sure the +others felt as strongly as I. So we followed in silence and watched all +that the dense blackness of the night let us see. + +Now the natives launched canoes, which slipped out on the water and lay +side by side in the stream. Roger and Neddie Benson got into one; Blodgett +and Davie Paine another; the cook and I into a third, Whatever thoughts or +plans we six might have, we could not express them to the natives, and we +were too widely separated to put them into practice ourselves. We could +only join in the fight with good-will when the time came, and I assure you, +the thought made me very nervous indeed. Also, I now realized that the +natives had taken no chance of treachery on our part: _behind each of us +sat an armed man_. + +The canoes shot ahead so swiftly under the pressure of the paddles that +they seemed actually to have come to life. But they moved as noiselessly as +shadows. We glided down the stream and out in a long line into a little +bay, where we gathered, evidently to arrange the last details of the +attack. I heard Roger say in a low voice, "We'll reach the ship about three +bells and there couldn't be a better hour." Then, with a few low words of +command from the native chief, we spread out again into an irregular, +swiftly moving fleet, and swept away from the shore. + +As I looked back at the island I could see nothing, for the cloudy sky and +the drizzly rain completely obscured every object beyond a limited circle +of water; but as I looked ahead, my heart leaped and my breath came +quickly. We had passed the farthest point of land and there, dimly in the +offing, shone a single blurred light, which I knew was on the Island +Princess. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +WE ATTACK + + +In the darkness and rain we soon lost sight even of those nearest us on +each side, but we knew by the occasional almost imperceptible whisper of a +paddle in the water, or by the faintest murmur of speech, that the others +were keeping pace with us. + +To this day I do not understand how the paddlers maintained the proper +intervals in our line of attack; yet maintain them they did, by some means +or other, according to a preconcerted plan, for we advanced without hurry +or hesitation. + +Approaching the ship more closely, we made out the rigging, which the soft +yellow light of the lantern dimly revealed. We saw, too, a single dark +figure leaning on the taffrail, which became clear as we drew nearer. I was +surprised to perceive that we had come up astern of the ship--quite without +reason I had expected to find her lying bow on. Now we rode the gentle +swell without sound or motion. The slow paddles held us in the same place +with regard to the ship, and minutes passed in which my nervousness rose to +such a pitch that I felt as if I must scream or clap my hands simply to +shatter that oppressive, tantalizing, almost unendurable silence. But when +I started to turn and whisper to the cook, something sharp and cold pricked +through the back of my shirt and touched my skin, and from that time on I +sat as still as a wooden figurehead. + +After a short interval I made out other craft drawing in on our right and +left, and I later learned that, while we waited, the canoes were forming +about the ship a circle of hostile spears. But it then seemed at every +moment as if the man who was leaning on the taffrail must espy us,--it +always is hard for the person in the dark, who sees what is near the light, +to realize that he himself remains invisible,--and a thousand fears swept +over me. + +There came now from somewhere on our right a whisper no louder than a +mouse's hiss of warning or of threat. I scarcely was aware of it. It might +have been a ripple under the prow of the canoe, a slightest turn of a +paddle. Yet it conveyed a message that the natives instantly understood. +The man just behind me repeated it so softly that his repetition was +scarcely audible, even to me who sat so near that I could feel his breath, +and at once the canoe seemed silently to stir with life. Inch by inch we +floated forward, until I could see clearly the hat and coat-collar of the +man who was leaning against the rail. It was Kipping. + +From forward came the cautious voices of the watch. The light revealed the +masts and rigging of the ship for forty or fifty feet from the deck, but +beyond the cross-jack yard all was hazy, and the cabin seemed in the odd +shadows twice its real size. I wondered if Falk were asleep, too, or if we +should come on him sitting up in the cabin, busy with his books and charts. +I wondered who was in the galley, where I saw a light; who was standing +watch; who was asleep below. Still we moved noiselessly on under the stern +of the ship, until I almost could have put my hands on the carved letters, +"Island Princess." + +Besides things on deck, the light also revealed our own attacking party. +The man in front of me had laid his paddle in the bottom of the canoe and +held a spear across his knees. In the boat on our right were five natives +armed with spears and krises; in the one on our left, four. Beyond the +craft nearest to us I could see others less distinctly--silent shadows on +the water, each with her head toward our prey, like a school of giant fish. +In the lee of the ship, the pinnace floated at the end of its painter. + +Still the watch forward talked on in low, monotonous voices; still Kipping +leaned on the rail, his head bent, his arms folded, to all appearances fast +asleep. + +I had now forgotten my fears. I was keenly impatient for the word to +attack. + +A shrill wailing cry suddenly burst on the night air. The man in front of +me, holding his spear above his head with one hand, made a prodigious leap +from the boat, caught the planking with his fingers, got toe-hold on a +stern-port, and went up over the rail like a wild beast. With knives +between their teeth, men from the proas on my right and left boarded the +ship by the chains, by the rail, by the bulwark. + +I saw Kipping leap suddenly forward and whirl about like a weasel in his +tracks. His yell for all hands sounded high above the clamor of the +boarders. Then some one jabbed the butt of a spear into my back and, +realizing that mine was not to be a spectator's part in that weird battle, +I scrambled up the stern as best I could. + +The watch on deck, I instantly saw, had backed against the forecastle where +the watch below was joining it. Captain Falk and some one else, of whose +identity I could not be sure, rushed armed from the cabin. Then a missile +crashed through the lantern, and in the darkness I heard sea-boots banging +on the deck as those aft raced forward to join the crew. + +I clambered aboard, waving my arms and shouting; then I stood and listened +to the chorus of yells fore and aft, the _slip-slip-slip_ of bare feet, the +thud of boots as the Americans ran this way and that. I sometimes since +have wondered how I escaped death in that wild melee in the darkness. +Certainly I was preserved by no effort of my own, for not knowing which way +to turn, ignored by friend and foe alike, almost stunned by the terrible +sounds that rose on every side, I simply clutched the rail and was as +unlike the hero that my silly dreams had made me out to be--never had I +dreamed of such a night!--as is every half-grown lad who stands side by +side with violent death. + +Of Kipping I now saw nothing, but as a light momentarily flared up, I +caught a glimpse of Captain Falk and his party sidling along back to back, +fighting off their assailants while they struggled to launch a boat. Time +and time again I heard the spiteful crack of their guns and their oaths and +exclamations. Presently I also heard another sound that made my heart +throb; a man was moaning as if in great pain. + +Then another cried, with an oath, "They've got me! O Tom, haul out that +spear!" A scream followed and then silence. + +Some one very near me, who as yet was unaware of my presence, said, "He's +dead." + +"Look out!" cried another. "See! There behind you!" + +I was startled and instinctively dodged back. There was a crashing report +in my face; the flame of a musket singed my brows and hair, and powder +stung my skin. Then, as the man clubbed his gun, I dashed under his guard, +scarcely aware of the pain in my shoulder, and locking my right heel behind +his left, threw him hard to the deck, where we slipped and slid in a warm +slippery stream that was trickling across the planks. + +Back and forth we rolled, neither of us daring to give the other a moment's +breathing-space in which to draw knife or pistol; and all the time the +fight went on over our heads. I now heard Roger crying to the rest of us to +stand by. I heard what I supposed to be his pistol replying smartly to the +fire from Falk's party, and wondered where in that scene of violence he had +got powder and an opportunity to load. But for the most part I was rolling +and struggling on the slippery deck. + +When some one lighted a torch and the flame flared up and revealed the grim +scene, I saw that Falk and his remaining men were trying at the same time +to stand off the enemy and to scramble over the bulwark, and I realized +that they must have drawn up the pinnace. But I had only the briefest +glimpse of what was happening, for I was in deadly terror every minute lest +my antagonist thrust a knife between my ribs. I could hear him gasping now +as he strove to close his hands on my throat, and for a moment I thought he +had me; but I twisted away, got half on my knees with him under me, sprang +to my feet, then slipped once more on the slow stream across the planks, +and fell heavily. + +In that moment I had seen by torchlight that the pinnace was clear of the +ship and that the men with their guns and spikes were holding off the +natives. I had seen, too, a spear flash across the space of open water and +cut down one of the men. But already my adversary was at me again, and with +his two calloused hands he once more was gripping my throat. I exerted all +my strength to keep from being throttled. I tried to scream, but could only +gurgle. His head danced before me and seemed to swing in circles. I felt +myself losing strength. I rallied desperately, only to be thrown. + +Then, suddenly, I realized that he had let me go and had sat down beside me +breathing heavily. It was the man from Boston whose nose had been broken. +He eyed me curiously as if an idea had come upon him by surprise. + +"I didn't go to fight so hard, mate," he gasped, "but you did act so kind +of vicious that I just had to." + +"You what?" I exclaimed, not believing my ears. + +"It's the only way I had to come over to your side," he said with a +whimper. "Falk would 'a' killed me if I'd just up an' come, though I wanted +to, honest I did." + +I put my hand on my throbbing shoulder, and stared at him incredulously. + +"You don't need to look at me like that," he sniveled. "Didn't I stand by +Bill Hayden to the last along with you? Ain't I human? Ain't I got as much +appreciation as any man of what it means to have a murderin' pair of +officers like Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping? You don't suppose, do you, that +I'd stay by 'em without I had to?" + +I was somewhat impressed by his argument, and he, perceiving it, continued +vehemently, "I _had_ to fight with you. They'd 'a' killed you, too, if I +hadn't." + +There was truth in that. Unquestionably they would have shot me down +without hesitation if we two had not grappled in such a lively tussle that +they could not hit one without hitting the other. + +We got up and leaned on the bulwark and looked down at the boat, which rode +easily on the slow, oily swell. There in the stern-sheets the torchlight +now revealed Falk. + +"I'm lawful master of this vessel," he called back, looking up at the men +who lined the side. "I'll see you hanged from the yard-arm yet, you +white-livered wharf-rats, and you, too, you cabin-window popinjay!"--I knew +that he meant me.--"There'll come a day, by God! There'll come a day!" + +The men in the boat gave way, and it disappeared in the darkness and mist, +its sides bristling with weapons. + +But still Falk's voice came back to us shrilly, "I'll see you yet a-hanging +by your necks," until at last we could only hear him cursing. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +WHAT WE FOUND IN THE CABIN + + +Now some one called, "Ben! Ben Lathrop! Where are you?" + +"Here I am," I cried as loudly as I could. + +"Well, Ben, what's this? Are you wounded?" + +It was Roger, and when he saw with whom I was talking he smiled. + +"Well, Bennie," he cried, "so we've got a prisoner, have we?" + +"No, sir," whimpered the man from Boston, "not a prisoner. I come over, I +did." + +"You what?" + +"I come over--to your side, sir." + +"How about it, Ben?" + +"Why, so he says. We were having a pretty hard wrestling match, but he says +it was to cover up his escape from the other party." + +"How was I to get away, sir, if I didn't have a subterfoog," the prisoner +interposed eagerly. "I _had_ to wrastle. If I hadn't have, they'd 'a' shot +me down as sure as duff on Sunday." + +For my own part I was not yet convinced of his good faith. He had gripped +my throat quite too vindictively. To this very day, when I close my eyes I +can feel his hard fingers clenched about my windpipe and his knees forcing +my arms down on the bloody deck. He had let me go, too, only when we both +knew that Captain Falk and his men had put off from the ship. It seemed +very much as if he were trying to make the best of a bad bargain. But if, +on the other hand, he was entirely sincere in his protestations, it might +well be true that he did not dare come over openly to our side. The problem +had so many faces that it fairly made me dizzy, so I abandoned it and tore +open my clothes to examine the flesh wound on my shoulder. + +"Ay," I thought, when I saw where the musket-ball had cut me at close +range, "that was a friendly shot, was it not?" + +Roger himself was not yet willing to let the matter fall so readily. His +sharp questions stirred the man from Boston to one uneasy denial after +another. + +"But I tell you, sir, I come over as quick as I could." + +Again Roger spoke caustically. + +"But I tell you, sir, I did. And what's more, I can tell you a lot of +things you'd like to know. Perhaps you'd like to know--" He stopped short. + +Roger regarded him as if in doubt, but presently he said in a low voice, +"All right! Say nothing of this to the others. I'll see you later." + +Captain Falk and his crew, meanwhile, had moved away almost unmolested. +Their pikes and guns had held off the few natives who made a show of +pursuing them, and the great majority of our allies were running riot on +the ship, which was a sad sight when we turned to take account of the +situation. + +Three natives were killed and two were wounded, not to mention my injured +shoulder among our own casualties; and two members of the other party in +the crew were sprawled in grotesque attitudes on the deck. Counting the one +who was hit by a spear and who had fallen out of the boat, it meant that +Falk had lost three dead, and if blood on the deck was any sign, others +must have been badly slashed. In other words, our party was, numerically, +almost the equal of his. Considering the man from Boston as on our side, we +were seven to their eight. The lantern that we now lighted revealed more of +the gruesome spectacle, and it made me feel sick to see that both the man +from Boston and I were covered from head to foot with the gore in which we +had been rolling; but to the natives the sight was a stupendous triumph; +and the cook, when I next saw him, was walking down the deck, looking at +the face of one dead man after another. + +By and by he came to me where, overcome by a wave of nausea, I had sat down +on the deck with my back against the bulwark. "Dey ain't none of 'em +Kipping," he said grimly. Then he saw my bleeding shoulder and instantly +got down beside me. "You jest let dis yeh ol' nigger took a hand," he +cried. "Ah's gwine fix you all up. You jest come along o' me!" And helping +me to my feet, he led me to the galley, where once more he was supreme and +lawful master. + +In no time at all he had a kettle of water on the stove, in which the coals +of a good fire still lingered, and with a clean cloth he washed my wound so +gently that I scarcely could believe his great, coarse hands were actually +at work on me. "Dah you is," he murmured, bending over the red, shallow +gash that the bullet had cut, "dah you is. Don' you fret. Ah's gwine git +you all tied up clean an' han'some, yass, sah." + +The yells and cries of every description alarmed and agitated us both. It +was far from reassuring to know that that mob of natives was ranging the +ship at will. + +"Ef you was to ask me," Frank muttered, rolling his eyes till the whites +gleamed starkly, "Ah's gwine tell you dis yeh ship is sottin', so to speak, +on a bar'l of gunpowder. Yass, sah!" + +An islander uttered a shrill catcall just outside the galley and thrust his +head and half his naked body in the door. He vanished again almost +instantly, but Frank jumped and upset the kettle. "Yass, sah, you creepy +ol' sarpint," he gasped. "Yass, sah, we's sottin' on a bar'l of gunpowder." + +I am convinced, as I look back on that night from the pinnacle of more than +half a century, that not one man in ten thousand has ever spent one like +it. Allied with a horde whose language we could not speak, we had boarded +our own ship and now--mutineers, pirates, or loyal mariners, according to +your point of view--we shared her possession with a mob of howling heathens +whose goodwill depended on the whim of the moment, and who might at any +minute, by slaughtering us out of hand, get for their own godless purposes +the ship and all that was in her. + +The cook cautiously fingered the keen edge of his cleaver as we looked out +and saw that dawn was brightening in the east. + +"Dat Falk, he say he gwine git us yet," the cook muttered. "Maybe so--maybe +not. Maybe we ain't gwine last as long as dat." + +"All hands aft!" + +Frank and I looked at each other. The galley was as safe and comfortable as +any place aboard ship and we were reluctant to leave it. + +"_All hands aft!_" came the call again. + +"Ah reckon," Frank said thoughtfully, "me and you better be gwine. When +Mistah Hamlin he holler like dat, he want us." + +Light had come with amazing swiftness, and already we could see the deck +from stem to stern without help of the torches, which still flamed and sent +thin streamers of smoke drifting into the mist. + +As we emerged from the galley, I noticed that the after-hatch was half +open. That in itself did not surprise me; stranger things than that had +come to pass in the last hour or two; but when some one cautiously emerged +from the hold, with a quick, sly glance at those on the quarter-deck, I'll +confess that I was surprised. It was the man from Boston. + +Smiling broadly and turning his black rat-like eyes this way and that, the +chief of our wild allies, who held a naked kris from which drops of blood +were falling, stood beside Roger. Blodgett was at the wheel, nervously +fingering the spokes; Neddie Benson stood behind him, obviously ill at +ease, and Davie Paine, who had got from the cabin what few of his things +were left there, to take them forward, was a little at one side. But the +natives were swarming everywhere, aloft and alow, and we knew only too well +that no small movable object would escape their thieving fingers. + +"Ef on'y dem yeh heathen don't took to butcherin'!" the cook muttered. + +The prophetic words were scarcely spoken when what we most feared came to +pass. One of the islanders, by accident or design, bumped into Blodgett,-- +always erratic, never to be relied on in a crisis,--who, turning without a +thought of the consequences, struck the man with his fist a blow that +floored him, and flashed out his knife. + +That single spark threatened an explosion that would annihilate us. Spears +enclosed us from all sides; krises leaped at our throats. + +"Come on, lads! Stand together," Blodgett shrieked. + +With a yell of terror the cook sprang to join the others, and bellowing in +panic, swung his cleaver wildly. + +The man from Boston and Neddie Benson shrank back against the taffrail as a +multitude of moving brown figures seemed to swarm about us. Then I saw +Roger leap forward, his arms high in air, his hands extended. + +"Get back!" he cried, glancing at us over his shoulders. + +As all stopped and stared at him, he coolly turned to the chief and handed +him his pistol, butt foremost. Was Roger mad, I wondered? He was the sanest +man of all our crew. The chief gravely took the proffered weapon and looked +at Blodgett, whose face was contorted with fear, and at the Malay, who by +now was sitting up on deck blinking about him in a dazed way. Then he +smiled and raised his hand and the points of the weapons fell. + +In truth I was nearly mad myself, for now it all struck me as funny and I +laughed until I cried, and all the others looked at me, and soon the +natives began to point and laugh themselves. I suppose I was hysterical, +but it created a diversion and helped to save the day; and Neddie Benson +and the man from Boston, whom Roger had sent below, returned soon with +bolts of cloth and knives and pistols and threw them in a heap on the +quarter-deck. + +Some word that I suppose meant gifts, went from lip to lip and our allies +eagerly crowded around us. + +"Get behind me, men," Roger said in an undertone. "Whatever happens, guard +the companionway. I think we're safe, but since by grace of Providence +we're all here together, we'll take no chances that we can avoid." + +The first rays of sunlight shone on the heap of bright stuffs and polished +metal, but the sun itself was no brighter than the face of the chief when +Roger draped over him a length of bright cloth and presented him with a +handsome knife. He threw back his head, laughing aloud, and strutted across +the deck. Turning in grave farewell, he grasped his booty with one arm and, +after a few sharp words to his men, swung himself down by the chains with +the other. To man after man we gave gaudy cloths or knives or, when all +the knives were given away, a cutlass or a gun; and when at last the only +canoes in sight were speeding toward shore like comets with tails of red +flannel and purple calico, we breathed deeply our relief. + +"Now, men," said Roger, "we have a hard morning's work in front of us. +Cook, break out a cask of beef and a cask of bread, and get us something to +eat. Davie, you stand watch and keep your eye out either for a native canoe +or for any sign of Falk or his party. The rest of you--all except Lathrop-- +wash down the deck and sew those bodies up in a piece of old sail with +plenty of ballast. Ben, you and I have a little job in front of us. Come +into the cabin with me." + +I gladly followed him. He was as composed as if battle and death were all +in the routine of a day at sea, and I was full of admiration for his +coolness and courage. + +The cabin was in complete disorder, but comparatively few things had been +stolen. Apparently not many of the natives had found their way thither. + +"Fortunately," Roger said, unlocking Captain Whidden's chest of which he +had the key, "they've left the spare quadrant. We have instruments to +navigate with, so, when all's said and done, I suppose we're lucky." + +He closed the chest and locked it again; then he took from his pocket a +second key. "Benny, my lad," he said, "let's have a look at that one +hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +Going into the captain's stateroom, we shut the door and knelt beside the +iron safe. The key turned with difficulty. + +"It needs oil," Roger muttered, as he worked over it. "It turns as hard as +if some one has been tinkering with it." By using both hands he forced it +round and opened the door. + +The safe was empty. + +[Illustration: ] + + + + +VI + +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +FALK PROPOSES A TRUCE + + +As we faced each other in amazed silence, we could hear the men working on +deck and the sea rippling against the hull of the ship. I felt that strange +sensation of mingled reality and unreality which comes sometimes in dreams, +and I rather think that Roger felt it, too, for we turned simultaneously to +look again into the iron safe. But again only its painted walls met our +eyes. + +The gold actually was gone. + +Roger started up. "Now how did Falk manage that?" he cried. "I swear he +hadn't time to open the safe. We took them absolutely by surprise--I could +swear we did." + +I suggested that he might have hidden it somewhere else. + +"Not he," said Roger. + +"Would Kipping steal from Captain Falk?" + +"From Captain Falk!" Roger exclaimed. "If his mother were starving, he'd +steal her last crust. How about the bunk?" + +We took the bunk apart and ripped open the mattress. We sounded the +woodwork above and below. With knives we slit the cushion of Captain +Whidden's great arm-chair, and pulled out the curled hair that stuffed it. +We ransacked box, bag, cuddy, and stove; we forced our way into every +corner of the cabin and the staterooms. But we found no trace of the lost +money. + +It seemed like sacrilege to disturb little things that once had belonged +to that upright gentleman, Captain Joseph Whidden. His pipe, his +memorandum-book, and his pearl-handled penknife recalled him to my mind as +I had seen him so many times of old, sitting in my father's drawing-room, +with his hands folded on his knee and his firm mouth bent in a whimsical +smile. I thought of my parents, of my sister and Roger, of all the old +far-away life of Salem; I must have stood dreaming thus a long time when my +eyes fell on Nathan Falk's blue coat, which he had thrown carelessly on the +cabin table and had left there, and with a burst of anger I came back to +affairs of the moment. + +"They've got it away, Benny," said Roger, soberly. "How or when I don't +know, but there's no question that it's gone from the cabin. Come, let's +clear away the disorder." + +As well as we could we put back the numerous things we had thrown about, +and such litter as we could not replace we swept up. But wisps of hair +still lay on the tables and the chairs, and feathers floated in the air +like thistle-down. We had little time for housewifery. + +We found the others gathered round the galley, eating a hearty meal of salt +beef, ship's bread, and coffee, at which we were right glad to join them. +Roger had a way with the men that kept them from taking liberties, yet that +enabled him to mingle with them on terms far more familiar than those of a +ship's officer. I watched him as he sat down by Davie Paine, and grinned at +the cook, and asked Neddie Benson how his courage was and laughed heartily +at Blodgett who had spilled a cup of coffee down his shirt-front--yet in +such a way that Blodgett was pleased by his friendliness rather than +offended by his amusement. I suppose it was what we call "personality." +Certainly Roger was a born leader. After our many difficulties we felt so +jolly and so much at home,--all, that is, except the man from Boston, who +sat apart from the rest and stared soberly across the long, slow seas,-- +that our little party on deck was merrier by far than many a Salem +merrymaking before or since. + +I knew that Roger was deeply troubled by the loss of the money and I +marveled at his self-control. + +Presently I saw something moving off the eastern point of the island. +Thinking little of it, I watched it idly until suddenly it burst upon me +that it was a ship's boat. With a start I woke from my dream and shouted, +"Sail ho! Off the starboard bow!" + +In an instant our men were on their feet, staring at the newcomer. In all +the monotonous expanse of shining, silent ocean only the boat and the +island and the tiny sails of a junk which lay hull down miles away, were to +be seen. But the boat, which now had rounded the point, was approaching +steadily. + +"Ben, lay below to the cabin and fetch up muskets, powder, and balls," +Roger cried sharply. "Lend a hand, Davie, and bring back all the pikes and +cutlasses you can carry. You, cook, clear away the stern-chasers and stand +by to load them the minute the powder's up the companionway. Blodgett, you +do the same by the long gun. You, Neddie, bear a hand with me to trice up +the netting!" + +Spilling food, cups, pans, and kids in confusion on the deck, we sprang to +do as we were bid. In the sternsheets of the approaching boat we could make +out at a distance the slim form of Captain Nathan Falk. + +The rain had stopped long since, and the hot sun shining from a cloudless +sky was rapidly burning off the last vestige of the night mist as Captain +Falk's boat came slowly toward us under a white flag. A ground-swell gave +it a leisurely motion and the men approached so cautiously that their oars +seemed scarcely more than to dip in and out of the water. + +With double-charged cannon, with loaded muskets ready at hand, and with +pikes and cutlasses laid out on deck, one for each man, where we could +snatch them up as soon as we had spent our first fire, we grinned from +behind the nettings at our erstwhile shipmates. Tables had turned with a +vengeance since we had rowed away from the ship so short a time before. +They now were a sad-looking lot of men, some of them with bandages on their +limbs or round their heads, all of them disheveled, weary, and unkempt. But +they approached with an air of dignity, which Falk tried to keep up by +calling with a grand fling of his hand and his head, "Mr. Hamlin, we come +to parley under a flag of truce." + +I think we really were impressed for a moment. His face was pale, and he +had a blood-stained rag tied round his forehead, so that he looked very +much as if he were a wounded hero returning after a brave fight to arrange +terms of an honorable peace. But the cook, who heartily disapproved of +admitting the boat within gunshot, shattered any such illusion that we may +have entertained. + +"Mah golly!" he exclaimed in a voice audible to every man in both parties, +"ef dey ain't done h'ist up cap'n's unde'-clothes foh a flag of truce!" + +The remark came upon us so suddenly and we were all so keyed up that, +although it seems flat enough to tell about it now, then it struck us as +irresistibly funny and we laughed until tears started from our eyes. I +heard Blodgett's cat-yowl of glee, Davie Paine's deep guffaw, Neddie +Benson's shrill cackle of delight. But when, to clear my eyes, I wiped away +my tears, the men in the other boat were glaring at us in glum and angry +silence. + +"Ah, it's funny is it?" said Falk, and his voice me think of the times when +he had abused Bill Hayden. "Laugh, curse you, laugh! Well, that's all +right. There's no law against laughing. I've got a proposition to put up to +you. You've had your little fling and a costly one it's like to be. You've +mutinied and unlawfully confined the master of the ship, and for that +you're liable for a fine of one thousand dollars and five years in prison. +You've usurped the command of a vessel on the high seas unlawfully and by +force, and for that you're liable to a fine of two thousand dollars and ten +years in prison. Think about that, some o' you men that haven't a hundred +dollars in the world. The law'll strip and break you. But if that ain't +enough, we've got evidence to convict you in every court of the United +States of America of being pirates, felons, and robbers, and the punishment +for that is death. Think of that, you men." + +Falk lowered his head until his red scarf, which he had knotted about his +throat, made the ghastly pallor of his face seem even more chalky than it +was, and thrust his chin forward and leveled at us the index finger of his +right hand. The slowly rolling boat was so near us now that as we waited to +see what he would say next we could see his hand tremble. + +"Now, men," he continued, "you've had your little fling, and that's the +price you'll have to pay the piper. I'll get you, never you fear. Ah, by +the good Lord's help, I'll see you swinging from a frigate's yard-arm yet, +unless"--he stopped and glared at us significantly--"unless you do like I'm +going to tell you. + +"You've had your fling and there's a bad day of reckoning coming to you, +don't you forget it. But if you drop all this nonsense now, and go forward +where you belong and work the ship like good seamen and swear on the Book +to have no more mutinous talk, I'll forgive you everything and see that no +one prosecutes you for all you've done so far. How about it? Nothing could +be handsomer than that." + +"Oh, you always was a smooth-tongued scoundrel" Blodgett, just behind me, +murmured under his breath. + +The men in the two parties looked at each other in silence for a moment, +and if ever I had distrusted Captain Falk, I distrusted him four times more +when I saw the mild, sleek smile on Kipping's face. It was reassuring to +see the gleam in black Frank's eyes as he fingered the edge of his cleaver. + +I turned eagerly to Roger, upon whom we waited unanimously for a reply. + +"Yes, that's very handsome of you," he said reflectively. "But how do we +know you'll do all that you promise?" + +Falk's white face momentarily lighted. I thought that for an instant his +eyes shone like a tiger's. But he answered quietly, "Ain't my word good?" + +"Why, a _gentleman's_ word is always good security." + +There was just enough accent on the word "gentleman" to puzzle me. The +remark sounded innocent enough, certainly, and yet the stress--if stress +was intended--made it biting sarcasm. Obviously the men in the boat were +equally in doubt whether to take offense or to accept the statement in good +faith. + +"Well, you have my word," said Falk at last. + + +"Yes, we have your word. But there's one other thing to be settled. How +about the owners' money?" + +For a moment Falk seemed disconcerted, and I, thinking now that Roger was +merely badgering him, smiled with satisfaction. But Falk answered the +question after only brief hesitation, and Roger's next words plunged me +deep in a sea of doubt. + +"Why, I shall guard the owners' money with all possible care, Mr. Hamlin, +and expend it in their best interests," said Falk. + +"If that's the case," said Roger, "come alongside." + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +INCLUDING A CROSS-EXAMINATION + + +Falk tried, I was certain, to conceal a smile of joy at Roger's simplicity, +and I saw that others in the boat were averting their faces. Also I saw +that they were shifting their weapons to have them more readily available. + +Our own men, on the contrary, were remonstrating audibly, and to my lasting +shame I joined them. + +A queer expression appeared on Roger's face and he looked at us as if +incredulous. I suddenly perceived that our rebellious attitude hurt him +bitterly. He had led us so bravely through all our recent difficulties! And +now, when success seemed assured, we manifested in return doubt and +disloyalty! I literally hung my head. The others were abashed and silent, +but I knew that my own defection was more contemptible by far than theirs, +and had Roger reproached me sharply, I might have felt better for it. +Instead, he spoke without haste or anger in a voice pitched so low that +Falk could not possibly overhear him. + +"We simply _have_ to hold together, men. All to the gangway, now, and stand +by for orders." + +That was all he said, but it was enough. Thoroughly ashamed of ourselves, +we followed him to the gangway whither the boat was coming slowly. + +Roger assumed an air of neutral welcome as he reached for the bow of the +pinnace; but to us behind him he whispered sharply, "Stand ready, all +hands, with muskets and pikes." + +"Now, then, Captain Falk," he cried, "hand over the money first. We'll stow +it safe on board." + +"Come, come," Falk replied. "Belay that talk." He was +standing ready to climb on deck. + +"The money first," said Roger coolly. + +Suddenly he tried to hook the bow of the pinnace, but missed it as the +pinnace dipped in the trough. + +The rest of us, waiting breathlessly, for the first time comprehended +Roger's strategy. + +Falk looked up at him angrily. "That'll get you nowhere," he retorted. +"Come, stand away, or so help me, I'll see you hanged anyhow." + +Roger smiled at him coldly. "The word of a gentleman? The money first, +Captain Falk." + +"Well, if you are so stupid that you haven't discovered the truth yet, I +haven't the money." + +"Where is the money?" + +"In the safe in the cabin, as you very well know," replied Falk. + +"You lie!" Roger responded. + +With a ripping oath, Captain Falk whipped out his pistol. + +"You lie!" Roger cried again, hotly. "Put down that pistol or I'll blow you +to hell. Stand by, boys. We'll show them!" + +Though we were fewer than they, we had them at a tremendous disadvantage, +for we were protected by the bulwarks and could pour our musket-fire into +the open boat at will, and in a battle of cutlasses and pikes our advantage +would be even greater. + +"Don't a flag of truce give us no protection?" Kipping asked in that +accursedly mild voice--I could not hear it without thinking of poor Bill +Hayden, and to the others, they told me later, it brought the same bitter +memory. + + +"How long since Cap'n Falk's ol' unde' shirt done be a p'tection?" muttered +the cook grimly. + +"Yes, laugh! Laugh, you black baboon! Laugh, you silly little fool, +Lathrop!" Falk yelled. "I'll have you laughing another time one of these +days. Give way men! We'll have out their haslets yet." + +A hundred feet from the ship, the men rested on their oars, and Falk put on +a very different manner. "Roger Hamlin," he cried, "you ain't going to send +us away, are you?" + +I was astounded. As long as I had known Falk, I had never realized how many +different faces the man could assume at the shortest notice. But Roger +seemed not at all surprised. "Yes," he said, shortly, "we're going to send +you away, you black-hearted scoundrel." + +"Good God! We'll perish!" + +Although obvious retorts were many, Roger made no reply. + +Now Kipping spoke up mildly and innocently:-- + +"What'll we do? We can't land--the Malays was waiting for us on shore with +knives, all ready to cut our throats. We can't go to sea like this. What'll +we do?" + +"Supposing," cried old Blodgett, sarcastically, "supposing you row back to +Salem. It's only three thousand miles or more. You'll find it a pleasant +voyage, I'm sure, and you'd ought to run into enough Ladronesers and Malays +to make it interesting along the way." + +"Ain't we human?" Kipping whined, as if trying to wring pity from even +Blodgett. "Ain't you going at least to give us a keg o' water and some +bread?" + +"If you're not out of gunshot in five minutes," Roger cried, "I'll train +the long gun and blow you clean out of water." + +Without more ado they rowed slowly away, growing smaller and smaller, until +at last they passed out of sight round the point. + +"Ah me," sighed Neddie Benson, "I'm glad they're gone. It's funny Falk +ain't quite a light man nor yet a real dark man." + +"_Gone_!" Davie repeated ominously. "_I_ wish they was gone." He looked up +at the furled sails. "They ain't--and neither is we." + +"There's work to be done," said Roger, "and we must be about it. Leave the +nets as they are. Stack the muskets in the waist, pile the pikes handy by +the deckhouse, and all lay aft. We'd best have a few words together before +we begin." + +A moment later, as I was busy with the pikes, Roger came to me and +murmured, "There's something wrong afoot. The after-hatch has been pried +off." + +I noticed the hatch once more the next time I passed it, and I remembered +seeing the man from Boston emerge from the hold. But there was so much else +to be attended to that it was a long, long time before I thought of it +again. + +When we had done as Roger told us, we gathered round him where he waited, +leaning against the cabin, with his hands in his pockets. + +"We're all in the same boat together, men," he began. "We knew what the +chances were when we took them. If you wish to have it so, in the eyes of +the law we're pirates and mutineers, and since Falk seems to have got away +with what money there was on board, things may go hard with us. _But_--" he +spoke the word with stern emphasis--"_but_ we've acted for the best, and I +think there's no one here wants to try to square things up by putting Falk +in command again. How about it?" + +"Square things up, is it?" cried Blodgett. "The dirty villain would have us +hanged at the nearest gallows for all his buttery words." + +"Exactly!" Roger threw back his head. "And when we get to Salem, I can +promise you there's no man here but will be better off for doing as he's +done so far." + +"But whar's all dat money gone?" the cook demanded unexpectedly. + +"I don't know," said Roger. + +"What! Ain' dat yeh money heah?" + +"No." + +At that moment my eye chanced to fall on the man from Boston, who was +looking off at the island as if he had no interest whatever in our +conversation. The circumstances under which he had stayed with us were so +strange and his present preoccupation was so carefully assumed, that I was +suddenly exceedingly suspicious of him, although when I came to examine the +matter closely, I could find no very definite grounds for it. + +Blodgett was watching him, too, and I think that Roger followed our gaze +for suddenly he cried, "You there!" in a voice that brought the man from +Boston to his feet like the snap of a whip. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he replied briskly. + +"What are you doing here, anyway?" Roger demanded. The fellow, who had +begun to assume as many airs and as much self-confidence as if he had been +one of our own party from the very first, was sadly disconcerted. "Why I +come over to your side first chance I had," he replied with an aggrieved +air. + +"What were you doing in the cabin when the natives were running all over +the ship?" + +The five of us, startled by the quick, sharp questions, looked keenly at +the man from Boston. But he, recovering his self-possession, replied coolly +enough, "I was just a-keeping watch so they wouldn't steal--I kept them +from running off with the quadrant." + +"Keeping watch so _nobody'd_ steal, I suppose," said Roger. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir! That's it exactly." + +Suddenly my mind leaped back to the night when Bill Hayden had died, and +the man from Boston had made that cryptic remark, to which I called +attention long since. "He said he could tell something, Roger," I burst +out. But Roger silenced me with a glance. + +Turning on the fellow again, he said, "If I find that you are lying to me, +I'll shoot you where you stand. What do you know about who killed Captain +Whidden?" + +For once the fellow was taken completely off his guard. He glanced around +as if he wished to run away, but there was no escape. He saw only hostile +faces. + +"What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" + +"Mr. Kipping killed him," the fellow gasped, startled out of whatever +reticence he may have intended to maintain. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" + +"Do you expect me to believe that Kipping shot the captain? If you lie to +me--" Roger drew his pistol. By eyes and voice he held the man in a +hypnosis of terror. + +"He did! I swear he did. Don't shoot me, sir! I'm telling you the very +gospel truth. He cursed awful and said--don't point that pistol at me, sir! +I swear I'll tell the truth!--'Mr. Thomas is as good as done for,' he said. +'There's only one man between us and a hundred thousand dollars in gold.' +And Falk--Kipping was talking to Falk low-like and didn't know I was +anywhere about--and Falk says, 'No, that's too much.' Then he says, +wild-like, 'Shoot--go on and shoot.' Then Kipping laughs and says, 'So +you've got a little gumption, have you?' and he shot Captain Whidden and +killed him. Don't point that pistol at _me_, sir! I didn't do it." + +Roger had managed the situation well. His sudden and entirely unexpected +attack had got from the man a story that a month of ordinary +cross-examinations might not have elicited; for although the fellow had +volunteered to tell all he knew, his manner convinced me that under other +circumstances he would have told no more than he had to. Also he had +admitted being in the cabin while the natives were roaming over the ship! + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +AN ATTEMPT TO PLAY ON OUR SYMPATHY + + +For the time being we let the matter drop and, launching a quarter-boat for +work around the ship, turned our attention to straightening out the rigging +and the running gear so that we could get under way at the earliest +possible moment. Twice natives came aboard, and a number of canoes now and +then appeared in the distance; but we were left on the whole pretty much to +our own devices, and we had great hopes of tripping anchor in a few hours +at the latest. + +Roger meanwhile got out the quadrant and saw that it was adjusted to take +an observation at the first opportunity; for there was no doubt that by +faulty navigation or, more probably, by malicious intent, Falk had brought +us far astray from the usual routes across the China Sea. + +Occasionally bands of natives would come out from shore in their canoes and +circle the ship, but we gave them no further encouragement to come aboard, +and in the course of the morning Roger divided us anew into anchor watches. +All in all we worked as hard, I think, as I ever have worked, but we were +so well contented with the outcome of our adventures that there was almost +no grumbling at all. + +When at last I went below I was dead tired. Every nerve and weary muscle +throbbed and ached, and flinging myself on my bunk, I fell instantly into +the deepest sleep. When I woke with the echo of the call, "All hands on +deck," still lingering in my ears, it seemed as if I scarcely had closed my +eyes; but while I hesitated between sleeping and waking, the call sounded +again with a peremptory ring that brought me to my feet in spite of my +fatigue. + +"All hands on deck! Tumble up! Tumble up!" It was the third summons. + +When we staggered forth, blinded by the glaring sunlight, the other watch +already had snatched up muskets and pikes and all were staring to the +northeast. Thence, moving very slowly indeed, once more came the boat. + +Falk was sitting down now; his chin rested on his hands and his face was +ghastly pale; the bandage round his head appeared bloodier than ever and +dirtier. The men, too, were white and woe-begone, and Kipping was scowling +disagreeably. + +It seemed shameful to take arms against human beings in such a piteous +plight, but we stood with our muskets cocked and waited for them to speak +first. + +"Haven't you men hearts?" Falk cried when he had come within earshot. "Are +you going to sit there aboard ship with plenty of food and drink and see +your shipmates a-dying of starvation and thirst?" + +The men rested on their oars while he called to us; but when we did not +answer, he motioned with his hand and they again rowed toward us with +short, feeble strokes. + +"All we ask is food and water," Falk said, when he had come so near that we +could see the lines on the faces of the men and the worn, hunted look in +their eyes. + +They had laid their weapons on the bottom of the boat, and there was +nothing warlike about them now to remind us of the bloody fight they had +waged against us. With a boy's short memory of the past and short sight for +the future, I was ready to take the poor fellows aboard and to forgive them +everything; and though it undoubtedly was foolish of me, I am not ashamed +of my generous weakness. They seemed so utterly miserable! But fortunately +wiser counsels prevailed. + +"You ain't really going to leave us to perish of hunger and thirst, are +you?" Falk cried. "We can't go ashore, even to get water. Those cursed +heathen are laying to butcher us. Guns pointed at friends and shipmates is +no kind of a 'welcome home.'" + +"Give us the money, then--" Roger began. + +The cook interrupted him in an undertone that was plainly audible though +probably not intended for all ears. + +"Yeee-ah! Heah dat yeh man discribblate! He don't like guns pointed at +shipmates, hey? How about guns pointed at a cap'n when he ain't lookin'? +Hey?" + +Falk obviously overheard the cook's muttered sally and was disconcerted by +it; and the murmur of assent with which our men received it convinced me +that it went a long way to reinforce their determination to withstand the +other party at any cost whatsoever. + +After hesitating perceptibly, Falk decided to ignore it. "All we want's +bread and water," he whined. + +"Give us the money, then," Roger repeated, "and we'll see that you don't +starve." His voice was calm and incisive. He absolutely controlled the +situation. + +Falk threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. "But we ain't got the +money. So help me God, we ain't got a cent of it." + +"Hand over the money," Roger repeated, "and we'll give you food and water." +He pointed at the quarter-boat, which swung at the end of a long painter. +"Come no nearer. Put the money in that boat and we'll haul it up." + +"We _ain't got the money_, I tell you. I swear on my immortal soul, we +ain't got it." Falk seemed to be on the point of weeping. He was so weak +and white! + +When Roger did not reply, I turned to look at him. There was a thoughtful +expression on his face, and following the direction of his eyes, my own +gaze rested on the face of the man from Boston. He was smiling. But when +he saw us looking at him, he stopped and changed color. + +"I believe you," Roger declared suddenly. "You'll have to keep your +distance or I'll blow your boat to pieces; but if you obey orders, I'll +help you out as far as a few days' supply of food will go. Cook, haul in +that boat and put half a hundredweight of ship's bread and four buckets of +water in it. That'll keep 'em for a while." + +"You ain't gwine to feed dat yeh Kipping, sah, is you?" + +"Yes." + +The cook turned in silence to do Roger's bidding. + +Twice the man from Boston started forward as if to speak. The motion was so +slight that it almost escaped me, but the second time I was sure that I +really had detected such an impulse, and at the same moment I perceived +that Falk, whose fingers were twitching nervously, was shooting an angry +glance at him. This byplay to a considerable extent distracted my +attention; but when the fellow finally did get up courage to speak, I saw +that the eyes of every man in Falk's boat were on him and that Kipping had +clenched both fists. + +"Stop!" the man from Boston cried. "Stop!" He stepped toward Roger with one +hand raised. + +Roger soberly turned on him. "Be still," he said. + +"But, sir--" + +"Be still!" + +"But, sir, there ain't no--" + +Certainly as far as we could see, the man's feverish persistence was arrant +insubordination. What Roger would have done we had no time to learn, for +Blodgett, bursting with zeal for our common cause, grasped him by the +throat and choked his words into a gurgle. A queer expression of spite and +hatred passed over the man's face, and when he squirmed away from +Blodgett's grip I saw that he was muttering to himself as he rubbed his +bruised neck. But the others were paying him no attention and he presently +folded his arms with an air that continued to trouble me and stood apart +from the rest. + +And Falk and Kipping and all their men now were grinning broadly! + +The water slopped over the edges of the buckets and wet some of the bread +as the cook pushed the boat out toward Falk; but the men in the pinnace +watched it eagerly, and when it floated to the end of the painter, they +clutched for it so hastily that they almost upset the precious buckets. + +When they had got it, they looked at each other and laughed and slapped +their legs and laughed again in an uproarious, almost maudlin mirth that we +could not understand. + +We covered them with our muskets lest they try to seize the boat, which I +firmly believe they had contemplated before they realized how closely we +were watching them, and we smiled to see them cram their mouths with bread +and pass the buckets from hand to hand. When they had finished their +inexplicable laughter, they ate like animals and drew new strength and +courage from their food. Though Falk was still white under his bloody +bandage, his voice was stronger. + +"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace +before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of +sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your +piper." + +He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as +if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances. + +"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see +what we shall see." + +"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see +it, too, won't it, sir?" + +It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so +we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the +long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in +undertones we kept up an exchange of comments. + +After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to +row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that +a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their +air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our +compassion. We watched them suspiciously, but they now assumed a frank +manner, which they evidently hoped would put us off our guard. + +"Now you men listen to me," said Falk. "After all, what's the use of +behaving this way? You're just getting yourselves into trouble with the +law. We can send you to the gallows for this little spree, and what's more +we're going to do it--unless, that is, unless you come round sensible and +call it all off. Now what do you say? Why don't you be reasonable? You take +us on board and we'll use you right and hush all this up as best we can. +What do you say?" + +"What do we say?" said Roger, "We say that bread and water have gone to +your head. You were singing another time a while back." + +"Oh well, we _were_ a little down in the mouth then. But we're feeling a +sight better now. Come, ain't our plan reasonable?" + +All the time they were rowing slowly nearer to the ship. + +"Mistah Falk, O Mistah Falk!" + +"Well?" Falk received the cook's interruption with an ill temper that made +the darkey's eyes roll with joy. + +"Whar you git dat bootiful head-piece?" + + +A flush darkened Falk's pale face under the bandage, and with what dignity +he could muster, he ignored our snickers. + +"What do you say?" he cried to Roger. "Evidently you haven't found the +money yet." + +To us Roger said in an undertone, "Hold your fire." To Falk he +replied clearly, "You black-hearted villain, if you show your face in a +Christian port you'll go to the gallows for abetting the cold-blooded +murder of an able officer and an honorable gentleman, Captain Joseph +Whidden. Quid that over a while and stow your tales of piracy and mutiny. +Back water, you! Keep off!" + +Here was no subtle insinuation. Falk was stopped in his tracks by the flat +statement. He had a dazed, frightened look. But Kipping, who had kept +himself in the background up to this point, now assumed command. + +"Them's bad words," he said mildly, coldly. "Bad words. _But_--" he +slightly raised his voice--"we ain't a-goin' to eat 'em. Not we." All at +once he let out a yell that rang shrilly far over the water. "At 'em, men! +At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull! Out pikes and cutlasses! Take +'em by storm! Slash the netting and go over the side." + +"Hold your fire,"--Roger repeated,--"one minute--till I give the word." + +My heart was pounding at my ribs. I was breathing in fast gulps. With my +thumb on the hammer of the musket, I gave one glance to the priming, and +half raised it to my shoulder. + +From the bottom of the boat Falk's men had snatched up the weapons that +hitherto they had kept out of sight. I had no time then to wonder why they +did not shoot; afterwards we agreed that they probably were so short of +powder and balls that they dared not expend any except in gravest +emergency. Kipping was standing as they rowed, and so fiercely now did they +ply their oars, casting to the winds every pretence of weakness, that the +boat rocked from side to side. + +"At 'em!" Kipping snarled. "We'll show 'em! We'll show'em!" + +"Hold your fire, men," said Roger the third time. "I'll wing that bird." +And aiming deliberately, he shot. + +The report of his musket rang out sharply and was followed by a groan. +Kipping clutched his thigh with both hands and fell. The men stopped rowing +and the boat, gradually losing way, veered in a half circle and lay +broadside toward us. In the midst of the confusion aboard it, I saw Kipping +sitting up and cursing in a way that chilled my blood. "Oh," he moaned, +"I'll get you yet! I'll get you yet!" Then some one in the boat returned a +single shot that buried itself in our bulwark. + +"Yeeeehaha! Got Kipping!" the cook cackled. "He got Kipping!" + +"Now then," cried Roger, "bear off. We've had enough of you. If ever again +you come within gunshot of this ship, we'll shoot so much lead into you +that the weight will sink you. It's only a leg wound, Kipping. I was +careful where I aimed." + +In a disorderly way the men began to pull out of range, but still we could +hear Kipping shrieking a stream of oaths and maledictions, and now Falk +stood up and shook his fist at us and yelled with as much semblance of +dignity as he could muster, "I'll see you yet, all seven of you, I'll see +you a-swinging one after another from the game yard-arm!" Then, to our +amazement, one of them whispered to the others behind his hand, and they +all began to laugh again as if they had played some famous joke on us. + +Instead of going toward the island, they rowed out into the ocean. We could +not understand it. Surely they would not try to cross the China Sea in an +open boat! Were they so afraid of the natives? + +Still we could hear Kipping, faintly now, bawling wrath and blasphemy. We +could see Captain Falk shaking his fist at us, and very clearly we could +hear his faint voice calling, "I'll sack that ship, so help me! We'll see +then what's become of the money." + +Where in heaven's name could they be going? Suddenly the answer came to us. +Beyond them in the farthest offing were the tiny sails of the almost +becalmed junk. They were rowing toward it. Eight mariners from a Christian +land! + +In that broad expanse of land and sea and sky, the only moving object was +the boat bearing Captain Falk and his men, which minute after minute +labored across the gently tossing sea. + +Already the monsoon was weakening. The winds were variable, and for the +time being scarce a breath of air was stirring. + +From the masthead we watched the boat grow smaller and smaller until it +seemed no bigger than the point of a pin. The men were rowing with short, +slow strokes. They may have gone eight or ten miles before darkness closed +in upon them and blotted them out, and they must have got very near to the +junk. + +The moon, rising soon after sunset, flooded the world with a pale light +that made the sea shine like silver and made the island appear like a dark, +low shadow. But of the boat and the junk it revealed nothing. + +The cook and Blodgett and I were talking idly on the fore hatch when +faintly, but so distinctly that we could not mistake it, we heard far off +the report of a gun. + +"Listen!" cried Blodgett. + +It came again and then again. + +The cook laid his hand on my shoulder. "Boy," he gasped out, "don' you heah +dat yeh screechin'?" + +"No," said I. + +"Listen!" + +We sat for a long time silent, and presently we heard one more very distant +gunshot. + +Neither Blodgett nor I had heard anything else, but the cook insisted that +he had heard clearly the sound of some one far off shrieking and wailing in +the night. "Ah heah dat yeh noise, yass, sah. Ah ain't got none of dem +yamalgamations what heahs what ain't." + +He was so big and black and primitive, and his great ears spread so far out +from his head, that he reminded me of some wild beast. Certainly he had a +wild beast's keen ears. + +But now Blodgett raised his hand. "Here's wind," he said. + +And wind it was, a fresh breeze that seemed to gather up the waning +strength of the light airs that had been playing at hide and seek with our +ropes and canvas. + +At daybreak, cutting the cable and abandoning the working bower, we got +under way on the remainder of our voyage to China, bearing in a generally +northwesterly course to avoid the dangerous waters lying directly between +us and the port of our destination. + +As we hauled at halyard and sheet and brace, and sprang quickly about at +Roger's bidding, I found no leisure to watch the dawn, nor did I think of +aught save the duties of the moment, which in some ways was a blessed +relief; but I presently became aware that David Paine, who seemed able to +work without thought, had stopped and was staring intently across the heavy +seas that went rolling past us. Then, suddenly, he cried in his deep voice, +"Sail ho!" + +Hazily, in the silver light that intervened between moonset and sunrise, we +saw a junk with high poop and swinging batten sails bearing across our +course. She took the seas clumsily, her sails banging as she pitched, and +we gathered at the rail to watch her pass. + +"See there, men!" old Blodgett cried. + +He pointed his finger at the strange vessel. We drew closer and stared +incredulously. + +On the poop of the junk, beside the cumbersome rudder windlass, leaning +nonchalantly against the great carved rail, were Captain Nathan Falk and +Chief Mate Kipping. That the slow craft could not cross our bows, they saw +as well as we. Indeed, I question if they cared a farthing whether they +sighted us that day or not. But they and their men, who gathered forward to +stare sullenly as we drew near, shook fists and once more shouted curses. I +could see them distinctly, Falk and Kipping and the carpenter and the +steward and the sail-maker and the rest--angry, familiar faces. + +When we had swept by them, running before the wind, some one called after +us in a small, far-off voice, "We'll see you yet in Sunda Strait." + +There was a commotion on the deck of the junk and Blodgett declared that +Falk had hit a man. + +Were they changing their time for some reason that they did not want us to +suspect? _Did they really wish to cut us off on our return?_ + + +Speculating about the fate of the yellow mariners who once had manned those +clumsy sails, and about what scenes of bloody cruelty there must have been +when those eight mad desperadoes attacked the ancient Chinese vessel, we +sailed away and left them in their pirated junk. But I imagined, even when +the old junk was hull down beyond the horizon, that I could hear an angry +voice calling after us. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +WE REACH WHAMPOA, BUT NOT THE END OF OUR TROUBLES + + +We were only seven men to work that ship, and after all these years I +marvel at our temerity. Time and again the cry "All hands" would come down +the hatch and summon the three of us from below to make sail, or reef, or +furl, or man the braces. Weary and almost blind with sleep, we would +stagger on deck and pull and haul, or would swarm aloft and strive to cope +with the sails. The cook, and even Roger, served tricks at the wheel, turn +and turn about with the rest of us; and for three terrible weeks we forced +ourselves to the sheets and halyards, day and night, when we scarcely could +hold our eyes open or bend our stiffened fingers. + +A Divine Providence must have watched over us during the voyage and have +preserved us from danger; for though at that season bad storms are by no +means unknown, the weather remained settled and fine. With clear water +under our keel we passed shoal and reef and low-lying island. Now we saw a +Tonquinese trader running before the wind, a curious craft, with one mast +and a single sail bent to a yard at the head and stiffened by bamboo sprits +running from luff to leech; now a dingy nondescript junk; now in the offing +a fleet of proas, which caused us grave concern. But in all our passage +only one event was really worth noting. + +When we were safely beyond London Reefs and the Fiery Cross, we laid our +course north by east to pass west of Macclesfield Bank. All was going as +well as we had dared expect, so willing was every man of our little +company, except possibly the man from Boston, whom I suspected of a +tendency to shirk, when late one evening the cook came aft with a very long +face. + +"Well," said Roger, his eyes a-twinkle. "What's wrong in the galley, +doctor?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah! S'pose, sah, you don't' know dah's almost no mo' +wateh foh to drink, sah." + +"What's that you say?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah, we done share up with dat yeh Kipping and dah ain't +no mo' to speak of at all, sah." + +It was true. The casks below decks were empty. In the casks already broken +out there was enough for short rations to last until we made port, so our +predicament as yet was by no means desperate; but we remembered the +laughter of Falk and his men, and we were convinced that they knew the +trick they played when they persuaded us to divide the ship's bread and +water. By what mishap or mismanagement the supply of food had fallen +short--there had been abundant opportunity for either--we were never to +learn; but concerning the water-supply and Falk's duplicity, we were very +soon enlightened. + +"Our friend from Boston," Roger said slowly, when the cook had gone, "seems +to have played us double. We'll have him below, Ben, and give him a chance +to explain." + +I liked the fellow less than ever when he came into the cabin. He had a +certain triumphant air that consorted ill with his trick of evading one's +eyes. He came nervously, I thought; but to my surprise Roger's caustic +accusal seemed rather to put him at ease than to disconcert him further. + +"And so," Roger concluded, after stating the case in no mincing terms, "you +knew us to be short of water, yet you deliberately neglected to warn us." + +"Didn't I try to speak, sir? Didn't you cut me off, sir?" + +Roger looked at him gravely. Although the fellow flinched, he was telling +the truth. In justice we had to admit that Roger had given him no hearing. + +"Ay, and that skinny old money-chaser tried to throttle me," he continued. +"Falk lay off that island only because we needed water. Ay, we all knew we +needed it--Falk and all of us. But them murderin' natives was after our +heart's blood whenever we goes ashore, just because Chips and Kipping +drills a few bullet-holes in some of 'em. I knew what Falk was after when +he asks you for water, sir. The scuttlebutts with water in 'em was on deck +handy, and most of them below was empty where you wa'n't likely to trouble +'em for a while yet. He see how't would work out. Wasn't I going to tell +you, even though he killed me for it, until you cut me off and that 'un +choked me? It helps take the soreness--it--I tried to tell you, sir." + +In petty spite, the fellow had committed himself, along with the rest of +us, to privation at the very least. Yet he had a defense of a kind, +contemptible though it was, and Roger let him go. + +It was a weary voyage; but all things have an end, and in ten days we had +left Helen Shoal astern. Now we saw many junks and small native craft, +which we viewed with uncomfortable suspicion, for though our cannon were +double-charged and though loaded muskets were stacked around the +mizzenmast, we were very, very few to stand off an attack by those yellow +demons who swarmed the Eastern seas in the time of my boyhood and who, for +all I know, swarm them still. + +There came at last a day when we went aloft and saw with red eyes that +ached for sleep hills above the horizon and a ship in the offing with all +sails set. A splendid sight she was, for our own flag flew from the ensign +halyards, and less than three weeks before, any man of us would have given +his right hand to see that ship and that flag within hail; but now it was +the sight of land that thrilled us to the heart. Hungry, thirsty, worn out +with fatigue, we joyously stared at those low, distant hills. + +"Oh, mah golly, oh, mah golly!" the cook cried, in ecstasy, "jest once Ah +gits mah foots on dry land Ah's gwine be de happies' nigger eveh bo'n. Ah +ain' neveh gwine to sea agin, no sah, not neveh." + +"Ay, land's good," Davie Paine muttered, "but the sea holds a man." + +Blodgett said naught. What dreams of wealth were stirring in his head, I +never knew. He was so very pale! He more than any one else, I think, was +exhausted by the hardships of the voyage. + +Roger, gaunt and silent, stood with his arms crossed on the rail. He had +eaten almost nothing; he had slept scarcely at all. With unceasing courage +he had done his duty by day and by night, and I realized as I saw him +standing there, sternly indomitable, that his was the fibre of heroes. I +was proud of him--and when I thought of my sister, I was glad. Then it was +that I remembered my father's words when, as we walked toward Captain +Whidden's house, we heard our gate shut and he knew without looking back +who had entered. + +We came into the Canton River, or the Chu-Kiang as it is called, by the +Bocca-Tigris, and with the help of some sailing directions that Captain +Whidden had left in writing we passed safely through the first part of +the channel between Tiger Island and Towling Flat. Thence, keeping the +watch-tower on Chuen-pee Fort well away from the North Fort of Anung-hoy, +we worked up toward Towling Island in seven or eight fathoms. + +A thousand little boats and sampans clustered round us, and we were annoyed +and a little frightened by the gesticulations of the Chinese who manned +them, until it dawned on us that they wished to serve as pilots. By signs +we drove a bargain--a silver dollar and two fingers; three fingers; five +fingers--and got for seven silver dollars the services of several men in +four sampans, who took their places along the channel just ahead of us and +sounded the depth with bamboo poles, until by their guidance we crossed the +second bar on the flood tide, which providentially came at the very hour +when we most needed it, and proceeded safely on up the river. + +That night, too tired and weak to stand, we let the best bower go by the +run in Whampoa Roads, and threw ourselves on the deck. By and by--hours +later it seemed--we heard the sound of oars. + +"Island Princess ahoy!" came the hearty hail. + +"Ahoy," some one replied. + +"What's wrong? Come, look alive! What does this mean?" + +I now sat up and saw that Roger was standing in the stern just as he had +stood before, his feet spread far apart, his arms folded, his chin +out-thrust. "Do you, sir," he said slowly, "happen to have a bottle of wine +with you?" + +I heard the men talking together, but I could not tell what they were +saying. Next, I saw a head appear above the bulwark and realized that they +were coming aboard. + +"Bless my soul! What's happened? Where's Captain Whidden? Bless my soul! +Who are _you_?" The speaker was big, well dressed, comfortably well fed. He +stared at the six of us sprawled out grotesquely on the deck, where we had +thrown ourselves when the ship swung at her anchor. He looked up at the +loose, half-furled sails. He turned to Roger, who stood gaunt and silent +before him. "Bless my soul! _Who are you?_" + +"I," said Roger, "am Mr. Hamlin, supercargo of this ship." + +"But where--what in heaven's name has taken place? Where's Captain +Whidden?" + +"Captain Whidden," said Roger, "is dead." + +"But when--but what--" + +"_Who are you?_" Roger fired the words at him like a thunderclap. + +"I--I--I am Mr. Johnston, agent for Thomas Webster and Sons," the man +stammered. + +"Sir," cried Roger, "if you are agent for Thomas Webster and Sons, fetch us +food and water and get watchmen to guard this ship while we sleep. Then, +sir, I'll tell you such a story as you'll not often hear." + +The well-fed, comfortable man regarded him with a kind of frown. The +situation was so extraordinary that he simply could not comprehend it. For +a moment he hesitated, then, stepping to the side, he called down some +order, which I did not understand, but which evidently sent the boat +hurrying back to the landing. As he paced the deck, he repeated over and +over in a curiously helpless way, "Bless my soul! Bless my soul!" + +All this time I was aware of Roger still standing defiantly on the +quarter-deck. I know that I fell asleep, and that when I woke he was still +there. Shortly afterwards some one raised my head and gave me something hot +to drink and some one else repeated my name, and I saw that Roger was no +longer in sight. Then, as I was carried below, I vaguely heard some one +repeating over and over, "Bless my soul! It is awful! Why won't that young +man explain things? Bless my soul!" When I opened my eyes sunlight was +creeping through the hatch. + +"Is this not Mr. Lathrop?" a stranger asked, when I stepped out in the open +air--and virtually for the first time, so weary had I been the night +before, saw the pointed hills, the broad river, and the great fleet of +ships lying at anchor. + +"Yes," said I, surprised at the man's respectful manner. Immediately I was +aware that he was no sailor. + +"I thought as much. Mr. Hamlin says, will you go to the cabin. I was just +going to call you. Mr. Johnston has come aboard again and there's some kind +of a conference. Mr. Johnston does get so wrought up! If you'll hurry right +along--" + +As I turned, the strange landsman kept in step with me. "Mr. Johnston is so +wrought up!" he repeated interminably. "So wrought up! I never saw him so +upset before." + +When I entered the cabin, Roger sat in the captain's chair, with Mr. +Johnston on his right and a strange gentleman on his left. Opposite Roger +was a vacant seat, but I did not venture to sit down until the others +indicated that they wished me to do so. + +"This is a strange story I've been hearing, Mr. Lathrop," said Mr. +Johnston. His manner instantly revealed that my family connection carried +weight with him. "I thought it best you should join us. One never knows +when a witness will be needed. It's one of the most disturbing situations +I've met in all my experience." + +The stranger gravely nodded. + +"Certainly it is without precedent in my own experience," said Roger. + +Mr. Johnston tapped the table nervously. "Captain and chief mate killed by +a member of the crew; second mate--later, acting captain--accused of +abetting the murder. You must admit, sir, that you make that charge on +decidedly inadequate evidence. And one hundred thousand dollars in gold +gone, heaven knows where! Bless my soul, what shall I do?" + +"Do?" cried Roger. "Help us to make arrangements to unload the cargo, to +ship a new crew, and to get a return cargo. It seems to me obvious enough +what you 'shall do'!" + +"But, Mr. Hamlin, the situation is extraordinary. There are legal problems +involved. There is no captain--bless my soul! I never heard of such a +thing." + +"I've brought this ship across the China Sea with only six hands. I assure +you that I shall have no difficulty in taking her back to Salem when a +new crew is aboard." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "Here's your +captain--I'll do. Lathrop, here, will do good work as supercargo, I'm sure. +I'm told there's the crew of a wrecked brig in port. They'll fill up our +forecastle and maybe furnish me with a mate or two. You'll have to give us +papers of a kind." + +"Lathrop as supercargo? He's too young. He's only a lad." + +"We can get no one else off-hand who has so good an education," said Roger. +"He can write a fair-copy, cipher, and keep books. I'll warrant, Mr. +Johnston, that not even you can catch him napping with a problem in tare +and tret. Above all, the Websters know him well and will be glad to see him +climb." + +"Hm! I'm doubtful--well, very well. As you say. But one hundred thousand +dollars in gold--bless my soul! I was told nothing about that; the letters +barely mention it." Mr. Johnston beat a mad tattoo on the arm of his chair. + +"That, sir, is my affair and my responsibility. I will answer to the +owners." + +"Bless my soul! I'm afraid I'll be compounding piracy, murder, and heaven +knows what other crimes; but we shall see--we shall see." Mr. Johnston got +up and paced the cabin nervously. "Well, what's done's done. Nothing to do +but make the best of a bad bargain. Woolens are high now, praise the Lord, +and there's a lively demand for ginseng. Well, I've already had good +offers. I'll show you the figures, Captain Hamlin, if you'll come to the +factory. And you, too, Mr. Lathrop. If you daren't leave the ship, I'll +send ashore for them. I'm confident we can fill out your crew, and I +suppose I'll have to give you some kind of a statement to authorize your +retaining command--What if I am compounding a felony? Bless my soul! And +one hundred thousand dollars!" + +I was glad enough to see Mr. Johnston rowed away from the ship. Roger, +accompanying him, returned late in the evening with half a dozen new men +and a Mr. Cledd, formerly mate of the brig Essay, which had been wrecked a +few weeks before in a typhoon off Hainan. He was a pleasant fellow of about +Roger's age, and had a frank manner that we all liked. The new men, all of +whom had served under him on the Essay, reported him to be a smart officer, +a little severe perhaps, but perfectly fair in his dealings with the crew; +so we were almost as glad to have him in the place of Kipping, as we were +to have Roger in the place of Captain Falk. We had settled down in the +forecastle to talk things over when presently word came that Davie Paine +and I were wanted aft. + +"Ben," said Roger to me, cordially, "you can move your things into the +cabin. You are to be supercargo." He tapped his pencil on the table and +turned to Davie with a kindly smile. "You, Davie, can have your old +berth of second mate, if you wish it. I'll not degrade a faithful man. +You'd better move aft to-day, for the new crew is coming aboard to-morrow." + +Davie scratched his head and shifted his feet uneasily. "Thank you, sir," +he said at last. "It's good of you and I'm sure I appreciate it, but I +ain't no great shakes of a scholar and I--well, if it's all the same to +you, sir, I'll stay for'ard with the men, sir." + +I was surprised to find how hard it was to leave the forecastle. The others +were all so friendly and so glad of my good fortune, that they brought a +lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. It seemed as if I were taking leave +forever, instead of only moving the length of the ship; and, indeed, as I +had long since learned, the distance from forecastle to cabin is not to be +measured by feet and inches. + +"I knew't would come," Neddie Benson remarked. "You was a gentleman's son. +But we've had good times together--ay, and hard times, too." He shook his +head dolefully. + +All who were left of the old crew gathered round me while I closed my +chest, and Blodgett and Davie Paine seized the beckets before I knew what +they were about and carried it to my stateroom. + + +As I passed the galley the cook stopped me. "You ain't gwine far, sah, +praise de Lo'd!" he said. "Dah's a hot time ahead and we gotta stand one by +anotheh. Ah's gwine keep my eye on dat yeh man f'om Boston. Yass, sah! Ah's +gwine keep mah eye on him." + +Now what did the cook mean by that, I wondered. But no answer suggested +itself to me, and when I entered the cabin I heard things that drove the +cook and the man from Boston far out of my mind. + +"Kipping!" Mr. Cledd, the new chief mate was saying. "Not _William_ +Kipping?" + +Roger got down the attested copy of the articles and pointed at the neatly +written name: "William Kipping." + +Mr. Cledd looked very grave indeed. "I've heard of Falk--he's a vicious +scoundrel in some ways, although too weak to be dangerous of his own +devices But I _know_ Kipping." + +"Tell me about him,' said Roger. + +"Kipping is the meanest, doggonedest, low-down wharf-runner that ever +robbed poor Jack of his wages. That's Kipping. Furthermore, he never signed +a ship's articles unless he thought there was considerable money in it +somewhere. I tell you, Captain Hamlin, he's an angry, disappointed man at +this very minute. If you want to know what I think, he's out somewhere on +those seas yonder--_just_--_waiting_. We've not seen the last of Kipping." + +Roger got up, and walking over to the chest of ammunition, thoughtfully +regarded it. + +"No, sir!" Mr. Cledd reiterated, "if Kipping's Kipping, we've not seen the +last of him." + +[Illustration:] + + + + +VII + +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +A MYSTERY IS SOLVED, AND A THIEF GETS AWAY + + +Innumerable sampans were plying up and down the river, some with masts and +some without, and great junks with carved sterns lay side by side so +closely that their sails formed a patchwork as many-colored as Joseph's +coat. There were West River small craft with arched deck-houses, which had +beaten their way precariously far up and down the coast; tall, narrow sails +from the north, and web-peaked sails on curved yards from the south; Hainan +and Kwangtung trawlers working upstream with staysails set, and a few +storm-tossed craft with great holes gaping between their battens. All were +nameless when I saw them for the first time, and strange; but in the days +that followed I learned them rope and spar. + +Vessels from almost every western nation were there, too--bluff-bowed Dutch +craft with square-headed crews, brigantines from the Levant, and ships from +Spain, England, and America. + +The captains of three other American ships in port came aboard to inquire +about the state of the seas between the Si-Kiang and the Cape of Good Hope +and shook their heads gravely at what we told them. One, an old friend of +Captain Whidden, said that he knew my own father. "It's shameful that such +things should be--simply shameful," he declared, when he had heard the +story of our fight with the Arab ship. "What with Arabs and Malays on the +high seas, Ladronesers in port--ay, and British men-of-war everywhere!" + +He went briskly over the side, settled himself in the stern-sheets of his +boat, and gave us on the quarter-deck a wave of his hand; then his men +rowed him smartly away down-stream. + +"Ay, it is shameful," Roger repeated. He soberly watched the other +disappear among the shipping, then he turned to Mr. Cledd. "I shall go +ashore for the day," he said. "I have business that will take considerable +time, and I think that Mr. Lathrop had better come too, and bring his +books." + +As we left the ship we saw Mr. Cledd observing closely all that went +forward, and Roger gravely nodded when I remarked that our new mate knew +his business. + +At the end of some three weeks of hard work we had cleared the hold, +painted and overhauled the ship inside and out, and were ready to begin +loading at daylight on a Monday morning. However great was Mr. Johnston's +proclivity to get "wrought up," he had proved himself an excellent man of +business by the way he had conducted our affairs ashore when once he put +his hand to them; and we, too, had accomplished much, both in getting out +the cargo and in putting the ship in repair. We had stripped her to her +girt-lines, calked her, decks and all, from her hold up, and painted her +inside and out. She was a sight to be proud of, when, rigged once more, she +swung at her anchorage. + +That evening, as Roger and Mr. Cledd, the new second mate, and I were +sitting in the cabin and talking of our plans and prospects, we heard a +step on the companionway. + +"Who's that?" Mr. Cledd asked in an undertone. "I thought steward had gone +for the night." + +Roger motioned him to remain silent. We all turned. + +To our amazement it was the cook who suddenly appeared before us, rolling +his eyes wildly under his deep frown. + +"'Scuse me, gen'lems! 'Scuse me, Cap'n Hamlin! 'Scuse me, Mistah Cledd! +'Scuse me, ev'ybody! Ah knows Ah done didn't had ought to, but Ah says, +Frank, you ol' nigger, you jest up 'n' go. Don't you let dat feller git +away with all dat yeh money." + +"What's that?" Roger cried sharply. + +"Yass, sah! Yass, sah! Hun f'om Boston! He's got de chisel and de hammer +and de saw." + +We all stared. + +"Come, come, doctor," said Roger. "What's this cock-and-bull story?" + +"Yass, sah, he's got de chisel and de hammer and de saw. Ah was a-watchin', +yass, sah. He don't fool dis yeh ol' nigger. Ah see him sneakin' round when +Chips he ain't looking." + +For a moment Roger frowned, then in a low, calm voice he said, "Mr. Cledd, +you'll take command on deck. Have a few men with you. Better see that your +pistols are well primed. You two, come with me. Now, then, Frank, lead the +way." + +From the deck we could see the lanterns of all the ships lying at anchor, +the hills and the land-lights and a boat or two moving on the river. We +hurried close at the negro's heels to the main hatch. + +"Look dah!" The negro rested the blunt tip of one of his great fingers on +the deck. + +Some sharp tool had dropped beside the hatch and had cut a straight, thin +line where it fell. + +"Chisel done dat." + +We were communicating in whispers now, and with a finger at his lips the +cook gave us a warning glance. He then laid hold of the rope that was made +fast to a shears overhead, swung out, and slid down to the very keelson. +Silently, one at a time, we followed. The only sound was our sibilant +breathing and the very faint shuffle of feet. Now we could see, almost +midway between the hatches, the dim light of a candle and a man at work. +While we watched, the man cautiously struck several blows. Was he scuttling +the ship? Then, as Roger and the cook tiptoed forward, I suddenly tripped +over a piece of plank and sprawled headlong. + +As I fell, I saw Roger and the cook leap ahead, then the man doused the +light. There was a sound of scuffling, a crash, a splutter of angry words. +A moment later I heard the click of flint on steel, a tiny blaze sprang +from the tinder, and the candle again sent up its bright flame. + +"Come, Ben, hold the light," Roger called. He and Frank had the man from +Boston down on the limber board and were holding him fast. The fight, +though fierce while it lasted, already was over. + +The second mate now handed me the candle, and bent over and examined the +hole the man had cut in the ceiling. "Is the scoundrel trying to sink us?" +he asked hotly. + +Roger smiled. "I suspect there's more than that behind this little +project," he replied. + +The man from Boston groaned. "Don't--don't twist my arm," he begged. + +"Heee-ha-ha!" laughed the cook. "Guess Ah knows whar dat money is." + +"Open up the hole, Ben," said Roger. + +I saw now that there was a chalk-line, as true as the needle, from +somewhere above us in the darkness, drawn along the skin of the hold +perpendicular to the keelson, and that the man from Boston had begun to cut +at the bilge where the line crossed it. + +He blinked at me angrily as I sawed through the planks. But when with +chisel and saw I had removed a square yard of planking and revealed only +the bilge-water that had backed up from the pump well, he brightened. Had +the Island Princess not been as tight as you could wish, we should have had +a wetter time of it than we had. Our feet were wet as it was, and the man +from Boston was sadly drabbled. + +"There's nothing there?" said Roger, interrogatively. "Hm! Put your hand in +and feel around." + +I reluctantly obeyed. Finding nothing at first, I thrust my arm deeper, +then higher up beyond the curve. My fingers touched something hard that +slipped away from them. Regardless of the foul water, I thrust my arm in +still farther, and, securing my hold on a cord, drew out a leather bag. It +was black and slimy, and so heavy that I had to use both hands to lift it, +and it clinked when I set it down. + +"I thought so," said Roger. "There'll be more of them in there. Fish them +out, Bennie." + +While Roger and the cook sat on the man from Boston and forced him down +into the evil-smelling bilge-water, the second mate and I felt around under +the skin of the hold and drew out bag after bag, until the candle-light +showed eighteen lying side by side. + +"There ought to be two more," said Roger. + +"I can't find another one, sir," the second mate replied. + +I now hit upon an idea. "Here," said I, "here's what will do the work." I +had picked up a six-foot pole and the others eagerly seized upon my +suggestion. + +I worked the pole into the space between the inner and outer planking while +the man from Boston blinked at me angrily, and fished about with it until I +discovered and pried within reach two more leather bags. + +"Well done!" Roger cried. "Cook, suppose you take this fellow in +tow,--we've a good strong set of irons waiting for him,--and I'll help +carry these bags over under the hatch." + +Calling up to Mr. Cledd, Roger then instructed him to throw down a +tarpaulin, which he did, and this we made fast about the twenty bags. +Having taken several turns of a rope's end round the whole, Roger, carrying +the other end, climbed hand-over-hand the rope by which we had lowered +ourselves, and I followed at his heels; then we rigged a tackle and, with +several men to help us, hauled up the bundle. + +"Cap'n Hamlin, sah," the cook called, "how's we gwine send up dis yeh +scound'l?" + +"Let him come," said Roger. "We'll see to him. Prick his calves with a +knife if he's slow about it." + +We heard the cook say in a lower voice, "G'wan, you ol' scalliwaggle"; +then, "Heah he is, cap'n, heah he come! Watch out foh him. He's +nimble--yass, sah, he's nimble." + +The rope swayed in the darkness below the hatch, then the fellow's head and +shoulders appeared; but, as we reached to seize him, he evaded our +outstretched fingers by a quick wriggle, flung himself safely to the deck +on the far side of the hatch, and leaping to the bulwark, dove into the +river with scarcely a splash. + +Some one fired a musket at the water; the flash illuminated the side of the +ship, and an echo rolled solemnly back from the shore. Three or four men +pointed and called, "There he goes--there--there! See him swimming!" For a +moment I myself saw him, a dark spot at the apex of a V-shaped ripple, then +he disappeared. It was the last we ever knew of the man from Boston. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +HOMEWARD BOUND + + +We had the gold, though, twenty leather bags of it; and we carried it to +the cabin and packed it into the safe, which it just filled. + +"Now," said Roger, "we _have_ a story to tell Mr. Johnston." + +"So we have!" exclaimed Mr. Cledd, who had heard as yet but a small part of +this eventful history. "Will you tell me, though, how that beggar ever knew +those bags were just there?" + +"Certainly." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "He put them there. When the +islanders were everywhere aboard ship, and the rest of us were so much +taken up with them and with the fight we'd just been through that we +didn't know what was on foot,--it was still so dark that he could work +unnoticed,--he sneaked below and opened the safe, which he had the craft to +lock again behind him, and hauled the money forward to the hatch, a few +bags at a time. Eventually he found a chance to crawl over the cargo, start +a plank in the ceiling, drop the bags down inside the jacket one by one, +and mark the place. Then, holding his peace until the cargo was out of the +hold, he drew a chalk line straight down from his mark to the lower deck, +took bearings from the hatch, and continued the line from the beam-clamp to +the bilge, and cut on the curve. There, of course, was where the money had +fallen. He worked hard--and failed." + +Then I remembered the hatch that had been pried off when the natives were +ranging over the boat. + +Early next morning Roger, Mr. Cledd, and I, placing the money between us in +the boat and arming ourselves and our men, each with a brace of pistols, +went ashore. That brief trip seems a mere trifle as I write of it here and +now, so far in distance and in time from the river at Whampoa, but I truly +think it was as perilous a voyage as any I have made; for pirates, or +Ladronesers as they were called, could not be distinguished from ordinary +boatmen, and enough true stories of robbery and murder on that river passed +current among seafaring men in my boyhood to make the everlasting fortune +of one of those fellows who have nothing better to do than sit down and +spin out a yarn of hair-raising adventures. But we showed our cocked +pistols and passed unmolested through the press, and came at last safe to +the landing. + +Laboring under the weight of gold, we went by short stages up to the +factory, where Mr. Johnston in his dressing-gown met us, blessing his soul +and altogether upset. + +"Never in my life," he cried, clasping his hands, "have I seen such men as +you. And now, pray, what brings you here?" + +"We have come with one hundred thousand dollars," said Roger, "to be paid +to the Chinese gentleman of whom you and I have spoken together." + +Mr. Johnston looked at the lumpy bundles wrapped now in canvas and for once +rose to an emergency. "Come in," he said. "I'll dispatch a messenger +immediately. Come in and I'll join you at breakfast." + +We ate our breakfast that morning with a fortune in gold coin under the +table; and when the boat came down the river, bringing a quiet man whom Mr. +Johnston introduced as the very person we were seeking, and who himself in +quaint pidgin English corroborated the statement that he it was who had +sent to Thomas Webster the five teakwood chests, we paid him the money and +received in return his receipt beautifully written with small flourishes of +the brush. + +"That's done," said Roger, when all was over, "in spite of as rascally a +crew as ever sailed a Salem ship. I am, I fear, a pirate, a mutineer, and +various other unsavory things; but I declare, Mr. Cledd, in addition to +them all, I am an honest man." + +The coolies already had begun to pass chests of tea into the hold when we +came aboard; and under the eye of the second mate, who was proving himself +in every respect a competent officer,--in his own place the equal, perhaps, +of Mr. Cledd in his,--all hands were industriously working. The days passed +swiftly. Work aboard ship and business ashore crowded every hour; and so +our stay on the river drew to an end. + +Before that time, however, Blodgett hesitantly sought me out one night. +"Mr. Lathrop," he said with a bit of constraint, "I and Davie and Neddie +and cook was a-thinkin' we'd like to do something for poor Bill Hayden's +little girl. Of course we ain't got no great to give, but we've taken up a +little purse of money, and we wondered wouldn't you, seein' you was a good +friend to old Bill, like to come in with us?" + +That I was glad of the chance, I assured him. "And Captain Hamlin will come +in, too," I added. "Oh, I'm certain he will." + +Blodgett seemed pleased. "Thinks I, he's likely to, but it ain't fit I +should ask the captain." + +Promising to present the plea as if it were my own, I sent Blodgett away +reassured, and eventually we all raised a sum that bought such a royal doll +as probably no merchant in Newburyport ever gave his small daughter, and +enough silk to make the little maid, when she should reach the age for it, +as handsome a gown as ever woman wore. Nor was that the end. The night +before we sailed from China, Blodgett came to me secretly, after a +mysterious absence, and pressed a small package into my hand. + +"Don't tell," he said. "It's little enough. If we'd stopped off on some o' +them islands I might ha' done better. Thinks I last night, I'd like to send +her a bit of a gift all by myself as a kind of a keepsake, you know, sir, +seeing I never had a little lass o' my own. So I slips away from the others +and borrows a boat that was handy to the shore and drops down stream +quiet-like till I comes in sight of one of them temples where there's gongs +ringing and all manner of queer goings-on. Says I,--not aloud, you +understand,--'Here, my lad, 's the very place you're looking for, just +a-waiting for you!' So I sneaks up soft and easy,--it were a rare dark +night,--and looks in, and what do I see by the light o' them there crazy +lanterns? There was one o' them heathen idols! Yes, sir, a heathen idol as +handy as you please. 'Aha!' says I,--not aloud, you understand, sir,--'Aha! +I'll wager you've got a fine pair o' rubies in your old eye-sockets, you +blessed idol.' And with that I takes a squint at the lay o' the land and +sees my chance, and in I walks. The old priest, he gives a squawk, but I +cracks him with a brass pot full of incense, which scatters and nigh chokes +me, and I grabs the ear-rings and runs before they catches me, for all +there's a million of 'em a-yammering at my heels. I never had a chance at +the eyes--worse luck! But I fared well, when all's said and done. It was a +dark night, thank heaven, and the boat was handy. The rings is jade. She'll +like 'em some day." + +I restrained my chuckles until he had gone, and added the stolen treasures +to the rest of the gifts. What else could I do? Certainly it was beyond my +power to restore them to the rightful owners. + +The last chest of tea and the last roll of silk were swung into the hold, +the hatches were battened down, and all was cleared for sailing as soon as +wind and tide should favor us. + +That morning Mr. Johnston came aboard, more brisk and pompous than ever, +and having critically inspected the ship, met us in the cabin for a final +word. My new duties as supercargo had kept me busy and my papers were +scattered over the table; but when I started to gather them up and +withdraw, he motioned me to stay. + +"Never in all my experience has such a problem as this arisen," he +exclaimed, rubbing his chin lugubriously. "Bless my soul! Who ever heard of +such a thing? Captain and chief mate murdered--crew mutinied--bless my +soul! Well, Captain Hamlin--I suppose you've noticed before, that I give +you the title of master?--well, Captain Hamlin, I fear I'm compounding +felony, but after all that's a matter to be settled in the courts. I'm +confident that I cannot be held criminally responsible for not +understanding a nice point in admiralty. Whatever else happens, the ship +must go home to Salem, and you, sir, are the logical man to take her home. +Well, sir, although in a way you represent the owners more directly than I +do, still your authority is vicariously acquired and I've that here +which'll protect you against interruption in the course of the voyage by +any lawful process. I doubt, from all I've heard, if Falk will go to law; +but here's a paper--" he drew it out of his pocket and laid it on the +table--"signed, sealed and witnessed, stating that I, Walter Johnston, +agent in China for Thomas Webster and Sons, do hereby recognize you as +master of the ship Island Princess, and do invest you, as far as my +authority goes, with whatever privileges and responsibilities are attached +to the office. All questions legal and otherwise, ensuing from this +investure, must be settled on your arrival at the United States of America. +That, sir, is the best I can do for you, and I assure you that I hope +sincerely you may not be hanged as a pirate but that I am by no means +certain of it." + +Thus he left-handedly concluded his remarks, and murmuring under his +breath, "Bless my soul," as if in final protest against everything without +precedent, folded his fat hands over his expansive waist-band. + +"I thank you, Mr. Johnston," Roger replied gravely, though he could not +completely hide the amusement in his eyes. "I'm sure it is handsome of you +to do so much for us, and I certainly hope no act of piracy or violence, of +which we may have been guilty, will compromise you in the slightest +degree." + +"Thank _you_, Captain Hamlin. I hope so myself." + +If I had met Roger's glance, I must have laughed outright. The man was so +unconscious of any double edge to Roger's words, and so complacent, that +our meeting was all but farce, when he bethought himself of another subject +of which he had intended to speak. + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "I well nigh forgot. Shall you--but of +course you will not!--go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +Mr. Cledd, who hitherto had sat with a slight smile on his lean Yankee +face, now looked at Roger with keener interest. + +"Yes," said Roger, "I shall go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"Now surely, Captain Hamlin, that would be folly; there are other courses." + +"But none so direct." + +"A long way round is often the shortest way home. Why, bless my soul, that +would be to back your sails in the face of Providence." + +Roger leaned forward. "Why should I not go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +"Why, my dear sir, if any one were--er-er--to wish you harm,--and if your +own story is to be believed, there are those who do wish you harm,--Sunda +Strait, of all places in the world, is the easiest to cut you off." + +"Mr. Johnston, that is nonsense," said Roger. "Such things don't happen. I +will go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"But, Captain Hamlin,--" the good man rubbed his hands more nervously than +ever,--"but, Captain Hamlin, bless my soul, I consider it highly +inadvisable." + +Roger smiled. "Sir, I will not back down. By Sunda Strait we came. By Sunda +Strait we'll return. If any man wishes to see us there--" He finished the +sentence with another smile. + +Mr. Cledd spoke up sharply. "Ay, and if a certain man we all know of should +appear, I'm thinking he'd be unpleasantly surprised to find me aboard." + +Mr. Johnston rubbed his hands and tapped the table and rubbed his hands +again. So comfortable did he appear, and so well-fed, that he seemed quite +out of place in that severely plain cabin, beside Roger and Mr. Cledd. That +he had a certain mercantile shrewdness I was ready to admit; but the others +were men fearless and quick to act. + +"Bless my soul!" he said at last, beating a tattoo on the table with his +soft fingers. "Bless my soul!" + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THROUGH SUNDA STRAIT + + +Laden deep with tea and silk, we dropped down the Chu-Kiang, past Macao and +the Ladrone Islands, and out through the Great West Channel. Since the +northeast monsoon now had set in and the winds were constant, we soon +passed the tide-rips of St. Esprit, and sighting only a few small islands +covered with brush and mangroves, where the seas broke in long lines of +silver under an occasional cocoanut palm, we left astern in due time the +treacherous water of the Paracel Reefs. + +Each day was much like every other until we had put the China Sea behind +us. We touched at the mouth of the Saigon, but found no promise of trade, +and weighed anchor again with the intention of visiting Singapore. Among +other curious things, we saw a number of pink porpoises and some that were +mottled pink and white and brown. Porpoises not infrequently are spotted by +disease; but those that we saw appeared to be in excellent health, and +although we remarked on their odd appearance, we believed their strange +colors to be entirely natural. A fleet of galleys, too, which we saw in the +offing, helped break the monotony of our life. There must have been fifty +of them, with flags a-flutter and arms bristling. Although we did not +approach them near enough to learn more about them, it seemed probable that +they were conveying some great mandarin or chief on affairs of state. + +"That man Blodgett is telling stories of one kind or another," Mr. Cledd +remarked one afternoon, after watching a little group that had gathered by +the forecastle-hatch during the first dog-watch. "The fortuneteller fellow, +too, Benson, is stirring up the men." + +As I looked across the water at the small island of palms where the waves +were rolling with a sullen roar, which carried far on the evening air, I +saw a native boat lying off the land, and dimly through the mists I saw the +sail of an old junk. I watched the junk uneasily. Small wonder that the men +were apprehensive, I thought. + +After leaving Singapore, we passed the familiar shores of eastern Sumatra, +Banka Island and Banka Strait, and the mouths of the Palambang, but in an +inverted order, which made them seem as strange as if we never before had +sighted them. Then one night, heading west against the tide, we anchored in +a rolling swell, with Kodang Island to the northeast and Sindo Island to +the north. On the one hand were the Zutphen Islands; on the other was Hog +Point; and almost abeam of us the Sumatran coast rose to the steep bluff +that across some miles of sea faces the Java shore. We lay in Sunda Strait. + +I came on deck after a while and saw the men stirring about. + +"They're uneasy," said Mr. Cledd. + +"I'm not surprised," I replied. + +The trees on the high summit of the island off which we lay were +silhouetted clearly against the sky. What spying eyes might not look down +upon us from those wooded heights? What lawless craft might not lurk beyond +its abrupt headlands? + +"No, I don't wonder, either," said Mr. Cledd, thoughtfully. + +At daybreak we again weighed anchor and set sail. Three or four times a +far-away vessel set my heart leaping, but each in turn passed and we saw it +no more. A score of native proas manoeuvring at a distance singly or by +twos caused Roger to call up the watch and prepare for any eventuality; but +they vanished as silently as they had appeared. At nightfall we once more +hove to, having made but little progress, and lay at anchor until dawn. + +In the darkness that night the cook came up to me in the waist whither I +had wandered, unable to sleep. "Mistah Lathrop," he muttered, "Ah don't +like dis yeh nosing and prying roun' islands whar a ship's got to lay up +all night jes' like an ol' hen with a mess of chickens." + +We watched phosphorescent waves play around the anchor cable. The spell of +uneasiness weighed heavily on us both. + +The next evening, still beating our way against adverse winds, we rounded +Java Head, which seemed so low by moonlight that I scarcely could believe +it was the famous promontory beyond which lay the open sea. I went to my +stateroom, expecting once again to sleep soundly all night long. Certainly +it seemed now that all our troubles must be over. Yet I could not compose +myself. After a time I came on deck, and found topsails and royals set and +Mr. Cledd in command. + +"All goes well, Mr. Lathrop," he said with a smile, "but that darky cook +seems not to believe it. He's prowling about like an old owl." + +"Which is he?" I asked; for several of the men were pacing the deck and at +the moment I could not distinguish between them. + +"They do seem to be astir. That nearest man walks like Blodgett. Has the +negro scared them all?" + +When, just after Mr. Cledd had spoken, Blodgett came aft, we were +surprised; but he approached us with an air of suppressed excitement, which +averted any reprimand Mr. Cledd may have had in mind. + +"If you please, sir," he said, "there's a sail to windward." + +"To windward? You're mistaken. You ought to call out if you see a sail, but +it's just as well you didn't this time." + +Mr. Cledd turned his back on Blodgett after looking hard up the wind. + +"If you please, sir, I've got good eyes." Blodgett's manner was such that +no one could be seriously offended by his persistence. + +"My eyes are good, too," Mr. Cledd replied rather sharply. "I see no +sail." + +Nor did I. + +Blodgett leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness like a cat. "If +you please, sir," he said, "I beg your pardon, but I _can_ see a sail." + +Now, for the first time I thought that I myself saw something moving. "I +see a bank of fog blowing westward," I remarked, "but I don't think it's a +sail." + +After a moment, Mr. Cledd spoke up frankly. "I'll take back what I've just +said. I see it too. It's only a junk, but I suppose we'd better call the +captain." + +"Only a junk!" Blodgett repeated sharply. "When last we saw 'em, a junk was +all they had." + +"What's that?" Mr. Cledd demanded. + +"Ay, ay, sir, they was sailing away in a junk, sir." + +Mr. Cledd stepped to the companionway. "Captain Hamlin," he called. + +The junk was running free when we first sighted her, but just as she was +passing astern of us, she began to come slowly about. I could see a great +number of men swaying in unison against the helm that controlled the +gigantic rudder. Others were bracing the curious old sails. + +"I wish she were near enough for us to watch them handle the sails on the +after masts," I said. + +She had a pair of mizzen-masts, one on the larboard side, one on the +starboard, and I was puzzled to know how they were used. + +"She'll pass close aboard on this next tack," Mr. Cledd replied. "I think +we'll be able to see." He had paused to watch her manoeuvres. + +"Here's the doctor," Blodgett murmured. + +Black Frank was coming aft with a quick humpy walk. "'Scuse me, sah, 'scuse +me!" he said. "But I's skeered that we--" + +Mr. Cledd now had gone to the companion. "Captain Hamlin," he called again, +"there's a junk passing close aboard." + +I heard Roger's step on the companion-way. It later transpired that he had +not heard the first summons. + +"Mah golly! Look dah!" the cook exclaimed. + +The junk was looming up dangerously. + +Mr. Cledd caught my arm. "Run forward quick--quick--call up all hands," he +cried. Then raising the trumpet, "Half a dozen of you men loose the +cannon." + +Leaping to the spar deck, I ran to do his bidding, for the junk now was +bearing swiftly down upon us. On my way to the forecastle-hatch I noted the +stacked pikes and loaded muskets by the mainmast, and picked out the most +likely cover from which to fire on possible boarders. That my voice was +shaking with excitement, I did not realize until I had sent my summons +trembling down into the darkness. + +I heard the men leaping from their bunks; I heard Roger giving sharp +commands from the quarter-deck; I heard voices on the junk. By accident or +by malice, she inevitably was going to collide with the Island Princess. As +we came up into the wind with sails a-shiver, I scurried back to the stack +of muskets. + +Neddie Benson was puffing away just behind me. "I didn't ought to 'ave +come," he moaned. "I had my warning. Oh, it serves me right--I might 'a' +married the lady." + +"Bah, that's no way for a _man_ to talk," cried Davie Paine. + +It all was so unreal that I felt as if I were looking at a picture. It did +not seem as if it could be Ben Lathrop who was standing shoulder to +shoulder with Neddie Benson and old Davie. There was running and calling on +all sides and aloft. Blocks were creaking as the men hauled at braces and +halyards; and when the ship rolled I saw that the men on the yard-arms were +shaking the courses from the gaskets. Although our crew was really too +small to work the ship and fight at the same time, it was evident that +Roger intended so far as possible to do both. + +But meanwhile the junk had worn ship and she still held her position to +windward. Suddenly there came from her deck the flash of a musket and a +loud report. Then another and another. Then Roger's voice sounded sharply +above the sudden clamor and our own long gun replied. + +Flame from its muzzle burst in the faces of the men at the bow of the junk, +and the ball, mainly by chance, I suppose, hit her foremast and brought +down mast and sail. Then the junk came about and bumped into us abreast, +with a terrific crash that stove in the larboard bulwark and showered us +with fragments of carved and gilded wood broken from her towering bow. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +PIKES, CUTLASSES, AND GUNS + + +As I hastily poured powder into the pan of my musket, a man sprang to our +deck and dashed at Davie Paine, who thrust out a pike and impaled him as if +he were a fowl on a spit, then reached for a musket. Another came and +another; I saw them leap down singly. One of our new men whom we had signed +at Canton raised his cutlass and sliced down the third man to board us; +then they came on in an overwhelming stream. + +Seeing that it would be suicide to attempt to maintain our ground, and that +we already were cut off from the party on the quarter-deck, we retreated +forward, fighting off the enemy as we went, and ten or a dozen of us took +our stand on the forecastle. + +Kipping and Falk and the beach-combers they had gathered together had +conducted their campaign well. Some half of us were forward, half aft, so +that we could not fire on the boarders without danger of hitting our own +men. Davie Paine clubbed his musket and felled a strange white man, and +Neddie Benson went down with a bullet through his thigh; then the pirates +surged forward and almost around us. Before we realized what was happening, +we had been forced back away from Neddie and had retreated to the +knightheads. We saw a beast of a yellow ruffian stab Neddie with a kris, +then one of our own men saw a chance to dart back under the very feet of +our enemies and lay hold of Neddie's collar and drag him groaning up to us. + +They came at us hotly, and we fought them off with pikes and cutlasses; but +we were breathing hard now and our arms ached and our feet slipped. The +circle of steel blades was steadily drawing closer. + +That the end of our voyage had come, I was convinced, but I truly was not +afraid to die. It was no credit to me; simply in the heat of action I found +no time for fear. Parry and slash! Slash and parry! Blood was in my eyes. A +cut burned across my right hand. My musket had fallen underfoot and I +wielded a rusty blade that some one else had dropped. Fortunately the flesh +wound I got from the musket-ball in our other battle had healed cleanly, +and no lameness handicapped me. + +We had no idea what was going on aft, and for my own part I supposed that +Roger and the rest were in straits as sore as our own; but suddenly a +tremendous report almost deafened us, and when our opponents turned to see +what had happened we got an instant's breathing-space. + +"It's the stern-chasers," Davie gasped. "They've faced 'em round!" + +The light of a torch flared up and I saw shadowy shapes darting this way +and that. + +There were two cannon; but only one shot had been fired. + +Suddenly Davie seized me by the shoulder. "See! See there!" he cried +hoarsely in my ear. + +I turned and followed his finger with my eyes. High on the stern of the +junk, black against the starlit sky, I saw the unmistakable figure of +Kipping. He was laughing--mildly. The outline of his body and the posture +and motion of his head and shoulders all showed it. Then he leaped to the +deck and we lost sight of him. Where he had mustered that horde of +slant-eyed pirates, we never stopped to wonder. We had no time for idle +questions. + +I know that I, for one, finding time during the lull in the fighting to +appraise our chances, expected to die there and then. A vastly greater +force was attacking us, and we were divided as well as outnumbered. But if +we were to die, we were determined to die fighting; so with our backs to +the bulwark and with whatever weapons we had been able to snatch up in our +hands, we defended ourselves as best we could and had no more respite to +think of what was going on aft. + +Only one stern gun, you remember, had been fired. Now the second spoke. + +There was a yell of anguish as the ball cut through the midst of the +pirates, a tremendous crash that followed almost instantly the report of +the cannon, a sort of brooding hush, then a thunderous reverberation +compared with which all other noises of the night had been as nothing. + +Tongues of flame sprang skyward and a ghastly light shot far out on the +sea. The junk heaved back, settled, turned slowly over and seemed to spread +out into a great mass of wreckage. Pieces of timber and plank and spar came +tumbling down and a few men scrambled to our decks. We could hear others +crying out in the water, as they swam here and there or grasped at planks +and beams to keep themselves afloat. + + +The cannon ball had penetrated the side of the junk and had exploded a +great store of gunpowder. + +Part of the wreckage of the junk was burning, and the flames threw a red +glare over the strange scene aboard the ship, where the odds had been so +suddenly altered. Our assailants, who but a moment before had had us at +their mercy, now were confounded by the terrific blow they had received; +instead of fighting the more bravely because no retreat was left them, they +were confused and did not know which way to turn. + +Davie Paine, sometimes so slow-witted, seemed now to grasp the situation +with extraordinary quickness. "Come on, lads," he bellowed, "we've got 'em +by the run." + +Again clubbing his musket, he leaped into the gangway so ferociously that +the pirates scrambled over the side, brown men and white, preferring to +take their chances in the sea. As he charged on, I lost sight of him in the +maelstrom of struggling figures. On my left a Lascar was fighting for his +life against one of our new crew. On every side men were splashing and +shouting and cursing. + +Now, high above the uproar, I heard a voice, at once familiar and strange. +For a moment I could not place it; it had a wild note that baffled me. Then +I saw black Frank, cleaver in hand, come bounding out of the darkness. His +arms and legs, like the legs of some huge tarantula, flew out at all angles +as he ran, and in fierce gutturals he was yelling over and over again:-- + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +He peered this way and that. + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +Out of the corner of my eye I saw some one stir by the deck-house, and the +negro, seeing him at the same moment, leaped at my own conclusion. + +In doubt whither to flee, too much of a coward at heart either to throw +himself overboard or to face his enemy if there was any chance of escape, +the unhappy Kipping hesitated one second too long. With a mighty lunge the +negro caught him by the throat, and for a moment the two swayed back and +forth in the open space between us and our enemies. + +I thought of the night when they had fought together in the galley door. +Momentarily Kipping seemed actually to hold his own against the mad negro; +but his strength was of despair and almost at once we saw that it was +failing. + +"Stop!" Kipping cried. "I'll yield! Stop--stop! Don't kill me!" + +For a moment the negro hesitated. He seemed bewildered; his very passion +seemed to waver. Then I saw that Kipping, all the while holding the negro's +wrist with his left hand, was fumbling for his sheath-knife with his right. +With basest treachery he was about to knife his assailant at the very +instant when he himself was crying for quarter. My shout of warning was +lost in the general uproar; but the negro, though taken off his guard, had +himself perceived Kipping's intentions. + +By a sudden jerk he shook Kipping's hand off his wrist and raised high his +sharp weapon. + +From the shadow of the deck-house one of Kipping's own adherents sprang to +his rescue, but Davie Paine--blundering old Davie!--knocked him flat. + +For an instant the cook's weapon shone bright in the glare of the torches. +Kipping snatched vainly at the black wrist above him, then jerked his knife +clean out of the sheath--but too late. + +"Ah got you now, you pow'ful fighter, you! Ah got you now, you dirty scut!" +the cook yelled, and with one blow of his cleaver he split Kipping's skull +to the chin. + + + * * * * * + + +When at last we braced the yards and drew away from the shattered fragments +of the junk, which were drifting out to sea, we found that of the lawless +company that so confidently had expected to murder us all, only five living +men, one of whom was Captain Nathan Falk, were left aboard. They were a +glum and angry little band of prisoners. + +Lights and voices ashore indicated that some of our assailants had saved +themselves, and by their cries and confused orders we knew that they in +turn were rescuing others. Of their dead we had no record, but the number +must have been large. + +Of us six who had defied Falk in that time long ago, which we had come to +regard almost as ancient history, only Neddie Benson had fallen. Although +we had laughed time and again at the charming plump lady who had prophesied +such terrible events, it had proved in bitter earnest a sad last voyage for +Neddie. + +From the low and distant land there continued to come what seemed to be +only faint whispers of sound, yet we knew that they really were the cries +of men fighting for their lives where the sea beat against the shore. + +"Ah wonder," said the cook, grimly, "how dem yeh scalliwaggles gwine git +along come Judgment when Gab'el blows his ho'n and Peter rattles his keys +and all de wicked is a-wailin' and a-weepin' and a-gnashin' and can't git +in nohow. Yass, sah. Ah guess dis yeh ol' nigger, he's gwine sit on de +pearly gate and twiddle his toes at 'em." + +He folded his arms and stood in the lantern light, with a dreamy expression +on his grotesque face such as I had seen there once or twice before. When +he glanced at me with that strange affection shining from his great eyes, +he seemed like some big, benign dog. Never had I seen a calmer man. It +seemed impossible that passion ever had contorted those homely black +features. + +But the others were discussing the fate of our prisoners. I heard Roger +say, "Let me look at them, Mr. Cledd. I'll know them--some of them anyway. +Ah, Captain Falk? And the carpenter? Well, well, well! We hadn't dared hope +for the pleasure of your company on the return voyage. In fact, we'd quite +given it up. I may add that we'd reconciled ourselves to the loss of it." + +I now edged toward them, followed by the cook. + +"Ay, Mr. Hamlin, it's all very well for you to talk like that," Falk +replied in a trembling voice from which all arrogance had not yet vanished. +"I'm lawful master of this here vessel, as you very well know. You're +nothing but a mutineer and a pirate. Go ahead and kill me! Why don't you? +You know I can tell a story that will send you to the gallows. What have I +done, but try to get back the owners' property and defend it? To think that +I could have knocked you and that addle-pated Ben Lathrop on the head any +day I wished! And I wished it, too, but Kipping he said--" + +Falk stopped suddenly. + +"So Kipping had a finger in the pie, did he?" said Roger. "Well, Mr. Falk, +what did Kipping say?" + +Falk bit his lip sullenly and remained silent. + +There really was something pathetic in the man's plight. He had been +ambitious, and ambition alone, which often is a virtue, had gone far to +contribute to his downfall. In many ways he was so weak! A quality that in +other men might have led to almost anything good, in him had bred +resentment and trickery and at last downright crime. He stood there now, +ruined in his profession, the leader of a defeated band of criminals and +vagabonds. Yet if he had succeeded in capturing the ship and putting the +rest of us to death, he could have sailed her home to Salem, and by +spreading his own version of the mutiny have gained great credit, and +probably promotion, for himself. + +"Well, Chips," said Roger, "I hope you, at least, are pleased with your +prospects." + +The carpenter likewise made no reply. + +"Hm, Mr. Cledd, they haven't a great deal to say, have they?" + +"Aha," the negro murmured just behind me, "dey's got fine prospec's, dey +has. Dey's gwine dance, dey is, yass, sah, on de end of a rope, and after +dey's done dance a while dey's gwine be leetle che'ubs, dey is, and flap +dey wings and sing sweet on a golden harp. Yass, sah." + +The carpenter shot an angry glance at the cook, but no one else paid him +any attention. + +A fire was flaming now on the distant shore. The seas rushed and gurgled +along the side of the ship. Our lights dipped with the rigging as the ship +rolled and tossed, now lifting her dripping sides high out of water, now +plunging them again deep into the trough. + +"Mr. Cledd, I think we can spare those five men a boat," Roger said, after +a time. + +"You're not going to let them go!" Mr. Cledd exclaimed. + +"Yes." + +Mr. Cledd raised his eyebrows, but silently acceded. + +I thought that an expression of relief crossed Falk's face, yet dismay was +mingled with it. Those were dark, inhospitable lands to leeward. The +carpenter opened his mouth as if to speak, closed it without a word, and +vacantly stared at Roger. The rest of us exchanged glances of surprise. + +When we had hove to, they lowered the boat, fumbling at the falls while +they did so, as if they were afraid to leave the ship. The seas caught the +boat and bumped it against the side, but Falk still lingered, even when +Roger indicated by a gesture that he was to go. + +"Ay," he cried, "it's over the side and away. You're sending us to our +death, Mr. Hamlin." + +"To your death?" said Roger. "Sir, do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Falk glared sullenly, but made no reply. + +"Sir," Roger repeated sharply, "do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Still there was no response. + +"Ah, I thought not. Stay here, if you wish. I shall have you put in irons; +I should not be justified in any other course. But in Salem we'll lay our +two stories before the owners--ay, and before the law. Then, sir, if you +are in the right and I am in the wrong, your triumph will repay you many +times over for the discomforts of a few months in irons. No? Will you not +come?" + +Still Falk did not reply. + +"Sir," Roger sternly cried, "if I were to take you back a prisoner to +Salem, you'd go to the gallows by way of the courts. Here you can steer +your own course--though in all probability the port will be the same." + +Without another word Falk went over the side, and down by the chains to the +boat that was bumping below. But before we cast off the painter, he looked +up at us in the light of a lantern that some one held over the bulwark and +cried bitterly, "I hope, Mr. Hamlin, you're satisfied now. I'm rightful +master of that vessel in spite of all your high-handed tricks." + +For the first time I noticed the marks of wounds that he had got in the +fight off the island. His face was white and his eyes were at once fierce +and hunted. + +"You're mistaken," Roger replied. "I have papers from the firm's agent that +appoint me as master." Then he laughed softly and added, "But any time you +wish to carry our little dispute to the courts, you'll find me ready and +willing to meet you there. Too ready, Mr. Falk, for your own good. No, Mr. +Falk, it's better for you that you leave us here. Go your own gait. May you +fare better than you deserve!" + +We cast off the painter, and they rowed into the dark toward the shore of +Java. They were men of broken fortunes, whose only hope for life lay in a +land infested with cut-throat desperadoes. I thought of Kipping who lay +dead on our deck. It seemed to me after all that Falk had got the worse +punishment; he had aspired to better things; weak though he was, there had +been the possibility of much good in his future. Now his career was +shattered; never again could he go home to his own country. + +Yet when all was said and done, it was more merciful to set him adrift than +to bring him home to trial. Though he must suffer, he would suffer alone. +The punishment that he so fully deserved would not be made more bitter by +his knowing that all who knew him knew of his ruined life. + +"Poor Falk!" I thought, and was amazed at myself for thinking almost kindly +of him. + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +"SO ENDS" + + +Through the watches that followed I passed as if everything were unreal; +they were like a succession of nightmares, and to this day they are no more +than shadows on my memory. Working in silence, the men laid the dead on +clean canvas and washed down the decks; cut away wreckage, cleared the +running rigging, and replaced with new sails those that had been cut or +burned in battle. Then came the new day with its new duties; and a sad day +it was for those of us who had stood together through so many hardships, +when Neddie Benson went over the side with a prayer to speed him. We were +homeward bound with all sail set, but things that actually had happened +already seemed incredible, and concerning the future we could only +speculate. + +We had gone a long way on our journey toward the Cape of Good Hope before +our new carpenter had repaired the broken bulwark and the various other +damages the ship had suffered, and before the rigging was thoroughly +restored. Weeks passed, their monotony broken only by the sight of an +occasional sail; days piled on end, morning and night, night and morning, +until weeks had become months. In the fullness of time we rounded Good +Hope, and now swiftly with fair winds, now slowly with foul, we worked up +to the equator, then home across the North Atlantic. + +On the afternoon of a bright day in the fall, more than a year after we +first had set sail, we passed Baker Island and stood up Salem Harbor. + +Bleak and bare though they were, the rough, rocky shores were home. To +those of us who hailed from Salem, every roof and tree gave welcome after +an absence of eighteen months. Already, we knew, reports of our approach +would have spread far and wide. Probably a dozen good old captains, +sweeping the sea, each with his glass on his "captain's walk," had sighted +our topsails while we were hull down and had cried out that Joseph Whidden +was home again. Such was the penetration of seafaring men in those good old +days when they recognized a ship and its master while as yet they could spy +nothing more than topgallantsails. + +We could see the people gathering along the shore and lining the wharf and +calling and cheering and waving hands. We thought of our comrades whom we +had left in far seas; we longed and feared to ask a thousand questions +about those at home, of whom we had thought so tenderly and so often. + +Already boats were putting out to greet us; and now, in the foremost of +them, one of the younger Websters stood up. "Mr. Hamlin, ahoy!" he called, +seeing Roger on the quarter-deck. "Where is Captain Whidden?" + +Roger did not answer until the boat had come fairly close under the rail, +and meanwhile young Webster stood looking up at him as if more than half +expecting bad news. + +Only when the boat was so near that each could see the other's expression +and hear every inflection of the other's voice, did Roger reply. + +"He is dead." + +"We heard a story," young Webster cried in great excitement, coming briskly +aboard. "One Captain Craigie, brig Eve late from Bencoolen, brought it. An +appalling tale of murder and mutiny. As he had it, the men mutinied against +Mr. Thomas and against Mr. Falk when he assumed command. They seized the +ship and killed Mr. Thomas and marooned Mr. Falk, who, while Captain +Craigie was thereabouts, hustled a crew of fire-eating Malays and white +adventurers and bought a dozen barrels of powder and set sail with a fleet +of junks to retake the ship. But that, of course, is stuff and nonsense. +Where's Falk?" + +"Falk," said Roger with a wry smile, "decided to spend the rest of his days +at the Straits." + +"Oh!" Young Webster looked hard at Roger and then looked around the deck. +All was ship-shape, but there were many strange faces. + +"Oh," he said again. "And you--" He stopped short. + +"And I?" Roger repeated. + +Again young Webster looked around the ship. He bit his lip. "What is _your_ +story, Mr. Hamlin?" he said sharply. + +"Is your father here, Mr. Webster?" Roger asked. + +"No," the young man replied stiffly, "he is at Newburyport, but I have no +doubt whatsoever that he will return at once when he hears you have +arrived. This seems to be a strange situation, Mr. Hamlin. Who is in +command here?" + +"I am, sir." + +"Oh!" After a time he added, "I heard rumors, but I refused to credit +them." + +"What do you mean by that, sir?" Roger asked. + +"Oh, nothing much, sir. You evaded my question. What is _your_ story?" + +"_My_ story?" Roger looked him squarely in the eye. In Roger's own eyes +there was the glint of his old humorous twinkle, and I knew that the young +man's bustling self-importance amused him. + +"My story?" Roger repeated. "Why, such a story as I have to tell, I'll tell +your father when I report to him." + +Young Webster reddened. "Oh!" he said with a sarcastic turn of his voice. +"Stuff and nonsense! It may be--or it may not." And with that he stationed +himself by the rail and said no more. + +When at last we had come to anchor and young Webster had gone hastily +ashore and we had exchanged greetings at a distance with a number of +acquaintances, Roger and Mr. Cledd and I sat down--perhaps more promptly +than need be--over our accounts in the great cabin. I felt bitterly +disappointed that none of my own people had come to welcome me; but +realizing how silly it was to think that they surely must know of our +arrival, I jumped at Roger's suggestion that we gather up our various +documents and then leave Mr. Cledd in charge--he was not a Salem man--and +hurry home as fast as we could go. + +As we bent to our work, Mr. Cledd remarked with a dry smile, "I'm thinking, +sir, there's going to be more of a sting to this pirate-and-mutiny business +than I'd believed. That smug, sarcastic young man means trouble or I've no +eye for weather." + +"He's the worst of all the Websters," Roger replied thoughtfully. "And I'll +confess that Captain Craigie's story knocks the wind out of _my_ canvas. +Who'd have looked for a garbled story of our misfortunes to outsail us? +However,--" he shook his head and brushed away all such anxieties,--"time +will tell. Now, gentlemen, to our accounts." + +Before we had more than got well started, I heard a voice on deck that +brought me to my feet. + +There was a step on the companionway, and then, "Father!" I cried, and +leaped up with an eagerness that, boy-like, I thought I concealed with +painstaking dignity when I shook his hand. + +"Come, come, come, you young rascals!" my father cried. "What's the meaning +of this? First hour in the home port and you are as busy at your books as +if you were old students like myself. Come, put by your big books and your +ledgers, lads. Roger, much as I hate to have to break bad news, your family +are all in Boston, so--more joy to us!--there's nothing left but you shall +come straight home with Benny here. Unless, that is--" my father's eyes +twinkled just as Roger's sometimes did--"unless you've more urgent business +elsewhere." + +"I thank you, sir," said Roger, "but I have _no_ more urgent business, and +I shall be--well, delighted doesn't half express it." + +His manner was collected enough, but at my father's smile he reddened and +his own eyes danced. + +"Pack away your books and come along, then. There's some one will be glad +to see you besides Benny's mother. Leave work till morning. I'll wager come +sun-up you'll be glad enough to get to your tasks if you've had a little +home life meanwhile. Come, lads, come." + +Almost before we fully could realize what it meant, we were walking up to +the door of my own home, and there was my mother standing on the threshold, +and my sister, her face as pink now as it had been white on the day long +ago when she had heard that Roger was to sail as supercargo. + +Many times more embarrassed than Roger, whom I never had suspected of such +shamelessness, I promptly turned my back on him and my sister; where upon +my father laughed aloud and drew me into the house. From the hall I saw +the dining-table laid with our grandest silver, and, over all, the +towering candle-sticks that were brought forth only on state occasions. + +"And now, lads," said my father, when we sat before such a meal as only +returning prodigals can know, "what's this tale of mutiny and piracy with +which the town's been buzzing these two weeks past? Trash, of course." + +"Why, sir, I think we've done the right thing," said Roger, "and yet I +can't say that it's trash." + +When my father had heard the story he said so little that he frightened me; +and my mother and sister exchanged anxious glances. + +"Of course," Roger added, "we are convinced absolutely, and if that fellow +hadn't got away at Whampoa, we'd have proof of Kipping's part in it--" + +"But he got away," my father interposed, "and I question if his word is +good for much, in any event. Poor Joseph Whidden! We were boys together." + +He shortly left the table, and a shadow seemed to have fallen over us. We +ate in silence, and after supper Roger and my sister went into the garden +together. What, I wondered, was to become of us now? + +That night I dreamed of courts and judges and goodness knows what penalties +of the law, and woke, and dreamed again, and slept uneasily until the +unaccustomed sound of some one pounding on our street door waked me in the +early morning. + +After a time a servant answered the loudly repeated summons. Low voices +followed, then I heard my father open his own door and go out into the +hall. + +"Is that you, Tom Webster?" he called. + +"It is. I'm told you've two of my men here in hiding. Rout 'em out. What +brand of discipline do you call this? All hands laying a-bed at four in the +morning. I've been up all night. Called by messenger just as I turned in at +that confounded tavern, charged full price for a night's lodging,--curse +that skinflint Hodges!--and took a coach that brought me to Salem as fast +as it could clip over the road. I'm too fat to straddle a horse. Come, +where's Hamlin and that young scamp of yours?" + +I scrambled out of bed and was dressing as fast as I could, when I heard +Roger also in the hall. + +"Aha! Here he is," Mr. Webster cried. "Fine sea-captain you are, you young +mutineer, laying abed at cockcrow! Come, stir a leg there. I've been aboard +ship this morning, after a ride that was like to shake my liver into my +boots. Where's Ben Lathrop? Come, come, you fine-young-gentleman +supercargo." + +Crying, "Here I am," I pulled on my boots and joined the others in the +lower hall, and the three of us, Mr. Webster, Roger, and I, hurried down +the street in time to the old man's testy exclamations, which burst out +fervently and often profanely whenever his lame foot struck the +ground harder than usual. "Pirates--mutineers--young cubs--laying abed-- +cockcrow--" and so on, until we were in a boat and out on the harbor, where +the Island Princess towered above the morning mist. + +"Lathrop'll row us," the old man snapped out. "Good for him--stretch his +muscles." + +Coming aboard the ship, we hailed the watch and went directly to the cabin. + +"Now," the old man cried, "bring out your log-book and your papers." + +He slowly scanned the pages of the log and looked at our accounts with a +searching gaze that noted every figure, dot and comma. After a time he +said, "Tell me everything." + +It was indeed a strange story that Roger told, and I thought that I read +incredulity in the old man's eyes; but he did not interrupt the narrative +from beginning to end. When it was done, he spread his great hands on the +table and shot question after question, first at one of us, then at the +other, indicating by his glance which he wished to answer him. + +"When first did you suspect Falk?--What proof had you?--Did Captain Whidden +know anything from the start?--How do you know that Falk was laying for Mr. +Thomas?--Do you know the penalty for mutiny?--Do you know the penalty for +piracy?--Hand out your receipts for all money paid over at Canton.--Who in +thunder gave you command of my ship?--Do you appreciate the seriousness of +overthrowing the lawful captain?--How in thunder did you force that paper +out of Johnston?" + +His vehemence and anger seemed to grow as he went on, and for twenty +minutes he snapped out his questions till it seemed as if we were facing a +running fire of musketry. His square, smooth-shaven chin was thrust out +between his bushy side-whiskers, and his eyes shot fiercely, first at +Roger, then at me. + +A small swinging lantern lighted the scene. Its rays made the corners seem +dark and remote. They fell on the rough features of the old merchant +mariner who owned the ship and who so largely controlled our fortunes, +making him seem more irascible than ever, and faded out in the early +morning light that came in through the deadlights. + +At last he placed his hands each on the opposite shoulder, planted his +elbows on the table, and fiercely glared at us while he demanded, "Have you +two young men stopped yet to think how it'll seem to be hanged?" + +The lantern swung slowly during the silence that followed. The shadows +swayed haltingly from side to side. + +"No," cried Roger hotly, "we have not, Captain Webster. We've been too busy +looking after _your_ interests." + +The scar where the case-knife had slashed his cheek so long ago stood +starkly out from the dull red of his face. + +At that the old man threw back his head and burst into a great guffaw of +laughter. He laughed until the lantern trembled, until his chair leaned so +far back that I feared he was about to fall,--or hoped he was,--until it +seemed as if the echoes must come booming back from the farthest shore. + +"Lads, lads!" he cried, "you're good lads. You're the delight of an old +man's heart! You've done fine! Roger Hamlin, I've a new ship to be finished +this summer. You shall be master, if you'll be so kind, for an old man that +wishes you well, and"--here he slyly winked at me--"on the day you take a +wife, there'll come to your bride a kiss and a thousand dollars in gold +from Thomas Webster. As for Ben, here, he's done fine as supercargo of the +old Island Princess,--them are good accounts, boy,--and I'll recommend he +sails in the new ship with you." + +He stopped short then and looked away as if through the bulkhead and over +the sea as far, perhaps, as Sunda Strait, and the long line of Sunda +Islands bending like a curved blade to guard the mysteries of the East +against such young adventurers as we. + +After a time he said in a very different voice, "I was warned of one man in +the crew, just after you sailed." His fingers beat a dull tattoo on the +polished table. "It was too late then to help matters, so I said never a +word--not even to my own sons. But--" the old man's voice hardened--"if +Nathan Falk ever again sets foot on American soil he'll hang higher than +ever Haman hung, if I have to build the gallows with my own two hands, Mr. +Hamlin--ay, he or any man of his crew. The law and I'll work together to +that end, Mr. Hamlin." + +So for a long time we sat and talked of one thing and another. + +When at last we went on deck, Mr. Cledd spoke to Roger of something that +had happened early in the watch. I approached them idly, overheard a phrase +or two and joined them. + +"It was the cook," Mr. Cledd was saying. "He was trying to sneak aboard in +the dark. I don't think he had been drinking. I can't understand it. He had +a big bag of dried apples and said that was all he went for. I don't like +to discipline a man so late in the voyage." + +"Let it pass," Roger replied. "Cook's done good work for us." + +I didn't understand then what it meant; but later in the day I heard some +one say softly, "Mistah Lathrop, Ah done got an apple pie, yass, sah. Young +gen'lems dey jest got to have pie. You jest come long with dis yeh ol' +nigger." + +There were tears in my eyes when I saw the great pie that the old African +had baked. I urged him to share it with me, and though for a time he +refused, at last he hesitantly consented. "Ah dunno," he remarked, "Ah +dunno as Ah had ought to. Pies, dey's foh young gen'lems and officers, but +dis yeh is a kind of ambigoo-cous pie--yass, sah, seeing you say so, Ah +will." + +Never did eating bread and salt together pledge a stronger or more enduring +friendship. To this very day I have the tenderest regard for the old man +with whom I had passed so many desperate hours. + +That old Blodgett and Davie Paine should take our gifts to "the tiny wee +girl" at Newburyport we all agreed, when they asked the privilege. "It +ain't but a wee bit to do for a good ship-mate," Blodgett remarked with a +deprecatory wave of his hand. "I'd do more 'n that for the memory of old +Bill Hayden." And just before he left for the journey he cautiously +confided to me, "I've got a few more little tricks I picked up at that 'ere +temple. It don't do to talk about such trinkets,--not that I'm +superstitious,--but she'll never tell if she don't know where they come +from. Ah, Mr. Lathrop, it's sad to lose a fortune, and that's what we done +when we let all them heathen islands go without a good Christian expedition +to destroy the idols and relieve them of their ill-gotten gains." + +The two departed side by side, with their bundles swung over their +shoulders. They and the cook had received double wages to reward their +loyal service, and they carried handsome presents for the little girl of +whom we had heard so much; but it was a sad mission for which they had +offered themselves. No gift on all the green earth could take the place of +poor, faithful old Bill, the father who was never coming home. + +That night, when Roger and I again went together to my own father's house, +eager to tell the news of our good fortune, we found my mother and my +sister in the garden waiting for us. I was not wise enough then to +understand that the tears in my mother's eyes were for a young boy and a +young girl whom she had had but yesterday, but of whom now only memories +remained--memories, and a youth and a woman grown. Nor could I read the +future and see the ships of the firm of Hamlin and Lathrop sailing every +sea. I only thought to myself, as I saw Roger stand straight and tall +beside my sister, with the white scar on his face, that _there_ was a +brother of whom I could be proud. + + +THE END + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mutineers, by Charles Boardman Hawes + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + +***** This file should be named 9657.txt or 9657.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/9/6/5/9657/ + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu and the PG +Distributed Proofreaders + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Mutineers + +Author: Charles Boardman Hawes + +Release Date: January, 2006 [EBook #9657] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on October 13, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu +and the PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +THE MUTINEERS + + + +_A tale of old days at sea and of adventures in the Far East as Benjamin +Lathrop set it down some sixty years ago_ + + + +by Charles Boardman Hawes + + + + + +_Illustrated_ + + + + +_To_ D.C.H. + + + + +_TO PAY MY SHOT_ + + +_To master, mate, and men of the ship Hunter, whose voyage is the backbone +of my story; to Captain David Woodard, English mariner, who more than a +hundred and twenty years ago was wrecked on the island of Celebes; to +Captain R.G.F. Candage of Brookline, Massachusetts, who was party to the +original contract in melon seeds; and to certain blue-water skippers who +have left sailing directions for eastern ports and seas, I am grateful for +fascinating narratives and journals, and indebted for incidents in this +tale of an earlier generation._ + +_C.B.H._ + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + I My Father and I Call on Captain Whidden + II Bill Hayden + III The Man Outside the Galley + IV A Piece of Pie + V Kipping + + +II +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + + VI The Council in the Cabin + + VII The Sail with a Lozenge-Shaped Patch + VIII Attacked + IX Bad Signs + X The Treasure-Seeker + + + +III +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + + XI A Hundred Thousand Dollars in Gold + XII A Strange Tale + XIII Trouble Forward + XIV Bill Hayden Comes to the End of His Voyage + + + +IV +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + + XV Mr. Falk Tries to Cover His Tracks + XVI A Prayer for the Dead + XVII Marooned +XVIII Adventures Ashore + + + +V +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + + XIX In Last Resort + XX A Story in Melon Seeds + XXI New Allies + XXII We Attack +XXIII What We Found in the Cabin + + + +VI +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + + XXIV Falk Proposes a Truce + XXV Including a Cross-Examination + XXVI An Attempt to Play on Our Sympathy +XXVII We Reach Whampoa, but Not the End of Our Troubles + + + +VII +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +XXVIII A Mystery Is Solved and a Thief Gets Away + XXIX Homeward Bound + XXX Through Sunda Strait + XXXI Pikes, Cutlasses, and Guns +XXXII "So Ends" + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + +"_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!" + +_Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a +pistol shot rang out sharply, and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and +fall_. + +_We helped him pile his belongings into his chest ... and gave him a hand +on deck_. + +"_Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk_. + +_He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo_. + + + + +[Illustration: "_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!"] + + + + +I + +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + + +CHAPTER I + +MY FATHER AND I CALL ON CAPTAIN WHIDDEN + + +My father's study, as I entered it on an April morning in 1809, to learn +his decision regarding a matter that was to determine the course of all my +life, was dim and spacious and far removed from the bustle and clamor of +the harbor-side. It was a large room paneled with dark wood. There were +books along the walls, and paintings of ships, and over the fireplace there +stood a beautiful model of a Burmese junk, carved by some brown artist on +the bank of the Irawadi. + +My father sat by the open window and looked out into the warm sunshine, +which was swiftly driving the last snow from the hollows under the +shrubbery. + +Already crocuses were blossoming in the grass of the year before, which was +still green in patches, and the bright sun and the blue sky made the study +seem to me, entering, dark and sombre. It was characteristic of my father, +I thought with a flash of fancy, to sit there and look out into a warm, gay +world where springtime was quickening the blood and sunshine lay warm on +the flowers; he always had lived in old Salem, and as he wrote his sermons, +he always had looked out through study windows on a world of commerce +bright with adventure. For my own part, I was of no mind to play the +spectator in so stirring a drama. + +With a smile he turned at my step. "So, my son, you wish to ship before the +mast," he said, in a repressed voice and manner that seemed in keeping with +the dim, quiet room. "Pray what do you know of the sea?" + +I thought the question idle, for all my life I had lived where I could look +from my window out on the harbor. + +"Why, sir," I replied, "I know enough to realize that I want to follow the +sea." + +"To follow the sea?" + +There was something in my father's eyes that I could not understand. He +seemed to be dreaming, as if of voyages that he himself had made. Yet I +knew he never had sailed blue water. "Well, why not?" he asked suddenly. +"There was a time--" + +I was too young to realize then what has come to me since: that my father's +manner revealed a side of his nature that I never had known; that in his +own heart was a love of adventure that he never had let me see. My sixteen +years had given me a big, strong body, but no great insight, and I thought +only of my own urgent desire of the moment. + +"Many a boy of ten or twelve has gone to sea," I said, "and the Island +Princess will sail in a fortnight. If you were to speak to Captain +Whidden--" + +My father sternly turned on me. "No son of mine shall climb through the +cabin windows." + +"But Captain Whidden--" + +"I thought you desired to follow the sea--to ship before the mast." + +"I do." + +"Then say no more of Captain Whidden. If you wish to go to sea, well and +good. I'll not stand in your way. But we'll seek no favoritism, you and I. +You'll ship as boy, but you'll take your medicine like a man." + +"Yes, sir," I said, trying perversely to conceal my joy. + +"And as for Captain Whidden," my father added, "you'll find he cuts a very +different figure aboard ship from that he shows in our drawing-room." + +Then a smile twinkled through his severity, and he laid his hand firmly on +my shoulder. + +"Son, you have my permission ungrudgingly given. There was a time--well, +your grandfather didn't see things as I did." + +"But some day," I cried, "I'll have a counting-house of my own-- +some day--" + +My father laughed kindly, and I, taken aback, blushed at my own eagerness. + +"Anyway," I persisted, "Roger Hamlin is to go as supercargo." + +"Roger--as supercargo?" exclaimed a low voice. + +I turned and saw that my sister stood in the door. + +"Where--when is he going?" + +"To Canton on the Island Princess! And so am I," I cried. + +"Oh!" she said. And she stood there, silent and a little pale. + +"You'll not see much of Roger," my father remarked to me, still smiling. He +had a way of enjoying a quiet joke at my expense, to him the more pleasing +because I never was quite sure just wherein the humor lay. + +"But I'm going," I cried. "I'm going--I'm going--I'm going!" + +"At the end of the voyage," said my father, "we'll find out whether you +still wish to follow the sea. After all, I'll go with you this evening, +when supper is done, to see Joseph Whidden." + +The lamps were lighted when we left the house, and long beams from the +windows fell on the walk and on the road. We went down the street side by +side, my father absently swinging his cane, I wondering if it were not +beneath the dignity of a young man about to go to sea that his parent +should accompany him on such an errand. + +Just as we reached the corner, a man who had come up the street a little +distance behind us turned in at our own front gate, and my father, seeing +me look back when the gate slammed, smiled and said, "I'll venture a guess, +Bennie-my-lad, that some one named Roger is calling at our house this +evening." + +Afterwards--long, long afterwards--I remembered the incident. + +When my father let the knocker fall against Captain Whidden's great front +door, my heart, it seemed to me, echoed the sound and then danced away at a +lively pace. A servant, whom I watched coming from somewhere behind the +stairs, admitted us to the quiet hall; then another door opened silently, a +brighter light shone out upon us, and a big, grave man appeared. He +welcomed us with a few thoughtful words and, by a motion of his hand, sent +us before him into the room where he had been sitting. + +"And so," said Captain Whidden, when we had explained our errand, "I am to +have this young man aboard my ship." + +"If you will, sir," I cried eagerly, yet anxiously, too, for he did not +seem nearly so well pleased as I had expected. + +"Yes, Ben, you may come with us to Canton; but as your father says, you +must fill your own boots and stand on your own two feet. And will you, +friend Lathrop,"--he turned to my father,--"hazard a venture on the +voyage?" + + +My father smiled. "I think, Joe," he said, "that I've placed a considerable +venture in your hands already." + +Captain Whidden nodded. "So you have, so you have. I'll watch it as best I +can, too, though of course I'll see little of the boy. Let him go now. I'll +talk with you a while if I may." + +My father glanced at me, and I got up. + +Captain Whidden rose, too. "Come down in the morning," he said. "You can +sign with us at the Websters' counting-house.--And good-bye, Ben," he +added, extending his hand. + +"Good-bye? You don't mean--that I'm not to go with you?" + +He smiled. "It'll be a long time, Ben, before you and I meet again on quite +such terms as these." + +Then I saw what he meant, and shook his hand and walked away without +looking back. Nor did I ever learn what he and my father talked about after +I left them there together. + + + +CHAPTER II + +BILL HAYDEN + + +More than two-score years and ten have come and gone since that day when I, +Benjamin Lathrop, put out from Salem harbor, a green hand on the ship +Island Princess, and in them I have achieved, I think I can say with due +modesty, a position of some importance in my own world. But although +innumerable activities have crowded to the full each intervening year, +neither the aspirations of youth nor the successes of maturity nor the +dignities of later life have effaced from my memory the picture of myself, +a boy on the deck of the Island Princess in April, 1809. + +I thought myself very grand as the wind whipped my pantaloons against my +ankles and flapped the ribbons of the sailor hat that I had pulled snugly +down; and I imagined myself the hero of a thousand stirring adventures in +the South Seas, which I should relate when I came back an able seaman at +the very least. Never was sun so bright; never were seas so blue; never was +ship so smart as the Island Princess. + +On her black hull a nicely laid band of white ran sheer from stem to stern; +her bows swelled to meet the seas in a gentle curve that hinted the swift +lines of our clippers of more recent years. From mainmast heel to truck, +from ensign halyard to tip of flying jib-boom, her well-proportioned masts +and spars and taut rigging stood up so trimly in one splendidly +cooerdinating structure, that the veriest lubber must have acknowledged her +the finest handiwork of man. + +It was like a play to watch the men sitting here and there on deck, or +talking idly around the forecastle, while Captain Whidden and the chief +mate conferred together aft. I was so much taken with it all that I had no +eyes for my own people who were there to see me off, until straight out +from the crowded wharf there came a young man whom I knew well. His gray +eyes, firm lips, square chin, and broad shoulders had been familiar to me +ever since I could remember. + +As he was rowed briskly to the ship, I waved to him and called out, "O +Roger--ahoy!" + +I thought, when he glanced up from the boat, that his gray eyes twinkled +and that there was the flutter of a smile on his well-formed lips; but he +looked at me and through me and seemed not to see me, and it came over me +all at once that from the cabin to the forecastle was many, many times the +length of the ship. + +With a quick survey of the deck, as if to see who had spoken, yet seeming +not to see me at all, Roger, who had lived all his life within a cable's +length of the house where I was born, who had taught me to box the compass +before I learned my ABC's, whose interest in my own sister had partly +mystified, partly amused her younger brother--that very Roger climbed +aboard the Island Princess and went on into the cabin without word or sign +of recognition. + +It was not the first time, of course, that I had realized what my chosen +apprenticeship involved; but the incident brought it home to me more +clearly than ever before. No longer was I to be known as the son of Thomas +Lathrop. In my idle dreams I had been the hero of a thousand imaginary +adventures; instead, in the strange experiences I am about to relate, I was +to be only the ship's "boy"--the youngest and least important member of +that little isolated community banded together for a journey to the other +side of the world. But I was to see things happen such as most men have +never dreamed of; and now, after fifty years, when the others are dead and +gone, I may write the story. + +When I saw that my father, who had watched Roger Hamlin with twinkling eyes +ignore my greeting, was chuckling in great amusement, I bit my lip. What if +Roger _was_ supercargo, I thought: he needn't feel so big. + +Now on the wharf there was a flutter of activity and a stir of color; now a +louder hum of voices drifted across the intervening water. Captain Whidden +lifted his hand in farewell to his invalid wife, who had come in her +carriage to see him sail. The mate went forward on the forecastle and the +second mate took his position in the waist. + +"Now then, Mr. Thomas," Captain Whidden called in a deep voice, "is all +clear forward?" + +"All clear, sir," the mate replied; and then, with all eyes upon him, he +took charge, as was the custom, and proceeded to work the ship. + +While the men paid out the riding cable and tripped it, and hove in the +slack of the other, I stood, carried away--foolish boy!--by the thought +that here at last I was a seaman among seamen, until at my ear the second +mate cried sharply, "Lay forward, there, and lend a hand to cat the +anchor." + +The sails flapped loose overhead; orders boomed back and forth; there was +running and racing and hauling and swarming up the rigging; and from the +windlass came the chanteyman's solo with its thunderous chorus:-- + + "Pull one and all! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + On this catfall! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Answer the call! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Hoy! Haulee! + Hoy! Hoy!!! + Oh, cheery men!" + +As the second anchor rose to the pull of the creaking windlass, we sheeted +home the topsails, topgallantsails and royals and hoisted them up, braced +head-yards aback and after-yards full for the port tack, hoisted the jib +and put over the helm. Thus the Island Princess fell off by the head, as we +catted and fished the anchor; then took the wind in her sails and slipped +slowly out toward the open sea. + +Aft, by the lee rail, I saw Roger Hamlin watching the group, a little apart +from the others, where my own people had gathered. My father stood half a +head above the crowd, and beside him were my mother and my sister. When I, +too, looked back at them, my father waved his hat and I knew his eyes were +following me; I saw the flutter of white from my mother's hand, and I knew +that her heart was going out with me to the uttermost parts of the earth. + +Then, almost timidly, my sister waved her handkerchief. But I saw that she +was looking at the quarter-deck. + +As land fell astern until it became a thin blue line on the western +horizon, and as the Island Princess ran free with the wind full in her +sails, I took occasion, while I jumped back and forth in response to the +mate's quick orders, to study curiously my shipmates in our little kingdom. +Now that we had no means of communication with that already distant shore, +we were a city unto ourselves. + +Yonder was the cook, a man as black as the bottom of his iron pot, whose +frown, engraved deeply in his low forehead, might have marked him in my +eyes as the villain of some melodrama of the sea, had I not known him for +many years to be one of the most generous darkies, so far as hungry small +boys were concerned, that ever ruled a galley. The second mate, who was now +in the waist, I had never seen before--to tell the truth, I was glad that +he held no better berth, for I disliked the turn of his too full lips. +Captain Whidden and the chief mate, Mr. Thomas, I had known a long time, +and I had thought myself on terms of friendship with them, even +familiarity; but so far as any outward sign was concerned, I might now have +been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate. + +We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin--Captain Whidden, Mr. +Thomas, Mr. Falk, and Roger, whose duties included oversight of the cargo, +supervision of matters purely of business and trade in foreign ports, and a +deal of clerical work that Captain Whidden had no mind to be bothered with; +three in the steerage--the cook (contrary, perhaps, to the more usual +custom), the steward, and the carpenter; and fourteen in the forecastle. + +All in all I was well pleased with my prospects, and promised myself that I +would "show them a thing or two," particularly Roger Hamlin. I'd make a +name for myself aboard the Island Princess. I'd let all the men know that +it would not take Benjamin Lathrop long to become as smart a seaman as +they'd hope to see. + +Silly lad that I was! + +Within twenty minutes of that idle dream the chain of circumstances had +begun that was to bring every man aboard the Island Princess face to face +with death. Like the small dark cloud that foreruns a typhoon, the first +act in the wild drama that came near to costing me my own life was so +slight, so insignificant relatively, that no man of us then dreamed of the +hidden forces that brought it to pass. + +On the forecastle by the larboard rigging stood a big, broad-shouldered +fellow, who nodded familiarly at the second mate, cast a bit of a leer at +the captain as if to impress on the rest of us his own daring and +independence, and gave me, when I caught his eye, a cold, noncommittal +stare. His name, I shortly learned, was Kipping. Undeniably he was +impudent; but he had, nevertheless, a mild face and a mild manner, and when +I heard him talk, I discovered that he had a mild voice; I could find no +place for him in the imaginary adventures that filled my mind--he was quite +too mild a man. + +I perceived that he was soldiering at his work, and almost at the same +moment I saw the mate come striding down on him. + +"You there," Mr. Thomas snapped out, "bear a hand! Do you think you're +waiting for the cows to come home?" + +"No-o-o, sir," the mild man drawled, starting to walk across the deck. + +The slow reply, delivered with a mocking inflection, fanned to sudden +laughter chuckles that the mate's words had caused. + + +Mr. Thomas reddened and, stepping out, thrust his face close to the +other's. "You try any of your slick tricks on me, my man," he said slowly +and significantly, "you try any of your slick tricks on me, and so help me, +I'll show you." + +"Ye-e-es, sir," the man replied with the same inflection, though not so +pronounced this time. + +Suddenly the deck became very still. The listeners checked their laughter. +Behind me I heard some one mutter, "Hear that, will you?" Glancing around, +I saw that Captain Whidden had gone below and that Mr. Thomas was in +command. I was confident that the mild seaman was mocking the mate, yet so +subtle was his challenge, you could not be sure that he actually was +defiant. + +Although Mr. Thomas obviously shared the opinion of the men, there was so +little on which to base a charge of insubordination or affront that he +momentarily hesitated. + +"What is your name?" he suddenly demanded. + +"Kipping, sir," the mild man replied. + +This time there was only the faintest suggestion of the derisive +inflection. After all, it might have been but a mannerism. The man had such +a mild face and such a mild manner! + +"Well, Kipping, you go about your work, and after this, let me warn you, +keep busy and keep a civil tongue in your head. We'll have no slick tricks +aboard this ship, and the sooner you men realize it, the easier it will be +for all hands." + +Turning, the mate went back to the quarter-deck and resumed his station by +the weather rail. + +While his back was toward us, however, and just as I myself, who had +listened, all ears, to the exchange of words between them, was turning to +the forecastle, I saw--or thought I saw--on Kipping's almost averted face +just such a leer as I had seen him cast at the captain, followed, I could +have taken my oath, by a shameless wink. When he noticed me gazing at him, +open-mouthed, he gave me such another cold stare as he had given me before +and, muttering something under his breath, walked away. + +I looked aft to discover at whom he could have winked, but I saw only the +second mate, who scowled at me angrily. + +"Now what," thought I, "can all this mean?" Then, being unable to make +anything of it, I forgot it and devoted myself industriously to my own +affairs until the hoarse call of "All hands on deck" brought the men who +were below tumbling up, to be summoned aft and addressed by the captain. + +Apparently Captain Whidden was not aware that there was a soul on board +ship except himself. With his eyes on the sea and his hands clasped behind +him, he paced the deck, while we fidgeted and twisted and grew more and +more impatient. At last, with a sort of a start, as if he had just seen +that we were waiting, he stopped and surveyed us closely. He was a fine +figure of a man and he affected the fashions of a somewhat earlier day. +A beaver with sweeping brim surmounted his strong, smooth-shaven face, and +a white stock, deftly folded, swathed his throat to his resolute chin. Trim +waistcoat, ample coat, and calmly folded arms completed his picture as he +stood there, grave yet not severe, waiting to address us. + +What he said to us in his slow, even voice was the usual speech of a +captain in those times; and except for a finer dignity than common, he did +not deviate from the well-worn customary phrases until he had outlined the +voyage that lay before us and had summed up the advantages of prompt, +willing obedience and the penalties of any other course. His tone then +suddenly changed. "If any man here thinks that he can give me slovenly work +or back talk and arguing," he said, "it'll be better for that man if he +jumps overboard and swims for shore." I was certain--and I still am--that +he glanced sharply at Kipping, who stood with a faint, nervous smile, +looking at no one in particular. "Well, Mr. Thomas," he said at last, +"we'll divide the watches. Choose your first man." + +When we went forward, I found myself, as the green hand of the voyage, one +of six men in the starboard watch. I liked the arrangement little enough, +for the second mate commanded us and Kipping was the first man he had +chosen; but it was all in the day's work, so I went below to get my jacket +before eight bells should strike. + +The voices in the forecastle suddenly stopped when my feet sounded on the +steps; but as soon as the men saw that it was only the boy, they resumed +their discussion without restraint. + +"I tell you," some one proclaimed from the darkest corner, "the second +mate, he had it all planned to get the chief mate's berth this voyage, and +the captain, he put him out no end because he wouldn't let him have it. +Yes, sir. And he bears a grudge against the mate, he does, him and that sly +friend of his, Kipping. Perhaps you didn't see Kipping wink at the second +mate after he was called down. I did, and I says to myself then, says I, +'There's going to be troublous times ere this voyage is over.' Yes, sir." + +"Right you are, Davie!" a higher, thinner voice proclaimed, "right you are. +I was having my future told, I was, and the lady--" + +A roar of laughter drowned the words of the luckless second speaker, and +some one yelled vociferously, "Neddie the fortune-teller! Don't tell me +he's shipped with us again!" + +"But I tell you," Neddie persisted shrilly, "I tell you they hit it right, +they do, often. And the lady, she says, 'Neddie Benson, don't you go +reckless on this next voyage. There's trouble in store,' she says. +'There'll be a dark man and a light man, and a terrible danger.' And I paid +the lady two dollars and I--" + +Again laughter thundered in the forecastle. + +"All the same," the deep-voiced Davie growled, "that sly, slippery--" + +"Hist!" A man raised his hand against the light that came faintly from on +deck. + +Then a mild voice asked, "What are you men quidding about anyway? One of +you's sitting on my chest." + +"Listen to them talk," some one close beside me whispered. "You'd think +this voyage was all of life, the way they run on about it. Now it don't +mean so much to me. My name's Bill Hayden, and I've got a little wee girl, +I have, over to Newburyport, that will be looking for her dad to come home. +Two feet long she is, and cute as they make them." + +Aware that the speaker was watching me closely, I perfunctorily nodded. At +that he edged nearer. "Now I'm glad we're in the same watch," he said. "So +many men just cut a fellow off with a curse." + +I observed him more sharply, and saw that he was a stupid-looking but +rather kindly soul whose hair was just turning gray. + +"Now I wish you could see that little girl of mine," he continued. "Cute? +there ain't no word to tell you how cute she is. All a-laughing and +gurgling and as good as gold. Why, she ain't but a little old, and yet she +can stand right up on her two little legs as cute as you please." + +I listened with mild interest as he rambled on. He seemed such a friendly, +homely soul that I could but regard him more kindly than I did some of our +keener-witted fellow seamen. + +Now we heard faintly the bell as it struck, _clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang-clang_. Feet scuffled overhead, and some one called down the hatch, +"Eight bells, starbow-lines ahoy!" + +Davie's deep voice replied sonorously, "Ay-ay!" And one after another we +climbed out on deck, where the wind from the sea blew cool on our faces. + +I had mounted the first rung of the ladder, and was regularly signed as a +member of the crew of the Island Princess, bound for Canton with a cargo of +woolen goods and ginseng. There was much that puzzled me aboard-ship--the +discontent of the second mate, the perversity of the man Kipping (others +besides myself had seen that wink), and a certain undercurrent of +pessimism. But although I was separated a long, long way from my old +friends in the cabin, I felt that in Bill Hayden I had found a friend of a +sort; then, as I began my first real watch on deck at sea, I fell to +thinking of my sister and Roger Hamlin. + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MAN OUTSIDE THE GALLEY + + +Strange events happened in our first month at sea--events so subtle as +perhaps to seem an unimportant part of this narrative of a strange voyage, +yet really as necessary to the foundation of the story as the single bricks +and the single dabs of mortar at the base of a tall chimney are necessary +to the completed structure. I later had cause to remember each trivial +incident as if it had been written in letters of fire. + +In the first dog watch one afternoon, when we were a few days out of port, +I was sitting with my back against the forward deck-house, practising +splices and knots with a bit of rope that I had saved for the purpose. I +was only a couple of feet from the corner, so of course I heard what was +going on just out of sight. + +The voices were low but distinct. + +"Now leave me alone!" It was Bill Hayden who spoke. "I ain't never troubled +you." + +"Ah, so you ain't troubled me, have you, you whimpering old dog?" + +"No, I ain't troubled you." + +"Oh, no! You was so glad to let me take your nice dry boots, you was, when +mine was filled with water." + +The slow, mild, ostensibly patient voice could be none other than +Kipping's. + +"I had to wear 'em myself." + +"Oh, had to wear 'em yourself, did you?" + +"Let go o' my arm!" + +"So?" + +"Let go, I tell you; let go or I'll--I swear I'll hammer you good." + +"Oh, you'll hammer me good, will you?" + +"Let go!" + +There was a sudden scuffle, then out from the corner of the deck-house +danced Kipping with both hands pressed over his jaw. + +"You bloody scoundrel!" he snarled, meek no longer. "You wait--I'll get +you. I'll--" Seeing me sitting there with my bit of rope, he stopped short; +then, with a sneer, he walked away. + +Amazed at the sudden departure of his tormentor, Bill Hayden stuck his own +head round the corner and in turn discovered me in my unintentional +hiding-place. + +Bill, however, instead of departing in chagrin, joined me with a puzzled +expression on his kind, stupid face. + +"I don't understand that Kipping," he said sadly. "I've tried to use him +right. I've done everything I can to help him out and I'm sure I don't want +to quarrel with him, yet for all he goes around as meek as a cat that's +been in the cream, he's always pecking at me and pestering me, till just +now I was fair drove to give him a smart larrup." + +Why, indeed, should Kipping or any one else molest good, dull old Bill +Hayden? + +"I'm a family man, I am," Bill continued, "with a little girl at home. I +ain't a-bothering no one. I'm sure all I want is to be left alone." + +For a time we sat in silence, watching the succession of blue waves through +which the Island Princess cut her swift and almost silent passage. A man +must have been a cowardly bully to annoy harmless old Bill. Yet even then, +young though I was, I realized that sometimes there is no more dangerous +man than a coward and a bully, "He's great friends with the second mate," +Bill remarked at last. "And the second mate has got no use at all for Mr. +Thomas because he thought he was going to get Mr. Thomas's berth and +didn't; and for the same reason he don't like the captain. Well, I'm glad +he's only _second mate_. He ain't got his hands out of the tar-bucket yet, +my boy." + +"How do you know he expected to get the mate's berth?" I asked. + +"It's common talk, my boy. The supercargo's the only man aft he's got any +manner of use for, and cook says the steward says Mr. Hamlin ain't got no +manner of use for him. There you are." + +"No," I thought,--though I discreetly said nothing,--"Roger Hamlin is not +the man to be on friendly terms with a fellow of the second mate's +calibre." + +And from that time on I watched Mr. Falk, the second mate, and the +mild-voiced Kipping more closely than ever--so closely that one night I +stumbled on a surprising discovery. + +Ours was the middle watch, and Mr. Falk as usual was on the quarter-deck. +By moonlight I saw him leaning on the weather rail as haughtily as if he +were the master. His slim, slightly stooped figure, silhouetted against the +moonlit sea, was unmistakable. But the winds were inconstant and drifting +clouds occasionally obscured the moon. Watching, I saw him distinctly; +then, as the moonlight darkened, the after part of the ship became as a +single shadow against a sea almost as black. While I still watched, there +came through a small fissure in the clouds a single moonbeam that swept +from the sea across the quarter-deck and on over the sea again. By that +momentary light I saw that Mr. Falk had left the weather rail. + +Certainly it was a trifling thing to consider twice, but you must remember, +in the first place, that I was only a boy, with all a boy's curiosity about +trifles, and in the second place that of the four men in the cabin no other +derived such obvious satisfaction from the minor prerogatives of office as +Mr. Falk. He fairly swelled like a frog in the sun as he basked in the +prestige that he attributed to himself when, left in command, he occupied +the captain's place at the weather rail. + +Immediately I decided that under the cover of darkness I would see what had +become of him. So I ran lightly along in the shelter of the lee bulwark, +dodging past the galley, the scuttle-butt, and the cabin in turn. At the +quarter-deck I hesitated, knowing well that a sound thrashing was the least +I could expect if Mr. Falk discovered me trespassing on his own territory, +yet lured by a curiosity that was the stronger for the vague rumors on +which it had fed. + +On hands and knees I stopped by the farther corner of the cabin. Clouds +still hid the moon and low voices came to my ears. Very cautiously I peeked +from my hiding-place, and saw that Mr. Falk and the helmsman had put their +heads together and were talking earnestly. + +While they talked, the helmsman suddenly laughed and prodded Mr. Falk in +the ribs with his thumb. Like a flash it came over me that it was Kipping's +trick at the wheel. Here was absolute proof that, when the second mate and +the mild man thought no one was spying upon them, they were on uncommonly +friendly terms. Yet I did not dream that I had stumbled on anything graver +than to confirm one of those idle rumors that set tongues wagging in the +forecastle, but that really are too trifling to be worth a second thought. + +When the crew of a ship is cut off from all communication with the world at +large, it is bound, for want of greater interests, to find in the +monotonous daily round something about which to weave a pretty tale. + +At that moment, to my consternation, the bell struck four times. As the two +dark figures separated, I started back out of sight. Kipping's trick at the +wheel was over, and his relief would come immediately along the very route +that I had chosen; unless I got away at once I should in all probability be +discovered on the quarterdeck and trounced within an inch of my life. Then +suddenly, as if to punish my temerity, the cloud passed and the moonlight +streamed down on deck. + +Darting lightly back to the companion-ladder, I slipped down it and was on +the point of escaping forward when I heard slow steps. In terror lest the +relief spy me and reveal my presence by some exclamation that Kipping or +the second mate would overhear, I threw myself down flat on the deck just +forward of the scuttle-butt, where the moon cast a shadow; and with the +fervent hope that I should appear to be only a heap of old sail, I lay +without moving a muscle. + +The steps came slowly nearer. They had passed, I thought, when a pause set +my heart to jumping madly. Then came a low, cautious whisper:-- + +"You boy, what you doin' dah?" + +It was not the relief after all. It was the good old villainous-looking +black cook, with a cup of coffee for Mr. Falk. + +"Put yo' head down dah," he whispered, "put yo' head down, boy." + +With a quick motion of his hand he jerked some canvas from the butt so that +it concealed me, and went on, followed by the quick steps of the real +relief. + +Now I heard voices, but the only words I could distinguish were in the +cook's deep drawl. + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah. Ah brought yo' coffee, sah, Yass, sah, Ah'll wait +fo' yo' cup, sah." + +Next came Kipping's step--a mild step, if there is such a thing; even in +his bullying the man was mild. Then came the slow, heavy tread of the +returning African. + +Flicking the canvas off me, he muttered, "All's cleah fo' you to git away, +boy. How you done come to git in dis yeh scrape sho' am excruciatin'. You +just go 'long with you while dey's a chanst." + +So, carrying with me the very unimportant discovery that I had made, I ran +cautiously forward, away from the place where I had no business to be. + +When, in the morning, just before eight bells, I was sent to the galley +with the empty kids, I found the worthy cook in a solemn mood. + +"You boy," he said, fixing on me a stare, which his deeply graven frown +rendered the more severe, "you boy, what you think you gwine do, prowlin' +round all hours? Hey? You tell dis nigger dat. Heah Ah's been and put you +onto all de ropes and give you more infohmative disco'se about ships and +how to behave on 'em dan eveh Ah give a green hand befo' in all de years Ah +been gwine to sea, and heah you's so tarnation foolish as go prowlin' round +de quarter-deck whar you's like to git skun alive if Mistah Falk ketches +you." + +I don't remember what I replied, but I am sure it was flippant; to the day +of my death I shall never forget the stinging, good-natured cuff with which +the cook knocked my head against the wall. "Sho' now," he growled, "go +'long!" + +I was not yet ready to go. "Tell me, doctor," I said, "does the second mate +get on well with the others in the cabin?" + +The title mollified him somewhat, but he still felt that he must uphold the +dignity of his office. "Sho' now, what kind of a question is dat fo' a +ship's boy to be askin' de cook?" He glanced at me suspiciously, then +challenged me directly, "Who put dose idea' in yo' head?" + +By the tone of the second question, which was quite too straightforward to +be confused with the bantering that we usually exchanged, I knew that he +was willing, if diplomatically coaxed, to talk frankly. I then said +cautiously, "Every one thinks so, but you're the only man forward that's +likely to know." + +"Now ain't dat jest like de assumptivity of dem dah men in de forecastle. +How'd Ah know dat kind of contraptiveness, tell me?" + +Looking closely at me he began to rattle his pans at a great rate while I +waited in silence. He was not accomplishing much; indeed, he really was +throwing things into a state of general disorder. But I observed that he +was working methodically round the galley toward where I stood, until at +last he bumped into me and started as if he hadn't known that I was there +at all. + +"You boy," he cried, "you still heah?" He scowled at me with a particularly +savage intensity, then suddenly leaned over and tapped me on the shoulder. +"You's right, boy," he whispered. "He ain't got no manner of use foh dem +other gen'lems, and what's mo', dey ain't got no manner of use foh him. +Ah's telling you, boy, it's darn lucky, you bet, dat Mistah Falk he eats at +second table. Yass, sah. Hark! dah's de bell--eight bells! Yo' watch on +deck, hey?" After a short pause, he whispered, "Boy, you come sneakin' +round to-morrow night when dat yeh stew'd done gone to bed, an' Ah'll jest +gadder you up a piece of pie f'om Cap'n's table--yass, sah! Eight bells is +struck. Go 'long, you." And shoving me out of his little kingdom, the +villainous-looking darky sent after me a savage scowl, which I translated +rightly as a token of his high regard and sincere friendship. + +In my delight at the promised treat, and in my haste to join the watch, I +gave too little heed to where I was going, and shot like a bullet squarely +against a man who had been standing just abaft the galley window. He +collapsed with a grunt. My shoulder had knocked the wind completely out of +him. + +"Ugh!--" he gasped--"ugh! You son of perdition--ugh! Why in thunder don't +you look where you're running--ugh!--I'll break your rascally young +neck--ugh--when I get my wind." + +It was Kipping, and for the second time he had lost his mildness. + +As he clutched at me fiercely, I dodged and fled. Later, when I was hauling +at his side, he seemed to have forgotten the accident; but I knew well +enough that he had not. He was not the kind that forgets accidents. His +silence troubled me. How much, I wondered, had he heard of what was going +on in the galley? + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A PIECE OF PIE + + +At two bells there sounded the sonorous call, "Sail ho!" + +"Where away?" cried Mr. Falk. + +"One point off the larboard bow." + +In all the days since we had lost sight of land, we had seen but one other +sail, which had appeared only to disappear again beyond the horizon. It +seemed probable, however, that we should speak this second vessel, a brig +whose course crossed our own. Captain Whidden came on deck and assumed +command, and the men below, getting wind of the excitement, trooped up and +lined the bulwarks forward. Our interest, which was already considerable, +became even keener when the stranger hove out a signal of distress. We took +in all studding-sails and topgallantsails fore and aft, and lay by for her +about an hour after we first had sighted her. + +Over the water, when we were within hailing distance, came the cry: "Ship +ahoy!" + +Captain Whidden held the speaking trumpet. "Hullo!" + +"What ship is that, pray?" + +"The ship Island Princess, from Salem, bound to Canton. Where are you +from?" + +"The brig Adventure, bound from the Straits to Boston. Our foretopmast was +carried away four hours ago. Beware of--" + +Losing the next words, the Captain called, "I didn't hear that last." + +"Beware,"--came again the warning cry, booming deeply over the sea while +one and all we strained to hear it--"beware of any Arab ship. Arabs have +captured the English ship Alert and have murdered her captain and fifteen +men." + +Squaring her head-yards, the brig dropped her mainsail, braced her cross +jack-yard sharp aback, put her helm a-weather and got sternway, while her +after sails and helm kept her to the wind. So she fell off from us and the +two vessels passed, perhaps never to meet again. + +Both forward and aft, we aboard the Island Princess were sober men. Kipping +and the second mate were talking quietly together, I saw (I saw, too, that +Captain Whidden and some of the others were watching them sharply) Mr. +Thomas and Roger Hamlin were leaning side by side upon the rail, and +forward the men were gathering in groups. It was indeed an ominous message +that the brig had given us. But supper broke the tension, and afterwards a +more cheerful atmosphere prevailed. + +As I was sweeping down the deck next day, Roger, to my great surprise,--for +by now I was accustomed to his amused silence,--came and spoke to me with +something of the old, humorous freedom that was so characteristic of him. + +"Well, Bennie," said he, "we're quite a man now, are we not?" + +"We are," I replied shortly. Although I would not for a great deal have +given him the satisfaction of knowing it, I had been much vexed, secretly, +by his rigidly ignoring me. + +"Bennie," he said in a low voice, "is there trouble brewing in the +forecastle?" + +I was startled. "Why, no. I've seen no sign of trouble." + +"No one has talked to you, then?" + +"Not in such a way as you imply." + +"Hm! Keep your eyes and ears open, anyway, and if you hear anything that +sounds like trouble, let me know--quietly, mind you, even secretly." + +"What do you mean?" + +"We are carrying a valuable cargo, and we have very particular orders. All +must be thus and so,--exactly thus and so,--and it means more to the +owners, Bennie, than I think you realize. Now you go on with your work. But +remember--eyes and ears open." + +That night, as I watched the restless sea and the silent stars, my +imagination was stirred as never before. I felt the mystery and wonder of +great distances and far places. We were so utterly alone! Except for the +passing hail of some stranger, we had cut ourselves off for months from all +communication with the larger world. Whatever happened aboard ship, in +whatever straits we found ourselves, we must depend solely upon our own +resources; and already it appeared that some of our shipmates were scheming +and intriguing against one another. Thus I meditated, until the boyish and +more natural, perhaps more wholesome, thought of the cook's promise came to +me. + +Pie! My remembrance of pie was almost as intangible as a pleasant dream +might be some two days later. With care to escape observation, I made my +way to the galley and knocked cautiously. + +"Who's dah?" asked softly the old cook, who had barricaded himself for the +night according to his custom, and was smoking a villainously rank pipe. + +"It's Ben Lathrop," I whispered. + +"What you want heah?" the cook demanded. + +"The pie you promised me," I answered. + +"Humph! Ain't you fo'got dat pie yet? You got de most miraculous memorizer +eveh Ah heared of. You wait." + +I heard him fumbling inside the galley; then he opened the door and stepped +out on deck as if he had just decided to take a breath of fresh air. Upon +seeing me, he pretended to start with great surprise, and exclaimed rather +more loudly than before:-- + +"What you doin' heah, boy, at dis yeh hour o' night?" + +But all this was only crafty by-play. Having made sure, so he thought, +that no one was in sight, he grabbed me by the collar and yanked me into +the galley, at the same time shutting the door so that I almost stifled in +the rank smoke with which he had filled the place. + +Scowling fiercely, he reached into a little cupboard and drew out half an +apple pie that to my eager eyes seemed as big as a half moon on a clear +night. + + +"Dah," he said. "Eat it up. Mistah Falk, he tell stew'd he want pie and he +gotta have pie, and stew'd he come and he say, 'Frank,' says he, 'dat +Mistah Falk, his langwidge is like he is in liquo'. He _gotta_ have pie.' +'All right,' Ah say, 'if he gotta have pie, he gotta wait twill Ah make +pie. Cap'n, he et hearty o' pie lately.' Stew'd he say, 'Cap'n ain't had +but one piece and Mistah Thomas, he ain't had but one piece, and Mistah +Hamlin, he ain't had any. Dah's gotta be pie. You done et dat pie yo'se'f,' +says he. 'Oh, no,' says Ah. 'Ah never et no pie. You fo'get 'bout dat pie +you give Cap'n foh breakfas'.' Den stew'd he done crawl out. He don' know +Ah make two pies yestidday. Dat's how come Ah have pie foh de boy. Boys dey +need pie to make 'em grow. It's won'erful foh de indignation, pie is." + +I was appalled by the hue and cry that my half-circle of pastry had +occasioned, and more than a little fearful of the consequences if the truth +ever should transpire; but the pie in hand was compensation for many such +intangible difficulties in the future, and I was making great inroads on a +wedge of it, when I thought I heard a sound outside the window, which the +cook had masked with a piece of paper. + +I stopped to listen and saw that Frank had heard it too. It was a scratchy +sound as if some one were trying to unship the glass. + +"Massy sake!" my host gasped, taking his vile pipe out of his mouth. + +Although it was quite impossible for pallor to make any visible impression +on his surpassing blackness, he obviously was much disturbed. + +"Gobble dat pie, boy," he gasped, "gobble up ev'y crumb an' splinter." + +Now, as the scratchy noise sounded at the door, the cook laid his pipe on a +shelf and glanced up at a big carving-knife that hung from a rack above his +head. + +"Who's dah?" he demanded cautiously. + +"Lemme in," said a mild, low voice, "I want some o' that pie." + +"Massy sake!" the cook gasped in disgust, "ef it ain't dat no 'count +Kipping." + +"Lemme in," persisted the mild, plaintive voice. "Lemme in." + +"Aw, go 'long! Dah ain't no pie in heah," the cook retorted. "You's +dreamin', dat's what you is. You needs a good dose of medicine, dat's what +you needs." + +"I'm dreaming, am I?" the mild voice repeated. "Oh, yes, I'm dreaming I am, +ain't I? I didn't sneak around the galley yesterday morning and hear you +tell that cocky little fool to come and get a piece of pie tonight. Oh, no! +I didn't see him come prowling around when he thought no one was looking. +Oh, no! I didn't see you come out of the galley like you didn't know there +was anybody on deck, and walk right under the rigging where I was waiting +for just such tricks. Oh, no! I was dreaming, I was. Oh, yes." + + +"Dat Kipping," the cook whispered, "he's hand and foot with Mistah Falk." + +"Lemme in, you woolly-headed son of perdition, or I swear I'll take the +kinky scalp right off your round old head." + +"He's gettin' violenter," the cook whispered, eyeing me questioningly. + +Saying nothing, I swallowed the last bit of pie. I had made the most of my +opportunity. + +Kipping now shook the door and swore angrily. Finally he kicked it with the +full weight of his heel. + +It rattled on its hinges and a long crack appeared in the lower panel. + +"He's sho' coming in," the African said slowly and reflectively. "He's sho' +coming in and when he don't get no pie, he's gwine tell Mistah Falk, and +you and me's gwine have trouble." Putting his scowling face close to my +ear, the cook whispered, "Ah's gwine scare him good." + +Amazed by the dramatic turn that events were taking, I drew back into a +corner. + +From the rack above his head the cook took down the carving-knife. Dropping +on hands and knees and creeping across the floor, he held the weapon +between his even white teeth, sat up on his haunches, and noiselessly +drew the bolt that locked the door. Then with a deft motion of an +extraordinarily long arm he put out the lantern behind him and threw the +galley into darkness. + + + +CHAPTER V + +KIPPING + + +I thought that Kipping must have abandoned his quest. In the darkness of +the galley the silence seemed hours long. The coals in the stove glowed +redly, and the almost imperceptible light of the starry sky came in here +and there around the door. Otherwise not a thing was visible in the +absolute blackness that shrouded my strange host, who seemed for the moment +to have reverted to the savage craft of his Slave Coast ancestors. Surely +Kipping must have gone away, I thought. He was so mild a man, one could +expect nothing else. Then somewhere I heard the faint sigh of indrawn +breath. + +"You blasted nigger, open that door," said the mild, sad voice. "If you +don't, I'm going to kick it in on top of you and cut your heart out right +where you stand." + +The silence, heavy and pregnant, was broken by the shuffling of feet. +Evidently Kipping drew off to kick the door a second time. His boot struck +it a terrific blow, but the door, instead of breaking, flew open and +crashed against the pans behind it. + +Then the cook, who so carefully had prepared the simple trap, swinging the +carving-knife like a cutlass, sprang with a fierce, guttural grunt full in +Kipping's face. Concealed in the dark galley, I saw it all silhouetted +against the starlit deck. With the quickness of a weasel, Kipping evaded +the black's clutching left hand and threw himself down and forward. Had the +cook really intended to kill Kipping, the weapon scarcely could have failed +to cut flesh in its terrific swing, but he gave it an upward turn that +carried it safely above Kipping's head. When Kipping, however, dived under +Frank's feet, Frank, who had expected him to turn and run, tripped and +fell, dropping the carving-knife, and instantly black man and white +wriggled toward the weapon. + +It would have been funny if it hadn't been so dramatic. The two men +sprawled on their bellies like snakes, neither of them daring to take time +to stand, each, in the snap of a finger, striving with every tendon and +muscle to reach something that lay just beyond his finger-tips. I found +myself actually laughing--they looked so like two fish just out of water. + +But the fight suddenly had become bitter earnest, Kipping unquestionably +feared for his life, and the cook knew well that the weapon for which they +fought would be turned against him if his antagonist once got possession of +it. + +As Kipping closed his fingers on the handle, the cook grabbed the blade. +Then the mate appeared out of the dark. + + +"Here, what's this?" he demanded, looming on the scene of the struggle. + +I saw starlight flash on the knife as it flew over the bulwark, then I +heard it splash. Kipping got away by a quick twist and vanished. The cook +remained alone to face the mate, for you can be very sure that I had every +discreet intention not to reveal my presence in the dark galley. + +"Yass, sah," said the cook, "yass, sah. Please to 'scuse me, sah, but Ah +didn't go foh no premeditation of disturbance. It is quite unintelligible, +sah, but one of de men, sah, he come round, sah, and says Ah gotta give him +a pie, sah, and of co'se Ah can't do nothin' like dat, sah. Pies is foh de +officers and gen'lems, sah, and of co'se Ah don't give pie to de men, sah, +not even in dey vittles, sah, even if dey was pie, which dey wa'n't, sah, +fob dis we'y day Mistah Falk he wants pie and stew'd he come, and me and +he, sah, we sho' ransack dis galley, sah, and try like we can, not even two +of us togetheh, sah, can sca' up a piece of pie foh Mistah Falk, sah, and +he--" + +Unwilling to listen longer, the mate turned with a grunt of disgust and +walked away. + +After he had gone, the cook stood for a time by the galley, looking +pensively at the stars. Long-armed, broad-shouldered, bullet-headed, he +seemed a typical savage. Yet in spite of his thick lips and protruding +chin, his face had a certain thoughtful quality, and not even that deeply +graven scowl could hide the dog-like faithfulness of his dark eyes. + +After all, I wondered, was he not like a faithful dog: loyal to the last +breath, equally ready to succor his friend or to fight for him? + +"Boy," he said, when he came in, "Ah done fool 'em. Dey ain' gwine believe +no gammon dat yeh Kipping tells 'em--leastwise, no one ain't onless it's +Mistah Falk. Now you go 'long with you and don't you come neah me foh a +week without you act like Ah ain't got no use foh you. And boy," he +whispered, "you jest look out and keep clear of dat Kipping. Foh all he +talk' like he got a mouth full of butter, he's an uncommon fighter, he is, +yass sah, an uncommon fighter." + +He paused for a moment, then added in such a way that I remembered it long +afterward, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +I reached the forecastle unobserved, and as I started to climb into my +bunk, I felt very well satisfied with myself indeed. Not even Kipping had +seen me come. But a disagreeable surprise awaited me; my hand encountered a +man lying wrapped in my blankets. + +It was Kipping! + +He rolled out with a sly smile, looked at me in silence a long time, and +then pretended to shake with silent laughter. + +"Well," I whispered, "what's the matter with you?" + +"There wasn't any pie," he sighed--so mildly. "How sad that there wasn't +any pie." + +He then climbed into his own bunk and almost immediately, I judged, went to +sleep. + +If he desired to make me exceedingly uncomfortable, he had accomplished his +purpose. For days I puzzled over his queer behavior. I wondered how much he +knew, how much he had told Mr. Falk; and I recalled, sometimes, the cook's +remark, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +Of one thing I was sure: both Kipping and Mr. Falk heartily disliked me. +Kipping took every occasion to annoy me in petty ways, and sometimes I +discovered Mr. Falk watching me sharply and ill-naturedly. But he always +looked away quickly when he knew that I saw him. + +We still lacked several days of having been at sea a month when we sighted +Madeira, bearing west southwest about ten leagues distant. Taking a fresh +departure the next day from latitude 32 deg. 22' North, and longitude 16 deg. 36' +West of London, we laid our course south southwest, and swung far enough +away from the outshouldering curve of the Rio de Oro coast to pass clear of +the Canary Islands. + + + * * * * * + + +"Do you know," said Bill Hayden one day, some five weeks later, when we +were aloft side by side, "they don't like you any better than they do me." + +It was true; both Kipping and Mr. Falk showed it constantly. + +"And there's others that don't like us, too," Bill added. "I told 'em, +though, that if they got funny with me or you, I'd show 'em what was what." + +"Who are they?" I asked, suddenly remembering Roger Hamlin's warning. + +"Davie Paine is one." + +"But I thought he didn't like Kipping or Mr. Falk!" + +"He didn't for a while; but there was something happened that turned his +mind about them." + +I worked away with the tar-bucket and reflected on this unexpected change +in the attitude of the deep-voiced seaman who, on our first day aboard +ship, had seen Kipping wink at the second mate. It was all so trivial that +I was ready to laugh at myself for thinking of it twice, and yet stupid +old Bill Hayden had noticed it. A new suspicion startled me. "Bill, did +any one say anything to you about any plan or scheme that Kipping is +concerned in?" I asked. + +"Why, yes. Didn't they speak to you about it?" + +"About what?" + +"Why, about a voyage that all the men was to have a venture in. I thought +they talked to every one. I didn't want anything to do with it if Kipping +was to have a finger in the pie. I told 'em 'No!' and they swore at me +something awful, and said that if ever I blabbed I'd never see my little +wee girl at Newburyport again. So I never said nothing." He looked at me +with a frightened expression. "It's funny they never said nothing to you. +Don't you tell 'em I talked. If they thought I'd split, they'd knock me in +the head, that's what they' d do." + +"Who's in it besides Kipping and Davie Paine?" + +"The two men from Boston and Chips and the steward. Them's all I know, but +there may be others. The men have been talking about it quiet like for a +good while now." + +As Mr. Falk came forward on some errand or other, we stopped talking and +worked harder than ever at tarring down the rigging. + +Presently Bill repeated without turning his head, "Don't you tell 'em I +said anything, will you, Bennie? Don't you tell 'em." + +And I replied, "No." + +We then had passed the Canaries and the Cape Verdes, and had crossed the +Line; from the most western curve of Africa we had weathered the narrows of +the Atlantic almost to Pernambuco, and thence, driven by fair winds, we had +swept east again in a long arc, past Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha, +and on south of the Cape of Good Hope. + +The routine of a sailor's life is full of hard work and petty detail. Week +follows week, each like every other. The men complain about their duties +and their food and the officers grow irritable. There are few stories worth +telling in the drudgery of life at sea, but now and then in a long, long +time fate and coincidence conspire to unite in a single voyage, such as +that which I am chronicling, enough plots and crimes and untoward incidents +to season a dozen ordinary lifetimes spent before the mast. + +I could not, of course, even begin as yet to comprehend the magnitude that +the tiny whirlpool of discontented and lawless schemers would attain. But +boy though I was, in those first months of the voyage I had learned +enough about the different members of the crew to realize that serious +consequences might grow from such a clique. + +Kipping, whom I had thought at first a mild, harmless man, had proved +himself a vengeful bully, cowardly in a sense, yet apparently courageous +enough so far as physical combat was concerned. Also, he had disclosed an +unexpected subtlety, a cat-like craft in eavesdropping and underhanded +contrivances. The steward I believed a mercenary soul, tricky so far as his +own comfort and gain were concerned, who, according to common report, had +ingratiated himself with the second mate by sympathizing with him on every +occasion because he had not been given the chief mate's berth. The two men +from Boston I cared even less for; they were slipshod workmen and +ill-tempered, and their bearing convinced me that, from the point of view +of our officers and of the owners of the ship, they were a most undesirable +addition to such a coterie as Kipping seemed to be forming. Davie Paine and +the carpenter prided themselves on being always affable, and each, although +slow to make up his mind, would throw himself heart and body into whatever +course of action he finally decided on. But significant above all else was +Kipping's familiarity with Mr. Falk. + +The question now was, how to communicate my suspicions secretly to Roger +Hamlin. After thinking the matter over in all its details, I wrote a few +letters on a piece of white paper, and found opportunity to take counsel +with my friend the cook, when I, as the youngest in the crew, was left in +the galley to bring the kids forward to the men in the forecastle. + +"Doctor," I said, "if I wanted to get a note to Mr. Hamlin without +anybody's knowing,--particularly the steward or Mr. Falk,--how should I go +about it?" + +The perpetually frowning black heaped salt beef on the kids. "Dah's enough +grub foh a hun'erd o'nary men. Dey's enough meat dah to feed a whole +regiment of Sigambeezel cavalry--yass, sah, ho'ses and all. And yet Ah'll +bet you foh dollahs right out of mah pay, doze pesky cable-scrapers fo'ward +'ll eat all dat meat and cuss me in good shape 'cause it ain't mo', and +den, mah golly, dey'll sot up all night, Ah'll bet you, yass, sah, +a-kicking dey heads off 'cause dey ain't fed f'om de cabin table. Boy, if +you was to set beefsteak and bake' 'taters and ham and eggs down befo' dem +fool men ev'y mo'ning foh breakfas', dey'd come heah hollerin' and cussin' +and tellin' me dey wah n't gwine have dey innards spiled on all dat yeh +truck jest 'cause dem aft can't eat it." + +Turning his ferocious scowl full upon me, the savage-looking darky handed +me the kids. "Dah! you take doze straight along fo'ward." Then, dropping +his voice to a whisper, he said, "Gimme yo' note." + +Knowing now that the cook approached every important matter by an +extraordinarily indirect route, I had expected some such conclusion, and I +held the note ready. + +"Go long," he said, when I had slipped it into his huge black hand. "Ah'll +do it right." + +So I departed with all confidence that my message would go secretly and +safely to its destination. Even if it should fall into other hands than +those for which it was intended, I felt that I had not committed myself +dangerously. I had written only one word: "News." + + +[Illustration] + + + + +II + +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COUNCIL IN THE CABIN + + +Sometimes in the night I dream of the forecastle of the Island Princess, +and see the crew sitting on chests and bunks, as vividly as if only +yesterday I had come through the hatchway and down the steps with a kid of +"salt horse" for the mess, and had found them waiting, each with his pan +and spoon and the great tin dipper of tea that he himself had brought from +the galley. There was Chips, the carpenter, who had descended for the +moment from the dignity of the steerage; calmly he helped himself to twice +his share, ignoring the oaths of the others, and washed down his first +mouthful with a great gulp of tea. Once upon a time Chips came down just +too late to get any meat, and tried to kill the cook; but as the cook +remarked to me afterwards, "Foh a drea'ful impulsive pusson, he wah n't +ve'y handy with his fists." There was Bill Hayden, who always got last +chance at the meat, and took whatever the doubtful generosity of his +shipmates had left him--poor Bill, as happy in the thought of his little +wee girl at Newburyport as if all the wealth of the khans of Tartary were +waiting for him at the end of the voyage. There was the deep-voiced Davie, +almost out of sight in the darkest corner, who chose his food carefully, +pretending the while to be considerate of the others, and growled amiably +about his hard lot. Also there was Kipping, mild and evasive, yet amply +able to look out for his own interests, as I, who so often brought down the +kids, well knew. + +When, that evening, Bill Hayden had scraped up the last poor slivers of +meat, he sat down beside me on my chest. + +"If I didn't have my little wee girl at Newburyport," he said, "I might +be as gloomy as Neddie Benson. Do you suppose if I went to see a +fortune-teller I'd be as gloomy as Neddie is? I never used to be gloomy, +even before I married, and I married late. I was older than Neddie is +now when I married. Neddie ought to get a wife and stop going to see +fortune-tellers, and then he wouldn't be so gloomy." + +Bill would run on indefinitely in his stupid, kindly way, for I was almost +the only person aboard ship who listened to him at all, and, to tell the +truth, even I seldom more than half listened. But already he had given me +valuable information that day, and now something in the tone of his +rambling words caught my attention. + +"Has Neddie Benson been talking about the fortuneteller again?" I asked. + +"He's had a lot to say about her. He says the lady said to him--" + +"But what started him off?" + +"He says things is bound to come to a bad end." + +"What things?" + +As I have said before, I had a normal boy's curiosity about all that was +going on around us. Perhaps, I have come to think, I had more than the +ordinary boy's sense for important information. Roger Hamlin's warning had +put me on my guard, and I intended to learn all I could and to keep my +mouth shut where certain people were concerned. + +"It's queer they don't say nothing to you about what's going on," Bill +remarked. + +For my own part I understood very well why they should say nothing of any +underhanded trickery to one who ashore was so intimately acquainted with +Captain Whidden and Roger Hamlin. But I kept my thoughts to myself and +persisted in my questions. + +"What is going on?" + +"Oh, I don't just make out what." Bill's stupidity was exasperating at +times. "It's something about Mr. Falk. Kipping, he--" + +"Yes?" said that eternally mild voice. "Mr. Falk? And Kipping? What else +please?" + +Both Bill and I were startled to find Kipping at our elbows. But before +either of us could answer, some one called down the hatch:-- + +"Lathrop is wanted aft." + +Relieved at escaping from an embarrassing situation, I jumped up so +promptly that my knife fell with a clatter, and hastened on deck, calling +"Ay, ay," to the man who had summoned me. I knew very well why I was wanted +aft. + +Mr. Falk, who was on duty on the quarter-deck, completely ignored me as I +passed him and went down the companionway. + +"At least," I thought, "he can't come below now." + +The steward, when I appeared, raised his eyebrows and almost dropped his +tray; then he paused in the door, inconspicuously, as if to linger. But +Captain Whidden glanced round and dismissed him by a sharp nod, and I found +myself alone in the cabin with the captain, Mr. Thomas, and Roger Hamlin. + +"I understand there's news forward, Lathrop," said Captain Whidden. + +Roger looked at me with that humorous, exasperating twinkle of his eyes,--I +thought of my sister and of how she had looked when she learned that he was +to sail for Canton,--and Mr. Thomas folded his arms and leaned back in his +chair. + +"Yes, sir," I replied, "although it seems pretty unimportant to be worth +much as news." + +"Tell us about it." + +To all that I had gathered from Bill Hayden I added what I had learned by +my own observations, and it seemed to interest them, although for my own +part I doubted whether it was of much account. + +"Has any one approached you directly about these things?" Captain Whidden +asked when I was through. + +"No, sir." + +"Have you heard any one say just what this little group is trying to +accomplish, or just when it is going to act?" + +"No, sir." + +"Do you, Lathrop, know anything about the cargo of the Island Princess? Or +anything about the terms under which it is carried?" + +"Only in a general way, sir, that it is made up of ginseng and woolen goods +shipped to Canton." + +Captain Whidden looked at me very sharply indeed. "You are positive that +that is all you know?" + +"Yes, sir--except, in a general way, that the cargo is uncommonly +important." + +The three men exchanged glances, and Roger Hamlin nodded as if to +corroborate my reply. + +"Lathrop," Captain Whidden began again, "I want you to say nothing about +this interview after you leave the cabin. It is more important that you +hold your peace than you may ever realize--than, I trust, you ever _will_ +realize. I am going to ask you to give me your word of honor to that +effect." + +It seemed to me then that I saw Captain Whidden in a new light. We of the +younger generation had inclined to belittle him because he continued to +follow the sea at an age when more successful men had established their +counting-houses or had retired from active business altogether. But twice +his mercantile adventures had proved unfortunate, and now, though nearly +sixty years old and worth a very comfortable fortune, he refused to leave +again for a less familiar occupation the profession by which he had amassed +his competence. I noticed that his hair was gray on his temples, and that +his weathered face revealed a certain stern sadness. I felt as if suddenly, +in spite of my minor importance on board his ship, I had come closer to the +straightforward gentleman, the true Joseph Whidden, than in all the years +that I had known him, almost intimately, it had seemed at the time, in my +father's house. + +"I promise, sir," I said. + +He took up a pencil and with the point tapped a piece of paper. + +"Tell me who of all the men forward absolutely are not influenced by this +man Kipping." + +"The cook," I returned, "and Bill Hayden, and, I think, Neddie Benson. +Probably there are a number of others, but only of those three am I +absolutely sure." + +"That's what I want--the men you are absolutely sure of. Hm! The cook, +useful but not particularly quick-witted. Hayden, a harmless, negative +body. Benson, a gloomy soul if ever there was one. It might be better +but--" He looked at Mr. Thomas and smiled. "That is all, Lathrop; you may +go now. Just one moment more, though: be cautious, keep your eyes and ears +open, and if anything else comes up, communicate with Mr. Hamlin or,--" he +hesitated, but finally said it,--"or directly with me." + +As I went up on deck, I again passed Mr. Falk and again he pretended not to +see me. But although he seemed to be intent on the rolling seas to +windward, I was very confident that, when I had left the quarter-deck, he +turned and looked after me as earnestly as if he hoped to read in my step +and carriage everything that had occurred in the cabin. + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE SAIL WITH A LOZENGE-SHAPED PATCH + + +It was not long before we got another warning even more ominous than the +one from the captain of the Adventure. On Friday, July 28, in latitude +19 deg. 50' South, longitude 101 deg. 53' East,--the log of the voyage, kept beyond +this point in Mr. Thomas's own hand, gives me the dates and figures to the +very day for it still is preserved in the vaults of Hamlin, Lathrop & +Company,--we sighted a bark to the south, and at the captain's orders wore +ship to speak her. When she also came about, we served out pikes and +muskets as a precaution against treachery, and Mr. Falk saw that our guns +were shotted. But she proved to be in good faith, and in answer to our hail +she declared herself the Adrienne of Liverpool, eight days from the +Straits, homeward bound. Her master, it appeared, wished to compare notes +on longitude, and a long, dull discussion followed; but in parting Captain +Whidden asked if there was news of pirates or marauders. + +"Yes," was the reply. "Much news and bad news." And the master of the +Adrienne thereupon launched into a tale of piracy and treachery such, as I +never had heard before. Leaning over the taffrail, his elbows out-thrust +and his big hands folded, he roared the story at us in a great booming +voice that at times seemed to drown the words in its own volume. Now, as +the waves and the wind snatched it away, it grew momentarily fainter and +clearer; now it came bellowing back again, loud, hoarse, and indistinct. + +It was all about an Arab ship off Benkulen; Ladronesers and the havoc they +had wrought among the American ships in the China Sea; a warning not to +sail from Macao for Whampoa without a fleet of four or five sail; and +again, about the depredations of the Malays. The grizzled old captain +seemed to delight in repeating horrible yarns of the seas whence he came, +whither we were going. He roared them after us until we had left him far +astern; and at the last we heard him laughing long and hoarsely. + +"What dat yeh man think we all am? He think we all gwine believe dat yeh? +Hgh!" the cook growled. + +But Neddie Benson dolefully shook his head. + +Parting, the Adrienne and the Island Princess continued, each on her +course, the one back round the Cape of Good Hope and north again to +Liverpool, the other on into strange oceans beset with a thousand dangers. + +We sailed now a sea of opalescent greens and purples that shimmered and +changed with the changing lights. Strange shadows played across it, even +when the sky was cloudless, and it rolled past the ship in great, regular +swells, ruffled by favoring breezes and bright beneath the clear sun. + +At daylight on August 3 we saw land about nine miles away, bearing from +east by south to north, a long line of rugged hills, which appeared to be +piled one above another, and which our last lunar observations indicated +were in longitude 107 deg. 15' East; and we made out a single sail lying off +the coast to the north. + +The sail caught and held our attention--not that, so far as we then could +see, that particular sail was at all remarkable: any sail, at that time and +in that place, would have interested us unusually. Mindful of the warnings +we had received, we paused in our work to watch it. Kipping, with a sly +glance aft, left the winch with which he was occupied and leaned on the +rail. Here and there the crew conversed cautiously, and on the quarter-deck +a lively discussion, I could see, was in progress. + +We were so intent on that distant spot of canvas which pricked the horizon, +that a fierce squall, sweeping down upon us, almost took us aback. + +The cry, "All hands on deck!" brought the sleeping watch from the bunks +below, and the carpenter, steward, and sailmaker from the steerage. The +foresail ripped from its bolt ropes with a deafening crack, and tore to +ribbons in the gale. As the ship lay into the wind, I could hear the +captain's voice louder than the very storm, "Meet her!--Meet her!--Ease her +off!" But the reply of the man at the wheel was lost in the rush of wind +and rain. + +I had been well drilled long since in furling the royals, for on them the +green hands were oftenest practised; and now, from his post on the +forecastle, Mr. Thomas spied me as I slipped and fell half across the deck. +I alone at that moment was not hard at work, and, in obedience to the +captain's orders, during a lull that gave us a momentary respite, he sent +me aloft. + +It was quite a different thing from furling a royal in a light breeze. When +I had got to the topgallant masthead, the yard was well down by the lifts +and steadied by the braces, but the clews were not hauled chock up to the +blocks. Leaning out precariously, I won Mr. Thomas's attention with +greatest difficulty, and shrieked to have it done. This he did. Then, +casting the yard-arm gaskets off from the tye and laying them across +between the tye and the mast, I stretched out on the weather yard-arm and, +getting hold of the weather leech, brought it in to the slings taut along +the yard. Mind you, all this time I, only a boy, was working in a gale of +wind and driven rain, and was clinging to a yard that was sweeping from +side to side in lurching, unsteady flight far above the deck and the angry +sea. Hauling the sail through the clew, and letting it fall in the bunt, I +drew the weather clew a little abaft the yard, and held it with my knee +while I brought in the lee leech in, the same manner. Then, making up my +bunt and putting into it the slack of the clews, the leech and footrope and +the body of the sail, I hauled it well up on the yard, smoothed the skin, +brought it down abaft, and made fast the bunt-gasket round the mast. +Passing the weather and lee yard-arm gaskets round the yard in turn, and +hauling them taut and making them fast, I left all snug and trim. + +From aft came faintly the clear command, "Full and by!" And promptly, for +by this time the force of the squall was already spent, the answer of the +man at the wheel, "Full and by, sir." + +In this first moment of leisure I instinctively turned, as did virtually +every man aboard ship, to look for the sail that had been reported to the +north of us. But although we looked long and anxiously, we saw no sail, no +trace of any floating craft. It had disappeared during the squall, utterly +and completely. Only the wild dark sea and the wild succession of mountain +piled on mountain met our searching eyes. + +A sail there had been, beyond all question, where now there was none. +Driven by the storm, it had vanished completely from our sight. + +As well as we could judge by our lunar observations, the land was between +Paga River and Stony Point, and when we had sailed along some forty miles, +the shore, as it should be according to our reckoning, was less +mountainous. + +It was my first glimpse of the Sunda Islands, of which I had heard so much, +and I well remember that I stood by the forward rigging watching the +distant land from where it seemed on my right to rise from the sea, to +where it seemed on my left to go down beyond the horizon into the sea +again, and that I murmured to myself in a small, awed voice:-- + +"This is Java!" + +The very name had magic in it. Already from those islands our Salem +mariners had accumulated great wealth. Not yet are the old days forgotten, +when Elias Hasket Derby's ships brought back fortunes from Batavia, and +when Captain Carnes, by one voyage in Jonathan Peele's schooner Rajah to +the northern coast of Sumatra for wild pepper, made a profit of seven +hundred per cent of both the total cost of the schooner itself and the +whole expense of the entire expedition. I who lived in the exhilarating +atmosphere of those adventurous times was thrilled to the heart by my first +sight of lands to which hundreds of Salem ships had sailed. + +It really was Java, and night was falling on its shores. Far to the +northeast some tiny object pricked above the skyline, and a point of light +gleamed clearly, low against the blue heavens in which the stars had just +begun to shine. + +"A sail!" I cried. + +Before the words had left my lips a deep voice aloft sonorously +proclaimed:-- + +"Sa-a-ail ho!" + +"Where away?" Mr. Thomas cried. + +"Two points off the larboard bow, sir." + +The little knot of officers on the quarter-deck already were intent on the +tiny spot of almost invisible canvas, and we forward were crowding one +another for a better sight of it. Then in the gathering darkness it faded +and was gone. Could it have been the same that we had seen before? + +There was much talk of the mysterious ship that night, and many strange +theories were offered to account for it. Davie Paine, in his deep, rolling +voice, sent shivers down our backs by his story of a ghost-ship manned by +dead men with bony fingers and hollow eyes, which had sailed the seas in +the days of his great-uncle, a stout old mariner who seemed from Davie's +account to have been a hard drinker. Kipping was reminded of yarns about +Malay pirates, which he told so quietly, so mildly, that they seemed by +contrast thrice as terrible. Neddie Benson lugubriously recalled the +prophecy of the charming fortune-teller and argued the worst of our +mysterious stranger. "The lady said," he repeated, "that there'd be a dark +man and a light man and no end o' trouble. She was a nice lady, too." But +Neddie and his doleful fortune-teller as usual banished our gloom, and the +forecastle reechoed with hoarse laughter, which grew louder and louder when +Neddie once again narrated the lady's charms, and at last cried angrily +that she was as plump as a nice young chicken. + +"If you was to ask me," Bill Hayden murmured, "I'd say it was just a sail." +But no one asked Bill Hayden, and with a few words about his "little wee +girl at Newburyport," he buried himself in his old blankets and was soon +asleep. + +During the mid-watch that same night, the cook prowled the deck forward +like a dog sneaking along the wharves. Silently, the whites of his eyes +gleaming out of the darkness, he moved hither and thither, careful always +to avoid the second mate's observation. As I watched him, I became more and +more curious, for I could make nothing of his veering course. He went now +to starboard, now to larboard, now to the forecastle, now to the steerage, +always silently, always deliberately. After a while he came over and stood +beside me. + +"It ain't right," he whispered. "Ah tell you, boy, it ain't right." + +"What's not right?" I asked. + +"De goin's on aboa'd dis ship." + +"What goings on?" + +"Boy, Ah's been a long time to sea and Ah's cooked foh some bad crews in my +time, yass, sah, but Ah's gwine tell you, boy, 'cause Ah done took a fancy +to you, dis am de most iniquitous crew Ah eveh done cook salt hoss foh. +Yass, sah." + +"What do you mean?" + +The negro ignored my question. + +"Ah's gwine tell you, boy, dis yeh crew am bad 'nough, but when dah come a +ha'nt boat a-sailin' oveh yondeh jest at dahk, boy, Ah wish Ah was back +home whar Ah could somehow come to shoot a rabbit what got a lef' +hind-foot. Yass, sah." + +For a long time he silently paced up and down by the bulwark; but finally I +saw him momentarily against the light of his dim lantern as he entered his +own quarters. + +Morning came with fine breezes and pleasant weather. At half-past four we +saw Winerow Point bearing northwest by west. At seven o'clock we took in +all studding-sails and staysails, and the fore and mizzen topgallant-sails. +So another day passed and another night. An hour after midnight we took in +the main topgallantsail, and lay by with our head to the south until six +bells, when we wore ship, proceeding north again, and saw Java Head at nine +o'clock to the minute. + +We now faced Sunda Strait, the channel that separates Java from Sumatra and +unites the Indian Ocean with the Java Sea. From the bow of our ship there +stretched out on one hand and on the other, far beyond the horizon, Borneo, +Celebes, Banka and Billiton; the Little Sunda Islands--Bali and Lombok, +Simbawa, Flores and Timor; the China Sea, the Philippines, and farther and +greater than them all, the mainland of Asia. + +While we were still intent on Java Head there came once more the cry, "Sail +ho!" + +This time the sail was not to be mistaken. Captain Whidden trained on it +the glass, which he shortly handed to Mr. Thomas. "See her go!" the men +cried. It was true. She was running away from us easily. Now she was hull +down. Now we could see only her topgallant-sails. Now she again had +disappeared. But this time we had found, besides her general appearance and +the cut of her sails, which no seaman could mistake, a mark by which any +landsman must recognize her: on her fore-topsail there was a white +lozenge-shaped patch. + +At eleven o'clock in the morning, with Prince's Island bearing from north +to west by south, we entered the Straits of Sunda. At noon we were due east +of Prince's Island beach and had sighted the third Point of Java and the +Isle of Cracato. + +Fine breezes and a clear sky favored us, and the islands, green and blue +according to their distance, were beautiful to see. Occasionally we had +glimpses of little native craft, or descried villages sleeping amid the +drowsy green of the cocoanut trees. It was a peaceful, beautiful world +that met our eyes as the Island Princess stood through the Straits and up +the east coast of Sumatra; the air was warm and pleasant, and the leaves of +the tufted palms, lacily interwoven, were small in the distance like the +fronds of ferns in our own land. But Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas +remained on deck and constantly searched the horizon with the glass; and +the men worked uneasily, glancing up apprehensively every minute or two, +and starting at slight sounds. There was reason to be apprehensive, we +all knew. + +On the evening of Friday, August 11, beyond possibility of doubt we sighted +a ship; and that it was the same which we already had seen at least once, +the lozenge-shaped patch on the foresail proved to the satisfaction +of officers and men. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +ATTACKED + + +In the morning we were mystified to see that the sail once again had +disappeared. But to distract us from idle speculations, need of fresh water +now added to our uneasiness, and we anchored on a mud bottom while the +captain and Mr. Thomas went ashore and searched in vain for a +watering-place. + +During the day we saw a number of natives fishing in their boats a short +distance away; but when our own boat approached them, they pulled for the +shore with all speed and fled into the woods like wild men. Thus the day +passed,--so quietly and uneventfully that it lulled us into confidence that +we were safe from harm,--and a new day dawned. + +That morning, as we lay at anchor, the strange ship, with the sun shining +brightly on her sails, boldly reappeared from beyond a distant point, and +hove to about three miles to the north-northeast. As she lay in plain sight +and almost within earshot, she seemed no more out of the ordinary than any +vessel that we might have passed off the coast of New England. But on her +great foresail, which hung loose now with the wind shaken out of it, there +was a lozenge-shaped patch of clean new canvas. + +Soon word passed from mouth to mouth that the captain and Mr. Falk would go +in the gig to learn the stranger's name and port. + +To a certain extent we were relieved to find that our phantom ship was +built of solid wood and iron; yet we were decidedly apprehensive as we +watched the men pull away in the bright sun. The boat became smaller and +smaller, and the dipping oars flashed like gold. + +With his head out-thrust and his chin sunk below the level of his +shoulders, the cook stood by the galley, in doubt and foreboding, and +watched the boat pull away. + +His voice, when he spoke, gave me a start. + +"Look dah, boy! Look dah! Dey's sumpin' funny, yass, sah. 'Tain't safe foh +to truck with ha'nts, no sah! You can't make dis yeh nigger think a winkin' +fire-bug of a fly-by-night ship ain't a ha'nt." + +"Ha'nts," said Kipping mildly, "ha'nts is bad things for niggers, but they +don't hurt white men." + +"Lemme tell you, you Kipping, it ain't gwine pay you to be disrespectable +to de cook." Frank stuck his angry face in front of the mild man's. "Ef you +think--ha!"--He stopped suddenly, his eyes fixed on something far beyond +Kipping, over whose shoulder he now was looking. "Look dah! Look dah! What +Ah say? Hey? What Ah say? Look dah! Look dah!" + +Startled by the cook's fierce yell, we turned as if a gun had been fired; +but we saw only that the boat was coming about. + +"Look dah! Look dah! See 'em row! Don' tell me dat ain't no ha'nt!" Jumping +up and down, waving his arms wildly, contorting his irregular features till +he resembled a gorilla, he continued to yell in frenzy. + +Although there seemed to be no cause for any such outburst, the rest of us +now were alarmed by the behavior of the men in the boat. Having come about, +they were racing back to the Island Princess as fast as ever they could, +and the captain and Mr. Falk, if we could judge by their gestures, were +urging them to even greater efforts. + +"Look dah! Look dah! Don't you tell me dey ain't seen a ha'nt, you +Kipping!" + +As they approached, I heard Roger Hamlin say sharply to the mate, "Mr. +Thomas, that ship yonder is drifting down on us rapidly. See! They're +sheeting home the topsail." + +I could see that Mr. Thomas, who evidently thought Roger's fear groundless, +was laughing, but I could not hear his reply. In any case he gave no order +to prepare for action until the boat came within earshot and the captain +abruptly hailed him and ordered him to trip anchor and prepare to make +sail. + +As the boat came aboard, we heard news that thrilled us. "She's an Arab +ship," spread the word. "They were waiting for our boat, with no sign of +hostility until Mr. Falk saw the sunlight strike on a gun-barrel that was +intended to be hidden behind the bulwark. As the boat veered away, the man +with the gun started to fire, but another prevented him, probably because +the distance was so great." + +Instantly there was wild activity on the Island Princess. While we loosed +the sails and sheeted them home and, with anchor aweigh, braced the yards +and began to move ahead, the idlers were tricing up the boarding nettings +and double-charging our cannon, of which we carried three--a long gun +amidships and a pair of stern chasers. Men to work the ship were ordered to +the ropes. The rest were served pikes and loaded muskets. + +We accomplished the various preparations in an incredibly short time, and, +gathering way, stood ready to receive the stranger should she force us to +fight. + +For the time being we were doubtful of her intentions, and seeing us armed +and ready, she stood off as if still unwilling to press us more closely. +But some one aboard her, if I guess aright, resented so tame an end to a +long pursuit and insisted on at least an exchange of volleys. + +[Illustration: Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two +thunderous reports, a pistol shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain +Whidden spin around and fall.] + +Now she came down on us, running easily with the wind on her quarter, and +gave us a round from her muskets. + +"Hold your fire," Captain Whidden ordered. "They're feeling their way." + +Emboldened by our silence, she wore ship and came nearer. It seemed now +that she would attempt to board us, for we spied men waiting with +grapnels, and she came steadily on while our own men fretted at their +guns, not daring to fire without the captain's orders, till we could see +the triumphant sneer on the dark face of her commander. + +Now her muskets spoke again. I heard a bullet sing over my head and saw one +of our own seamen in the waist fall and lie quite still. Should we never +answer her in kind? In three minutes, it seemed, we should have to meet her +men hand to hand. + +Now our helmsman luffed, and we came closer into the wind, which gave our +guns a chance. + +"Now, then," Captain Whidden cried, "let them have the long gun and hold +the rest." + +With a crash our cannon swept the deck of the Arab, splintering the cabin +and accomplishing ten times as much damage as all her muskets had done to +us. But she in turn, exasperated by the havoc we had wrought, fired +simultaneously her two largest guns at point-blank range. + +I ducked behind the bulwark and looked back along the deck. One ball had +hit the scuttle-butt and had splashed the water fifteen feet in every +direction. Another had splintered the cross jack-yard. Suddenly, in the +brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a single +pistol-shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and fall. + +Our own guns, as we came about, sent an answer that cut the Arab's lower +sail to ribbons, disabled many men and, I am confident, killed several. But +there was no time to load again. Although by now we showed our stern to the +enemy, and had a fair--chance to outstrip her in a long race, her greater +momentum was bringing her down upon us rapidly. From aft came the order--it +was Mr. Thomas who gave it,--"All hands to the pikes and repel boarders!" + +There was, however, no more fighting. Our assailants took measure of the +stout nets and the strong battery of pikes, and, abandoning the whole +unlucky adventure, bore away on a new course. + +One man forward was killed and four were badly hurt. Mr. Thomas sat with +his back against the cabin, very white of face, with streams of red running +from his nostrils and his mouth; and Captain Whidden lay dead on the deck. +An hour later word passed through the ship that Mr. Thomas, too, had died. + + + +CHAPTER IX + +BAD SIGNS + + +It was strange that, while some of us in the forecastle were much cast down +by the tragic events of the day, others should seem to be put in really +good humor by it all. Neddie Benson soberly shook his head from time to +time; old Bill Hayden lay in his bunk without even a word about his "little +wee girl in Newburyport," and occasionally complained of not feeling well; +and various others of the crew faced the future with frank hopelessness. + +For my own part, it seemed to me as unreal as a nightmare that Captain +Joseph Whidden actually had been shot dead by a band of Arab pirates. I was +bewildered--indeed, stunned--by the incredible suddenness of the calamity. +It was so complete, so appallingly final! To me, a boy still in his 'teens, +that first intimate association with violent death would have been in +itself terrible, and I keenly felt the loss of our chief mate. But Captain +Whidden to me was far more than master of the ship. He had been my father's +friend since long before I was born; and from the days when I first +discriminated between the guests at my father's house, I had counted him as +also a friend of mine. Never had I dreamed that so sad an hour would darken +my first voyage. + +Kipping, on the other hand, and Davie Paine and the carpenter seemed +actually well pleased with what had happened. They lolled around with an +air of exasperating superiority when they saw any of the rest of us looking +at them; and now and then they exchanged glances that I was at a loss to +understand until all at once a new thought dawned on me: since the captain +and the first mate were dead, the command of the ship devolved upon +Mr. Falk, the second mate. + +No wonder that Kipping and Davie and the carpenter and all the rest of that +lawless clique were well pleased. No wonder that old Bill Hayden and some +of the others, for whom Kipping and his friends had not a particle of use +were downcast by the prospect. + +I was amazed at my own stupidity in not realizing it before, and above all +else I now longed to talk with someone whom I could trust--Roger Hamlin by +preference; as second choice, my friend the cook. But for the time being I +was disappointed in this. Almost immediately Mr. Falk summoned all hands +aft. + +"Men," he said, putting on a grave face that seemed to me assumed for the +occasion, "men, we've come through a dangerous time, and we are lucky to +have come alive out of the bad scrape that we were in. Some of us haven't +come through so well. It's a sad thing for a ship to lose an officer, and +it is twice as sad to lose two fine officers like Captain Whidden and Mr. +Thomas. I'll now read the service for the burial of the dead, and after +that I'll have something more to say to you." + +One of the men spoke in an undertone, and Mr. Falk cried, "What's that?" + +"If you please, sir," the man said, fidgeting nervously, "couldn't we go +ashore and bury them decently?" + +Others had thought of the same thing, and they showed it by their faces; +but Mr. Falk scowled and replied, "Nonsense! We'd be murdered in cold +blood." + +So we stood there, bareheaded, silent, sad at heart, and heard the droning +voice of the second mate,--even then he could not hide his unrighteous +satisfaction,--who read from a worn prayer-book, that had belonged to +Captain Whidden himself, the words committing the bodies of three men to +the deep, their souls to God. + +When the brief, perfunctory service was over, Mr. Falk put away the +prayer-book,--I verily believe he put away with it all fear of the +Lord,--folded his arms and faced us arrogantly. + +"By the death of Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas," he said, "I have become +the rightful master of this ship. Now I've got a few things to say to you, +and I'm going to have them understood. If you heed them and work smartly, +you'll get along as well as you deserve. If you don't heed them, you'd +better be dead and done with it. If you don't heed them--" he sneered +disagreeably--"if you don't heed them I'll lash the skin off the back of +every bloody mother's son of ye. This voyage from now on is to be carried +out for the best interests of all concerned." He stopped and smiled and +repeated significantly, "_Of_ ALL _concerned_." After another pause, in +which some of the men exchanged knowing glances, he went on, "I have no +doubt that the most of us will get along as well as need be. So far, well +and good. But if there's those that try to cross my bows,"--he swore +roundly,--"heaven help'em! They'll need it. That's all. Wait! One thing +more: we've got to have officers, and as I know you'll not be bold to pick +from among yourselves, I'll save you the trouble. Kipping from this time on +will be chief mate. You'll take his things aft, and you'll obey him from +now on and put the handle to his name. Paine will be second mate. That's +all. Go forward." + +Kipping and Davie Paine! I was thunderstruck. But some of the men exchanged +glances and smiles as before, and I saw by his expression that Roger, +although ill pleased, was by no means so amazed as I should have expected +him to be. + +For the last time as seaman, Kipping, mild and quiet, came to the +forecastle. But as he packed his bag and prepared to leave us, he smiled +constantly with a detestable quirk of his mouth, and before going he +stopped beside downcast old Bill Hayden. "Straighten up, be a man," he said +softly; "I'll see that you're treated right." He fairly drawled the words, +so mildly did he speak; but when he had finished, his manner instantly +changed. Thrusting out his chin and narrowing his eyes, he deliberately +drew back his foot and gave old Bill one savage kick. + +I was right glad that chance had placed me in the second mate's watch. + +As for Davie Paine, he was so overcome by the stroke of fortune that had +resulted in his promotion, that he could not even collect his belongings. +We helped him pile them into his chest, which he fastened with trembling +fingers, and gave him a hand on deck. But even his deep voice had failed +him for the time being, and when he took leave of us, he whispered +piteously, '"Fore the Lord, I dunno how it happened. I ain't never learned +to figger and I can't no more than write my name." + +What was to become of us? Our captain was a weak officer. Our present chief +mate no man of us trusted. + +Our second mate was inexperienced, incompetent, illiterate. More than ever +I longed to talk with Roger Hamlin, but there was no opportunity that +night. + +Our watch on deck was a farce, for old Davie was so unfamiliar with his new +duties and so confused by his sudden eminence that, according to the men at +the wheel, he didn't know north from south or aloft from alow. Evading his +confused glances, I sought the galley, and without any of the usual +complicated formalities was admitted to where the cook was smoking his rank +pipe. + +Rolling his eyes until the whites gleamed, he told me the following +astounding story. + +"Boy," he said, "dis am de most unmitigated day ol' Frank ever see. Cap'n, +he am a good man and now he's a dead un. Mistah Thomas he am a good man and +now _he's_ a dead un. What Ah tell you about dem ha'nts? Ef Ah could have +kotched a rabbit with a lef' hind-leg, Ah guess we'd be better off. Hey? +Mistah Falk, he am cap'n--Lo'd have mercy on us! Dat Kipping, he am chief +mate--Lo'd have mercy on us mis'able sinners! Davie Paine, he am second +mate--Lo'd perserve ou' souls! Ah guess you don't know what Ah heah Mistah +Falk say to stew'd! He says, 'Stew'd, we got ev'ything--ev'ything. And we +ain't broke a single law!' Now tell me what he mean by dat? What's stew'd +got, Ah want to know? But dat ain't all--no, sah, dat ain't all." + +He leaned forward, the whites of his eyes rolling, his fixed frown more +ominous than ever. "Boy, Ah see 'em when dey's dead, Ah did. Ah see 'em +all. Mistah Thomas, he have a big hole in de middle of his front, and dat +po' old sailo' man he have a big hole in de middle of his front. Yass, sah, +Ah see 'em! But cap'n, he have a little roun' hole in the back of his +head.--Yass, sah--_he was shot f'om behine_!" + +The sea that night was as calm and as untroubled as if the day had passed +in Sabbath quiet. It seemed impossible that we had endured so much, that +Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas were dead, that the space of only +twenty-four hours had wrought such a change in the fortunes of all on +board. + +[Illustration: We helped him pile his belongings into his chest +and gave him a hand on deck.] + +I could not believe that one of our own men had shot our captain. Surely +the bullet must have hit him when he was turning to give an order or to +oversee some particular duty. And yet I could not forget the cook's words. +They hummed in my ears. They sounded in the strumming of the rigging, in +the "talking" of the ship:-- + +"A little roun' hole in the back of his head--yass, sah--he was shot f'om +behine." + +Without the captain and Mr. Thomas the Island Princess was like a strange +vessel. Both Kipping and Davie Paine had been promoted from the starboard +watch, leaving us shorthanded; so a queer, self-confident fellow named +Blodgett was transferred from the chief mate's watch to ours. But even so +there were fewer hands and more work, and the spirit of the crew seemed to +have changed. Whereas earlier in the voyage most of the men had gone +smartly about their duties, always glad to lend a hand or join in a +chantey, and with an eye for the profit and welfare of the owners as well +as of themselves, now there came over the ship, silently, imperceptibly, +yet so swiftly and completely that, although no man saw it come, in +twenty-four hours it was with us and upon us in all its deadening and +discouraging weight, a spirit of lassitude and procrastination. You would +have expected some of the men to find it hard to give old Davie Paine quite +all the respect to which his new berth entitled him, and for my own part I +liked Kipping less even than I had liked Mr. Falk. But although my own +prejudice should have enabled me to understand any minor lapses from the +strict discipline of life aboard ship, much occurred in the next +twenty-four hours that puzzled me. + +For one thing, those men whom I had thought most likely to accord Kipping +and Mr. Falk due respect were most careless in their work and in the small +formalities observed between officers and crew. The carpenter and the +steward, for example, spent a long time in the galley at an hour when they +should have been busy with their own duties. I was near when they came out, +and heard the cook's parting words: "Yass, sah, yass, sah, it ain't +neveh no discombobilation to help out gen'lems, sah. Yass, sah, no, sah." + +And when, a little later, I myself knocked at the door, I got a reception +that surprised me beyond measure. + +"Who dah," the cook cried in his usual brusque voice. "Who dah knockin' at +mah door?" + +Coming out, he brushed past me, and stood staring fiercely from side to +side. I knew, of course, his curiously indirect methods, and I expected him +by some quick motion or muttered command to summon me, as always before, +into his hot little cubby-hole. Never was boy more taken aback! "Who dah +knockin' at mah door?" he said again, standing within two feet of my elbow, +looking past me not two inches from my nose. "Humph! Somebody knockin' at +mah door better look at what dey doin' or dey gwine git into a peck of +trouble." + +He turned his back on me and reentered the galley. + +Then I looked aft, and saw Kipping and the steward grinning broadly. +Before, I had been disconcerted. Now I was enraged. How had they turned old +black Frank against me, I wondered? Kipping and the steward, whom the negro +disliked above all people on board! So the steward and the carpenter and +Kipping were working hand in glove! And Mr. Falk probably was in the same +boat with them. Where was Roger Hamlin, and what was he doing as supercargo +to protect the goods below decks? Then I laughed shortly, though a little +angrily, at my own childish impatience. + +Certainly any suspicions of danger to the cargo were entirely without +foundations. Mr. Falk--Captain Falk, I must call him now--might have a +disagreeable personality, but there was nothing to indicate that he was not +in most respects a competent officer, or that the ship and cargo would +suffer at his hands. The cook had been companionable in his own peculiar +way and a very convenient friend indeed; but, after all, I could get along +very well on my own resources. + +The difference that a change of officers makes in the life and spirit of a +ship's crew is surprising to one unfamiliar with the sea. Captain Whidden +had been a gentleman and a first-class sailor; by ordering our life +strictly, though not harshly or severely, he had maintained that efficient, +smoothly working organization which is best and pleasantest for all +concerned. But Captain Falk was a master whose sails were cut on another +pattern. He lacked Captain Whidden's straightforward, searching gaze. From +the corners of his mouth lines drooped unpleasantly around his chin. His +voice was not forceful and commanding. I was confident that under ordinary +conditions he never would have been given a ship; I doubted even if he +would have got a chief mate's berth. But fortune had played into his hands, +and he now was our lawful master, resistance to whom could be construed as +mutiny and punished in any court in the land. + +Never, while Captain Whidden commanded the ship, would the steward and the +carpenter have deserted their work and have hidden themselves away in the +cook's galley. Never, I was positive, would such a pair of officers as +Kipping and old Davie Paine have been promoted from the forecastle. To be +sure, the transgressions of the carpenter and the steward were only petty +as yet, and if no worse came of our new situation, I should be very foolish +to take it all so seriously. But it was not easy to regard our situation +lightly. There were too many straws to show the direction of the wind. + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE TREASURE-SEEKER + + +It was a starlit night while we still lingered off the coast of Sumatra for +water and fresh vegetables. The land was low and black against the steely +green of the sky, and a young moon like a silver thread shone in the west. +Blodgett, the new man in our watch, was the centre of a little group on the +forecastle. + +He was small and wrinkled and very wise. The more I saw and heard of him, +the more I marveled that he had not attracted my attention before; but up +to this point in the voyage it was only by night that he had appeared +different from other men, and I thought of him only as a prowler in the +dark. + +In some ways he was like a cat. By day he would sit in corners in the sun +when opportunity offered, or lurk around the galley, shirking so brazenly, +that the men were amused rather than angry. Even at work he was as slow and +drowsy as an old cat, half opening his sleepy eyes when the officers called +him to account, and receiving an occasional kick or cuff with the same mild +surprise that a favorite cat might show. But once darkness had fallen, +Blodgett was a different man. He became nervously wakeful. His eyes +distended and his face lighted with strange animation. He walked hither and +yon. He fairly arched his neck. And sometimes, when some ordinary incident +struck his peculiar humor, he would throw back his head, open his great +mouth, and utter a screech of wild laughter for all the world like the yowl +of a tom-cat. + +On that particular night he walked the forecastle, keeping close to the +bulwarks, till the rest of us assembled by the rigging and watched him with +a kind of fascination. After a time he saw us gathered there and came over +to where we were. His eyes were large and his wrinkled features twitched +with eagerness. He seemed very old; he had traveled to the farthest lands. + +"Men," he cried in his thin, windy voice, "yonder's the moon." + +The moon indeed was there. There was no reason to gainsay him. He stood +with it over his left shoulder and extended his arms before him, one +pointing somewhat to the right, the other to the left. "The right hand is +the right way," he cried, "but the left we'll never leave." + +We stared at the man and wondered if he were mad. + +"No," he said, smiling at our puzzled glances, "we'll never leave the +left." + +"Belay that talk," said one of the men sharply. "Ye'll have to steer a +clearer course than that if you want us to follow you." + +Blodgett smiled. "The course is clear," he replied. "Yonder"--he waved his +right hand--"is Singapore and the Chinese Sea and Whampoa. It's the right +course. Our orders is for that course. Our cargo is for that course. It's +the course that will make money for the owners. It's the right--you +understand?--my right hand and the right course according to orders. But +yonder"--this time he waved his left hand--"is the course that won't be +left. And yet it's the left you know--my left hand." + +He explained his feeble little joke with an air of pride. + +"Why won't it be left?" the gruff seaman demanded. + +"Because," said Blodgett, "we ain't going to leave it. There's gold there +and no end of treasure. Do you suppose Captain Falk is going to leave it +all for some one else to get? He's going to sail through Malacca Strait and +across the Bay of Bengal to Calcutta. That's what he's going to do. I've +been in India myself and seen the heaps of gold lying on the ground by the +money-changer's door and no body watching it but a sleepy Gentoo." + +"But what's this treasure you're talking about," some one asked. + +"Sure," said Blodgett in a husky whisper, "it's a treasure such as never +was heard of before. There's barrels and barrels of gold and diamonds and +emeralds and rubies and no end of such gear. There's idols with crowns of +precious stones, and eyes in their carved heads that would pay a king's +ransom. There's money enough in gold mohurs and rupees to buy the Bank of +England." + +It was a cock-and-bull story that the little old man told us; but, absurd +though it was, he had an air of impressive sincerity; and although every +one of us would have laughed the yarn out of meeting had it been told of +Captain Whidden, affairs had changed in the last days aboard ship. +Certainly we did not trust Captain Falk. I thought of the cook's dark +words, "A little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine!" As we followed the direction of Blodgett's two hands,--the right +to the northeast and the Chinese shore, the left to the northwest and the +dim lowlands of Sumatra that lay along the road to Burma,--anything seemed +possible. Moon-madness was upon us, and we were carried away by the mystery +of the night. + +Such madness is not uncommon. Of tales in the fore-castle during a long +voyage there is no end. Extraordinary significance is attributed to trivial +happenings in the daily life of the crew, and the wonders of the sea and +the land are overshadowed completely by simple incidents that superstitious +shipmates are sure to exaggerate and to dwell upon. + +After a time, though, as Blodgett walked back and forth along the bulwark, +like a cat that will not go into the open, my sanity came back to me. + +"That's all nonsense," I said--perhaps too sharply; "Mr. Falk is an honest +seaman. His whole future would be ruined if he attempted any such thing as +that." + +"Ay, hear the boy," Blodgett muttered sarcastically. "What does the boy +think a man rich enough to buy all the ships in the king's navy will care +for such a future as Captain Falk has in front of him? Hgh! A boy that +don't know enough to call his captain by his proper title!" + +Blodgett fairly bristled in his indignation, and I said no more, although I +knew well enough--or thought I did--that such a scheme was quite too wild +to be plausible. Captain Falk might play a double game, but not such a +silly double game as that. + +"No," said Bill Hayden solemnly, as if voicing my own thought, "the captain +ain't going to spoil his good name like that." Poor, stupid old Bill! + +Blodgett snorted angrily, but the others laughed at Bill--silly old butt of +the forecastle, daft about his little girl!--and after speculating at +length concerning the treasure that Blodgett had described so vaguely, fell +at last into a hot argument about how far a skipper could disobey the +orders of his owners without committing piracy. + +Thus began the rumor that revealed the scatterwitted convictions so +characteristic of the strange, cat-like Blodgett, which later were to lead +almost to death certain simple members of the crew; which served, by a +freak of chance, to involve poor Bill Hayden in an affair that came to a +tragic end; and which, by a whim of fortune almost as remote, though +happier, placed me in closer touch with Roger Hamlin than I had been since +the Island Princess sailed from Salem harbor. + +An hour later I saw the cook standing silently by his galley. He gave me +neither look nor word, although he must have known that I was watching him, +but only puffed at his rank old pipe and stared at the stars and the hills. +I wondered if the jungle growth reminded him of his own African tropics; if +behind his grim, seamed face an unsuspected sense of poetry lurked, a sort +of half-beast, half-human imagination. + +Never glancing at me, never indicating by so much as a quiver of his black +features that he had perceived my presence, he sighed deeply, walked to the +rail and knocked the dead ashes from his pipe into the water. He then +turned and went into the galley and barricaded himself against intruders, +there to stay until, some time in the night, he should seek his berth in +the steerage for the few hours of deep sleep that were all his great body +required. But as he passed me I heard him murmuring to himself, "Dat Bill +Hayden, he betteh look out, yass, sah. He say Mistah Captain Falk don't +want to go to spoil his good name. Dat Hay den he betteh look out." + +With a bang of his plank door the old darky shut himself away from all of +us in the darkness of his little kingdom of pots and pans. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +III + +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XI + +A HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS IN GOLD + + +Unquestionably the negro had known that I was there. Never otherwise could +he have ignored me so completely. I was certain too, that his cryptic +remarks about Bill Hayden were intended for my ears, for he never acted +without a reason, obscure, perhaps, and far-fetched, but always, according +to his own queer notions, sufficient. + +Sometimes it seemed as if he despised me; sometimes, as if he were +concealing a warm, friendly regard for me. + +An hour later, hearing the murmer of low voices, I discovered a little +group of men by the mainmast; and moved by the curiosity that more than +once had led me where I had no business to go, I silently approached. + +"Ah," said one of the men, "so you're keeping a weather eye out for my good +name, are you?" It was Captain Falk. + +I was startled. It seemed as if the old African were standing at my +shoulder, saying, "What did Ah told you, hey?" The cook had used almost +those very words. Where, I wondered, had he got them? It was almost +uncanny. + +"No, sir," came the reply,--it was poor Bill Hayden's voice,--"no, sir, I +didn't say that. I said--" + +"Well, what _did_ you say? Speak up!" + +"Why, sir, it--well, it wasn't that, I know. I wouldn't never ha' said +that. I--well, sir, it sounded something like that, I got to admit--I--I +ain't so good at remembering, sir, as I might be." + +The shadowy figures moved closer together. + +"You'll admit, then, that it _sounded_ like that?" There was the thud of a +quick blow. "I'll show you. I don't care what you _said_, as long as that +was what you _meant_. Take that! I'll show you." + +"Oh!--I--that's just it, sir, don't hit me!--It may have sounded like that, +but--Oh!--it never meant anything like that. I can't remember just how the +words was put together--I ain't so good at remembering but--Oh!--" + +The scene made me feel sick, it was so brutal; yet there was nothing that +the rest of us could do to stop it. + +Captain Falk was in command of the ship. + +I heard a mild laugh that filled me with rage. "That's the way to make 'em +take back their talk, captain. Give him a good one," said the mild voice. +"He ain't the only one that 'll be better for a sound beating." + + +There was a scuffle of footsteps, then I heard Bill cry out, "Oh--oh!--oh!" + +Suddenly a man broke from the group and fled along the deck. + +"Come back here, you scoundrel!" the captain cried with vile oaths; "come +back here, or I swear I'll seize you up and lash you to a bloody pulp." + +The fugitive now stood in the bow, trembling, and faced those who were +approaching him. "Don't," he cried piteously, "I didn't go to do nothing." + +"Oh, no, not you!" said the mild voice, followed by a mild laugh. "He +didn't do nothing, captain." + +"Not he!" Captain Falk muttered. "I'll show him who's captain here." + +There was no escape for the unfortunate man. They closed in on him and +roughly dragged him from his retreat straight aft to the quarter-deck, and +there I heard their brief discussion. + +"Hadn't you better call up the men, captain?" asked the mild voice. "It'll +do 'em good, I'll warrant you." + +"No," the captain replied, hotly. "This is a personal affair. Strip him and +seize him up." + +I heard nothing more for a few minutes, but I could see them moving about, +and presently I distinguished Bill's bare back and arms as they +spread-eagled him to the rigging. + +Then the rope whistled in the air and Bill moaned. + +Unable to endure the sight, I was turning away, when some one coming from +the cabin broke in upon the scene. + +"Well," said Roger Hamlin, "what's all this about?" + +Roger's calm voice and composed manner were so characteristic of him that +for the moment I could almost imagine myself at home in Salem and merely +passing him on the street. + +"I'll have you know, sir," said Captain Falk, "that I'm master here." + +"Evidently, sir." + +"Then what do you mean, sir, by challenging me like that?" + +"From what I have heard, I judge that the punishment is out of proportion +to the offense, even if the steward's yarn was true." + +"I'll have you know, that I'm the only man aboard this ship that has any +judgment," Falk snarled. + +"Judgment ?" Roger exclaimed; and the twist he gave the word was so funny +that some one actually snickered. + +"Yes, judgment !" Falk roared; and he turned on Roger with all the anger of +his mean nature choking his voice. "I'll--I'll beat you, you young upstart, +you! I'll beat you in that man's place," he cried, with a string of oaths. + +"No," said Roger very coolly, "I think you won't." + +"By heaven, I will!" + +The two men faced each other like two cocks in the pit at the instant +before the battle. There was a deathly silence on deck. + +Such a scene, as I saw it there, if put on the stage in a theatre, would be +a drama in itself without word or action. The sky was bright with stars; +the land lay low and dark against the horizon; the sea whispered round the +ship and sparkled with golden phosphorescence. Over our heads the masts +towered to slender black shafts, which at that lofty height seemed far too +frail to support the great network of rigging and spars and close-furled +canvas. Dwarfed by the tall masts, by the distances of the sea, and by the +vastness of the heavens, the small black figures stood silent on the +quarter-deck. But one of those men was bound half-naked to the rigging, and +two faced each other in attitudes that by outline alone, for we could +discern the features of neither, revealed antagonism and defiance. + +"No," said Roger once more, very coolly, "I think you won't." + +As the captain lifted his rope to hit Bill again, Roger stepped forward. + +The captain looked sharply at him; then with a shrug he said, "Oh, well, +the fellow's had enough. Cut him down, cut him down." + +So they unlashed Bill, and he came forward with his clothes in his arms and +one long, raw welt across his back. + +"Now, what did I say?" he whimpered. "What did I say to make 'em do like +that?" + +What had he said, indeed? Certainly nothing culpable. Some one had twisted +his innocent remarks in such a way as to irritate the captain and had +carried tales to the cabin. With decent officers such a thing never would +have happened. Affairs had run a sad course since Captain Falk had read the +burial service over Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas, both of whom had been +strict, fair, honorable gentlemen. There was a sober time in the forecastle +that night, and none of us had much to say. + +Next day we sent a boat ashore again, and got information that led us to +sail along five miles farther, where there was a settlement from which we +got a good supply of water and vegetables. This took another day, and on +the morning of the day following we made sail once more and laid our course +west of Lingga Island, which convinced us for a time that we really were +about to bear away through Malacca Strait and on to Burma, at the very +least. + +I almost believed it myself, India seemed so near; and Blodgett, sleepy by +day, wakeful by night, prowled about with an air of triumph. But in the +forenoon watch Roger Hamlin came forward openly and told me certain things +that were more momentous than any treasure-hunting trip to India that +Blodgett ever dreamed of. + +Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping--I suppose they must be given their titles +now--watched him, and I could see that they didn't like it. They exchanged +glances and stared after him suspiciously, even resentfully; but there +was nothing that they could do or say. So he came on slowly and +confidently, looking keenly from one man to another as he passed. + +By this time the two parties on board were sharply divided, and from the +attitude of the men as they met Roger's glance their partisanship was +pretty plainly revealed. The two from Boston, who were, I was confident, +on friendly and even familiar terms with Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping, gave +him a half-concealed sneer. There was no doubt where their sympathies would +lie, should Roger cross courses with our new master. The carpenter, working +on a plank laid on deck, heard him coming, glanced up, and seeing who it +was, continued at his labor without moving so much as a hair's breadth to +let him by; the steward looked him in the eye brazenly and impersonally; +and others of the crew, among them the strange Blodgett, treated him with a +certain subtle rudeness, even contempt. Yet here and there a man was glad +to see him coming and gave him a cordial nod, or a cheerful "Ay, ay, sir," +in answer to whatever observation he let fall. + +The cook alone, as I watched the scene with close interest, I could not +understand. To a certain extent he seemed surly, to a certain extent, +subservient. Perhaps he intended that we--and others--should be mystified. + +One thing I now realized for the first time: although the crew was divided +into two cliques, the understanding was much more complete on the side of +Captain Falk. Among those who enjoyed the favor of our new officers there +was, I felt sure, some secret agreement, perhaps even some definite +organization. There seemed to be a unity of thought and manner that only a +common purpose could explain, whereas the rest drifted as the wind blew. + +"Ben," Roger said, coming to me where I sat on the forecastle, "I want to +talk to you. Step over by the mast." + +I followed him, though surprised. + +"Here we can see on all sides," he said. "There are no hiding-places within +earshot. Ben"--He hesitated as if to find the right words. + +All were watching us now, the captain and the mate from the quarter-deck, +the others from wherever they happened to be. + +"I am loath to draw your sister's younger brother into danger," Roger +began. His adjective was tactfully chosen. "I am almost equally reluctant +to implicate you in what seems likely to confront us, because you are an +old friend of mine and a good deal younger than I am. But when the time +comes to go home, Ben, I'm sure we want to be able to look your sister and +all the others squarely in the eyes, with our hands clean and our +consciences clear--if we go home. How about it, Ben?" + + +I was too bewildered to answer, and in Roger's eyes something of his old +twinkle appeared. + +"Ultimately," he continued, grave once more and speaking still in enigmas, +"we shall be vindicated in any case. But I fear that, before then, I, for +one, shall have to clasp hands with mutiny, perhaps with piracy. How would +you like that, Ben, with a thundering old fight against odds, a fight that +likely enough will leave us to sleep forever on one of these green islands +hereabouts?" + +Still I did not understand. + +Roger regarded me thoughtfully. "Tell me all that you know about our +cargo." + +"Why," said I, finding my tongue at last, "it's ginseng and woollen goods +for Canton. That's all I know." + +"Then you don't know that at this moment there is one hundred thousand +dollars in gold in the hold of the Island Princess?" + +"What?" I gasped. + +"One hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +I could not believe my ears. Certainly, so far as I was concerned, the +secret had been well kept. + +Then a new thought came to me, "Does Captain Falk know?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Roger, "Captain Falk knows." + + + +CHAPTER XII + +A STRANGE TALE + + +Roger Hamlin's words were to linger a long time in my ears, and so far as I +then could see, there was little to say in reply. A hundred thousand +dollars in gold had bought, soul and body, many a better man than Captain +Falk. At that very moment Falk was watching us from the quarter-deck with +an expression on his face that was partly an amused smile, partly a sneer. +Weak and conceited though he was, he was master of that ship and crew in +more ways than one. + +But Roger had not finished. "Do you remember, Ben," he continued in a low +voice, but otherwise unmindful of those about us, "that some half a dozen +years ago, when Thomas Webster was sore put to it for enough money to +square his debts and make a clean start, the brig Vesper, on which he had +sent a venture, returned him a profit so unbelievably great that he was +able to pay his creditors and buy from the Shattucks the old Eastern +Empress, which he fitted out for the voyage to Sumatra that saved his +fortunes?" + +I remembered it vaguely--I had been only a small boy when it happened--and +I listened with keenest interest. The Websters owned the Island Princess. + +"Not a dozen people know all the story of that voyage. It's been a kind of +family secret with the Websters. Perhaps they're ashamed to be so deeply +indebted to a Chinese merchant. Well, it's a story I shouldn't tell under +other conditions, but in the light of all that's come to pass, it's best +you should hear the whole tale, Ben; and in some ways it's a fine tale, +too. The Websters, as you probably know, had had bad luck, what with three +wrecks and pirates in the West Indies. They were pretty much by the head in +those days, and it was a dark outlook before them, when young Webster +signed the Vesper's articles as first officer and went aboard, with all +that the old man could scrape together for a venture, and with the future +of his family hanging in the balance. At Whampoa young Webster went up to +the Hong along with the others, and drove what bargains he could, and +cleared a tidy little sum. But it was nowhere near enough to save the +family. If only they could get the money to tide them over, they'd weather +the gale. If not, they'd go on a lee shore. Certain men--you'd know their +names, but such things are better forgotten--were waiting to attach the +ships the Websters had on the ways, and if the ships were attached there +would be nothing left for the Websters but stools in somebody's +counting-house. + +"As I've heard the story, young Webster was waiting by the river for his +boat, with a face as long as you'd hope to see, when a Chinese who'd been +watching him from a little distance came up and addressed him in such +pidgin English as he could muster and asked after his father. Of course +young Webster was taken by surprise, but he returned a civil answer, and +the two fell to talking together. It seemed that, once upon a time, when +the Chinese was involved, head and heels, with some rascally down-east +Yankee, old man Webster had come to the rescue and had got him out of the +scrape with his yellow hide whole and his moneybags untapped. + +"The Chinaman seemed to suspect from the boy's long face that all was not +as it should be, and he squeezed more or less of the truth out of the +young fellow, had him up to the Hong again, gave him various gifts, and +sent him back to America with five teak-wood chests. Just five ordinary +teak-wood chests--but in those teak-wood chests, Ben, was the money that +put the Websters on their feet again. The hundred thousand dollars below +is for that Chinese merchant." + +It was a strange tale, but stranger tales than that were told in the old +town from which we had sailed. + +"And Captain Falk--?" I began questioningly. + +"Captain Falk was never thought of as a possible master of this ship." + +"Will he try to steal the money?" + +Roger raised his brows. "Steal it? Steal is a disagreeable word. He thinks +he has a grievance because he was not given the chief mate's berth to begin +with. He says, at all events, that he will not hand over any such sum to a +yellow heathen. He thinks he can return it to the owners two-fold. Although +he seldom reads his Bible, I believe he referred to the man who was given +ten talents." + +"But the owners' orders!" I exclaimed. + +"The owners' orders in that respect were secret. They were issued to +Captain Whidden and to me, and Captain Falk refuses to accept my version of +them." + +"And you?" + +Roger smiled and looked me hard in the eye. "I am going to see that they +are carried out," he said. "The Websters would be grievously disappointed +if this commission were not discharged. Also--" his eyes twinkled in the +old way--"I am not convinced that Captain Falk is in all respects an +honest--no, let us not speak too harshly--let us say, a _reliable_ man." + +"So there'll be a fight," I mused. + +"We'll see," Roger replied. "In any case, you know the story. Are you with +me?" + +After fifty years I can confess without shame that I was frightened when +Roger asked me that question, for Roger and I were only two, and Falk, by +hook or by crook, had won most of the others to his side. There was Bill +Hayden, to be sure, on whom we could count; but he was a weak soul at best, +and of the cook's loyalty to Roger and whatever cause he might espouse I +now held grave doubts. Yet I managed to reply, "Yes, Roger, I am with you." + +I thought of my sister when I said it, and of the white flutter of her +handkerchief, which had waved so bravely from the old wharf when Roger and +I sailed out of Salem harbor. After all, I was glad even then that I had +answered as I did. + +"I'll have more to say later," said Roger; "but if I stay here much longer +now, Falk and Kipping will be breaking in upon us." And, turning, he coolly +walked aft. + +Falk and Kipping were still watching us with sneers, and not a few of the +crew gave us hostile glances as we separated. But I looked after Roger with +an affection and a confidence that I was too young fully to appreciate. I +only realized that he was upright and fearless, and that I was ready to +follow him anywhere. + +More and more I was afraid of the influence that Captain Falk had +established in the forecastle. More and more it seemed as if he actually +had entered into some lawless conspiracy with the men. Certainly they +grumbled less than before, and accepted greater discomforts with better +grace; and although I found myself excluded from their councils without any +apparent reason, I overheard occasional snatches of talk from which I +gathered that they derived great satisfaction from their scheme, whatever +it was. Even the cook would have none of me in the galley of an evening; +and Roger in the cabin where no doubt he was fighting his own battles, was +far away from the green hand in the forecastle. I was left to my own +devices and to Bill Hayden. + +To a great extent, I suppose, it counted against me that I was the son of a +gentleman. But if I was left alone forward, so Roger, I learned now and +then, was left alone aft. + +Continually I puzzled over the complacency of the men. They would nod and +smile and glance at me pityingly, even when I was getting my meat from the +same kids and my tea from the same pot; and chance phrases, which I caught +now and then, added to my uneasiness. + +Once old Blodgett, prowling like a cat in the night, was telling how he was +going to "take his money and buy a little place over Ipswich way. There's +nice little places over Ipswich way where a man can settle snug as you +please and buy him a wife and end his days in comfort. We'll go home by way +of India, too, I'll warrant you, and take each of us our handful of round +red rubies. Right's right, but right'll be left--mind what I tell you." +Another time--on the same day, as I now recall it--I overheard the +carpenter saying that he was going to build a brick house in Boston up on +Temple Place. "And there'll be fan-lights over the door," he said, "their +panels as thin as rose-leaves, and leaded glass in a fine pattern." The +carpenter was a craftsman who aspired to be an artist. + +But where did old Blodgett or the carpenter hope to get the money to +indulge the tastes of a prosperous merchant? I suspected well enough the +answer to that question, and I was not far wrong. + +The cook remained inscrutable. I could not fathom the expressions of his +black frowning face. Although Captain Falk of course had no direct +communication with him openly, I learned through Bill Hayden that +indirectly he treated him with tolerant and friendly patronage. It even did +not surprise me greatly to be told that sometimes he secretly visited the +galley after dark and actually hobnobbed with black Frank in his own +quarters. It was almost incredible, to be sure; but so was much else in +which Captain Falk was implicated, and I could see revealed now in the game +that he was playing his desire to win and hold the men until they had +served his ends, whatever those ends might be. + +"Yass, sah," black Frank would growl absently as he passed me without a +glance, "dis am de most appetizin' crew eveh Ah cooked foh. Dey's got no +mo' bottom to dey innards dan a sponge has. Ah's a-cookin' mah head off to +feed dat bunch of wuthless man-critters, a-a-a-a-h!" And he would stump to +the galley with a brimming pail of water in each hand. + +I came sadly to conclude that old Frank had found other friends more to his +taste than the boy in the forecastle, and that Captain Falk, by trickery +and favoritism, really was securing his grip on the crew. In all his petty +manoeuvres and childish efforts to please the men and flatter them and make +them think him a good officer to have over them, he had made up to this +point only one or two false steps. + +Working our way north by west to the Straits of Singapore, and thence on +into the China Sea, where we expected to take advantage of the last weeks +of the southwest monsoon, we left far astern the low, feverous shores of +Sumatra. There were other games than a raid on India to be played for +money, and the men thought less and less now of the rubies of Burma and the +gold mohurs and rupees of Calcutta. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +TROUBLE FORWARD + + +In the starboard watch, one fine day when there was neither land nor sail +in sight, Davie Paine was overseeing the work on the rigging and badly +botching it. The old fellow was a fair seaman himself, but for all his deep +voice and big body, his best friend must have acknowledged that as an +officer he was hopelessly incompetent. "Now unlay the strands so," he would +say. "No, that ain't right. No, so! No, that ain't right either. Supposing +you form the eye so. No, that ain't right either." + +After a time we were smiling so broadly at his confused orders that we +caught the captain's eye. + +He came forward quickly--say what you would against Captain Falk as an +officer, no one could deny that he knew his business--and instantly he took +in the whole unfortunate situation. "Well, _Mister_ Paine," he cried, +sarcastically stressing the title, "are n't you man enough to unlay a bit +of rope and make a Flemish eye?" + +Old Davie flushed in hopeless embarrassment, and even the men who had been +chuckling most openly were sorry for him. That the captain had reason to be +dissatisfied with the second mate's work, we were ready enough to admit; +but he should have called him aside and rebuked him privately. We all, I +think, regarded such open interference as unnecessary and unkind. + +"Why--y-yes, sir," Davie stammered. + +"To make you a Flemish eye," Captain Falk continued in cold sarcasm, "you +unlay the end of the rope and open up the yarns. Then you half-knot some +half the inside yarns over that bit of wood you have there, and scrape the +rest of them down over the others, and marl, parcel, and serve them +together. That's the way you go to make a Flemish eye. Now then, _Mister_ +Paine, see that you get a smart job done here and keep your eyes open, you +old lubber. I thought you shipped for able seaman. A fine picture of an +able seaman you are, you doddering old fool!" + +It is impossible to reproduce the meanness with which he gave his little +lecture, or the patronizing air with which he walked away. Old Davie was +quite taken aback by it and for a time he could not control his voice +enough to speak. It was pitiful to see him drop all the pretensions of his +office and, as if desiring only some friendly word, try to get back on the +old familiar footing of the forecastle. + +"I know I ain't no great shakes of a scholar," he managed to mutter at +last, "and I ain't no great shakes of a second mate. But he made me second +mate, he did, and he hadn't ought to shame me in front of all the men, now +had he? It was him that gave me the berth. If he don't like me in it, now +why don't he take it away from me? I didn't want to be second mate when he +made me do it, and I can't read figures good nor nothing. Now why don't he +send me forrard if he don't like the way I do things?" + +The old man ran on in a pathetic monologue, for none of us felt exactly at +liberty to put in our own oars, and he could find relief only in his +incoherent talk. It had been a needless and unkind thing and the men almost +unanimously disapproved of it. Why indeed should Captain Falk not send +Davie back to the forecastle rather than make his life miserable aft? The +captain was responsible only to himself for the appointment, and its tenure +depended only on his own whims; but that, apparently, he had no intention +of doing. + +"'Tain't right," old Blodgett murmured, careful not to let Captain Falk see +him talking. "He didn't ought to use a man like that." + +"No, he didn't," Neddie Benson said in his squeaky voice, turning his face +so that neither Davie nor Captain Falk should see the motion of his lips. +"I didn't ought to ship for this voyage, either. The fortune teller--she +was a lady, she was, a nice lady--she says, 'Neddie, there'll be a dark man +and a light man and a store of trouble.' She kind of liked me, I think. But +I up and come. I'm always reckless." + +A ripple of low, mild laughter, which only Kipping could have uttered, +drifted forward, and the men exchanged glances and looked furtively at old +Davie. + +The murmur of disapproval went from mouth to mouth, until for a time I +dared hope that Captain Falk had quite destroyed the popularity that he had +tried so hard to win. But, though Davie was grieved by the injustice and +though the men were angry, they seemed soon to forget it in the excitement +of that mysterious plot from which Roger and I were virtually the only ones +excluded. + +Nevertheless, like certain other very trivial happenings aboard the Island +Princess, Captain Falk's unwarrantable insult to Davie Paine--it seems +incongruous to call him "mister"--was to play its part later in events that +as yet were only gathering way. + +We had not seen much of Kipping for a time, and perhaps it was because he +had kept so much to himself that to a certain extent we forgot his sly, +tricky ways. His laugh, mild and insinuating, was enough to call them to +mind, but we were to have a yet more disagreeable reminder. + +All day Bill Hayden had complained of not feeling well and now he leaned +against the deck-house, looking white and sick. Old Davie would never have +troubled him, I am sure, but Kipping was built by quite another mould. + +Unaware of what was brewing, I turned away, sorry for poor Bill, who seemed +to be in much pain, and in response to a command from Kipping, I went aloft +with an "Ay, ay sir," to loose the fore-royal. Having accomplished my +errand, I was on my way down again, when I heard a sharp sound as of +slapping. + +Startled, I looked at the deck-house. I was aware at the same time that the +men below me were looking in the same direction. + +The sound of slapping was repeated; then I heard a mild, gentle voice +saying, "Oh, he's sick, is he? Poor fellow! Ain't it hard to be sick away +from home?" Slap--slap. "Well, I declare, what do you suppose we'd better +do about it? Shan't we send for the doctor? Poor fellow!" Slap--slap. "Ah! +ah! ah!" Kipping's voice hardened. "You blinking, bloody old fool. You +would turn on me, would you? You would give me one, would you? You would +sojer round the deck and say you're sick, would you? I 'll show you--take +that--I'll show you!" + +Now, as I sprang on deck and ran out where I could see what was going +forward, I heard Bill's feeble reply. "Don't hit me, sir. I didn't go to do +nothing. I'm sick. I've got a pain in my innards. I _can't_ work--so help +me, I _can't_ work." + +"Aha!" Again Kipping laughed mildly. "Aha! _Can't_ work, eh? I'll teach you +a lesson." + +Bill staggered against the deck-house and clumsily fell, pressing his hands +against his side and moaning. + +"Hgh!" Kipping grunted. "Hgh!" + +At that moment the day flashed upon my memory when I had sat on one side of +that very corner while Kipping attempted to bully Bill on the other side of +it--the day when Bill had turned on his tormentor. I now understood some of +Kipping's veiled references, and a great contempt for the man who would use +the power and security of his office to revenge himself on a fellow seaman +who merely had stood up bravely for his rights swept over me. But what +could I or the others do? Kipping now was mate, and to strike him would be +open mutiny. Although thus far, in spite of the dislike with which he and +Captain Falk regarded me, my good behavior and my family connections had +protected me from abuse, I gladly would have forfeited such security to +help Bill; but mutiny was quite another affair. + +We all stood silent, while Kipping berated Bill with many oaths, though +poor Bill was so white and miserable that it was almost more than we could +endure. I, for one, thought of his little girl in Newburyport, and I +remember that I hoped she might never know of what her loving, stupid old +father was suffering. + +Enraged to fury by nothing more or less than Bill's yielding to his +attacks, Kipping turned suddenly and reached for the carpenter's mallet, +which lay where Chips had been working nearby. With a round oath, he +yelled, "I'll make you grovel and ask me to stop." + +Kipping had moved quickly, but old Bill moved more quickly still. Springing +to his feet like a flash, with a look of anguish on his face such as I hope +I never shall see again, he warded off a blow of the mallet with his hand +and, running to the side, scrambled clean over the bulwark into the sea. + +We stood there like men in a waxwork for a good minute at the very least; +and if you think a minute is not a long time, try it with your eyes shut. +Kipping's angry snarl was frozen on his mean features,--it would have been +ludicrous if the scene had not been so tragic,--and his outstretched hand +still held the mallet at the end of the blow. The carpenter's mouth was +open in amazement. Neddie Benson, the first to move or break the silence, +had spread his hands as if he were about to clutch at a butterfly or a +beetle; dropping them to his side, he gasped huskily, "She said there'd be +a light man and a dark man--I--oh, Lord!" + +It was the cook, as black as midnight and as inscrutable as a figurehead, +who brought us to our senses. Silently observing all that had happened, he +had stood by the galley, without lifting his hand or changing the +expression of a single feature; but now, taking his pipe from his mouth, he +roared, "Man ovehboa'd!" Then, snatching up the carpenter's bench with one +hand and gathering his great body for the effort, he gave a heave of his +shoulders and tossed the bench far out on the water. + +As if waking from a dream, Mr. Kipping turned aft, smiling scornfully, and +said with a deliberation that seemed to me criminal, "Put down the helm!" + +So carelessly did he speak, that the man at the wheel did not hear him, and +he was obliged to repeat the order a little more loudly. "Didn't you hear +me? I say, put down the helm." + +"Put down the helm, sir," came the reply; and the ship began to head up in +the wind. + +At this moment Captain Falk, having heard the cook's shout, appeared on +deck, breathing hard, and took command. However little I liked Captain +Falk, I must confess in justice to him that he did all any man could have +done under the circumstances. While two or three hands cleared away a +quarter-boat, we hauled up the mainsail, braced the after yards and raised +the head sheets, so that the ship, with her main yards aback, drifted down +in the general direction in which we thought Bill must be. + +Not a man of us expected ever to see Bill again. He had flung himself +overboard so suddenly, and so much time had elapsed, that there seemed to +be no chance of his keeping himself afloat. I saw that the smile actually +still hovered on Kipping's mean, mild mouth. But all at once the cook, near +whom I was standing, grasped my arm and muttered almost inaudibly, "If dey +was to look behine, dey'd get ahead, yass, sah." + +Taking his hint, I looked astern and cried out loudly. Something was +bobbing at the end of the log line. It was Bill clinging desperately. + +When we got him on board, he was nearer dead than alive, and even the stiff +drink that the captain poured between his blue lips did not really revive +him. He moaned continually and now and then he cried out in pain. +Occasionally, too, he tried to tell us about his little girl at +Newburyport, and rambled on about how he had married late in life and had a +good wife and a comfortable home, and before long, God willing, he would be +back with them once more and would never sail the seas again. It was all so +natural and homely that I didn't realize at the time that Bill was +delirious; but when I helped the men carry him below, I was startled to +find his face so hot, and presently it came over me that he did not +recognize me. + +Poor old stupid Bill! He meant so well, and he wished so well for all of +us! It was hard that he should be the one who could not keep out of harm's +way. + +But there were other things to think of, more important even than the fate +of Bill Hayden, and one of them was an extraordinary interview with the +cook. + +I heard laughter in the galley that night, and lingered near as long as I +dared, with a boy's jealous desire to learn who was enjoying the cook's +hospitality. By his voice I soon knew that it was the steward, and +remembering how black Frank once was ready to deceive him for the sake of +giving me a piece of pie, I was more disconsolate than ever. After a while +I saw him leave, but I thought little of that. I still had two more hours +to stand watch, so I paced along in the darkness, listening to the sound of +the waves and watching the bright stars. + +When presently I again passed the galley I thought I heard a suspicious +sound there. Later I saw something move by the door. But neither time did I +go nearer. I had no desire for further rebuffs from the old negro. + +When I passed a third time, at a distance of only a foot or two, I was +badly startled. A long black arm reached out from the apparently closed +door; a black hand grasped me, lifted me bodily from the floor, and +silently drew me into the galley, which was as dark as Egypt. I heard the +cook close the door behind me and bolt it and cover the deadlight with a +tin pan. What he was up to, I had not the remotest idea; but when he had +barricaded and sealed every crack and cranny, he lighted a candle and set +it on a saucer and glared at me ferociously. + +"Mind you, boy," he said in a very low voice, "don't you think Ah'm any +friend of yo's. No, sah. Don't you think Ah'm doing nothin' foh you. No, +sah. 'Cause Ah ain't. No, sah. Ah'm gwine make a fo'tune dis yeh trip, Ah +am. Yass, sah. Dis yeh nigger's gwine go home putty darn well off. Yass, +sah. So don't you think dis yeh nigger's gwine do nothin' foh you. No, +sah." + +For a moment I was completely bewildered; then, as I recalled the darky's +crafty and indirect ways, my confidence returned and I had the keenest +curiosity to see what would be forthcoming. + +"Boys, dey's a pest," he grumbled. "Dey didn't had ought to have boys +aboa'd ship. No, sah. Cap'n Falk, he say so, too." + +The negro was looking at me so intently that I searched his words for some +hidden meaning; but I could find none. + +"No, sah, boys am de mos' discombobulationest eveh was nohow. Yass, sah. +Dey's been su'thin' happen aft. Yass, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy, +nohow. No, sah. 'Taint dis nigger would go tell a boy dat Mistah Hamlin he +have a riot with Mistah Cap'n Falk, no sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat +Mistah Hamlin, he say dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he ain't holdin' to de right +co'se, no, sah; nor dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he bristle up like a guinea +gander and he say, while he's swearin' most amazin', dat he know what co'se +he's sailin', no, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat Mistah Hamlin, he say +he am supercargo, an' dat he reckon he got orders f'om de owners; and +Mistah Cap'n Falk, he say he am cap'n and he cuss su'thin' awful 'bout dem +orders; and Mistah Roger Hamlin he say Mistah Cap'n Falk his clock am a +hour wrong and no wonder Mistah Kipping am writing in de log-book dat de +ship am whar she ain't; and Mistah Kipping he swear dre'ful pious and he +say by golly he am writer of dat log-book and he reckon he know what's what +ain't. No, sah, Ah ain't gwine tell a boy dem things 'cause Ah tell stew'd +Ah ain't, an' stew'd, him an' me is great friends, what's gwine make a +fo'tune _when Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +He said those last words in a whisper, and stared at me intently; in that +same whisper, he repeated them, "When Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +Then, in a strangely meditative way, as if an unfamiliar process of thought +suddenly occupied all his attention, he muttered absently, letting his eyes +fall, "Seem like Ah done see dat Kipping befo'; Ah jes' can't put mah +finger on him." It was the second time that he had made such a remark in my +hearing. + +The candle guttered in the saucer that served for a candlestick, and its +crazy, wavering light shone unsteadily on the black face of the cook, who +continued to stare at me grimly and apparently in anger. A pan rattled as +the ship rolled. Water splashed from a bucket. I watched the drops falling +from the shelf. One--two--three--four--five--six--seven! Each with its +_pht_, its little splash. They continued to drip interminably. I lost all +count of them. And still the black face, motionless except for the wildly +rolling eyes, stared at me across the galley stove. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +BILL HAYDEN COMES TO THE END OF HIS VOYAGE + + +I was ejected from the galley as abruptly and strangely as I had been drawn +into it. The candle went out at a breath from the great round lips; the big +hand again closed on my shoulder and lifted me bodily from my chair. The +door opened and shut, and there was I, dazed by my strange experience and +bewildered by the story I had heard, outside on the identical spot from +which I had been snatched ten minutes before. + +In my ears the negro's parting message still sounded, "Dis nigger wouldn't +tell a boy one word, no sah, not dis nigger. If he was to tell a boy jest +one leetle word, dat boy, he might lay hisself out ready foh a fight. Yass, +sah." + +For a long time I puzzled over the whole extraordinary experience. It was +so like a dream, that only the numbness of my arm where the negro's great +fist had gripped it convinced me that the happenings of the night were +real. But as I pondered, I found more and more significance in the cook's +incoherent remarks, and became more and more convinced that their +incoherence was entirely artful. Obviously, first of all, he was trying to +pacify his conscience, which troubled him for breaking the promise of +secrecy that he probably had given the steward, from whom he must have +learned the things at which he had hinted. Also he had established for +himself an alibi of a kind, if ever he should be accused of tattling about +affairs in the cabin. + +That Captain Falk had promised to divide the money among the crew, I long +had suspected; consequently that part of the cook's revelations did not +surprise me. But the picture he gave of affairs in the cabin, disconnected +though it was, caused me grave concern. After all, what could Roger do to +preserve the owners' property or to carry out their orders? Captain Falk +had all the men on his side, except me and perhaps poor old Bill Hayden. +Indeed, I feared for Roger's own safety if he had detected that rascally +pair in falsifying the log; he then would be a dangerous man when we all +went back to Salem together. I stopped as if struck: what assurance had I +that we should go back to Salem together--or singly, for that matter? There +was no assurance whatever, that all, or any one of us, would ever go back +to Salem. If they wished to make way with Roger, and with me too, for that +matter, the green tropical seas would keep the secret until the end of +time. + +I am not ashamed that I frankly was white with fear of what the future +might bring. You can forgive in a boy weaknesses of which a man grown might +have been guilty. But as I watched the phosphorescent sea and the stars +from which I tried to read our course, I gradually overcame the terror that +had seized me. I think that remembering my father and mother, and my +sister, for whom I suspected that Roger cared more than I, perhaps, could +fully realize, helped to compose me; and I am sure that the thought of the +Roger I had known so long,--cool, bold, resourceful, with that twinkle in +his steady eyes--did much to renew my courage. When eight bells struck and +some one called down the hatch, "Larbowlines ahoy," and the dim figures of +the new watch appeared on deck, and we of the old watch went below, I was +fairly ready to face whatever the next hours might bring. + +"Roger and I against them all," I thought, feeling very much a martyr, +"unless," I mentally added, "Bill Hayden joins us." At that I actually +laughed, so that Blodgett, prowling restlessly in the darkness, asked me +crossly what was the matter. I should have been amazed and incredulous if +anyone had told me that poor Bill Hayden was to play the deciding part in +our affairs. + +He lay now in his bunk, tossing restlessly and muttering once in a while to +himself. When I went over and asked if there was anything that I could do +for him, he raised himself on his elbow and stared at me more stupidly than +ever. It seemed to come to him slowly who I was. After a while he made out +my face by the light of the dim, swinging lantern, and thanked me, and said +if I would be so good as to give him a drink of water--He never completed +the sentence; but I brought him a drink carefully, and when he had finished +it, he thanked me again and leaned wearily back. + +His face seemed dark by the lantern-light, and I judged that it was still +flushed. Muttering something about a "pain in his innards," he apparently +went to sleep, and I climbed into my own bunk. The lantern swung more and +more irregularly, and Bill tossed with ever-increasing uneasiness. When at +last I dozed off, my own sleep was fitful, and shortly I woke with a start. + +Others, too, had waked, and I heard questions flung back and forth:-- + +"Who was that yelled?" + +"Did you hear that? Tell me, did you hear it?" + +Some one spoke of ghosts,--none of us laughed,--and Neddie Benson whimpered +something about the lady who told fortunes. "She said the light man and the +dark man would make no end o' trouble," he cried; "and he--" + +"Keep still," another voice exclaimed angrily. "It was Bill Hayden," the +voice continued. "He hollered." + +Getting out of my bunk, I crossed the forecastle. "Bill," I said, "are you +all right?" + +He started up wildly. "Don't hit me!" he cried. "That wasn't what I said-- +it--I don't remember _just_ what I said, because I ain't good at +remembering, but it wasn't that--don't-oh! oh!--I _know_ it wasn't that." + +Two of the men joined me, moving cautiously for the ship was pitching now +in short, heavy seas. + +"What's that he's saying?" one of them asked. + +Before I could answer, Bill seemed suddenly to get control of himself. +"Oh," he moaned. "I've got such a pain in my innards! I've got a rolling, +howling old pain in my innards." + +There was little that we could do, so we smoothed his blankets and went +back to our own. The Island Princess was pitching more fiercely than ever +now, and while I watched the lantern swing and toss before I went to sleep, +I heard old Blodgett saying something about squalls and cross seas. There +was not much rest for us that night. No sooner had I hauled the blankets to +my chin and closed my eyes, than a shout came faintly down to us, +"All-hands--on deck!" + +Some one called, "Ay, ay," and we rolled out again wearily--all except Bill +Hayden whose fitful tossing seemed to have settled at last into deep sleep. + +Coming on deck, we found the ship scudding under close-reefed maintopsail +and reefed foresail, with the wind on her larboard quarter. A heavy sea +having blown up, all signs indicated that a bad night was before us; and +just as we emerged from the hatch, she came about suddenly, which brought +the wind on the starboard quarter and laid all aback. + +In the darkness and rain and wind, we sprang to the ropes. Mr. Kipping was +forward at his post on the forecastle and Captain Falk was on the +quarter-deck. As the man at the wheel put the helm hard-a-starboard, we +raised the fore tack and sheet, filled the foresail and shivered the +mainsail, thus bringing the wind aft again, where we met her with the helm +and trimmed the yards for her course. For the moment we were safe, but +already it was blowing a gale, and shortly we lay to, close-reefed, under +what sails we were carrying. + +In a lull I heard Blodgett, who was pulling at the ropes by my side, say to +a man just beyond him, "Ay, it's a good thing for _us_ that Captain Falk +got command. We'd never make our bloody fortunes under the old officers." + +As the wind came again and drowned whatever else may have been said, I +thought to myself that they never would have. Plainly, Captain Falk and +Kipping had won over the simple-minded crew, which was ready to follow them +with never a thought of the chance that that precious pair might run off +with the spoils themselves and leave the others in the lurch. + +But now Kipping's indescribably disagreeable voice, which we all by this +time knew so well, asked, "Has anybody seen that sojering old lubber, +Hayden?" + +"Ay, ay, sir," Blodgett replied. "He's below sick." + +"Sick?" said the mild voice. "Sick is he? Supposing Blodgett, you go below +and bring him on deck. He ain't sick, he's sojering." + +"But, sir,--" Blodgett began. + +"But what?" roared Kipping. His mildness changed to fierceness. "_You go_!" +He snapped out the words, and Blodgett went. + +Poor stupid old Bill! + +When he appeared, Blodgett had him by the arm to help him. + +"You sojering, bloody fool," Kipping cried; "do you think I'm so blind I +can't see through such tricks as yours?" + +A murmur of remonstrance came from the men, but Kipping paid no attention +to it. + +"You think, do you, that I ain't on to your slick tricks? Take that." + +Bill never flinched. + +"So!" Kipping muttered. "So! Bring him aft." + +Though heavy seas had blown up, the squalls had subsided, and some of the +men, for the moment unoccupied, trailed at a cautious distance after the +luckless Bill. We could not hear what those on the quarterdeck said; but +Blodgett, who stood beside me and stared into the darkness with eyes that I +was convinced could see by night, cried suddenly, "He's fallen!" + +Then Captain Falk called, "Come here, two or three of you, and take this +man below." + +Old Bill was moaning when we got there. "Sure," he groaned, "I've got a +rolling--howling--old Barney's bull of a pain in my innards." But when we +laid him in his bunk, he began to laugh queerly, and he seemed to pretend +that he was talking to his little wee girl; for we heard him saying that +her old father had come to her and that he was never going to leave her +again. + +To me--only a boy, you must remember--it was a horrible experience, even +though I did not completely understand all that was happening; and to the +others old Bill's rambling talk seemed to bring an unnamed terror. + +All night he restlessly tossed, though he soon ceased his wild talking and +slept lightly and fitfully. The men watching him were wakeful, too, and as +I lay trying to sleep and trying not to see the swaying lantern and the +fantastic shadows, I heard at intervals snatches of their low conversation. + +"They hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. It warn't human. A sick man has +got _some_ rights," one of the men from Boston repeated interminably. He +seemed unable to hold more than one idea at a time. + +Then Blodgett would say, "Ay, it don't seem right. But we've all got to +stand by the skipper. That's how we'll serve our ends best. It don't do to +get too much excited." + +I imagined that Blodgett's voice did not sound as if he were fully +convinced of the doctrine he was preaching. + +"Ay," the other would return, "but they hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. +It warn't human. A sick man has got _some_ rights, and he was allers +quiet." + +They talked on endlessly, while I tried in vain to sleep and while poor +Bill tossed away, getting no good from the troubled slumber that the Lord +sent him. + +No sooner, it seemed to me, did I actually close my eyes than I woke and +heard him moaning, "Water--a--drink--of--water." + +The others by then had left him, so I got up and fetched water, and he +muttered something more about the "pain in his innards." Then my watch was +called and I went on deck with the rest. + +For the most part it was a day of coarse weather. Now intermittent squalls +from the southwest swept upon us with lightning and thunder, driving before +them rain in solid sheets; now the ship danced in choppy waves, with barely +enough wind to give her steerage-way and with a warm, gentle drizzle that +wet us to the skin and penetrated into the forecastle, where blankets and +clothing soon became soggy and uncomfortable. But the greater part of the +time we lurched along in a gale of wind, with an occasional dash of rain, +which we accepted as a compromise between those two worse alternatives, the +cloudbursts that accompanied the squalls, and the enervating warm drizzle. + +That Bill Hayden did not stand watch with the others, no one, apparently, +noticed. The men were glad enough to forget him, I think, and the officers +let his absence pass, except Davie Paine, who found opportunity to inquire +of me secretly about him and sadly shook his gray head at the tidings I +gave. + +Below we could not forget him. I heard the larboard watch talking of it +when they relieved us; and no sooner had we gone below in turn than +Blodgett cried, "Look at old Bill! His face is all of a sweat." + +He was up on his elbow when we came down, staring as if he had expected +some one; and when he saw who it was, he kept his eyes on the hatch as if +waiting for still another to come. Presently he fell back in his bunk. "Oh, +I've got such a pain in my innards," he moaned. + +By and by he began to talk again, but he seemed to have forgotten his pain +completely, for he talked about doughnuts and duff, and Sundays ashore when +he was a little shaver, and going to church, and about the tiny wee girl on +the bank of the Merrimac who would be looking for her dad to come home, and +lots of things that no one would have thought he knew. He seemed so natural +now and so cheerful that I was much relieved about him, and I whispered to +Blodgett that I thought Bill was better. But Blodgett shook his head so +gravely that I was frightened in spite of my hopes, and we lay there, some +of us awake, some asleep, while Bill rambled cheerily on and the lantern +swung with the motion of the ship. + +To-day I remember those watches below at +that time in the voyage as a succession of short unrestful snatches of +sleep broken by vivid pictures of the most trivial things--the swinging +lantern, the distorted shadows the muttered comments of the men, Bill +leaning on his elbow at the edge of his bunk and staring toward the hatch +as if some one long expected were just about to come. I do not pretend to +understand the reason, but in my experience it is the trifling unimportant +things that after a time of stress or tragedy are most clearly remembered. + +When next I woke I heard the bell--_clang-clang, clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang_--faint and far off. Then I saw that Blodgett was sitting on the edge +of his bunk, counting the strokes on his fingers. When he had finished he +gravely shook his head and nodded toward Bill who was breathing harder now. +"He's far gone," Blodgett whispered. "He ain't going to share in no +split-up at Manila. He ain't going to put back again to India when we've +got rid of the cargo. His time's come." + +I didn't believe a word that Blodgett said then, but I sat beside him as +still as the grave while the forecastle lantern nodded and swung as +casually as if old Bill were not, for all we knew, dying. By and by we +heard the bell again, and some one called from the hatch, "Eight bells! +Roll out!" + +The very monotony of our life--the watches below and on deck, each like +every other, marked off by the faint clanging of the ship's bell--made +Bill's sickness seem less dreadful. There is little to thrill a lad or +even, after a time, to interest him, in the interminable routine of a long +voyage. + +When we came on deck Davie Paine looked us over and said, "Where's Bill?" + +Blodgett shook his head. Even this simple motion had a sleepy quality that +made me think of a cat. + +"I'm afraid, sir," he replied, "that Bill has stood his last watch." + +"So!" said old Davie, reflectively, in his deep voice, "so!--I was afraid +of that." Ignorant though Davie was, and hopelessly incompetent as an +officer, he had a certain kindly tolerance, increased, perhaps, by his own +recent difficulties, that made him more approachable than any other man in +the cabin. After a time he added, "I cal'ate I got to tell the captain." +Davie's manner implied that he was taking us into his confidence. + +"Yes," Neddie Benson muttered under his breath, "tell the captain! If it +wasn't for Mr. Kipping and the captain, Bill would be as able a man this +minute as any one of us here. It didn't do to abuse him. He ain't got the +spirit to stand up under it." + +Davie shuffled away without hearing what was said, and soon, instead of +Captain Falk, Mr. Kipping appeared, bristling with anger. + +"What's all this?" he snapped, with none of the mildness that he usually +affected. "Who says Bill Hayden has stood his last watch? Is mutiny +brewing? I'll have you know I'm mate here, legal and lawful, and what's +more I'll show you I'm mate in a way that none of you won't forget if he +thinks he can try any more of his sojering on me. I'll fix him. You go +forward, Blodgett, and drag him out by the scalp-lock." + +Blodgett walked off, keeping close to the bulwark, and five minutes later +he was back again. + +Mr. Kipping grew very red. "Well, my man," he said in a way that made my +skin creep, "are you a party to this little mutiny?" + +"N-no, sir," Blodgett stammered. "I--he-it ain't no use, he _can't_ come." + +The mate looked sternly at Blodgett, and I thought he was going to hit +him; but instead, after a moment of hesitation, he started forward alone. + +We scarcely believed our eyes. + +By and by he came back again, but to us he said nothing. He went into the +cabin, and when next we saw him Captain Falk was by his side. + +"I don't like the looks of it," Kipping was saying, "I don't at all." + +As the captain passed me he called, "Lathrop, go to the galley and get a +bucket of hot water." + +Running to the deck-house, I thrust my head into the galley and made known +my want with so little ceremony that the cook was exasperated. Or so at +least his manner intimated. + +"You boy," he roared in a voice that easily carried to where the others +stood and grinned at my discomfiture, "you boy, what foh you come +promulgatin' in on me with 'gimme dis' and 'gimme dat' like Ah wahn't ol' +enough to be yo' pa? Ain't you got no manners nohow? You vex me, yass, sah, +you vex me. If we gotta have a boy on boa'd ship, why don' dey keep him out +of de galley?" + +Then with a change of voice that startled me, he demanded in an undertone +that must have been inaudible a dozen feet away, "Have things broke? Is de +fight on? Has de row started?" + +Bewildered, I replied, "Why, no--it's only Bill Hayden." + +Instantly he resumed his loud and abusive tone. "Well, if dey gwine send a +boy heah foh wateh, wateh he's gotta have. Heah, you wuthless boy, git! Git +out of heah!" + +Filling a bucket with boiling water, he thrust it into my hand and shoved +me half across the deck so roughly that I narrowly escaped scalding myself, +then returned to his work, muttering imprecations on the whole race of +boys. He was too much of a strategist for me. + +When I took the bucket to the forecastle, I found the captain and Mr. +Kipping looking at poor old Bill. + +"Dip a cloth in the water," the captain said carelessly, "and pull his +clothes off and lay the cloth on where it hurts." + +I obeyed as well as I could, letting the cloth cool a bit first; and +although Bill cried out sharply when it touched his skin, the heat eased +him of pain, and by and by he opened his eyes for all the world as if he +had been asleep and looked at Captain Falk and said in a scared voice, "In +heaven's name, what's happened?" + +The captain and Mr. Kipping laughed coldly. It seemed to me that they +didn't care whether he lived or died. + +Certainly the men of the larboard watch, who were lying in their bunks at +the time, didn't like the way the two behaved. I caught the word +"heartless" twice repeated. + +"Well," said Captain Falk at last, "either he'll live or he'll not. How +about it, Mr. Kipping?" + +The mate laughed as if he had heard a good joke. "That's one of the truest +things ever was said aboard a ship," he replied, in his slow, insincere +way. "Yes, sir, it hits the nail on the head going up and coming down." + +"Well, then, let's leave him to make up his mind." + +So the two went aft together as if they had done a good day's work. But +there was a buzz of disapproval in the forecastle when they had gone, and +one of the men from Boston, of whom I hitherto had had a very poor opinion, +actually got out of his blankets and came over to help me minister to poor +Bill's needs. + +"It ain't right," he said dipping the cloth in the hot water; "they never +so much as gave him a dose of medicine. A man may be only a sailor, but +he's worth a dose of medicine. There never come no good of denying poor +Jack his pill when he's sick." + +"Ay, heartless!" one of the others exclaimed. _"I could tell things if I +would."_ + +That remark, I ask you to remember. The man who made it, the other of the +two from Boston, had black hair and a black beard, and a nose that +protruded in a big hook where he had broken it years before. It was easy to +recognize his profile a long way off because of the peculiar shape of the +nose. The remark itself is of little importance, of course; but a story is +made up of things that seem to be of little importance, yet really are more +significant by far than matters that for the moment are startling. + +It was touching to see the solicitude of the men and the clumsy kindness of +their efforts to help poor Bill when the captain and the mate had left him. +They crowded up to his bunk and smoothed out his blankets and spoke to him +more gently than I should have believed possible. So angry were they at the +brutality of the two officers, that the coldest and hardest of them all +gave the sick man a muttered word of sympathy or an awkward helping hand. + +We worked over him, easing him as best we could, while the bell struck the +half hours and the hours; and for a while he seemed more comfortable. In a +moment of sanity he looked up at me with a sad smile and said, "I wish, +lad, I surely wish I could do something for _you_." But long before the +watch was over he once more began to talk about the tiny wee girl at +Newburyport--"Cute she is as they make 'em," he reiterated weakly, +"a-waiting for her dad to come home." And by and by he spoke of his wife, +--"a good wife," he called her,--and then he made a little noise in his +throat and lay for a long time without moving. + +"He's dead," the man from Boston said at last; there was no sound in the +forecastle except the rattle of the swinging lantern and the chug-chug of +waves. + +I was younger than the others and more sensitive, so I went on deck and +leaned on the bulwark, looking at the ocean and seeing nothing. + + [Illustration] + + + + +IV + +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XV + +MR. FALK TRIES TO COVER HIS TRACKS + + +How long I leaned on the bulwark I do not know; I had no sense of passing +time. But after a while some one told me that the captain wished to see me +in the cabin, and I went aft with other tragic memories in mind. I had not +entered the cabin since Captain Whidden died--"_shot f'om behine_." The +negro's phrase now flashed upon my memory and rang over and over again in +my ears. + +The cabin itself was much as it had been that other day: I suppose no +article of its furnishings had been changed. But when I saw Captain Falk in +the place of Captain Whidden and Kipping in the place of Mr. Thomas, I felt +sick at heart. All that encouraged me was the sight of Roger Hamlin, and I +suspected that he attended uninvited, for he came into the cabin from his +stateroom at the same moment when I came down the companionway, and there +was no twinkle now in his steady eyes. + +Captain Falk glanced at him sharply. "Well, sir?" he exclaimed testily. + +"I have decided to join you, sir," Roger said, and calmly seated himself. + +For a moment Falk hesitated, then, obviously unwilling, he assented with a +grimace. + +"Lathrop," he said, turning to me, "you were present when Hayden died, and +also you had helped care for him previously. Mr. Kipping has written a +statement of the circumstances in the log and you are to sign it, Here's +the place for your name. Here's a pen and ink. Be careful not to blot or +smudge it." + +He pushed the big, canvas-covered book over to me and placed his finger on +a vacant line. All that preceded it was covered with paper. + +"Of course," said Roger, coldly, "Lathrop will read the statement before +signing it." He was looking the captain squarely in the eye. + +Falk scowled as he replied, "I consider that quite unnecessary." + +"A great many of the ordinary decencies of life seem to be considered +unnecessary aboard this ship." + +"If you are making any insinuations at me, Mr. Hamlin, I'll show you who's +captain here." + +"You needn't. You've done it sufficiently already. Anyhow, if Lathrop were +foolish enough to sign the statement without reading it, I should know that +he hadn't read it and I assure you that it wouldn't pass muster in any +court of law." + +As Captain Falk was about to retort even more angrily, Kipping touched his +arm and whispered to him. + +"Oh, well," he said with ill grace, "as you wish, Mr. Kipping. There's +nothing underhanded about this. Of course the account is absolutely true +and the whole world could read it; only I don't intend a silly young fop +shall think he can bully me on my own ship. Show Lathrop the statement." + +Kipping withdrew the paper and I began to read what was written in the log, +but Roger now interrupted again. + +"Read it aloud," he said. + +"What in heaven's name do you think you are, you young fool? If you think +you can bully Nathan Falk like that, I'll lash you to skin and pulp." + +"Oh, well," said Roger comically, in imitation of the captain's own air of +concession, "since you feel so warmly on the subject, I'm quite willing to +yield the point. It's enough that Lathrop should read it before he signs." +Then, turning to me suddenly, he cried, "Ben, what's the course according +to the log?" + +The angry red of Captain Talk's face deepened, but before he could speak, I +had seen and repeated it:-- + +"Northeast by north." + +Roger smiled. "Go on," he said. "Read the statement." + +The statement was straightforward enough for the most part--more +straightforward, it seemed to me, than either of the two men who probably +had collaborated in writing it; but one sentence caught my attention and I +hesitated. + +"Well," said Roger who was watching me closely, "is anything wrong?" + +"Why, perhaps not exactly wrong," I replied, "though I do think most of the +men forward would deny it." + +"See here," cried Captain Falk, cutting off Kipping, who tried to speak at +the same moment, "I tell you, Mr. Hamlin, if you thrust your oar in here +again I'll thrash you within an inch of your life! I'll keelhaul you, so +help me! I'll--" He wrinkled up his nose and twisted his lips into a sneer +before he added, almost in a whisper, "I'll do worse than that." + +"No," said Roger calmly, "I don't think you will. What's the sentence, +Benny?" + +Without waiting for another word from anyone I read aloud as follows:-- + +"'And the captain and the chief mate tended Hayden carefully and did what +they might to make his last hours comfortable.'" + +"Well," said Falk, "didn't we?" + +"No, by heaven, you didn't," Roger cried suddenly, taking the floor from +me. "I know how you beat Hayden. I know how you two drove him to throw +himself overboard. You're a precious pair! And what's more, all the men +forward know it. While we're about it, Captain Falk, here's something else +I know. According to the log, which you consistently have refused to let me +see the course is northeast by north. According to the men at the wheel,--I +will not be still! I will not close my mouth! If you assault me, sir, I +will break your shallow head,--according to the men at the wheel, of whom I +have inquired, according to the ship's compass when I've taken a chance to +look at it, according to the tell-tale that you yourself can see at this +very minute and--" Roger laid on the table a little box of hard wood bound +with brass--"according to this compass of my own, which I know is a good +one, our course is now and has been for two days east-northeast. Captain +Falk, do you think you can make us believe that Manila is Canton?" + +"It may be that I do, and it may be that I do not," Falk retorted hotly. +"As for you, Mr. Hamlin, I'll attend to your case later. Now sign that +statement, Lathrop." + +Falk was standing. His hands, a moment before lifted for a blow, rested on +the table; but the knuckles were streaked with red along the creases, and +the nails of his fingers, which were bent under, he had pressed hard +against the dull mahogany. When he had finished speaking, he sat down +heavily. + +"Sign it, Ben," said Roger; "but first draw your pen through that +particular sentence." + +Quick as thought I did what Roger told me, leaving a single broad line +through the words "and did what they might to make his last hours +comfortable"; then I wrote my name and laid the pen on the table. + +[Illustration: "Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk.] + +Leaning over to see what I had done, Falk leaped up white with passion. +"Good God!" he yelled, "that's worse than nothing." + +"Yes," said Roger coolly, "I think it is." + +"What--" Falk stopped suddenly. Kipping had touched his sleeve. "Well?" + +Kipping whispered to him. + +"No," Falk snarled, glancing at me, "I'm going to take that young pup's +hide off his back and salt it." + +Again Kipping whispered to him. + +This time he seemed half persuaded. He was a weak man, even in his +passions. "All right," he said, after reflecting briefly. "As you say, it +don't make so much odds. Myself, I'm for slitting the young pup's ears--but +later on, later on. And though I'd like to straighten out the record as far +as it goes--Well, as you say." + +For all of Captain Falk's bluster and pretension, I was becoming more and +more aware that the subtle Kipping could twist him around his little +finger, and that for some end of his own Kipping did not wish affairs to +come yet to a head. + +He leaned back in his chair, twirling his thumbs behind his interlocked +fingers, and smiled at us mildly. His whole bearing was odious. He fairly +exhaled hypocrisy. I remembered a dozen episodes of his career aboard the +Island Princess--the wink he had given Captain Falk, then second mate; his +coming to the cook's galley for part of my pie; his bullying poor old Bill +Hayden; his cold selfishness in taking the best meat from the kids, and +many other offensive incidents. Was it possible that Captain Falk was not +at the bottom of all our troubles? that Captain Falk had been from the +first only somebody's tool? + +We left the cabin in single file, the captain first, Kipping second, then +Roger, then I. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +A PRAYER FOR THE DEAD + + +In the last few hours we had sighted an island, which lay now off the +starboard bow; and as I had had no opportunity hitherto to observe it +closely, I regarded it with much interest when I came on deck. Inland there +were several cone-shaped mountains thickly wooded about the base; to the +south the shore was low and apparently marshy; to the north a bold and +rugged promontory extended. Along the shore and for some distance beyond it +there were open spaces that might have been great tracts of cleared land; +and a report prevailed among the men that a fishing boat had been sighted +far off, which seemed to put back incontinently to the shore. Otherwise +there was no sign of human habitation, but we knew the character of the +natives of such islands thereabouts too well to approach land with any +sense of security. + +Captain Falk and Kipping were deep in consultation, and the rest were +intent upon the sad duty that awaited us. On the deck there lay now a shape +sewed in canvas. The men, glancing occasionally at the captain, stood a +little way off, bare-headed and ill at ease, and conversed in whispers. For +the moment I had forgotten that we were to do honor for the last time--and, +I fear me, for the first--to poor Bill Hayden. Poor, stupid Bill! He had +meant so well by us all, and life had dealt so hardly with him! Even in +death he was neglected. + +As time passed, the island became gradually clearer, so that now we could +see its mountains more distinctly and pick out each separate peak. Although +the wind was light and unsteady, we were making fair progress; but Captain +Falk and Mr. Kipping remained intent on their conference. + +I could see that Roger Hamlin, who was leaning on the taffrail, was +imperturbable; but Davie Paine grew nervous and walked back and forth, +looking now and then at the still shape in canvas, and the men began to +murmur among themselves. + +"Well," said the captain at last, "what does all this mean, Mr. Paine? What +in thunder do you mean by letting the men stand around like this?" + +He knew well enough what it meant, though, for all his bluster. If he had +not, he would have been ranting up the deck the instant he laid eyes on +that scene of idleness such as no competent officer could countenance. + +Old Davie, who was as confused as the captain had intended that he should +be, stammered a while and finally managed to say, "If you please, sir, Bill +Hayden's dead." + +"Yes," said the captain, "it looks like he's dead." + +We all heard him and more than one of us breathed hard with anger. + +"Well, why don't you heave him over and be done with it?" he asked shortly, +and turned away. + + +The men exchanged glances. + + +"If you please, sir,--" it was Davie, and a different Davie from the one we +had known before,--"if you please, sir, ain't you goin' to read the service +and say the words?" + +I turned and stared at Davie in amazement. His voice was sharper now than +ever I had heard it and there was a challenge in his eyes as well. + +"What?" Falk snapped out angrily. + +"Ain't you goin' to read the Bible and say the words, sir?" + +I am convinced that up to this point Captain Falk had intended, after +badgering Davie enough to suit his own unkind humor, to read the service +with all the solemnity that the occasion demanded. He was too eager for +every prerogative of his office to think of doing otherwise. But his was +the way of a weak man; at Davie's challenge he instantly made up his mind +not to do what was desired, and having set himself on record thus, his +mulish obstinacy held him to his decision in spite of whatever better +judgment he may have had. + +"Not I!" he cried. "Toss him over to suit yourself." + +When an angry murmur rose on every side, he faced about again. "Well," he +said, "what do you want, anyway? I'm captain here, and if you wish I'll +_show_ you I'm captain here. I'll read the service or I'll not read it, +just as I please. If any man here's got anything to say about it, I'll do +some saying myself. If any man here wants to read the service over that +lump of clay, let him read it." Then, turning with an air of indifference, +he leaned on the rail with a sneer, and smiled at Kipping. + +What would have happened next I do not know, so angry were the men at this +wretched exhibition on the part of the captain, if Roger had not stepped +forward. + +"Very well, sir," he said facing the captain, "since you put it that way, +_I'll read the service_." And without ceremony he took from the captain's +hand the prayer-book that Falk had brought on deck. + +Disconcerted by this unexpected act and angered by the murmur of approval +from the men, Falk started to speak, then thought better of it and sidled +over beside Kipping, to whom he whispered something at which they both +laughed heartily. Then they stood smiling scornfully while Roger went down +beside poor Bill's body. + +Roger opened the prayer-book, turned the pages deliberately, and began to +read the service slowly and with feeling. He was younger and more slender +than many of the men, but straight and tall and handsome, and I remember +how proud of him I felt for taking affairs in his own hands and making the +best of a bad situation. + +"We therefore commit his body to the deep," he read "looking for the +general Resurrection in the last day, and the life of the world to come, +through our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in glorious majesty +to judge the world, the sea shall give up her dead; and the corruptible +bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed and made like unto his +glorious body; according to the mighty working whereby He is able to subdue +all things unto Himself." + +Then Blodgett, Davie Paine, the cook, and the man from Boston lifted the +plank and inclined it over the bulwark, and so passed all that was mortal +of poor Bill Hayden. + +Suddenly, in the absolute silence that ensued when Roger closed the +prayer-book, I became aware that he was signaling me to come nearer, and I +stepped over beside him. At the same instant the reason for it burst upon +me. Now, if ever, was the time to turn against Captain Falk. + +"Men," said Roger in a low voice, "are you going to stand by without +lifting a hand and see a shipmate's dead body insulted?" + +The crew came together in a close group about their supercargo. With stern +faces and with the heavy breathing of men who contemplate some rash or +daring deed, they were, I could see, intent on what Roger had to say. + +He looked from one to another of them as if to appraise their spirit and +determination. "I represent the owners," he continued tersely. "The owners' +orders are not being obeyed. Mind what I tell you--_the owners' orders are +not being obeyed._ You know why as well as I do, and you remember this: +though it may seem on the face of it that I advocate mutiny or even piracy, +if we take the ship from the present captain and carry out the voyage and +obey the owners' orders, I can promise you that there'll be a fine rich +reward waiting at Salem for every man here. What's more, it'll be an honest +reward, with credit from the owners and all law-abiding men. But enough of +that! It's a matter of ordinary decency--of common honesty! The man who +will conspire against the owners of this ship is a contemptible cur, a fit +shipmate with the brute who horsed poor Bill to death." + +I never had lacked faith in Roger, but never before had I appreciated to +the full his reckless courage and his unyielding sense of personal honor. + +He paused and again glanced from face to face. "What say, men? Are you with +me?" he cried, raising his voice. + +Meanwhile Captain Falk, aware that something was going on forward, shouted +angrily, "Here, here! What's all this! Come, lay to your work, you sons of +perdition, or I'll show you what's what. You, Blodgett, go forward and +heave that lead as you were told." + +In his hand Blodgett held the seven-pound dipsey lead, but he stood his +ground. + +"Well?" Falk came down on us like a whirlwind. "Well? You, Hamlin, what in +Tophet are you backing and hauling about?" + +"I? Backing and hauling?" Roger spoke as calmly as you please. "I am merely +advocating that the men take charge of the ship in the name of the lawful +owners and according to their orders." + +As Captain Falk sprang forward to strike him down, there came a thin, windy +cry, "No you don't; no, you don't!" + +To my amazement I saw that it was old Blodgett. + +"It don't do to insult the dead," he cried in a voice like the yowl of a +tom-cat. "You can kill us all you like. It's captain's rights. But, by the +holy, you ain't got no rights whatsoever to refuse a poor sailor a decent +burial." + +With a vile oath, Captain Falk contemplated this new factor in the +situation. Suddenly he yelled, "Kipping! It's mutiny! Help!" And with a +clutch at his hip he drew his pistol. + +"'Heave the lead' is it?" Blodgett muttered. "Ay, I'll heave the lead." He +whipped up his arm and hurled the missile straight at Captain Falk's head. + +The captain dodged, but the lead struck his shoulder and felled him. + +Seeing Kipping coming silently with a pistol in each hand, I ducked and +tried to pull Roger over beside Blodgett; but Roger, instantly aware of +Kipping's move, spun on his heel as the first bullet flew harmlessly past +us, and lithely stepped aside. With a single swing of his right arm he cut +Kipping across the face with a rope's end and stopped him dead. + +As the welt reddened on his face, Kipping staggered, leveled his other +pistol point-blank and pulled the trigger. + +For the moment I could not draw breath, but the pistol missed fire. + +"Flashed in the pan!" Roger cried, and tugged at his own pistol, which had +caught inside his shirt where he had carried it out of sight. "That's not +all--that's flashed in the pan!" + +"Now then, you fools," Kipping shrieked. "Go for 'em! Go for'em! The bell's +struck! Now's the time!" + +So far it all had happened so suddenly and so extraordinarily swiftly, with +one event fairly leaping at the heels of another, that the men were +completely dazed. + +Captain Falk sat on the deck with his hand pressed against his injured +shoulder and with his pistol lying beside him where he had dropped it when +he fell. Kipping, the red bruise showing across his face, confronted us +with one pistol smoking, the other raised; Blodgett, having thrown the +lead, was drawing his knife from the sheath; Roger was pulling desperately +at his own pistol; and for my part I was in a state of such complete +confusion that to this day I don't know what I did or said. In the moments +that followed we were to learn once and for all the allegiance of every man +aboard the Island Princess. + +One of the men from Boston, evidently picking me out as the least +formidable of the trio, shot a quick glance back at Kipping as if to be +sure of his approval, and springing at me, knocked me flat on my back. I +felt sure he was going to kill me when he reached for my throat. But I +heard behind me a thunderous roar, "Heah Ah is! Heah Ah is!" And out of the +corner of my eye I saw the cook, the meat-cleaver in his hand, leaping to +my rescue, with Roger, one hand still inside his shirt, scarcely a foot +behind him. + +The man from Boston scrambled off me and fled. + +"Ah's with you-all foh one," the cook cried, swinging his cleaver. "Ah +ain't gwine see no po' sailor man done to death and me not say 'What foh!'" + +"You fool! You black fool!" Chips shrieked, shaking his fist, "Stand by and +share up! Stand by and share up!" + + +Neddie Benson jumped over beside the cook. "Me too!" he called shrilly. +"Bad luck or good luck, old Bill he done his best and was fair murdered." + +Poor Bill! His martyrdom stood us in good stead in our hour of need. + +On the other side of the deck there was a lively struggle from which came +fierce yells as each man sought to persuade his friends to his own way of +thinking: + +"Stand by, lads, stand by--" + +"----the bloody money!--" + +"Hanged for mutiny--" + +"I know where my bed's made soft--" + +The greater part of the men, it seemed, were lining up behind Kipping and +Captain Falk, when a scornful shout rose and I was aware that some one else +had come over to our side. It was old Davie Paine. "He didn't ought to +shame me in front of all the men," Davie muttered. "No, sir, it wa'n't +right. And what's more, there's lots o' things aboard this ship that ain't +as they should be. I may be poor and ignorant and no shakes of a scholar, +but I ain't goin' to put up with 'em." + +So we six faced the other twelve with as good grace as we could +muster,--Roger, the cook, Blodgett, Neddie Benson, Davie, and I,--and there +was a long silence. But Roger had got out his pistol now, and the lull in +the storm was ominous. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +MAROONED + + +That it was important to control the after part of the ship, I was well +aware, and though we were outnumbered two to one, I hoped that by good +fortune we might win it. + +I was not long in doubt of Roger's sharing my hope. He analyzed our +opponents' position at a single glance, and ignoring their advantage in +numbers, seized upon the only chance of taking them by surprise. Swinging +his arm and crying, "Come, men! All for the cabin!" he flung himself +headlong at Falk. I followed close at his heels--I was afraid to be left +behind. I heard the cook grunt hoarsely as he apprehended the situation and +sprang after us. Then the others met us with knives and pistols. + +Our attack was futile and soon over, but while it lasted there was a merry +little fight. As a man slashed at Roger with a case-knife, laying open a +long gash in his cheek, Roger fired a shot from his pistol, and the fellow +pitched forward and lay still except for his limbs, which twitched +sickeningly. For my own part, seeing another who had run aft for a weapon +swing at me with a cutlass, I threw myself under his guard and got my arms +round both his knees. As something crashed above me, I threw the fellow +back and discovered that the cook had met the cutlass in full swing with +the cleaver and had shattered it completely. Barely in time to escape a +murderous blow that the carpenter aimed at me with his hammer, I scrambled +to my feet and leaped back beside Roger, who held his cheek with his hand. + +I believe it was the cook's cleaver that saved our lives for the time +being. Falk and Kipping had fired the charges in their pistols, and no one +was willing to venture within reach of the black's long arm and brutal +weapon. So, having spent our own last charge of powder, we backed away into +the bow with our faces to the enemy, and the only sounds to be heard were +flapping sails and rattling blocks, the groans of the poor fellow Roger had +shot, and the click of a powder-flask as Falk reloaded and passed his +ammunition to Kipping. + +"So," said Falk at last, "we have a fine little mutiny brewing, have we?" +He looked first at us, then at those who remained true to him and his +schemes. "Well, Mr. Kipping, with the help of Chips here, we can make out +to work the ship at a pinch. Yes, I think we can dispense with these young +cocks altogether. Yes,--" he raised his voice and swore roundly--"yes, we +can follow our own gait and fare a damned sight better without them. We'll +let them have a boat and row back to Salem. A voyage of a few thousand +miles at the oars will be a rare good thing to tone down a pair of young +fighting cocks." Then he added, smiling, "If they meet with no Ladronesers +or Malays to clip their spurs." + +Captain Falk looked at Kipping and his men, and they all laughed. + +"Ay, so it will," cried Kipping. "And old Davie Paine 'll never have a +mister to his name again. You old lubber, you, your bones will be rotting +at the bottom of the sea when we're dividing up the gold." + +Again the men laughed loudly. + +Davie flushed and stammered, but Blodgett spoke out bitterly. + +"So they will, before you or Captain Falk divide with any of the rest. Ah! +Red in the face, are ye? That shot told. Davie 'd rather take his chances +with a gentleman than be second mate under either one o' you two. He may +not know when he's well off, but he knows well when he ain't." + +For all Blodgett spoke so boldly, I could see that Davie in his own heart +was still afraid of Kipping. But Kipping merely smiled in his mean way and +slowly looked us over. + +"If we was to walk them over a plank," he suggested, deferentially, to the +captain, "there would be an end to all bother with them." + +"No," said Falk, "give them a boat. It's all the same in the long run, and +I ain't got the stomach to watch six of them drown one after another." + +Kipping raised his eyebrows at such weakness; then a new thought seemed to +dawn on him. His accursed smile grew broader and he began to laugh softly. +For the moment I could not imagine what he was laughing at, but his next +words answered my unspoken question. "Ha ha ha! Right you are, captain! +Just think of 'em, a-sailing home in a ship's boat! Oh, won't they have a +pretty time?" + +The predicament of six fellow men set adrift in an open boat pleased the +man's vile humor. We knew that he believed he was sending us to certain +death, and that he delighted in it. + +"This fine talk is all very well," said Roger, "and I've no doubt you think +yourselves very witty, but let that be as it may. As matters stand now, +you've got the upper hand--though I wish you joy of working the ship. +However, if you give us the long-boat and a fair allowance of water and +bread, we'll ask nothing more." + +"Ah," said Falk, with a leer at Kipping who was smiling quietly, "the +long-boat and a fair allowance of water and bread! Ay, next they'll be +wanting us to set 'em up in their own ship." He changed suddenly from a +leer to a snarl. "You'll take what I give you and nothing more nor less. +Now then, men, we'll just herd these hearties overboard and bid them a gay +farewell." + +He stood there, pointing the way with a grand gesture and the late +afternoon sun sparkled on the buttons of his coat and shone brightly on the +fine white shirt he wore, which in better days had belonged to Captain +Whidden. "Murderer and thief!" I thought. For although about Captain +Whidden's death I knew nothing more than the cook's never-to-be-forgotten +words, "a little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine," I laid Bill Hayden's death at Captain Falk's door, and I knew well +by now that our worthy skipper would not scruple at stealing more than +shirts. + +When Falk pointed to the quarter-boat, the men, laughing harshly, closed in +on us and drove us along by threatening us with pistols and pikes, which +the bustling steward by now had distributed. And all the while Kipping +stood just behind the captain, smiling as if no unkind thought had ever +ruffled his placid nature. I could not help but be aware of his meanness, +and I suppose it was because I was only a boy and not given to looking +under the surface that I did not yet completely recognize in him the real +leader of all that had gone astray aboard the Island Princess. + +We let ourselves be driven toward the boat. Since we were outnumbered now +eleven to six,--not counting the wounded man of course,--and since, +compared with the others, we were virtually unarmed, we ought, I suppose, +to have been thankful that we were not murdered in cold blood, as doubtless +we should have been if our dangerous plight had not so delighted Kipping's +cruel humor, and if both Falk and Kipping had not felt certain that they +would never see or hear of us again. But we found little comfort in +realizing that, as matters stood, although in our own minds we were +convinced absolutely that Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping had conspired with +the crew to rob the owners, by the cold light of fact we could be proved in +the wrong in any court of admiralty. + +So far as Roger and I were concerned, our belief was based after all +chiefly on supposition; and so craftily had the whole scheme been phrased +and manoeuvred that, if you got down to categorical testimony, even +Blodgett and Davie Paine would have been hard put to it to prove anything +culpable against the other party. Actually we were guilty of mutiny, if +nothing more. + +The cook still carried his great cleaver and Blodgett unobtrusively had +drawn and opened a big dirk knife; but Neddie Benson, Davie, and I had no +weapons of any kind, and Roger's pistol was empty. + +We worked the boat outboard in silence and made no further resistance, +though I knew from Roger's expression as he watched Falk and Kipping and +their men, that, if he had seen a fair chance to turn the scales in our +favor, he would have seized it at any cost. + +Meanwhile the sails were flapping so loudly that it was hard to hear +Roger's voice when he again said, "Surely you'll give us food and water." + +"Why--no," said Falk. "I don't think you'll need it. You won't want to row +right home without stopping to say how-d'y'-do to the natives." + +Again a roar of laughter came from the men on deck. + +As the boat lay under the side of the ship, they crowded to the rail and +stared down at us with all sorts of rough gibes at our expense. +Particularly they aimed then-taunts at Davie Paine and Blodgett, who a +short time before had been hand-in-glove with them; and I was no little +relieved to see that their words seemed only to confirm the two in their +determination, come what might, never to join forces again with Falk and +Kipping. But Kipping singled out the cook and berated him with a stream of +disgusting oaths. + +"You crawling black nigger, you," he yelled. "Now what'll _you_ give _me_ +for a piece of pie?" + +Holding the cleaver close at his side, the negro looked up at the fox who +was abusing him, and burst into wild vituperation. Although Kipping only +laughed in reply, there was a savage and intense vindictiveness in the +negro's impassioned jargon that chilled my blood. I remember thinking then +that I should dread being in Kipping's shoes if ever those two met again. + +As we cast off, we six in that little boat soon to be left alone in the +wastes of the China Sea, we looked up at the cold, laughing faces on which +the low sun shone with an orange-yellow light, and saw in them neither pity +nor mercy. The hands resting on the bulwark, the hands of our own +shipmates, were turned against us. + +The ship was coming back to her course now, and some of us were looking at +the distant island with the cone-shaped peaks, toward which by common +consent we had turned our bow, when the cook, who still stared back at +Kipping, seemed to get a new view of his features. Springing up suddenly, +he yelled in a great voice that must have carried far across the sea:-- + +"You Kipping, Ah got you--Ah got you--Ah knows who you is--Ah knows who you +is--you crimp's runner, you! You blood-money sucker, you! Ah seen you in +Boston! Ah seen you befo' now! A-a-a-ah!--a-a-a-ah!" And he shook his great +black fist at the mate. + +The smile on Kipping's face was swept away by a look of consternation. With +a quick motion he raised his loaded pistol, which he had primed anew, and +fired on us; then, snatching another from one of the crew, he fired again, +and stood with the smoking weapons, one in each hand, and a snarl fixed on +his face. + +Captain Falk was staring at the negro in wrath and amazement, and there was +a stir on the deck that aroused my strong curiosity. But the cook was +groaning so loudly that we could hear no word of what was said, so we bent +to the oars with all our strength and rowed out of range toward the distant +island. + +Kipping's second ball had grazed the negro's head and had left a deep +furrow from which blood was running freely. But for the thickness of his +skull I believe it would have killed him. + +Once again the sails of the Island Princess, as we watched her, filled with +wind and she bore away across the sapphire blue of the sea with all her +canvas spread, as beautiful a sight as I have ever seen. The changing +lights in the sky painted the water with opalescent colors and tinted the +sails gold and crimson and purple, and by and by, when the sun had set and +the stars had come out and the ocean had darkened, we still could make her +out, smaller and ghostlike in the distance, sailing away before light winds +with the money and goods all under her hatches. + +Laboring at the oars, we rowed on and on and on. Stars, by which we now +held our course, grew bright overhead, and after a time we again saw dimly +the shores of the island. We dared not stay at sea in a small open boat +without food or water, and the island was our only refuge. + +Presently we heard breakers and saw once more the bluff headlands that we +had seen from the deck of the Island Princess. Remembering that there had +been low shores farther south, we rowed on and on, interminably and at +last, faint and weary, felt the keel of the boat grate on a muddy beach. + +At all events we had come safely to land. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +ADVENTURES ASHORE + + +As we rested on our oars by the strange island, and smelled the warm odor +of the marsh and the fragrance of unseen flowers, and listened to the +_wheekle_ of a night-hawk that circled above us, we talked of one thing and +another, chiefly of the men aboard the Island Princess and how glad we were +to be done with them forever. + +"Ay," said Davie Paine sadly, "never again 'll I have the handle before my +name. But what of that? It's a deal sight jollier in the fo'castle than in +the cabin and I ain't the scholar to be an officer." He sighed heavily. + +"It warn't so jolly this voyage," Neddie Benson muttered, "what with Bill +Hayden passing on, like he done." + +We were silent for a time. For my own part, I was thinking about old Bill's +"little wee girl at Newbury-port" waiting for her stupid old dad to come +back to her, and I have an idea that the others were thinking much the same +thoughts. But soon Blodgett stirred restlessly, and the cook, the cleaver +on his knees, cleared his throat and after a premonitory grunt or two began +to speak. + +"Boy, he think Ah ain't got no use foh boys," he chuckled. "Hee-ha ha! Ah +fool 'em. Stew'd, he say, 'Frank, am you with us o' without us?' He say, +'Am you gwine like one ol' lobscozzle idjut git cook's pay all yo' life?' + +"'Well,' Ah says, 'what pay you think Ah'm gwine fob to git? Cap'n's pay, +maybe? 0' gin'ral's pay? Yass, sah. Ef Ah'm cook Ah'm gwine git cook's +pay.' + +"Den he laff hearty and slap his knee and he say 'Ef you come in with us, +you won't git cook's pay, no' sah. You is gwine git pay like no admiral +don't git if you come in with us. Dah's money 'board dis yeh ol' +ship.' + +"'Yass, sah,' says I, suspicionin' su'thin' was like what it didn't had +ought to be. 'But dat's owner's money.' + +"Den stew'd, he say, 'Listen! You come in with me and Cap'n Falk and Mistah +Kipping, and we's gwine split dat yeh money all up'twix' one another. Yass, +sah! But you all gotta have nothin' to do with dat yeh Mistah Hamlin and +dat yeh cocky li'le Ben Lathrop.' + +"'Oh no,' Ah says inside, so stew'd he don't heah me. 'Guess you all don't +know me and dat yeh Ben Lathrop is friends.' + +"Den Ah stop sudden. 'Mah golly,' Ah think, 'dey's a conspiration a-foot, +yass, sah, and if dis yeh ol' nigger don't look out dey gwine hu't de boy.' +If Ah gits into dat yeh conspiration, den Ah guess Ah'll snoop roun' and +learn what Ah didn't had ought to, and when time come, den mah golly, Ah'll +took good keer of dat boy. So Ah done like Ah'm sayin' now, and Ah says to +stew'd, 'Yass, sah, yass, sah,' and Ah don't let boy come neah de galley +and Ah don't give him no pie nor cake, but when time come Ah take good keer +of him, and Ah's tellin' you, Ah knows a lot 'bout what dem crawlin' +critters yonder on ship think dey gwine foh to do." + +With a glance toward me in the darkness that I verily believe expressed as +much genuine affection as so villainous a black countenance could show, +Frank got out his rank pipe and began packing it full of tobacco. + +Here was further evidence of what we so long had suspected. But as I +reflected on it, with forgiveness in my heart for every snub the faithful, +crafty old darky had given me and with amusement at the simple way he had +tricked the steward and Falk and Kipping, I recalled his parting remarks to +our worthy mate. + +"What was that you said to Mr. Kipping just as we gave way this afternoon?" +I asked. + +"Hey, what dat?" Frank growled. + +"When had you seen Kipping before?" + +There was a long silence, then Frank spoke quietly and yet with obvious +feeling. "Ah got a bone to pick with Kipping," he said, "but dat yeh's a +matter 'twix' him and me." + +All this time Roger had watched and listened with a kindly smile. + +"Well, men," he now said, "we've had a chance to rest and get our wind. +It's time we set to work. What do you say, hadn't we better haul the boat +out?" + +Although we tacitly had accepted Roger as commander of our expedition, he +spoke always with a certain deference to the greater age and experience of +Blodgett and Davie Paine, which won them so completely that they would have +followed him anywhere. + +They both looked at the sky and at the darkly rolling sea on which there +now rested a low incoming mist; but Davie left the burden of reply to old +Blodgett, who spoke nervously in his thin, windy voice. + +"Ay, sir, that we had. There's not much wind, nor is there, I think, likely +to be much; but if we was to haul up into some bushes like those yonder, +there won't be a thousand savages scouring the coast, come daylight, +a-hunting for the men that came in the boat." + +That was sound common sense. + +We got out and, standing three on a side, hauled the boat by great effort +clean out of water. Then we bent ropes to each end of three thwarts, and +thrust an oar through the bights of each pair of ropes. Thus, with one of +us at each end of an oar, holding it in the crooks of his elbows, we made +out to lift the boat and drag it along till we got it safely hidden in the +bushes with the oars tucked away under it. We then smoothed out our tracks +and restored the branches as well as we could, and held a counsel in which +every man had an equal voice. + +That it would be folly to remain on the beach until daylight, we were all +agreed. Immediately beyond the muddy shore there was, so far as we could +tell, only a salt marsh overgrown with rank grass and scattered clumps of +vegetation, which might conceal us after a fashion if we were willing to +lie all day long in mud that probably swarmed with reptile life, but which +would afford us no real security and would give us no opportunity to forage +for fresh water and food. + +Blodgett, wide-eyed and restless, urged that we set out inland and travel +as far as possible before daybreak. "You can't tell about a country like +this," he said. "Might be we'd stumble on a temple with a lot of heathen +idols full of gold and precious stones to make our everlasting fortunes, or +a nigger or two with a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string." + +"Yeah!" the cook grunted, irritated by Blodgett's free use of the word +"nigger," "and Ah's tellin' you he'll have a Malay kris what'll slit yo' +vitals and chop off yo' head; and nex' time when you gwine come to say +howdy, you'll find yo' ol' skull a-setting in de temple, chockfull of dem +rubies and grinnin' like he was glad to see you back again. Ah ain't gwine +on no such promulgation, no sah! What Ah wants is a good, cool drink and a +piece of pie. Yass, sah," + +"Now that's like I feel," said Neddie Benson. "I never thought when the +lady was tellin' me about trouble in store, that there warn't goin' to be +enough victuals to go round--" + +"Ah, you make me tired," Blodgett snapped out. "Food, food, food! And +here's a chance to find a nice little temple an' better our fortunes. Of +course it ain't like India, but if these here slant-eyed pirates have stole +any gold at all, it'll be in the temples." + +"What I'd like"--it was Davie Paine's heavy, slow voice--"is just a drink +of water and some ship's bread." + +"Well," said Roger, "we'll find neither bread nor rubies lying on the +beach, and since we're agreed that it's best to get out of sight, let's set +off." + +He was about to plunge blindly into the marsh, when Blodgett, who had been +ranging restlessly while we talked, cried, "Here's a road! As I'm alive +here's a road!" + +We trooped over to where he stood, and saw, sure enough, an opening in the +brush and grass where the ground was beaten hard as if by the passing of +many feet. + +"Well, let's be on our way," said Blodgett, starting forward. + +"No, sah, dat ain't no way foh to go!" the cook exclaimed. He stood there, +head thrown forward, chin out-thrust, the cleaver, which he had carried all +the time since we left the ship, hanging at his side. + +"Why not?" asked Roger. + +"'Cause, sah, whar dey's a road dey's humans and humans heahbouts on dese +yeh islands is liable to be drefful free with strangers. Yass, sah, if we +go a-walkin' along dat yeh road, fust thing we know we's gwine walk into a +whole mob of dem yeh heathens. Den whar'll we be?" In answer to his +question, the negro thrust out his left hand and, grasping an imaginary +opponent by the throat, raised the cleaver, and swept it through the air +with a slicing motion. Looking keenly at us to be sure that we grasped the +significance of his pantomime he remarked, "Ah want mah ol' head to stay +put." + +"There ain't going to be no village till we come to trees," said Davie +Paine slowly. "If there is, we can see it anyhow, and if there isn't, this +road'll take us across the marsh. Once we're on the other side, we can +leave the road and take to the hills." + +"There's an idea," Roger cried. "How about it, Bennie?" + +I nodded. + +Blodgett eagerly went first and the cook, apparently fearing that he was on +his way to be served as a particularly choice tidbit at somebody else's +banquet, came last. The rest of us just jostled along together. But Davie +Paine, I noticed, held his head higher than I ever had seen it before; for +Roger's appreciation of his sound common sense had pleased him beyond +measure and had done wonders to restore his self-confidence. + +First there were interwoven bushes and vines beside the road, and then tall +reeds and marsh grasses; now there was sand underfoot, now mud. But it was +a better path by far than any we could have beaten out for ourselves, and +we all--except the cook--were well pleased that we had taken it. + +The bushes and tall grasses, which shut us in, prevented our seeing the +ocean behind us or the hills ahead, and the miasmic mist that we had +noticed some time since billowed around our knees. But the stars were very +bright above us, and phosphorescent creatures like fire-flies fluttered +here and there, and, all things considered, we made excellent progress. + +As it had been Blodgett in his eternal peering and prowling who had found +the path, so now it was Blodgett, bending low as he hurried at the head of +our irregular line, who twice stopped suddenly and said that he had heard +hoarse, distant calls. + +Each time, when the rest of us came up to him and listened, they had died +away, but Blodgett now had lost his confident air. He bent lower as he +walked and he peered ahead in a way that seemed to me more prowling and +catlike than ever. As we advanced his uneasiness grew on him, until +presently he turned and raised his hand. The five of us crowded close +together behind him and listened intently. + +For a while, as before, we heard nothing; then suddenly a new, strange +noise came to our ears. It was an indistinct sound of trampling, and it +certainly was approaching. + +The cook grasped my arm. "'Fo' de good Lo'd!" he muttered, "dey's voices!" + +Now I, too, and all the others heard occasional grunts and gutturals. We +dared not flee back to the beach, for there or in the open marshy land we +could not escape observation, and since it had taken us a good half hour to +carry our boat to its hiding-place, it would be utter folly to try to +launch it and put out to sea. + +Not knowing which way to turn, the six of us stood huddled together like +frightened sheep, in the starlight, in the centre of that great marsh, with +the white mist sweeping up around the bushes, and waited for we knew not +what. + +As the noise of tramping and the guttural voices grew louder, Blodgett +gasped, "Look! In heaven's name, look there!" + +Where the path wound over a gentle rise, which was blurred to our eyes by +the mist, there appeared a moving black mass above which swayed and rose +and fell what seemed to our excited vision the points of a great number of +spears. + +With one accord we turned and plunged from the path straight into the marsh +and ran with all our might and main. The cook, who hitherto had brought up +the rear, now forged to the front, springing ahead with long jumps. +Occasionally, as he leaped even higher to clear a bush or a stump, I could +see his kinky round head against the sky, and catch the flash of starlight +on his cleaver, which he still carried. Close behind him ran Neddie Benson, +who saw in the adventures of the night a more terrible fulfillment of the +plump lady's prophecies than ever he had dreamed of; then came Roger and I, +and at my shoulder I heard Davie's heavy breathing and Blodgett's hard +gasps. + +To snakes or other reptiles that may have inhabited the warm pools through +which we splashed, we gave no thought. Somewhere ahead of us there was high +land--had we not rowed close enough to the promontory to hear breakers? +When Davie and Blodgett fairly panted to us to stop for breath, the cook +and Neddie Benson with one voice urged us on to the hills where we could +find rocks or trees for a shelter from which to stand off whatever savages +might pursue us. + +Though we tried to make as little noise as possible, our splashing and +crashing as we raced now in single file, now six abreast, now as +irregularly as half a dozen sheep, must have been audible to keen ears a +mile away. When we came at last to woods and drier ground, we settled down +to a steady jog, which was much less noisy, but even then we stumbled and +fell and clattered and thrashed as we labored on. + +At first we had heard in the night behind us, repeated over and over again, +those hoarse, unintelligible calls and certain raucous blasts, which we +imagined came from some crude native trumpet; but as we climbed, the rising +mist floated about us, and hearing less of the calling and the blasts, we +slowed down to a hard walk and went on up, up, up, through trees and over +rocks, with the mist in our faces and obscuring the way until we could not +see three feet in front of us, but had to keep together by calling +cautiously now and then. + +Blodgett, coming first to a ridge of rock, stopped high above us like a +shadow cast by the moonlight on the mist. + +"Here's the place to make a stand," he cried in his thin voice. "A nat'ral +fort to lay behind. Come, lads, over we go!" + +Up on the rock we scrambled, all of us ready to jump down on the other +side, when Neddie Benson called on us to stop, and with a queer cry let +himself fall back the way he had come. Fearing that he was injured, we +paused reluctantly. + +"Don't go over that rock," he cried. + +"Why not?" Roger asked. + +"It gives me a sick feeling inside." + +"Stuff!" exclaimed Blodgett. "Behind that rock we'll be safe from all the +heathen in the Chinese Sea." + +"The lady she said there'd be trouble," Neddie wailed insistently, "and I +ain't going over that rock. No, sir, not when I feel squeamish like I do +now." + +With an angry snort Blodgett hesitated on the very summit of the ledge. +"Come on, come on," he said. + +"Listen dah!" the cook whispered. + +I thought of savage yells and trampling feet when, crouching on hands and +knees, I listened; but I heard none of them. The sound that came to my ears +was the faint, distant rumble of surf breaking on rocks. + +Now Roger spoke sharply: "Steady, men, go slow." + +"The sea's somewhere beyond us," I said. + +"Come, come," Blodgett repeated tiresomely in his thin windy voice, "over +these rocks and we'll be safe." He was so confident and eager that we were +on the very point of following him. I actually leaned out over the edge +ready to leap down. Never did a man's strange delusion come nearer to +leading his comrades to disaster! + +The cook raised his hand. "Look--look dah!" + +He was staring past Blodgett's feet, past my hands, down at the rocks +whither we were about to drop. The mist was opening slowly. There was +nothing for more than six feet below us--for more than twelve feet. Now the +mist eddied up to the rock again; now it curled away and opened out until +we could look down to the ghostly, phosphorescent whiteness of waves +breaking on rough stones almost directly under us. Blodgett, with a queer, +frightened expression, crawled back to Neddie Benson. + +We were sitting at the brink of a sheer precipice, which fell away more +than two hundred feet to a mass of jagged rock on which the sea was booming +with a hollow sound like the voice of a great bell. + +"Well, here we'll have to make our stand if they follow us," said Davie. + +Although the rest were white with horror at the death we so narrowly had +avoided, old Davie did not even breathe more quickly. The man had no more +imagination than a porpoise. + +Gathering in the lee of the rocky ridge, we took stock of our weapons and +recovered our self-possession. The cook again ran his thumb-nail along the +edge of the cleaver; Roger examined the lock of his pistol--I saw a queer +expression on his face at the time, but he said nothing; Blodgett sharpened +his knife on his calloused palm and the rest of us found clubs and stones. +We could flee no farther. Here, if we were pursued, we must fight. But +although we waited a long time, no one came. The mist gradually passed off; +the stars again shone brightly, and the moon presently peeped out from +between the cone-shaped mountains on our eastern horizon. + +[Illustration] + + + + +V + +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN LAST RESORT + + +"They're not on our heels at all events," said Roger, when we had sat +silent and motionless until we were cramped from head to foot. Of our +little band, he was by far the least perturbed. "If we should set an anchor +watch, we could sleep, turn and turn about. What do you say to that?" + + +He had a way with him, partly the quiet humor that twinkled in his eyes, +partly his courteous manner toward all of us, particularly the older men, +that already had endeared him to every member of our company, and a general +murmur of assent answered him. + +"Blodgett, Neddie, and I'll stand first watch, then. We'll make the watches +three hours on deck and three below, if you say so. You others had best +hunt out an easy place to sleep, but let every man keep his knife or club +where he can snatch it up in case of attack." + +Remembering his comfortable quarters in the steerage of the Island +Princess, the cook groaned; but we found a spot where there was some +sun-baked earth, which we covered with such moss as we could lay our hands +on, threw ourselves down, and fell asleep forthwith. + +We were so stiff when the other three waked us that we scarcely could stand +without help; but we gradually worked new life into our sore muscles and +took our stations with as much good-will as we could muster. Roger gave us +his watch to tell the time by, and we agreed on separate posts from which +to guard against surprise--the cook a little way down the hill to the +right, Davie Paine farther to the left, and I on the summit of the rocks +whence I could see in all directions. + +The wild view from that rock would have been a rare sight for old and +experienced voyagers, and to me, a boy in years and in travels, it was +fascinating both for its uncommon beauty and for the thousand perils that +it might conceal. Who could say what savages were sleeping or prowling +about under the dark branches of yonder shadowy woods? What wild creatures +lurked in their depths? What pirate prows were steering their course by +yonder cone-shaped peaks or by those same bright stars that twinkled +overhead? + +I studied the outline of the island, with its miles of flat marshland deep +in grass and tangled vines, its palms and dense forests, its romantic +mountains, and its jagged northern cliffs; I watched the moonbeams +sparkling on the water; I watched a single light shining far out at sea. By +and by I saw inland, on the side of one of the hills, a light shining in +the jungle, and stared at it with a sort of unwilling fascination. + +A light in the jungle could mean so many things! + +Startled by a sound down in our own camp, I quickly turned and saw old +Blodgett scrambling up to where I sat. + +"It ain't no use," he said in an undertone. "I can't sleep." He twisted his +back and writhed like a cat that wants to scratch itself against a +doorpost. "What an island for temples! Ah, Benny, here's our chance to make +our everlasting fortunes." + +I touched him and pointed at the distant light shining out of the darkness. + +Sitting down beside me, he watched it intently. "I tell ye, Benny," he +murmured thoughtfully, "either me and you and the rest of us is going to +make our everlasting fortunes out o' these here natives, or we're going to +lay out under these here trees until the trumpet blows for Judgment." + +After a time he spoke again. "Ah, but it's a night to be stirring! I'll +stake all my pay for this unlucky voyage that there's not a native on the +island who hasn't a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string, or +maybe emeralds--there's a stone for you! Emeralds are green as the sea by a +sandy shore and bright as a cat's eyes in the dark." + +Morning came quickly. Pink and gold tinted the cone-shaped peaks, the sky +brightened from the color of steel to a clear cobalt, and all at once the +world lay before us in the cool morning air, which the sun was soon to warm +to a vapid heat. As we gathered at the summit of the cliff over which +Blodgett nearly had let us into eternity, we could see below, flying in and +out, birds of the variety, as I afterwards learned, that make edible nests. + +It now was apparent that the light I had seen at sea was that of a ship's +lantern, for to our amazement the Island Princess lay in the offing. +Landward unbroken verdure extended from the slope at our feet to the base +of the cone-shaped peaks, and of the armed force that had frightened us so +badly the evening before we saw no sign; but when we looked at the marsh we +rubbed our eyes and stared anew. + +There was the rough hillside that we had climbed in terror; there was the +marsh with its still pools, its lush herbage, and the "road" that wound +from the muddy beach to the forest on our left. But in the marsh, scattered +here and there--! The truth dawned on us slowly. All at once Blodgett +slapped his thin legs and leaned back and laughed until tears started from +his faded eyes; Neddie Benson stared at him stupidly, then poured out a +flood of silly oaths. The cook burst into a hoarse guffaw, and Roger and +Davie Paine chuckled softly. We stopped and looked at each other and then +laughed together until we had to sit down on the ground and hold our aching +sides. + +In the midst of the marsh were feeding a great number of big, long-horned +water buffaloes. We now realized that the road we had followed was one of +their trails that the guttural calls and blasts from rude trumpets were +their snorts and blats, that the spears we had seen were their horns viewed +from lower ground. + +The ebbing tide had left our boat far from the water, and since we were +faint from our long fast, it was plain that, if we were to survive our +experience, we must find help soon. + +"If I was asked," Davie remarked thoughtfully, "I'd say the thing to do was +to follow along the edge of that there swamp to the forest, where maybe +we'll find a bit of a spring and some kind of an animal Mr. Hamlin can +shoot with that pistol of his." + +Roger drew the pistol from his belt and regarded it with a wry smile. +"Unfortunately," he said, "I have no powder." + +At all events there was no need to stay longer where we were; so, retracing +our steps of the evening before, we skirted the marsh and came to a place +where there were many cocoanut trees. We were bitterly disappointed to find +that our best efforts to climb them were of no avail. We dared not try to +fell them with the cook's cleaver, lest the noise of chopping attract +natives; for we were convinced by the light we had seen shining in the +jungle that the island was inhabited. So we set off cautiously into the +woods, and slowly tramped some distance through an undergrowth that +scratched our hands and faces and tore our clothes. On the banks of a small +stream we picked some yellow berries, which Blodgett ate with relish, but +which the rest of us found unpalatable. We all drank water from the hollows +of trees,--we dared not drink from the boggy stream,--and Neddie Benson ate +the leaves of some bushes and urged the rest of us to try them. That we +refused, we later had reason to be deeply thankful. + +Following the stream we crossed a well-marked path, which caused us +considerable uneasiness, and came at last to an open glade, at the other +end of which we saw a person moving. At that we bent double and retreated +as noiselessly as possible. Once out of sight in the woods, we hurried off +in single file till we thought we had put a safe distance behind us; but +when we stopped to rest we were terrified by a noise in the direction from +which we had come, and we hastened to conceal ourselves under the leaves +and bushes. + +The noise slowly drew nearer, as if men were walking about and beating the +undergrowth as they approached. Blodgett stared from his covert with beady +eyes; Neddie gripped my wrist; the cook rubbed his thumb along the blade of +the cleaver, and Roger fingered the useless pistol. Still the noises +approached. At the sight of something that moved I felt my heart leap and +stand still, then Blodgett laughed softly; a pair of great birds which flew +away as soon as they saw us stirring, had occasioned our fears. + +Having really seen a man in the glade by the stream, we were resolved to +incur no foolish risks; so we cautiously returned to the hill, whence we +could watch the beach and the broad marsh and catch between the mountains a +glimpse of a bay to the northeast where we now saw at a great distance some +men fishing from canoes. While the rest of us prepared another hiding-place +among the bushes, Roger and Blodgett sallied forth once more to reconnoitre +in a new direction. + +Although we no longer could see the ship, we were much perplexed that she +had lingered off the island, and we talked of it at intervals throughout +the day. Whatever her purpose, we were convinced that for us it augured +ill. + +Presently Roger and Blodgett returned in great excitement and reported that +the woods were full of Malays. Apparently the natives were unaware of our +presence but we dared not venture again in search of food, so we resumed +our regular watches and slept in our turns. As soon as the sun should set +we planned to skirt the mountains under the cover of darkness, in desperate +hope of finding somewhere food and water with which we could return to our +boat and defy death by putting out to sea; but ere the brief twilight of +the tropics had settled into night, Neddie Benson was writhing and groaning +in mortal agony. We were alarmed, and for a time could think of no +explanation; but after a while black Frank looked up from where he crouched +by the luckless Neddie and fiercely muttered:-- + +"What foh he done eat dem leaves? Hey? Tell me dat!" + +It was true that Neddie alone had eaten the leaves. A heavy price he was +paying for it! We all looked at Blodgett with an anxiety that it would have +been kinder, perhaps, to hide, and Blodgett himself seemed uneasy lest he +should be poisoned by the berries he had eaten. But no harm came of them, +and by the time the stars were shining again Neddie appeared to be over the +worst of his sickness and with the help of the rest of us managed to +stagger along. So we chose a constellation for our guide and set off +through the undergrowth. + +Even Blodgett by this time had got over his notion of robbing temples. + +"If only we was to run on a yam patch," he said to me as together we +stumbled forward, "or maybe some chickens or a little rice or a vegetable +garden or a spring of cold water--" + +But only a heavy sigh answered him, a grunt from the cook, and a moan from +Neddie. Our spirits were too low to be stirred even by Blodgett's visionary +tales. It was hard to believe that the moon above the mountains was the +same that had shone down upon us long before off the coast of Sumatra. + +The woods were so thick that we soon lost sight of our constellation, but +we kept on our way, stopping often to rest, and made what progress we +could. More than once we heard at a little distance noises that indicated +the presence of wild beasts; and the brambles and undergrowth tore our +clothes and scratched and cut our skin till blood ran from our hands and +faces. But the thing that alarmed us most we heard one time when we had +thrown ourselves on the ground to rest. Though it came from a great +distance it unmistakably was four distinct gunshots. + +Too weak and exhausted to talk, yet determined to carry through our +undertaking, we pushed on and on till we could go no farther; then we +dropped where we stood, side by side, and slept. + +Morning woke us. Through the trees we saw a cone-shaped peak and a great +marsh where buffalo were feeding. We unwittingly had circled in the night +and had come back to within a quarter of a mile of the very point from +which we had set forth. + + + +CHAPTER XX + +A STORY IN MELON SEEDS + + +We were all gaunt and unkempt after our hardships of the past two days, but +Neddie, poor fellow, looked more like a corpse than a living man and moaned +with thirst and scarcely could sit up without help. Finding about a pint of +water close at hand in the hollow of a tree, we carried him to it and he +sucked it up with a straw till it was all gone; but though it relieved his +misery, he was manifestly unable to walk, even had we dared stir abroad, so +we stayed where we were while the sun rose to the meridian. We could find +so little water that we all suffered from thirst, and with Neddie's +sickness in mind none of us dared eat more leaves or berries. + +The afternoon slowly wore away; the tide came in across the flats; the +shadows lengthened hour by hour. But no breath of wind cooled our hot +faces. Neddie lay in a heap, moaning fitfully; Blodgett and Davie Paine +slept; Roger sat with his back to a tree and watched the incoming tide; the +cook stirred about uneasily and muttered to himself. + +Coming over to me, he crouched at my side and spoke of Kipping. He was +savagely vindictive. "Hgh!" he grunted, "dat yeh crimp! He got dis nigger +once, yass, sah. Got me to dat boa'din' house what he was runner foh. Yass, +sah. Ah had one hunnerd dollahs in mah pants pocket, yass, sah. Nex' +mohnin' Ah woke up th'ee days lateh 'boa'd ship bound foh London. Ah ain' +got no hunnerd dollah in mah pants pocket. Dat yeh Kipping he didn't leave +me no pants pocket." The old black pulled open his shirt and revealed a +jagged scar on his great shoulder. "Look a' dat! Cap'n done dat--dat yeh +v'yage. Hgh!" + +At dusk Neddie's moaning woke the sleepers, and we held a council in which +we debated plans for the future. Daring neither to venture abroad nor to +eat the native fruits and leaves, exhausted by exposure, perishing of +hunger and thirst, we faced a future that was dark indeed. + +"As for me," said Davie calmly, "I can see only one way to end our misery." +He glanced at the cook's cleaver as he spoke. + +"No, no!" Roger cried sharply. "Let us have no such talk as that, Davie." +He hesitated, looking first at us,--his eyes rested longest on Neddie's +hollow face,--then at the marsh; then he leaned forward and looked from one +to another. "Men," he said, "I see no better way out of our difficulties +than to surrender to the natives." + +"Oh, no, no, sah! No, sah! Don' do dat, sah! No, no no!" With a yell black +Frank threw himself on his knees. "No, sah, no, sah! Dey's we'y devils, +sah, dey's wuss 'n red Injuns, sah!" + +"Fool." Roger cried. "Be still!" Seeming to hold the negro in contempt, he +turned to the rest of us and awaited our answer. + +At the time we were amazed at his harshness, and the poor cook was +completely overwhelmed; for little as Roger said, there was something in +his manner of saying it that burned like fire. But later, when we looked +back on that day and remembered how bitterly we were discouraged, we saw +reason to thank God that Roger Hamlin had had the wisdom and the power to +crush absolutely the first sign of insubordination. + +Staring in a curious way at the cook, who was fairly groveling on the +earth, Blodgett spoke up in a strangely listless voice. "I say yes, sir. If +we're to die, we're to die anyhow, and there's a bare chance they'll feed +us before they butcher us." + +"Ay," said Davie. "Me, too!" + +And Neddie made out to nod. + +The cook, watching the face of each man in turn, began to blubber; and when +I, the youngest and last, cast my vote with the rest, he literally rolled +on the ground and bellowed. + +"Get up!" Roger snapped out at him. + +He did so in a kind of stupid wonder. + +"Now then, cook, there's been enough of this nonsense. Come, let's sleep. +At daylight to-morrow we'll be on our way." + +Apparently the negro at first doubted his ears; but Roger's peremptory tone +brought him to his senses, and the frank disapproval of the others ended +his perversity. + +A certain confidence that our troubles were soon to be ended in one way or +another, coupled with exhaustion, enabled me to sleep deeply that night, +despite the numberless perils that beset us. + +I was aware that the cook continually moaned to himself and that at some +time in the night Roger and Blodgett were throwing stones at a wild beast +that was prowling about. Then the sun shone full on my face and I woke with +a start. + +Roger and Davie Paine each gave Neddie Benson an arm, Blodgett and I pushed +ahead to find the best footing, and the cook, once more palsied with fear, +again came last. To this day I have not been able to account for Frank's +strange weakness. In all other circumstances he was as brave as a lion. + +Staggering along as best we could, we arrived at the stream we had found +before--we dared not drink its water, even in our extremity--and followed +it to the glade, which this time we boldly entered. At first we saw no one, +but when we had advanced a few steps, we came upon three girls fishing from +the bank of the stream. As they darted off along the path that led up the +glade, we started after them, but we were so weak that, when we had gone +only a short distance, we had to sit down on the trunk of a large tree to +rest. + +About a quarter of an hour later we heard steps, and shortly seven men +appeared by the same path. + +Indicating by a motion of his hand that he wished the rest of us to remain +seated, Roger rose and went fearlessly to meet the seven. When he had +approached within a short distance, they stopped and drew their krises, or +knives with waved points. Never hesitating, Roger continued to advance +until he was within six feet of them, then falling on his knees and +extending his empty hands, he begged for mercy. + +For a long time they stood with drawn knives, staring at him and at us; +then one of them put up his kris, and knelt in front of him and offered him +both hands, which, it seemed, was a sign of friendship. + +When we indicated by gestures that we were hungry, they immediately gave us +each a cocoanut; but meanwhile some twenty or thirty more natives had +arrived at the spot where we were, and they now proceeded to take our hats +and handkerchiefs, and to cut the buttons from our coats. + +Presently they gave us what must have been an order to march. At all events +we walked with them at a brisk pace along a well-marked trail, between +great ferns and rank canes and grasses, and after a time we came to a +village composed of frail, low houses or bungalows, from which other +natives came running. Some of them shook their fists at us angrily; some +picked up sticks and clubs or armed themselves with knives and krises, and +came trailing along behind. Children began to throw clods and pebbles at +us. The mob was growing rapidly, and for some cause, their curiosity to see +the white men, the like of whom most of them probably never had seen +before, was unaccountably mixed with anger. + +If they were going to kill us, why did they not cut our throats and have it +done with? Still the people came running, till the whining of their voices +almost deafened us; and still they hustled us along, until at last we came +to a house larger than any we had passed. + +Here they all stopped, and our captors, with as many of the clamoring mob +as the place would hold, drove us through the open door into what appeared +to be the judgment-hall of the village. Completely at their mercy, we stood +by the judgment-seat in the centre of a large circle and waited until, at +the end of perhaps half an hour, an even greater uproar arose in the +distance. + +There was much stirring and talking and new faces continued to appear. From +where I stood I could see that the growing throng was armed with spears and +knives. More and more natives pressed into the ring that surrounded us and +listened intently to a brisk discussion, of which none of us could +understand a word. + +In one corner was a heap of melons; in another were spears and shields. I +was looking at them curiously when something familiar just above them +caught my eye and sent a stab of fear through my heart. In that array of +savage weapons were _three ship's cutlasses_. I was familiar enough with +the rife of those Eastern islands to know what that meant. + +Everywhere in the dim hall were bared knives, and muttering voices now and +then rose to loud shrieks. What with faintness and fatigue and fear, I felt +myself growing weak and dizzy. The circle of hostile faces and knives and +spears seemed suddenly dim and far-away. In all the hut I could see only +the three ship's cutlasses in the corner, and think only of what a grand +history theirs must have been. + +The distant roar that came slowly nearer seemed so much like a dream that I +thought I must be delirious, and rubbed my eyes and ears and tried to +compose myself; but the roar continued to grow louder, and now a more +intense clamor arose. The crowd parted and in through the open lane came a +wild, tall man, naked except for a pair of short breeches, a girdle, and a +red handkerchief on his head, who carried a drawn kris. Coming within the +circle, he stopped and stared at us. Then everything grew white and I found +myself lying on my back on the floor, looking up at them all and wondering +if they had killed me already. Small wonder that starvation and exposure +had proved too much for me! + +Roger was down on his knees beside me,--he told me long afterwards that +nothing ever gave him such a start as did my ghastly pallor,--and the +others, in the face of our common danger, gathered round me solicitously. +All, that is, except the cook; for, although our captors had exhibited a +lively curiosity about those of us who were white, they had frightened the +poor negro almost out of his wits by feeling of his cheeks and kinky hair +and by punching his ribs with their fingers, until now, having been +deprived of his beloved cleaver, he cowered like a scared puppy before the +gravely interested natives. "O Lo'd," he muttered between chattering teeth, +"O Lo'd, why am dis yeh nigger so popolous? O Lo'd, O Lo'd, dah comes +anotheh--dah comes anotheh!" + +Of the hostility of our captors there now could be no doubt. The sinister +motion of their weapons, the angry glances that they persistently darted at +us, the manner and inflection of their speech, all were threatening. But +Roger, having made sure that I was not injured, was on his feet and already +had faced boldly the angry throng. + +Though we could not understand the savages and they could not understand +us, Roger's earnestness when he began to speak commanded their attention, +and the chief fixed his eyes on him gravely. But some one else repeated it +twice a phrase that sounded like "Pom-pom, pom-pom!" And the rest burst +into angry yells. + +Roger indignantly threw his hands down,--palms toward the chief,--as if to +indicate that we had come in friendship; but the man laughed scornfully and +repeated the phrase, "Pom-pom!" + +Again Roger spoke indignantly; again he threw his hands down, palms out. +But once more the cry, "Pom-pom, pom-pom," rose fiercely, and the angry +throng pressed closer about us. The rest of us had long since despaired of +our lives, and for the moment even Roger was baffled. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" + +What the phrase meant we had not the remotest idea, but that our state now +was doubly perilous the renewed hubbub and the closing circle of weapons +convinced us. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" Again and again in all parts of the hall we heard the +mysterious words. + +Was there nothing that we could do to prove our good faith? Nothing to show +them that at least we did not come as enemies? + +Over Davie Fame's face an odd expression now passed. He was staring at the +heap of melons. + +"Mr. Hamlin," he said in a low voice, "if we was to cut a ship out of one +of them melons, and a boat and some men, we could show these 'ere heathen +how we didn't aim to bother them, and then maybe they'd let us go away +again." + +"Davie, Davie, man," Roger cried, "there's an idea!" + +I was completely bewildered. What could Davie mean, I wondered. Melons and +a ship? Were he and Roger mad? From Roger's actions I verily believed they +were. + +He faced our captors for a moment as if striving to think of some way to +impress them; then, with a quick gesture, he deliberately got down on the +floor and took the chief's foot and placed it on his head, to signify that +we were completely in the fellow's power. Next he rose and faced the man +boldly, and began a solemn and impressive speech. His grave air and stern +voice held their attention, though they could not understand a word he +said; and before their interest had time to fail, he drew from his pocket a +penknife, a weapon so small that it had escaped their prying fingers, and +walking deliberately to the corner where the melons were heaped up, took +one of them and began to cut it. + +At first they started forward; but when Roger made no hostile motion, they +gathered round him in silence to see what he was doing. + +"Here, men, is the ship," he said gravely, "and here the boats." Kneeling +and continuing his speech, he cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped +model of a ship, and stuck in it, to represent masts, three slivers of +bamboo, which he split from a piece that lay on the floor; then he cut a +smaller model, which he laid on the deck of the ship, to represent a boat. +On one side of the deck he upright six melon seeds, on the other twelve. +Pointing at the six seeds and holding up six fingers, he pointed at each +of us in turn. + +Suddenly one of the natives cried out in his own tongue; then another and +another seemed to understand Roger's meaning as they jabbered among +themselves and in turn pointed at the six seeds and at the six white men +whom they had captured. + +Roger then imitated a fight, shaking his fists and slashing as if with a +cutlass, and, last of all, he pointed his finger, and cried, "Bang! Bang!" + +At this the natives fairly yelled in excitement and repeated over and over, +"Pom--pom--pom--pom!" + +"Bang-bang!"--"Pom-pom!" We suddenly understood the phrase that they had +used so often. + +Now in dead silence, all in the hut, brown men and white, pressed close +around the melon-rind boat on the floor. So moving the melon seeds that it +was obvious that the six men represented by six seeds were being driven +overboard, Roger next set the boat on the floor and transferred them to it. +Lining up all the rest along the side of the ship, he cried loudly, "Bang +bang!" + +"Cook," he called, beckoning to black Frank, "come here!" + +As the negro reluctantly obeyed, Roger pointed to the long gash that +Kipping's bullet had cut in his kinky scalp. Crying again, "Bang-bang!" he +pointed at one of the seeds in the boat and then at the cook. + +Not one of them who could see the carved boats failed to understand what +Roger meant, and the brown men looked at Frank and laughed and talked more +loudly and excitedly than ever. Then the chief stood up and cried to some +one in the farthest corner of the room, and at that there was more laughing +and shouting. The man in the corner seemed much abashed; but those about +him pushed him forward, and he was shoved along through the crowd until he, +too, stood beside the table, where a dozen men pointed at his head and +cried "Bang-bang!" or "Pom-pom!" as the case might be. + +To our amazement we saw that just over his right temple there was torn the +path of a bullet, exactly that on the cook's head. + +[Illustration: +He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo.] + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +NEW ALLIES + + +Now the chief reached for Roger's knife and deftly whittled out the shape +of a native canoe. In it he placed several seeds, then, pushing it against +the carved ship, he pointed to the man with the bullet wound on his temple +and cried, "Pom-pom!" Next he pointed at two seeds in the boat and said, +"Pom-pom," and snapped them out of the canoe with his finger. + +"Would you believe it!" Blodgett gasped. "The heathens went out to the ship +in one o' them boats, and Falk fired on 'em!" + +"And two of 'em was killed!" Davie exclaimed unnecessarily. + +Roger now laid half a melon on the floor, its flat side down, and moved the +boat slowly over to it. + +That the half-melon represented the island was apparent to all. The natives +crowded round us, jabbering questions that we could not understand and of +course could not answer; they examined the cook's wound and compared it +with the wound their friend had suffered; they pointed at the little boats +cut out of melon-rind and laughed uproariously. + +Now one of them made a suggestion, the others took it up, and the chief +split melons and offered a half to each of us. + +We ate them like the starving men we were, and did not notice that the +chief had assembled his head men for a consultation, until he sent a man +running from the hall, returned shortly with six pieces of betel nut, which +the natives chew instead of tobacco, and gave them to the chief, who handed +one to each of us as a mark of friendship. Next, to our amazement, one of +the natives produced Roger's useless pistol and handed it back to him; and +as if that were a signal, one after another they restored our knives and +clubs, until, last of all, a funny little man with a squint handed the +cleaver back to the cook. + +With a tremendous sigh of relief, Frank seized the mighty weapon and laid +it on his knee and buried his big white teeth in half a melon. "Mah golly!" +he muttered, when he had swallowed the huge mouthful and had wiped his lips +and chin with the back of his hand, "Ah neveh 'spected to see dis yeh +felleh again. No, sah!" And he tapped the cleaver lovingly. + +The chief, who had been talking earnestly with his counselors, now made +signs to attract our attention. Obviously he wished to tell us a story of +his own. He cut out a number of slim canoes from the melon-rind and laid +them on the half-melon that represented the island; next, he pushed the +ship some distance away on the floor. Blowing on it through pursed lips, he +turned it about and drew it back toward the half-melon that represented the +island. When it was in the lee of the island, he stopped it and looked up +at us and smiled and pointed out of the door. We were puzzled. Seeing our +blank expressions, he repeated the process. Still we could not understand. + +Persisting in his efforts, he now launched three roughly carved canoes, in +which he placed a number of seeds, pointing at himself and various others; +then in each of the prows he placed two seeds and pointed at the six of us, +two at a time. Pointing next at the roof of the hut, he waved his hand from +east to west and closed his eyes as if in sleep, after which he placed his +finger on his lips, pushed the carved canoes very slowly across the floor +toward the ship, then, with a screech that made our hair stand on end, he +rushed them at the seeds that represented Captain Falk and his men, +yelling, "Pom-pom-pom-pom!" and snapped the seeds off on the floor. + +Leaning back, he bared his teeth and laughed ferociously. + +Here was a plot to take the ship! Although we probably had missed the fine +points of it, we could not mistake its general character. + +"Ay," said Blodgett, as if we had been discussing the matter for hours, +"but we'll be a pack of bloody pirates to be hanged from the yard-arms of +the first frigate that overhauls us." + +It was true. We should be liable as pirates in any port in Christendom. + +"Men," said Roger coolly, "there's no denying that in the eyes of the law +we'd be pirates as well as mutineers. But if we can take the ship and sail +it back to Salem, we'll be acquitted of any charge of mutiny or piracy, I +can promise you. It'll be easy to ship a new crew at Canton, and we can +settle affairs with the Websters' agents there so that at least we'll have +a chance at a fair trial if we are taken on our homeward voyage. Shall we +venture it?" + +The cook rolled his eyes. "Gimme dat yeh Kipping!" he cried, and with a +savage cackle he swung his cleaver. + +"Falk for me, curse him!" Davie Paine muttered with a neat that surprised +me. I had not realized that emotions as well as thoughts developed so +slowly in Davie's big, leisurely frame that he now was just coming to the +fullness of his wrath at the indignities he had undergone. + +Turning to the native chief, Roger cried, "We're with you!" And he +extended his hand to seal the bargain. + +Of course the man could not understand the words but in the nods we had +exchanged and in the cook's fierce glee, he had read our consent, and he +laughed and talked with the others, who laughed, too, and pointed at +Roger's pistol and cried, "Pom-pom!" and at the cook's cleaver and cried, +"Whish!" + +When by signs Roger indicated that we needed sleep the chief issued orders, +and half a dozen natives led us to a hut that seemed to be set apart for +our use. But although we were nearly perishing with fatigue, they urged by +signs that we follow them, and so insistent were they that we reluctantly +obeyed. + +Climbing a little hill beyond the village, we came to a cleared spot +surrounded by bushes through which we looked across between the mountains +to where we could just see the open ocean. There, not three miles away, the +Island Princess rode at anchor. + +I remember thinking, as I fell asleep, of the chance that Falk and Kipping +would sail away before it was dark enough to attack them, and I spoke of it +to Roger and the others, who shared my fear; but when our savage hosts +wakened us, we knew by their eagerness that the ship still lay at her +anchor. Why she remained, we could not agree. We hazarded a score of +conjectures and debated them with lively interest. + +Presently the natives brought us rice and sago-bread and peas. + +As I ate and looked out into the darkness where fires were twinkling, I +wondered which was the light I had seen that night when I watched from the +summit of the headland. + +Though a gentle rain was falling, the whole village was alive with people. +Men armed with spears and krises squatted in all parts of the hut. Boys +came and went in the narrow circle of light. Women and girls looked from +the door and from the farthest corners. Now and then some one would point +at Roger's pistol and cry, "Pom-pom!" or, to the pride and delight of the +cook, point at the cleaver and cry, "Whish!" and laugh loudly. + +Even black Frank had got over his terror of having natives come up without +warning and feel of his arm or his woolly head, though he muttered +doubtfully, "Ah ain't sayin' as Ah likes it. Dah's su'thin' so kind of +hongry de way dey comes munchin' an' proddin' round dis yeh ol' niggeh." + +At midnight we went out into the dark and the rain, and followed single +file after our leader along a narrow path that led through dripping ferns +and pools of mud and water, over roots and rocks, and under low branches, +which time and again swung back and struck our faces. + +We were drenched to the skin when we came at last to a sluggish, black +little stream, which ran slowly under thick overhanging trees, and in other +circumstances we should have been an unhappy and rebellious crew. But now +the spell of adventure was upon us. Our savage guides moved silently and +surely, and the forest was so mysterious and strange that I found its +allurement all but irresistible. The slow, silent stream, on which now and +then lights as faint and elusive as wisps of cloud played fitfully, +reflected from I knew not where, had a fascination that I am sure the +others felt as strongly as I. So we followed in silence and watched all +that the dense blackness of the night let us see. + +Now the natives launched canoes, which slipped out on the water and lay +side by side in the stream. Roger and Neddie Benson got into one; Blodgett +and Davie Paine another; the cook and I into a third, Whatever thoughts or +plans we six might have, we could not express them to the natives, and we +were too widely separated to put them into practice ourselves. We could +only join in the fight with good-will when the time came, and I assure you, +the thought made me very nervous indeed. Also, I now realized that the +natives had taken no chance of treachery on our part: _behind each of us +sat an armed man_. + +The canoes shot ahead so swiftly under the pressure of the paddles that +they seemed actually to have come to life. But they moved as noiselessly as +shadows. We glided down the stream and out in a long line into a little +bay, where we gathered, evidently to arrange the last details of the +attack. I heard Roger say in a low voice, "We'll reach the ship about three +bells and there couldn't be a better hour." Then, with a few low words of +command from the native chief, we spread out again into an irregular, +swiftly moving fleet, and swept away from the shore. + +As I looked back at the island I could see nothing, for the cloudy sky and +the drizzly rain completely obscured every object beyond a limited circle +of water; but as I looked ahead, my heart leaped and my breath came +quickly. We had passed the farthest point of land and there, dimly in the +offing, shone a single blurred light, which I knew was on the Island +Princess. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +WE ATTACK + + +In the darkness and rain we soon lost sight even of those nearest us on +each side, but we knew by the occasional almost imperceptible whisper of a +paddle in the water, or by the faintest murmur of speech, that the others +were keeping pace with us. + +To this day I do not understand how the paddlers maintained the proper +intervals in our line of attack; yet maintain them they did, by some means +or other, according to a preconcerted plan, for we advanced without hurry +or hesitation. + +Approaching the ship more closely, we made out the rigging, which the soft +yellow light of the lantern dimly revealed. We saw, too, a single dark +figure leaning on the taffrail, which became clear as we drew nearer. I was +surprised to perceive that we had come up astern of the ship--quite without +reason I had expected to find her lying bow on. Now we rode the gentle +swell without sound or motion. The slow paddles held us in the same place +with regard to the ship, and minutes passed in which my nervousness rose to +such a pitch that I felt as if I must scream or clap my hands simply to +shatter that oppressive, tantalizing, almost unendurable silence. But when +I started to turn and whisper to the cook, something sharp and cold pricked +through the back of my shirt and touched my skin, and from that time on I +sat as still as a wooden figurehead. + +After a short interval I made out other craft drawing in on our right and +left, and I later learned that, while we waited, the canoes were forming +about the ship a circle of hostile spears. But it then seemed at every +moment as if the man who was leaning on the taffrail must espy us,--it +always is hard for the person in the dark, who sees what is near the light, +to realize that he himself remains invisible,--and a thousand fears swept +over me. + +There came now from somewhere on our right a whisper no louder than a +mouse's hiss of warning or of threat. I scarcely was aware of it. It might +have been a ripple under the prow of the canoe, a slightest turn of a +paddle. Yet it conveyed a message that the natives instantly understood. +The man just behind me repeated it so softly that his repetition was +scarcely audible, even to me who sat so near that I could feel his breath, +and at once the canoe seemed silently to stir with life. Inch by inch we +floated forward, until I could see clearly the hat and coat-collar of the +man who was leaning against the rail. It was Kipping. + +From forward came the cautious voices of the watch. The light revealed the +masts and rigging of the ship for forty or fifty feet from the deck, but +beyond the cross-jack yard all was hazy, and the cabin seemed in the odd +shadows twice its real size. I wondered if Falk were asleep, too, or if we +should come on him sitting up in the cabin, busy with his books and charts. +I wondered who was in the galley, where I saw a light; who was standing +watch; who was asleep below. Still we moved noiselessly on under the stern +of the ship, until I almost could have put my hands on the carved letters, +"Island Princess." + +Besides things on deck, the light also revealed our own attacking party. +The man in front of me had laid his paddle in the bottom of the canoe and +held a spear across his knees. In the boat on our right were five natives +armed with spears and krises; in the one on our left, four. Beyond the +craft nearest to us I could see others less distinctly--silent shadows on +the water, each with her head toward our prey, like a school of giant fish. +In the lee of the ship, the pinnace floated at the end of its painter. + +Still the watch forward talked on in low, monotonous voices; still Kipping +leaned on the rail, his head bent, his arms folded, to all appearances fast +asleep. + +I had now forgotten my fears. I was keenly impatient for the word to +attack. + +A shrill wailing cry suddenly burst on the night air. The man in front of +me, holding his spear above his head with one hand, made a prodigious leap +from the boat, caught the planking with his fingers, got toe-hold on a +stern-port, and went up over the rail like a wild beast. With knives +between their teeth, men from the proas on my right and left boarded the +ship by the chains, by the rail, by the bulwark. + +I saw Kipping leap suddenly forward and whirl about like a weasel in his +tracks. His yell for all hands sounded high above the clamor of the +boarders. Then some one jabbed the butt of a spear into my back and, +realizing that mine was not to be a spectator's part in that weird battle, +I scrambled up the stern as best I could. + +The watch on deck, I instantly saw, had backed against the forecastle where +the watch below was joining it. Captain Falk and some one else, of whose +identity I could not be sure, rushed armed from the cabin. Then a missile +crashed through the lantern, and in the darkness I heard sea-boots banging +on the deck as those aft raced forward to join the crew. + +I clambered aboard, waving my arms and shouting; then I stood and listened +to the chorus of yells fore and aft, the _slip-slip-slip_ of bare feet, the +thud of boots as the Americans ran this way and that. I sometimes since +have wondered how I escaped death in that wild melee in the darkness. +Certainly I was preserved by no effort of my own, for not knowing which way +to turn, ignored by friend and foe alike, almost stunned by the terrible +sounds that rose on every side, I simply clutched the rail and was as +unlike the hero that my silly dreams had made me out to be--never had I +dreamed of such a night!--as is every half-grown lad who stands side by +side with violent death. + +Of Kipping I now saw nothing, but as a light momentarily flared up, I +caught a glimpse of Captain Falk and his party sidling along back to back, +fighting off their assailants while they struggled to launch a boat. Time +and time again I heard the spiteful crack of their guns and their oaths and +exclamations. Presently I also heard another sound that made my heart +throb; a man was moaning as if in great pain. + +Then another cried, with an oath, "They've got me! O Tom, haul out that +spear!" A scream followed and then silence. + +Some one very near me, who as yet was unaware of my presence, said, "He's +dead." + +"Look out!" cried another. "See! There behind you!" + +I was startled and instinctively dodged back. There was a crashing report +in my face; the flame of a musket singed my brows and hair, and powder +stung my skin. Then, as the man clubbed his gun, I dashed under his guard, +scarcely aware of the pain in my shoulder, and locking my right heel behind +his left, threw him hard to the deck, where we slipped and slid in a warm +slippery stream that was trickling across the planks. + +Back and forth we rolled, neither of us daring to give the other a moment's +breathing-space in which to draw knife or pistol; and all the time the +fight went on over our heads. I now heard Roger crying to the rest of us to +stand by. I heard what I supposed to be his pistol replying smartly to the +fire from Falk's party, and wondered where in that scene of violence he had +got powder and an opportunity to load. But for the most part I was rolling +and struggling on the slippery deck. + +When some one lighted a torch and the flame flared up and revealed the grim +scene, I saw that Falk and his remaining men were trying at the same time +to stand off the enemy and to scramble over the bulwark, and I realized +that they must have drawn up the pinnace. But I had only the briefest +glimpse of what was happening, for I was in deadly terror every minute lest +my antagonist thrust a knife between my ribs. I could hear him gasping now +as he strove to close his hands on my throat, and for a moment I thought he +had me; but I twisted away, got half on my knees with him under me, sprang +to my feet, then slipped once more on the slow stream across the planks, +and fell heavily. + +In that moment I had seen by torchlight that the pinnace was clear of the +ship and that the men with their guns and spikes were holding off the +natives. I had seen, too, a spear flash across the space of open water and +cut down one of the men. But already my adversary was at me again, and with +his two calloused hands he once more was gripping my throat. I exerted all +my strength to keep from being throttled. I tried to scream, but could only +gurgle. His head danced before me and seemed to swing in circles. I felt +myself losing strength. I rallied desperately, only to be thrown. + +Then, suddenly, I realized that he had let me go and had sat down beside me +breathing heavily. It was the man from Boston whose nose had been broken. +He eyed me curiously as if an idea had come upon him by surprise. + +"I didn't go to fight so hard, mate," he gasped, "but you did act so kind +of vicious that I just had to." + +"You what?" I exclaimed, not believing my ears. + +"It's the only way I had to come over to your side," he said with a +whimper. "Falk would 'a' killed me if I'd just up an' come, though I wanted +to, honest I did." + +I put my hand on my throbbing shoulder, and stared at him incredulously. + +"You don't need to look at me like that," he sniveled. "Didn't I stand by +Bill Hayden to the last along with you? Ain't I human? Ain't I got as much +appreciation as any man of what it means to have a murderin' pair of +officers like Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping? You don't suppose, do you, that +I'd stay by 'em without I had to?" + +I was somewhat impressed by his argument, and he, perceiving it, continued +vehemently, "I _had_ to fight with you. They'd 'a' killed you, too, if I +hadn't." + +There was truth in that. Unquestionably they would have shot me down +without hesitation if we two had not grappled in such a lively tussle that +they could not hit one without hitting the other. + +We got up and leaned on the bulwark and looked down at the boat, which rode +easily on the slow, oily swell. There in the stern-sheets the torchlight +now revealed Falk. + +"I'm lawful master of this vessel," he called back, looking up at the men +who lined the side. "I'll see you hanged from the yard-arm yet, you +white-livered wharf-rats, and you, too, you cabin-window popinjay!"--I knew +that he meant me.--"There'll come a day, by God! There'll come a day!" + +The men in the boat gave way, and it disappeared in the darkness and mist, +its sides bristling with weapons. + +But still Falk's voice came back to us shrilly, "I'll see you yet a-hanging +by your necks," until at last we could only hear him cursing. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +WHAT WE FOUND IN THE CABIN + + +Now some one called, "Ben! Ben Lathrop! Where are you?" + +"Here I am," I cried as loudly as I could. + +"Well, Ben, what's this? Are you wounded?" + +It was Roger, and when he saw with whom I was talking he smiled. + +"Well, Bennie," he cried, "so we've got a prisoner, have we?" + +"No, sir," whimpered the man from Boston, "not a prisoner. I come over, I +did." + +"You what?" + +"I come over--to your side, sir." + +"How about it, Ben?" + +"Why, so he says. We were having a pretty hard wrestling match, but he says +it was to cover up his escape from the other party." + +"How was I to get away, sir, if I didn't have a subterfoog," the prisoner +interposed eagerly. "I _had_ to wrastle. If I hadn't have, they'd 'a' shot +me down as sure as duff on Sunday." + +For my own part I was not yet convinced of his good faith. He had gripped +my throat quite too vindictively. To this very day, when I close my eyes I +can feel his hard fingers clenched about my windpipe and his knees forcing +my arms down on the bloody deck. He had let me go, too, only when we both +knew that Captain Falk and his men had put off from the ship. It seemed +very much as if he were trying to make the best of a bad bargain. But if, +on the other hand, he was entirely sincere in his protestations, it might +well be true that he did not dare come over openly to our side. The problem +had so many faces that it fairly made me dizzy, so I abandoned it and tore +open my clothes to examine the flesh wound on my shoulder. + +"Ay," I thought, when I saw where the musket-ball had cut me at close +range, "that was a friendly shot, was it not?" + +Roger himself was not yet willing to let the matter fall so readily. His +sharp questions stirred the man from Boston to one uneasy denial after +another. + +"But I tell you, sir, I come over as quick as I could." + +Again Roger spoke caustically. + +"But I tell you, sir, I did. And what's more, I can tell you a lot of +things you'd like to know. Perhaps you'd like to know--" He stopped short. + +Roger regarded him as if in doubt, but presently he said in a low voice, +"All right! Say nothing of this to the others. I'll see you later." + +Captain Falk and his crew, meanwhile, had moved away almost unmolested. +Their pikes and guns had held off the few natives who made a show of +pursuing them, and the great majority of our allies were running riot on +the ship, which was a sad sight when we turned to take account of the +situation. + +Three natives were killed and two were wounded, not to mention my injured +shoulder among our own casualties; and two members of the other party in +the crew were sprawled in grotesque attitudes on the deck. Counting the one +who was hit by a spear and who had fallen out of the boat, it meant that +Falk had lost three dead, and if blood on the deck was any sign, others +must have been badly slashed. In other words, our party was, numerically, +almost the equal of his. Considering the man from Boston as on our side, we +were seven to their eight. The lantern that we now lighted revealed more of +the gruesome spectacle, and it made me feel sick to see that both the man +from Boston and I were covered from head to foot with the gore in which we +had been rolling; but to the natives the sight was a stupendous triumph; +and the cook, when I next saw him, was walking down the deck, looking at +the face of one dead man after another. + +By and by he came to me where, overcome by a wave of nausea, I had sat down +on the deck with my back against the bulwark. "Dey ain't none of 'em +Kipping," he said grimly. Then he saw my bleeding shoulder and instantly +got down beside me. "You jest let dis yeh ol' nigger took a hand," he +cried. "Ah's gwine fix you all up. You jest come along o' me!" And helping +me to my feet, he led me to the galley, where once more he was supreme and +lawful master. + +In no time at all he had a kettle of water on the stove, in which the coals +of a good fire still lingered, and with a clean cloth he washed my wound so +gently that I scarcely could believe his great, coarse hands were actually +at work on me. "Dah you is," he murmured, bending over the red, shallow +gash that the bullet had cut, "dah you is. Don' you fret. Ah's gwine git +you all tied up clean an' han'some, yass, sah." + +The yells and cries of every description alarmed and agitated us both. It +was far from reassuring to know that that mob of natives was ranging the +ship at will. + +"Ef you was to ask me," Frank muttered, rolling his eyes till the whites +gleamed starkly, "Ah's gwine tell you dis yeh ship is sottin', so to speak, +on a bar'l of gunpowder. Yass, sah!" + +An islander uttered a shrill catcall just outside the galley and thrust his +head and half his naked body in the door. He vanished again almost +instantly, but Frank jumped and upset the kettle. "Yass, sah, you creepy +ol' sarpint," he gasped. "Yass, sah, we's sottin' on a bar'l of gunpowder." + +I am convinced, as I look back on that night from the pinnacle of more than +half a century, that not one man in ten thousand has ever spent one like +it. Allied with a horde whose language we could not speak, we had boarded +our own ship and now--mutineers, pirates, or loyal mariners, according to +your point of view--we shared her possession with a mob of howling heathens +whose goodwill depended on the whim of the moment, and who might at any +minute, by slaughtering us out of hand, get for their own godless purposes +the ship and all that was in her. + +The cook cautiously fingered the keen edge of his cleaver as we looked out +and saw that dawn was brightening in the east. + +"Dat Falk, he say he gwine git us yet," the cook muttered. "Maybe so--maybe +not. Maybe we ain't gwine last as long as dat." + +"All hands aft!" + +Frank and I looked at each other. The galley was as safe and comfortable as +any place aboard ship and we were reluctant to leave it. + +"_All hands aft!_" came the call again. + +"Ah reckon," Frank said thoughtfully, "me and you better be gwine. When +Mistah Hamlin he holler like dat, he want us." + +Light had come with amazing swiftness, and already we could see the deck +from stem to stern without help of the torches, which still flamed and sent +thin streamers of smoke drifting into the mist. + +As we emerged from the galley, I noticed that the after-hatch was half +open. That in itself did not surprise me; stranger things than that had +come to pass in the last hour or two; but when some one cautiously emerged +from the hold, with a quick, sly glance at those on the quarter-deck, I'll +confess that I was surprised. It was the man from Boston. + +Smiling broadly and turning his black rat-like eyes this way and that, the +chief of our wild allies, who held a naked kris from which drops of blood +were falling, stood beside Roger. Blodgett was at the wheel, nervously +fingering the spokes; Neddie Benson stood behind him, obviously ill at +ease, and Davie Paine, who had got from the cabin what few of his things +were left there, to take them forward, was a little at one side. But the +natives were swarming everywhere, aloft and alow, and we knew only too well +that no small movable object would escape their thieving fingers. + +"Ef on'y dem yeh heathen don't took to butcherin'!" the cook muttered. + +The prophetic words were scarcely spoken when what we most feared came to +pass. One of the islanders, by accident or design, bumped into Blodgett,-- +always erratic, never to be relied on in a crisis,--who, turning without a +thought of the consequences, struck the man with his fist a blow that +floored him, and flashed out his knife. + +That single spark threatened an explosion that would annihilate us. Spears +enclosed us from all sides; krises leaped at our throats. + +"Come on, lads! Stand together," Blodgett shrieked. + +With a yell of terror the cook sprang to join the others, and bellowing in +panic, swung his cleaver wildly. + +The man from Boston and Neddie Benson shrank back against the taffrail as a +multitude of moving brown figures seemed to swarm about us. Then I saw +Roger leap forward, his arms high in air, his hands extended. + +"Get back!" he cried, glancing at us over his shoulders. + +As all stopped and stared at him, he coolly turned to the chief and handed +him his pistol, butt foremost. Was Roger mad, I wondered? He was the sanest +man of all our crew. The chief gravely took the proffered weapon and looked +at Blodgett, whose face was contorted with fear, and at the Malay, who by +now was sitting up on deck blinking about him in a dazed way. Then he +smiled and raised his hand and the points of the weapons fell. + +In truth I was nearly mad myself, for now it all struck me as funny and I +laughed until I cried, and all the others looked at me, and soon the +natives began to point and laugh themselves. I suppose I was hysterical, +but it created a diversion and helped to save the day; and Neddie Benson +and the man from Boston, whom Roger had sent below, returned soon with +bolts of cloth and knives and pistols and threw them in a heap on the +quarter-deck. + +Some word that I suppose meant gifts, went from lip to lip and our allies +eagerly crowded around us. + +"Get behind me, men," Roger said in an undertone. "Whatever happens, guard +the companionway. I think we're safe, but since by grace of Providence +we're all here together, we'll take no chances that we can avoid." + +The first rays of sunlight shone on the heap of bright stuffs and polished +metal, but the sun itself was no brighter than the face of the chief when +Roger draped over him a length of bright cloth and presented him with a +handsome knife. He threw back his head, laughing aloud, and strutted across +the deck. Turning in grave farewell, he grasped his booty with one arm and, +after a few sharp words to his men, swung himself down by the chains with +the other. To man after man we gave gaudy cloths or knives or, when all +the knives were given away, a cutlass or a gun; and when at last the only +canoes in sight were speeding toward shore like comets with tails of red +flannel and purple calico, we breathed deeply our relief. + +"Now, men," said Roger, "we have a hard morning's work in front of us. +Cook, break out a cask of beef and a cask of bread, and get us something to +eat. Davie, you stand watch and keep your eye out either for a native canoe +or for any sign of Falk or his party. The rest of you--all except Lathrop-- +wash down the deck and sew those bodies up in a piece of old sail with +plenty of ballast. Ben, you and I have a little job in front of us. Come +into the cabin with me." + +I gladly followed him. He was as composed as if battle and death were all +in the routine of a day at sea, and I was full of admiration for his +coolness and courage. + +The cabin was in complete disorder, but comparatively few things had been +stolen. Apparently not many of the natives had found their way thither. + +"Fortunately," Roger said, unlocking Captain Whidden's chest of which he +had the key, "they've left the spare quadrant. We have instruments to +navigate with, so, when all's said and done, I suppose we're lucky." + +He closed the chest and locked it again; then he took from his pocket a +second key. "Benny, my lad," he said, "let's have a look at that one +hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +Going into the captain's stateroom, we shut the door and knelt beside the +iron safe. The key turned with difficulty. + +"It needs oil," Roger muttered, as he worked over it. "It turns as hard as +if some one has been tinkering with it." By using both hands he forced it +round and opened the door. + +The safe was empty. + +[Illustration: ] + + + + +VI + +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +FALK PROPOSES A TRUCE + + +As we faced each other in amazed silence, we could hear the men working on +deck and the sea rippling against the hull of the ship. I felt that strange +sensation of mingled reality and unreality which comes sometimes in dreams, +and I rather think that Roger felt it, too, for we turned simultaneously to +look again into the iron safe. But again only its painted walls met our +eyes. + +The gold actually was gone. + +Roger started up. "Now how did Falk manage that?" he cried. "I swear he +hadn't time to open the safe. We took them absolutely by surprise--I could +swear we did." + +I suggested that he might have hidden it somewhere else. + +"Not he," said Roger. + +"Would Kipping steal from Captain Falk?" + +"From Captain Falk!" Roger exclaimed. "If his mother were starving, he'd +steal her last crust. How about the bunk?" + +We took the bunk apart and ripped open the mattress. We sounded the +woodwork above and below. With knives we slit the cushion of Captain +Whidden's great arm-chair, and pulled out the curled hair that stuffed it. +We ransacked box, bag, cuddy, and stove; we forced our way into every +corner of the cabin and the staterooms. But we found no trace of the lost +money. + +It seemed like sacrilege to disturb little things that once had belonged +to that upright gentleman, Captain Joseph Whidden. His pipe, his +memorandum-book, and his pearl-handled penknife recalled him to my mind as +I had seen him so many times of old, sitting in my father's drawing-room, +with his hands folded on his knee and his firm mouth bent in a whimsical +smile. I thought of my parents, of my sister and Roger, of all the old +far-away life of Salem; I must have stood dreaming thus a long time when my +eyes fell on Nathan Falk's blue coat, which he had thrown carelessly on the +cabin table and had left there, and with a burst of anger I came back to +affairs of the moment. + +"They've got it away, Benny," said Roger, soberly. "How or when I don't +know, but there's no question that it's gone from the cabin. Come, let's +clear away the disorder." + +As well as we could we put back the numerous things we had thrown about, +and such litter as we could not replace we swept up. But wisps of hair +still lay on the tables and the chairs, and feathers floated in the air +like thistle-down. We had little time for housewifery. + +We found the others gathered round the galley, eating a hearty meal of salt +beef, ship's bread, and coffee, at which we were right glad to join them. +Roger had a way with the men that kept them from taking liberties, yet that +enabled him to mingle with them on terms far more familiar than those of a +ship's officer. I watched him as he sat down by Davie Paine, and grinned at +the cook, and asked Neddie Benson how his courage was and laughed heartily +at Blodgett who had spilled a cup of coffee down his shirt-front--yet in +such a way that Blodgett was pleased by his friendliness rather than +offended by his amusement. I suppose it was what we call "personality." +Certainly Roger was a born leader. After our many difficulties we felt so +jolly and so much at home,--all, that is, except the man from Boston, who +sat apart from the rest and stared soberly across the long, slow seas,-- +that our little party on deck was merrier by far than many a Salem +merrymaking before or since. + +I knew that Roger was deeply troubled by the loss of the money and I +marveled at his self-control. + +Presently I saw something moving off the eastern point of the island. +Thinking little of it, I watched it idly until suddenly it burst upon me +that it was a ship's boat. With a start I woke from my dream and shouted, +"Sail ho! Off the starboard bow!" + +In an instant our men were on their feet, staring at the newcomer. In all +the monotonous expanse of shining, silent ocean only the boat and the +island and the tiny sails of a junk which lay hull down miles away, were to +be seen. But the boat, which now had rounded the point, was approaching +steadily. + +"Ben, lay below to the cabin and fetch up muskets, powder, and balls," +Roger cried sharply. "Lend a hand, Davie, and bring back all the pikes and +cutlasses you can carry. You, cook, clear away the stern-chasers and stand +by to load them the minute the powder's up the companionway. Blodgett, you +do the same by the long gun. You, Neddie, bear a hand with me to trice up +the netting!" + +Spilling food, cups, pans, and kids in confusion on the deck, we sprang to +do as we were bid. In the sternsheets of the approaching boat we could make +out at a distance the slim form of Captain Nathan Falk. + +The rain had stopped long since, and the hot sun shining from a cloudless +sky was rapidly burning off the last vestige of the night mist as Captain +Falk's boat came slowly toward us under a white flag. A ground-swell gave +it a leisurely motion and the men approached so cautiously that their oars +seemed scarcely more than to dip in and out of the water. + +With double-charged cannon, with loaded muskets ready at hand, and with +pikes and cutlasses laid out on deck, one for each man, where we could +snatch them up as soon as we had spent our first fire, we grinned from +behind the nettings at our erstwhile shipmates. Tables had turned with a +vengeance since we had rowed away from the ship so short a time before. +They now were a sad-looking lot of men, some of them with bandages on their +limbs or round their heads, all of them disheveled, weary, and unkempt. But +they approached with an air of dignity, which Falk tried to keep up by +calling with a grand fling of his hand and his head, "Mr. Hamlin, we come +to parley under a flag of truce." + +I think we really were impressed for a moment. His face was pale, and he +had a blood-stained rag tied round his forehead, so that he looked very +much as if he were a wounded hero returning after a brave fight to arrange +terms of an honorable peace. But the cook, who heartily disapproved of +admitting the boat within gunshot, shattered any such illusion that we may +have entertained. + +"Mah golly!" he exclaimed in a voice audible to every man in both parties, +"ef dey ain't done h'ist up cap'n's unde'-clothes foh a flag of truce!" + +The remark came upon us so suddenly and we were all so keyed up that, +although it seems flat enough to tell about it now, then it struck us as +irresistibly funny and we laughed until tears started from our eyes. I +heard Blodgett's cat-yowl of glee, Davie Paine's deep guffaw, Neddie +Benson's shrill cackle of delight. But when, to clear my eyes, I wiped away +my tears, the men in the other boat were glaring at us in glum and angry +silence. + +"Ah, it's funny is it?" said Falk, and his voice me think of the times when +he had abused Bill Hayden. "Laugh, curse you, laugh! Well, that's all +right. There's no law against laughing. I've got a proposition to put up to +you. You've had your little fling and a costly one it's like to be. You've +mutinied and unlawfully confined the master of the ship, and for that +you're liable for a fine of one thousand dollars and five years in prison. +You've usurped the command of a vessel on the high seas unlawfully and by +force, and for that you're liable to a fine of two thousand dollars and ten +years in prison. Think about that, some o' you men that haven't a hundred +dollars in the world. The law'll strip and break you. But if that ain't +enough, we've got evidence to convict you in every court of the United +States of America of being pirates, felons, and robbers, and the punishment +for that is death. Think of that, you men." + +Falk lowered his head until his red scarf, which he had knotted about his +throat, made the ghastly pallor of his face seem even more chalky than it +was, and thrust his chin forward and leveled at us the index finger of his +right hand. The slowly rolling boat was so near us now that as we waited to +see what he would say next we could see his hand tremble. + +"Now, men," he continued, "you've had your little fling, and that's the +price you'll have to pay the piper. I'll get you, never you fear. Ah, by +the good Lord's help, I'll see you swinging from a frigate's yard-arm yet, +unless"--he stopped and glared at us significantly--"unless you do like I'm +going to tell you. + +"You've had your fling and there's a bad day of reckoning coming to you, +don't you forget it. But if you drop all this nonsense now, and go forward +where you belong and work the ship like good seamen and swear on the Book +to have no more mutinous talk, I'll forgive you everything and see that no +one prosecutes you for all you've done so far. How about it? Nothing could +be handsomer than that." + +"Oh, you always was a smooth-tongued scoundrel" Blodgett, just behind me, +murmured under his breath. + +The men in the two parties looked at each other in silence for a moment, +and if ever I had distrusted Captain Falk, I distrusted him four times more +when I saw the mild, sleek smile on Kipping's face. It was reassuring to +see the gleam in black Frank's eyes as he fingered the edge of his cleaver. + +I turned eagerly to Roger, upon whom we waited unanimously for a reply. + +"Yes, that's very handsome of you," he said reflectively. "But how do we +know you'll do all that you promise?" + +Falk's white face momentarily lighted. I thought that for an instant his +eyes shone like a tiger's. But he answered quietly, "Ain't my word good?" + +"Why, a _gentleman's_ word is always good security." + +There was just enough accent on the word "gentleman" to puzzle me. The +remark sounded innocent enough, certainly, and yet the stress--if stress +was intended--made it biting sarcasm. Obviously the men in the boat were +equally in doubt whether to take offense or to accept the statement in good +faith. + +"Well, you have my word," said Falk at last. + + +"Yes, we have your word. But there's one other thing to be settled. How +about the owners' money?" + +For a moment Falk seemed disconcerted, and I, thinking now that Roger was +merely badgering him, smiled with satisfaction. But Falk answered the +question after only brief hesitation, and Roger's next words plunged me +deep in a sea of doubt. + +"Why, I shall guard the owners' money with all possible care, Mr. Hamlin, +and expend it in their best interests," said Falk. + +"If that's the case," said Roger, "come alongside." + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +INCLUDING A CROSS-EXAMINATION + + +Falk tried, I was certain, to conceal a smile of joy at Roger's simplicity, +and I saw that others in the boat were averting their faces. Also I saw +that they were shifting their weapons to have them more readily available. + +Our own men, on the contrary, were remonstrating audibly, and to my lasting +shame I joined them. + +A queer expression appeared on Roger's face and he looked at us as if +incredulous. I suddenly perceived that our rebellious attitude hurt him +bitterly. He had led us so bravely through all our recent difficulties! And +now, when success seemed assured, we manifested in return doubt and +disloyalty! I literally hung my head. The others were abashed and silent, +but I knew that my own defection was more contemptible by far than theirs, +and had Roger reproached me sharply, I might have felt better for it. +Instead, he spoke without haste or anger in a voice pitched so low that +Falk could not possibly overhear him. + +"We simply _have_ to hold together, men. All to the gangway, now, and stand +by for orders." + +That was all he said, but it was enough. Thoroughly ashamed of ourselves, +we followed him to the gangway whither the boat was coming slowly. + +Roger assumed an air of neutral welcome as he reached for the bow of the +pinnace; but to us behind him he whispered sharply, "Stand ready, all +hands, with muskets and pikes." + +"Now, then, Captain Falk," he cried, "hand over the money first. We'll stow +it safe on board." + +"Come, come," Falk replied. "Belay that talk." He was +standing ready to climb on deck. + +"The money first," said Roger coolly. + +Suddenly he tried to hook the bow of the pinnace, but missed it as the +pinnace dipped in the trough. + +The rest of us, waiting breathlessly, for the first time comprehended +Roger's strategy. + +Falk looked up at him angrily. "That'll get you nowhere," he retorted. +"Come, stand away, or so help me, I'll see you hanged anyhow." + +Roger smiled at him coldly. "The word of a gentleman? The money first, +Captain Falk." + +"Well, if you are so stupid that you haven't discovered the truth yet, I +haven't the money." + +"Where is the money?" + +"In the safe in the cabin, as you very well know," replied Falk. + +"You lie!" Roger responded. + +With a ripping oath, Captain Falk whipped out his pistol. + +"You lie!" Roger cried again, hotly. "Put down that pistol or I'll blow you +to hell. Stand by, boys. We'll show them!" + +Though we were fewer than they, we had them at a tremendous disadvantage, +for we were protected by the bulwarks and could pour our musket-fire into +the open boat at will, and in a battle of cutlasses and pikes our advantage +would be even greater. + +"Don't a flag of truce give us no protection?" Kipping asked in that +accursedly mild voice--I could not hear it without thinking of poor Bill +Hayden, and to the others, they told me later, it brought the same bitter +memory. + + +"How long since Cap'n Falk's ol' unde' shirt done be a p'tection?" muttered +the cook grimly. + +"Yes, laugh! Laugh, you black baboon! Laugh, you silly little fool, +Lathrop!" Falk yelled. "I'll have you laughing another time one of these +days. Give way men! We'll have out their haslets yet." + +A hundred feet from the ship, the men rested on their oars, and Falk put on +a very different manner. "Roger Hamlin," he cried, "you ain't going to send +us away, are you?" + +I was astounded. As long as I had known Falk, I had never realized how many +different faces the man could assume at the shortest notice. But Roger +seemed not at all surprised. "Yes," he said, shortly, "we're going to send +you away, you black-hearted scoundrel." + +"Good God! We'll perish!" + +Although obvious retorts were many, Roger made no reply. + +Now Kipping spoke up mildly and innocently:-- + +"What'll we do? We can't land--the Malays was waiting for us on shore with +knives, all ready to cut our throats. We can't go to sea like this. What'll +we do?" + +"Supposing," cried old Blodgett, sarcastically, "supposing you row back to +Salem. It's only three thousand miles or more. You'll find it a pleasant +voyage, I'm sure, and you'd ought to run into enough Ladronesers and Malays +to make it interesting along the way." + +"Ain't we human?" Kipping whined, as if trying to wring pity from even +Blodgett. "Ain't you going at least to give us a keg o' water and some +bread?" + +"If you're not out of gunshot in five minutes," Roger cried, "I'll train +the long gun and blow you clean out of water." + +Without more ado they rowed slowly away, growing smaller and smaller, until +at last they passed out of sight round the point. + +"Ah me," sighed Neddie Benson, "I'm glad they're gone. It's funny Falk +ain't quite a light man nor yet a real dark man." + +"_Gone_!" Davie repeated ominously. "_I_ wish they was gone." He looked up +at the furled sails. "They ain't--and neither is we." + +"There's work to be done," said Roger, "and we must be about it. Leave the +nets as they are. Stack the muskets in the waist, pile the pikes handy by +the deckhouse, and all lay aft. We'd best have a few words together before +we begin." + +A moment later, as I was busy with the pikes, Roger came to me and +murmured, "There's something wrong afoot. The after-hatch has been pried +off." + +I noticed the hatch once more the next time I passed it, and I remembered +seeing the man from Boston emerge from the hold. But there was so much else +to be attended to that it was a long, long time before I thought of it +again. + +When we had done as Roger told us, we gathered round him where he waited, +leaning against the cabin, with his hands in his pockets. + +"We're all in the same boat together, men," he began. "We knew what the +chances were when we took them. If you wish to have it so, in the eyes of +the law we're pirates and mutineers, and since Falk seems to have got away +with what money there was on board, things may go hard with us. _But_--" he +spoke the word with stern emphasis--"_but_ we've acted for the best, and I +think there's no one here wants to try to square things up by putting Falk +in command again. How about it?" + +"Square things up, is it?" cried Blodgett. "The dirty villain would have us +hanged at the nearest gallows for all his buttery words." + +"Exactly!" Roger threw back his head. "And when we get to Salem, I can +promise you there's no man here but will be better off for doing as he's +done so far." + +"But whar's all dat money gone?" the cook demanded unexpectedly. + +"I don't know," said Roger. + +"What! Ain' dat yeh money heah?" + +"No." + +At that moment my eye chanced to fall on the man from Boston, who was +looking off at the island as if he had no interest whatever in our +conversation. The circumstances under which he had stayed with us were so +strange and his present preoccupation was so carefully assumed, that I was +suddenly exceedingly suspicious of him, although when I came to examine the +matter closely, I could find no very definite grounds for it. + +Blodgett was watching him, too, and I think that Roger followed our gaze +for suddenly he cried, "You there!" in a voice that brought the man from +Boston to his feet like the snap of a whip. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he replied briskly. + +"What are you doing here, anyway?" Roger demanded. The fellow, who had +begun to assume as many airs and as much self-confidence as if he had been +one of our own party from the very first, was sadly disconcerted. "Why I +come over to your side first chance I had," he replied with an aggrieved +air. + +"What were you doing in the cabin when the natives were running all over +the ship?" + +The five of us, startled by the quick, sharp questions, looked keenly at +the man from Boston. But he, recovering his self-possession, replied coolly +enough, "I was just a-keeping watch so they wouldn't steal--I kept them +from running off with the quadrant." + +"Keeping watch so _nobody'd_ steal, I suppose," said Roger. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir! That's it exactly." + +Suddenly my mind leaped back to the night when Bill Hayden had died, and +the man from Boston had made that cryptic remark, to which I called +attention long since. "He said he could tell something, Roger," I burst +out. But Roger silenced me with a glance. + +Turning on the fellow again, he said, "If I find that you are lying to me, +I'll shoot you where you stand. What do you know about who killed Captain +Whidden?" + +For once the fellow was taken completely off his guard. He glanced around +as if he wished to run away, but there was no escape. He saw only hostile +faces. + +"What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" + +"Mr. Kipping killed him," the fellow gasped, startled out of whatever +reticence he may have intended to maintain. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" + +"Do you expect me to believe that Kipping shot the captain? If you lie to +me--" Roger drew his pistol. By eyes and voice he held the man in a +hypnosis of terror. + +"He did! I swear he did. Don't shoot me, sir! I'm telling you the very +gospel truth. He cursed awful and said--don't point that pistol at me, sir! +I swear I'll tell the truth!--'Mr. Thomas is as good as done for,' he said. +'There's only one man between us and a hundred thousand dollars in gold.' +And Falk--Kipping was talking to Falk low-like and didn't know I was +anywhere about--and Falk says, 'No, that's too much.' Then he says, +wild-like, 'Shoot--go on and shoot.' Then Kipping laughs and says, 'So +you've got a little gumption, have you?' and he shot Captain Whidden and +killed him. Don't point that pistol at _me_, sir! I didn't do it." + +Roger had managed the situation well. His sudden and entirely unexpected +attack had got from the man a story that a month of ordinary +cross-examinations might not have elicited; for although the fellow had +volunteered to tell all he knew, his manner convinced me that under other +circumstances he would have told no more than he had to. Also he had +admitted being in the cabin while the natives were roaming over the ship! + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +AN ATTEMPT TO PLAY ON OUR SYMPATHY + + +For the time being we let the matter drop and, launching a quarter-boat for +work around the ship, turned our attention to straightening out the rigging +and the running gear so that we could get under way at the earliest +possible moment. Twice natives came aboard, and a number of canoes now and +then appeared in the distance; but we were left on the whole pretty much to +our own devices, and we had great hopes of tripping anchor in a few hours +at the latest. + +Roger meanwhile got out the quadrant and saw that it was adjusted to take +an observation at the first opportunity; for there was no doubt that by +faulty navigation or, more probably, by malicious intent, Falk had brought +us far astray from the usual routes across the China Sea. + +Occasionally bands of natives would come out from shore in their canoes and +circle the ship, but we gave them no further encouragement to come aboard, +and in the course of the morning Roger divided us anew into anchor watches. +All in all we worked as hard, I think, as I ever have worked, but we were +so well contented with the outcome of our adventures that there was almost +no grumbling at all. + +When at last I went below I was dead tired. Every nerve and weary muscle +throbbed and ached, and flinging myself on my bunk, I fell instantly into +the deepest sleep. When I woke with the echo of the call, "All hands on +deck," still lingering in my ears, it seemed as if I scarcely had closed my +eyes; but while I hesitated between sleeping and waking, the call sounded +again with a peremptory ring that brought me to my feet in spite of my +fatigue. + +"All hands on deck! Tumble up! Tumble up!" It was the third summons. + +When we staggered forth, blinded by the glaring sunlight, the other watch +already had snatched up muskets and pikes and all were staring to the +northeast. Thence, moving very slowly indeed, once more came the boat. + +Falk was sitting down now; his chin rested on his hands and his face was +ghastly pale; the bandage round his head appeared bloodier than ever and +dirtier. The men, too, were white and woe-begone, and Kipping was scowling +disagreeably. + +It seemed shameful to take arms against human beings in such a piteous +plight, but we stood with our muskets cocked and waited for them to speak +first. + +"Haven't you men hearts?" Falk cried when he had come within earshot. "Are +you going to sit there aboard ship with plenty of food and drink and see +your shipmates a-dying of starvation and thirst?" + +The men rested on their oars while he called to us; but when we did not +answer, he motioned with his hand and they again rowed toward us with +short, feeble strokes. + +"All we ask is food and water," Falk said, when he had come so near that we +could see the lines on the faces of the men and the worn, hunted look in +their eyes. + +They had laid their weapons on the bottom of the boat, and there was +nothing warlike about them now to remind us of the bloody fight they had +waged against us. With a boy's short memory of the past and short sight for +the future, I was ready to take the poor fellows aboard and to forgive them +everything; and though it undoubtedly was foolish of me, I am not ashamed +of my generous weakness. They seemed so utterly miserable! But fortunately +wiser counsels prevailed. + +"You ain't really going to leave us to perish of hunger and thirst, are +you?" Falk cried. "We can't go ashore, even to get water. Those cursed +heathen are laying to butcher us. Guns pointed at friends and shipmates is +no kind of a 'welcome home.'" + +"Give us the money, then--" Roger began. + +The cook interrupted him in an undertone that was plainly audible though +probably not intended for all ears. + +"Yeee-ah! Heah dat yeh man discribblate! He don't like guns pointed at +shipmates, hey? How about guns pointed at a cap'n when he ain't lookin'? +Hey?" + +Falk obviously overheard the cook's muttered sally and was disconcerted by +it; and the murmur of assent with which our men received it convinced me +that it went a long way to reinforce their determination to withstand the +other party at any cost whatsoever. + +After hesitating perceptibly, Falk decided to ignore it. "All we want's +bread and water," he whined. + +"Give us the money, then," Roger repeated, "and we'll see that you don't +starve." His voice was calm and incisive. He absolutely controlled the +situation. + +Falk threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. "But we ain't got the +money. So help me God, we ain't got a cent of it." + +"Hand over the money," Roger repeated, "and we'll give you food and water." +He pointed at the quarter-boat, which swung at the end of a long painter. +"Come no nearer. Put the money in that boat and we'll haul it up." + +"We _ain't got the money_, I tell you. I swear on my immortal soul, we +ain't got it." Falk seemed to be on the point of weeping. He was so weak +and white! + +When Roger did not reply, I turned to look at him. There was a thoughtful +expression on his face, and following the direction of his eyes, my own +gaze rested on the face of the man from Boston. He was smiling. But when +he saw us looking at him, he stopped and changed color. + +"I believe you," Roger declared suddenly. "You'll have to keep your +distance or I'll blow your boat to pieces; but if you obey orders, I'll +help you out as far as a few days' supply of food will go. Cook, haul in +that boat and put half a hundredweight of ship's bread and four buckets of +water in it. That'll keep 'em for a while." + +"You ain't gwine to feed dat yeh Kipping, sah, is you?" + +"Yes." + +The cook turned in silence to do Roger's bidding. + +Twice the man from Boston started forward as if to speak. The motion was so +slight that it almost escaped me, but the second time I was sure that I +really had detected such an impulse, and at the same moment I perceived +that Falk, whose fingers were twitching nervously, was shooting an angry +glance at him. This byplay to a considerable extent distracted my +attention; but when the fellow finally did get up courage to speak, I saw +that the eyes of every man in Falk's boat were on him and that Kipping had +clenched both fists. + +"Stop!" the man from Boston cried. "Stop!" He stepped toward Roger with one +hand raised. + +Roger soberly turned on him. "Be still," he said. + +"But, sir--" + +"Be still!" + +"But, sir, there ain't no--" + +Certainly as far as we could see, the man's feverish persistence was arrant +insubordination. What Roger would have done we had no time to learn, for +Blodgett, bursting with zeal for our common cause, grasped him by the +throat and choked his words into a gurgle. A queer expression of spite and +hatred passed over the man's face, and when he squirmed away from +Blodgett's grip I saw that he was muttering to himself as he rubbed his +bruised neck. But the others were paying him no attention and he presently +folded his arms with an air that continued to trouble me and stood apart +from the rest. + +And Falk and Kipping and all their men now were grinning broadly! + +The water slopped over the edges of the buckets and wet some of the bread +as the cook pushed the boat out toward Falk; but the men in the pinnace +watched it eagerly, and when it floated to the end of the painter, they +clutched for it so hastily that they almost upset the precious buckets. + +When they had got it, they looked at each other and laughed and slapped +their legs and laughed again in an uproarious, almost maudlin mirth that we +could not understand. + +We covered them with our muskets lest they try to seize the boat, which I +firmly believe they had contemplated before they realized how closely we +were watching them, and we smiled to see them cram their mouths with bread +and pass the buckets from hand to hand. When they had finished their +inexplicable laughter, they ate like animals and drew new strength and +courage from their food. Though Falk was still white under his bloody +bandage, his voice was stronger. + +"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace +before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of +sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your +piper." + +He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as +if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances. + +"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see +what we shall see." + +"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see +it, too, won't it, sir?" + +It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so +we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the +long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in +undertones we kept up an exchange of comments. + +After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to +row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that +a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their +air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our +compassion. We watched them suspiciously, but they now assumed a frank +manner, which they evidently hoped would put us off our guard. + +"Now you men listen to me," said Falk. "After all, what's the use of +behaving this way? You're just getting yourselves into trouble with the +law. We can send you to the gallows for this little spree, and what's more +we're going to do it--unless, that is, unless you come round sensible and +call it all off. Now what do you say? Why don't you be reasonable? You take +us on board and we'll use you right and hush all this up as best we can. +What do you say?" + +"What do we say?" said Roger, "We say that bread and water have gone to +your head. You were singing another time a while back." + +"Oh well, we _were_ a little down in the mouth then. But we're feeling a +sight better now. Come, ain't our plan reasonable?" + +All the time they were rowing slowly nearer to the ship. + +"Mistah Falk, O Mistah Falk!" + +"Well?" Falk received the cook's interruption with an ill temper that made +the darkey's eyes roll with joy. + +"Whar you git dat bootiful head-piece?" + + +A flush darkened Falk's pale face under the bandage, and with what dignity +he could muster, he ignored our snickers. + +"What do you say?" he cried to Roger. "Evidently you haven't found the +money yet." + +To us Roger said in an undertone, "Hold your fire." To Falk he +replied clearly, "You black-hearted villain, if you show your face in a +Christian port you'll go to the gallows for abetting the cold-blooded +murder of an able officer and an honorable gentleman, Captain Joseph +Whidden. Quid that over a while and stow your tales of piracy and mutiny. +Back water, you! Keep off!" + +Here was no subtle insinuation. Falk was stopped in his tracks by the flat +statement. He had a dazed, frightened look. But Kipping, who had kept +himself in the background up to this point, now assumed command. + +"Them's bad words," he said mildly, coldly. "Bad words. _But_--" he +slightly raised his voice--"we ain't a-goin' to eat 'em. Not we." All at +once he let out a yell that rang shrilly far over the water. "At 'em, men! +At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull! Out pikes and cutlasses! Take +'em by storm! Slash the netting and go over the side." + +"Hold your fire,"--Roger repeated,--"one minute--till I give the word." + +My heart was pounding at my ribs. I was breathing in fast gulps. With my +thumb on the hammer of the musket, I gave one glance to the priming, and +half raised it to my shoulder. + +From the bottom of the boat Falk's men had snatched up the weapons that +hitherto they had kept out of sight. I had no time then to wonder why they +did not shoot; afterwards we agreed that they probably were so short of +powder and balls that they dared not expend any except in gravest +emergency. Kipping was standing as they rowed, and so fiercely now did they +ply their oars, casting to the winds every pretence of weakness, that the +boat rocked from side to side. + +"At 'em!" Kipping snarled. "We'll show 'em! We'll show'em!" + +"Hold your fire, men," said Roger the third time. "I'll wing that bird." +And aiming deliberately, he shot. + +The report of his musket rang out sharply and was followed by a groan. +Kipping clutched his thigh with both hands and fell. The men stopped rowing +and the boat, gradually losing way, veered in a half circle and lay +broadside toward us. In the midst of the confusion aboard it, I saw Kipping +sitting up and cursing in a way that chilled my blood. "Oh," he moaned, +"I'll get you yet! I'll get you yet!" Then some one in the boat returned a +single shot that buried itself in our bulwark. + +"Yeeeehaha! Got Kipping!" the cook cackled. "He got Kipping!" + +"Now then," cried Roger, "bear off. We've had enough of you. If ever again +you come within gunshot of this ship, we'll shoot so much lead into you +that the weight will sink you. It's only a leg wound, Kipping. I was +careful where I aimed." + +In a disorderly way the men began to pull out of range, but still we could +hear Kipping shrieking a stream of oaths and maledictions, and now Falk +stood up and shook his fist at us and yelled with as much semblance of +dignity as he could muster, "I'll see you yet, all seven of you, I'll see +you a-swinging one after another from the game yard-arm!" Then, to our +amazement, one of them whispered to the others behind his hand, and they +all began to laugh again as if they had played some famous joke on us. + +Instead of going toward the island, they rowed out into the ocean. We could +not understand it. Surely they would not try to cross the China Sea in an +open boat! Were they so afraid of the natives? + +Still we could hear Kipping, faintly now, bawling wrath and blasphemy. We +could see Captain Falk shaking his fist at us, and very clearly we could +hear his faint voice calling, "I'll sack that ship, so help me! We'll see +then what's become of the money." + +Where in heaven's name could they be going? Suddenly the answer came to us. +Beyond them in the farthest offing were the tiny sails of the almost +becalmed junk. They were rowing toward it. Eight mariners from a Christian +land! + +In that broad expanse of land and sea and sky, the only moving object was +the boat bearing Captain Falk and his men, which minute after minute +labored across the gently tossing sea. + +Already the monsoon was weakening. The winds were variable, and for the +time being scarce a breath of air was stirring. + +From the masthead we watched the boat grow smaller and smaller until it +seemed no bigger than the point of a pin. The men were rowing with short, +slow strokes. They may have gone eight or ten miles before darkness closed +in upon them and blotted them out, and they must have got very near to the +junk. + +The moon, rising soon after sunset, flooded the world with a pale light +that made the sea shine like silver and made the island appear like a dark, +low shadow. But of the boat and the junk it revealed nothing. + +The cook and Blodgett and I were talking idly on the fore hatch when +faintly, but so distinctly that we could not mistake it, we heard far off +the report of a gun. + +"Listen!" cried Blodgett. + +It came again and then again. + +The cook laid his hand on my shoulder. "Boy," he gasped out, "don' you heah +dat yeh screechin'?" + +"No," said I. + +"Listen!" + +We sat for a long time silent, and presently we heard one more very distant +gunshot. + +Neither Blodgett nor I had heard anything else, but the cook insisted that +he had heard clearly the sound of some one far off shrieking and wailing in +the night. "Ah heah dat yeh noise, yass, sah. Ah ain't got none of dem +yamalgamations what heahs what ain't." + +He was so big and black and primitive, and his great ears spread so far out +from his head, that he reminded me of some wild beast. Certainly he had a +wild beast's keen ears. + +But now Blodgett raised his hand. "Here's wind," he said. + +And wind it was, a fresh breeze that seemed to gather up the waning +strength of the light airs that had been playing at hide and seek with our +ropes and canvas. + +At daybreak, cutting the cable and abandoning the working bower, we got +under way on the remainder of our voyage to China, bearing in a generally +northwesterly course to avoid the dangerous waters lying directly between +us and the port of our destination. + +As we hauled at halyard and sheet and brace, and sprang quickly about at +Roger's bidding, I found no leisure to watch the dawn, nor did I think of +aught save the duties of the moment, which in some ways was a blessed +relief; but I presently became aware that David Paine, who seemed able to +work without thought, had stopped and was staring intently across the heavy +seas that went rolling past us. Then, suddenly, he cried in his deep voice, +"Sail ho!" + +Hazily, in the silver light that intervened between moonset and sunrise, we +saw a junk with high poop and swinging batten sails bearing across our +course. She took the seas clumsily, her sails banging as she pitched, and +we gathered at the rail to watch her pass. + +"See there, men!" old Blodgett cried. + +He pointed his finger at the strange vessel. We drew closer and stared +incredulously. + +On the poop of the junk, beside the cumbersome rudder windlass, leaning +nonchalantly against the great carved rail, were Captain Nathan Falk and +Chief Mate Kipping. That the slow craft could not cross our bows, they saw +as well as we. Indeed, I question if they cared a farthing whether they +sighted us that day or not. But they and their men, who gathered forward to +stare sullenly as we drew near, shook fists and once more shouted curses. I +could see them distinctly, Falk and Kipping and the carpenter and the +steward and the sail-maker and the rest--angry, familiar faces. + +When we had swept by them, running before the wind, some one called after +us in a small, far-off voice, "We'll see you yet in Sunda Strait." + +There was a commotion on the deck of the junk and Blodgett declared that +Falk had hit a man. + +Were they changing their time for some reason that they did not want us to +suspect? _Did they really wish to cut us off on our return?_ + + +Speculating about the fate of the yellow mariners who once had manned those +clumsy sails, and about what scenes of bloody cruelty there must have been +when those eight mad desperadoes attacked the ancient Chinese vessel, we +sailed away and left them in their pirated junk. But I imagined, even when +the old junk was hull down beyond the horizon, that I could hear an angry +voice calling after us. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +WE REACH WHAMPOA, BUT NOT THE END OF OUR TROUBLES + + +We were only seven men to work that ship, and after all these years I +marvel at our temerity. Time and again the cry "All hands" would come down +the hatch and summon the three of us from below to make sail, or reef, or +furl, or man the braces. Weary and almost blind with sleep, we would +stagger on deck and pull and haul, or would swarm aloft and strive to cope +with the sails. The cook, and even Roger, served tricks at the wheel, turn +and turn about with the rest of us; and for three terrible weeks we forced +ourselves to the sheets and halyards, day and night, when we scarcely could +hold our eyes open or bend our stiffened fingers. + +A Divine Providence must have watched over us during the voyage and have +preserved us from danger; for though at that season bad storms are by no +means unknown, the weather remained settled and fine. With clear water +under our keel we passed shoal and reef and low-lying island. Now we saw a +Tonquinese trader running before the wind, a curious craft, with one mast +and a single sail bent to a yard at the head and stiffened by bamboo sprits +running from luff to leech; now a dingy nondescript junk; now in the offing +a fleet of proas, which caused us grave concern. But in all our passage +only one event was really worth noting. + +When we were safely beyond London Reefs and the Fiery Cross, we laid our +course north by east to pass west of Macclesfield Bank. All was going as +well as we had dared expect, so willing was every man of our little +company, except possibly the man from Boston, whom I suspected of a +tendency to shirk, when late one evening the cook came aft with a very long +face. + +"Well," said Roger, his eyes a-twinkle. "What's wrong in the galley, +doctor?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah! S'pose, sah, you don't' know dah's almost no mo' +wateh foh to drink, sah." + +"What's that you say?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah, we done share up with dat yeh Kipping and dah ain't +no mo' to speak of at all, sah." + +It was true. The casks below decks were empty. In the casks already broken +out there was enough for short rations to last until we made port, so our +predicament as yet was by no means desperate; but we remembered the +laughter of Falk and his men, and we were convinced that they knew the +trick they played when they persuaded us to divide the ship's bread and +water. By what mishap or mismanagement the supply of food had fallen +short--there had been abundant opportunity for either--we were never to +learn; but concerning the water-supply and Falk's duplicity, we were very +soon enlightened. + +"Our friend from Boston," Roger said slowly, when the cook had gone, "seems +to have played us double. We'll have him below, Ben, and give him a chance +to explain." + +I liked the fellow less than ever when he came into the cabin. He had a +certain triumphant air that consorted ill with his trick of evading one's +eyes. He came nervously, I thought; but to my surprise Roger's caustic +accusal seemed rather to put him at ease than to disconcert him further. + +"And so," Roger concluded, after stating the case in no mincing terms, "you +knew us to be short of water, yet you deliberately neglected to warn us." + +"Didn't I try to speak, sir? Didn't you cut me off, sir?" + +Roger looked at him gravely. Although the fellow flinched, he was telling +the truth. In justice we had to admit that Roger had given him no hearing. + +"Ay, and that skinny old money-chaser tried to throttle me," he continued. +"Falk lay off that island only because we needed water. Ay, we all knew we +needed it--Falk and all of us. But them murderin' natives was after our +heart's blood whenever we goes ashore, just because Chips and Kipping +drills a few bullet-holes in some of 'em. I knew what Falk was after when +he asks you for water, sir. The scuttlebutts with water in 'em was on deck +handy, and most of them below was empty where you wa'n't likely to trouble +'em for a while yet. He see how't would work out. Wasn't I going to tell +you, even though he killed me for it, until you cut me off and that 'un +choked me? It helps take the soreness--it--I tried to tell you, sir." + +In petty spite, the fellow had committed himself, along with the rest of +us, to privation at the very least. Yet he had a defense of a kind, +contemptible though it was, and Roger let him go. + +It was a weary voyage; but all things have an end, and in ten days we had +left Helen Shoal astern. Now we saw many junks and small native craft, +which we viewed with uncomfortable suspicion, for though our cannon were +double-charged and though loaded muskets were stacked around the +mizzenmast, we were very, very few to stand off an attack by those yellow +demons who swarmed the Eastern seas in the time of my boyhood and who, for +all I know, swarm them still. + +There came at last a day when we went aloft and saw with red eyes that +ached for sleep hills above the horizon and a ship in the offing with all +sails set. A splendid sight she was, for our own flag flew from the ensign +halyards, and less than three weeks before, any man of us would have given +his right hand to see that ship and that flag within hail; but now it was +the sight of land that thrilled us to the heart. Hungry, thirsty, worn out +with fatigue, we joyously stared at those low, distant hills. + +"Oh, mah golly, oh, mah golly!" the cook cried, in ecstasy, "jest once Ah +gits mah foots on dry land Ah's gwine be de happies' nigger eveh bo'n. Ah +ain' neveh gwine to sea agin, no sah, not neveh." + +"Ay, land's good," Davie Paine muttered, "but the sea holds a man." + +Blodgett said naught. What dreams of wealth were stirring in his head, I +never knew. He was so very pale! He more than any one else, I think, was +exhausted by the hardships of the voyage. + +Roger, gaunt and silent, stood with his arms crossed on the rail. He had +eaten almost nothing; he had slept scarcely at all. With unceasing courage +he had done his duty by day and by night, and I realized as I saw him +standing there, sternly indomitable, that his was the fibre of heroes. I +was proud of him--and when I thought of my sister, I was glad. Then it was +that I remembered my father's words when, as we walked toward Captain +Whidden's house, we heard our gate shut and he knew without looking back +who had entered. + +We came into the Canton River, or the Chu-Kiang as it is called, by the +Bocca-Tigris, and with the help of some sailing directions that Captain +Whidden had left in writing we passed safely through the first part of +the channel between Tiger Island and Towling Flat. Thence, keeping the +watch-tower on Chuen-pee Fort well away from the North Fort of Anung-hoy, +we worked up toward Towling Island in seven or eight fathoms. + +A thousand little boats and sampans clustered round us, and we were annoyed +and a little frightened by the gesticulations of the Chinese who manned +them, until it dawned on us that they wished to serve as pilots. By signs +we drove a bargain--a silver dollar and two fingers; three fingers; five +fingers--and got for seven silver dollars the services of several men in +four sampans, who took their places along the channel just ahead of us and +sounded the depth with bamboo poles, until by their guidance we crossed the +second bar on the flood tide, which providentially came at the very hour +when we most needed it, and proceeded safely on up the river. + +That night, too tired and weak to stand, we let the best bower go by the +run in Whampoa Roads, and threw ourselves on the deck. By and by--hours +later it seemed--we heard the sound of oars. + +"Island Princess ahoy!" came the hearty hail. + +"Ahoy," some one replied. + +"What's wrong? Come, look alive! What does this mean?" + +I now sat up and saw that Roger was standing in the stern just as he had +stood before, his feet spread far apart, his arms folded, his chin +out-thrust. "Do you, sir," he said slowly, "happen to have a bottle of wine +with you?" + +I heard the men talking together, but I could not tell what they were +saying. Next, I saw a head appear above the bulwark and realized that they +were coming aboard. + +"Bless my soul! What's happened? Where's Captain Whidden? Bless my soul! +Who are _you_?" The speaker was big, well dressed, comfortably well fed. He +stared at the six of us sprawled out grotesquely on the deck, where we had +thrown ourselves when the ship swung at her anchor. He looked up at the +loose, half-furled sails. He turned to Roger, who stood gaunt and silent +before him. "Bless my soul! _Who are you?_" + +"I," said Roger, "am Mr. Hamlin, supercargo of this ship." + +"But where--what in heaven's name has taken place? Where's Captain +Whidden?" + +"Captain Whidden," said Roger, "is dead." + +"But when--but what--" + +"_Who are you?_" Roger fired the words at him like a thunderclap. + +"I--I--I am Mr. Johnston, agent for Thomas Webster and Sons," the man +stammered. + +"Sir," cried Roger, "if you are agent for Thomas Webster and Sons, fetch us +food and water and get watchmen to guard this ship while we sleep. Then, +sir, I'll tell you such a story as you'll not often hear." + +The well-fed, comfortable man regarded him with a kind of frown. The +situation was so extraordinary that he simply could not comprehend it. For +a moment he hesitated, then, stepping to the side, he called down some +order, which I did not understand, but which evidently sent the boat +hurrying back to the landing. As he paced the deck, he repeated over and +over in a curiously helpless way, "Bless my soul! Bless my soul!" + +All this time I was aware of Roger still standing defiantly on the +quarter-deck. I know that I fell asleep, and that when I woke he was still +there. Shortly afterwards some one raised my head and gave me something hot +to drink and some one else repeated my name, and I saw that Roger was no +longer in sight. Then, as I was carried below, I vaguely heard some one +repeating over and over, "Bless my soul! It is awful! Why won't that young +man explain things? Bless my soul!" When I opened my eyes sunlight was +creeping through the hatch. + +"Is this not Mr. Lathrop?" a stranger asked, when I stepped out in the open +air--and virtually for the first time, so weary had I been the night +before, saw the pointed hills, the broad river, and the great fleet of +ships lying at anchor. + +"Yes," said I, surprised at the man's respectful manner. Immediately I was +aware that he was no sailor. + +"I thought as much. Mr. Hamlin says, will you go to the cabin. I was just +going to call you. Mr. Johnston has come aboard again and there's some kind +of a conference. Mr. Johnston does get so wrought up! If you'll hurry right +along--" + +As I turned, the strange landsman kept in step with me. "Mr. Johnston is so +wrought up!" he repeated interminably. "So wrought up! I never saw him so +upset before." + +When I entered the cabin, Roger sat in the captain's chair, with Mr. +Johnston on his right and a strange gentleman on his left. Opposite Roger +was a vacant seat, but I did not venture to sit down until the others +indicated that they wished me to do so. + +"This is a strange story I've been hearing, Mr. Lathrop," said Mr. +Johnston. His manner instantly revealed that my family connection carried +weight with him. "I thought it best you should join us. One never knows +when a witness will be needed. It's one of the most disturbing situations +I've met in all my experience." + +The stranger gravely nodded. + +"Certainly it is without precedent in my own experience," said Roger. + +Mr. Johnston tapped the table nervously. "Captain and chief mate killed by +a member of the crew; second mate--later, acting captain--accused of +abetting the murder. You must admit, sir, that you make that charge on +decidedly inadequate evidence. And one hundred thousand dollars in gold +gone, heaven knows where! Bless my soul, what shall I do?" + +"Do?" cried Roger. "Help us to make arrangements to unload the cargo, to +ship a new crew, and to get a return cargo. It seems to me obvious enough +what you 'shall do'!" + +"But, Mr. Hamlin, the situation is extraordinary. There are legal problems +involved. There is no captain--bless my soul! I never heard of such a +thing." + +"I've brought this ship across the China Sea with only six hands. I assure +you that I shall have no difficulty in taking her back to Salem when a +new crew is aboard." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "Here's your +captain--I'll do. Lathrop, here, will do good work as supercargo, I'm sure. +I'm told there's the crew of a wrecked brig in port. They'll fill up our +forecastle and maybe furnish me with a mate or two. You'll have to give us +papers of a kind." + +"Lathrop as supercargo? He's too young. He's only a lad." + +"We can get no one else off-hand who has so good an education," said Roger. +"He can write a fair-copy, cipher, and keep books. I'll warrant, Mr. +Johnston, that not even you can catch him napping with a problem in tare +and tret. Above all, the Websters know him well and will be glad to see him +climb." + +"Hm! I'm doubtful--well, very well. As you say. But one hundred thousand +dollars in gold--bless my soul! I was told nothing about that; the letters +barely mention it." Mr. Johnston beat a mad tattoo on the arm of his chair. + +"That, sir, is my affair and my responsibility. I will answer to the +owners." + +"Bless my soul! I'm afraid I'll be compounding piracy, murder, and heaven +knows what other crimes; but we shall see--we shall see." Mr. Johnston got +up and paced the cabin nervously. "Well, what's done's done. Nothing to do +but make the best of a bad bargain. Woolens are high now, praise the Lord, +and there's a lively demand for ginseng. Well, I've already had good +offers. I'll show you the figures, Captain Hamlin, if you'll come to the +factory. And you, too, Mr. Lathrop. If you daren't leave the ship, I'll +send ashore for them. I'm confident we can fill out your crew, and I +suppose I'll have to give you some kind of a statement to authorize your +retaining command--What if I am compounding a felony? Bless my soul! And +one hundred thousand dollars!" + +I was glad enough to see Mr. Johnston rowed away from the ship. Roger, +accompanying him, returned late in the evening with half a dozen new men +and a Mr. Cledd, formerly mate of the brig Essay, which had been wrecked a +few weeks before in a typhoon off Hainan. He was a pleasant fellow of about +Roger's age, and had a frank manner that we all liked. The new men, all of +whom had served under him on the Essay, reported him to be a smart officer, +a little severe perhaps, but perfectly fair in his dealings with the crew; +so we were almost as glad to have him in the place of Kipping, as we were +to have Roger in the place of Captain Falk. We had settled down in the +forecastle to talk things over when presently word came that Davie Paine +and I were wanted aft. + +"Ben," said Roger to me, cordially, "you can move your things into the +cabin. You are to be supercargo." He tapped his pencil on the table and +turned to Davie with a kindly smile. "You, Davie, can have your old +berth of second mate, if you wish it. I'll not degrade a faithful man. +You'd better move aft to-day, for the new crew is coming aboard to-morrow." + +Davie scratched his head and shifted his feet uneasily. "Thank you, sir," +he said at last. "It's good of you and I'm sure I appreciate it, but I +ain't no great shakes of a scholar and I--well, if it's all the same to +you, sir, I'll stay for'ard with the men, sir." + +I was surprised to find how hard it was to leave the forecastle. The others +were all so friendly and so glad of my good fortune, that they brought a +lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. It seemed as if I were taking leave +forever, instead of only moving the length of the ship; and, indeed, as I +had long since learned, the distance from forecastle to cabin is not to be +measured by feet and inches. + +"I knew't would come," Neddie Benson remarked. "You was a gentleman's son. +But we've had good times together--ay, and hard times, too." He shook his +head dolefully. + +All who were left of the old crew gathered round me while I closed my +chest, and Blodgett and Davie Paine seized the beckets before I knew what +they were about and carried it to my stateroom. + + +As I passed the galley the cook stopped me. "You ain't gwine far, sah, +praise de Lo'd!" he said. "Dah's a hot time ahead and we gotta stand one by +anotheh. Ah's gwine keep my eye on dat yeh man f'om Boston. Yass, sah! Ah's +gwine keep mah eye on him." + +Now what did the cook mean by that, I wondered. But no answer suggested +itself to me, and when I entered the cabin I heard things that drove the +cook and the man from Boston far out of my mind. + +"Kipping!" Mr. Cledd, the new chief mate was saying. "Not _William_ +Kipping?" + +Roger got down the attested copy of the articles and pointed at the neatly +written name: "William Kipping." + +Mr. Cledd looked very grave indeed. "I've heard of Falk--he's a vicious +scoundrel in some ways, although too weak to be dangerous of his own +devices But I _know_ Kipping." + +"Tell me about him,' said Roger. + +"Kipping is the meanest, doggonedest, low-down wharf-runner that ever +robbed poor Jack of his wages. That's Kipping. Furthermore, he never signed +a ship's articles unless he thought there was considerable money in it +somewhere. I tell you, Captain Hamlin, he's an angry, disappointed man at +this very minute. If you want to know what I think, he's out somewhere on +those seas yonder--_just_--_waiting_. We've not seen the last of Kipping." + +Roger got up, and walking over to the chest of ammunition, thoughtfully +regarded it. + +"No, sir!" Mr. Cledd reiterated, "if Kipping's Kipping, we've not seen the +last of him." + +[Illustration:] + + + + +VII + +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +A MYSTERY IS SOLVED, AND A THIEF GETS AWAY + + +Innumerable sampans were plying up and down the river, some with masts and +some without, and great junks with carved sterns lay side by side so +closely that their sails formed a patchwork as many-colored as Joseph's +coat. There were West River small craft with arched deck-houses, which had +beaten their way precariously far up and down the coast; tall, narrow sails +from the north, and web-peaked sails on curved yards from the south; Hainan +and Kwangtung trawlers working upstream with staysails set, and a few +storm-tossed craft with great holes gaping between their battens. All were +nameless when I saw them for the first time, and strange; but in the days +that followed I learned them rope and spar. + +Vessels from almost every western nation were there, too--bluff-bowed Dutch +craft with square-headed crews, brigantines from the Levant, and ships from +Spain, England, and America. + +The captains of three other American ships in port came aboard to inquire +about the state of the seas between the Si-Kiang and the Cape of Good Hope +and shook their heads gravely at what we told them. One, an old friend of +Captain Whidden, said that he knew my own father. "It's shameful that such +things should be--simply shameful," he declared, when he had heard the +story of our fight with the Arab ship. "What with Arabs and Malays on the +high seas, Ladronesers in port--ay, and British men-of-war everywhere!" + +He went briskly over the side, settled himself in the stern-sheets of his +boat, and gave us on the quarter-deck a wave of his hand; then his men +rowed him smartly away down-stream. + +"Ay, it is shameful," Roger repeated. He soberly watched the other +disappear among the shipping, then he turned to Mr. Cledd. "I shall go +ashore for the day," he said. "I have business that will take considerable +time, and I think that Mr. Lathrop had better come too, and bring his +books." + +As we left the ship we saw Mr. Cledd observing closely all that went +forward, and Roger gravely nodded when I remarked that our new mate knew +his business. + +At the end of some three weeks of hard work we had cleared the hold, +painted and overhauled the ship inside and out, and were ready to begin +loading at daylight on a Monday morning. However great was Mr. Johnston's +proclivity to get "wrought up," he had proved himself an excellent man of +business by the way he had conducted our affairs ashore when once he put +his hand to them; and we, too, had accomplished much, both in getting out +the cargo and in putting the ship in repair. We had stripped her to her +girt-lines, calked her, decks and all, from her hold up, and painted her +inside and out. She was a sight to be proud of, when, rigged once more, she +swung at her anchorage. + +That evening, as Roger and Mr. Cledd, the new second mate, and I were +sitting in the cabin and talking of our plans and prospects, we heard a +step on the companionway. + +"Who's that?" Mr. Cledd asked in an undertone. "I thought steward had gone +for the night." + +Roger motioned him to remain silent. We all turned. + +To our amazement it was the cook who suddenly appeared before us, rolling +his eyes wildly under his deep frown. + +"'Scuse me, gen'lems! 'Scuse me, Cap'n Hamlin! 'Scuse me, Mistah Cledd! +'Scuse me, ev'ybody! Ah knows Ah done didn't had ought to, but Ah says, +Frank, you ol' nigger, you jest up 'n' go. Don't you let dat feller git +away with all dat yeh money." + +"What's that?" Roger cried sharply. + +"Yass, sah! Yass, sah! Hun f'om Boston! He's got de chisel and de hammer +and de saw." + +We all stared. + +"Come, come, doctor," said Roger. "What's this cock-and-bull story?" + +"Yass, sah, he's got de chisel and de hammer and de saw. Ah was a-watchin', +yass, sah. He don't fool dis yeh ol' nigger. Ah see him sneakin' round when +Chips he ain't looking." + +For a moment Roger frowned, then in a low, calm voice he said, "Mr. Cledd, +you'll take command on deck. Have a few men with you. Better see that your +pistols are well primed. You two, come with me. Now, then, Frank, lead the +way." + +From the deck we could see the lanterns of all the ships lying at anchor, +the hills and the land-lights and a boat or two moving on the river. We +hurried close at the negro's heels to the main hatch. + +"Look dah!" The negro rested the blunt tip of one of his great fingers on +the deck. + +Some sharp tool had dropped beside the hatch and had cut a straight, thin +line where it fell. + +"Chisel done dat." + +We were communicating in whispers now, and with a finger at his lips the +cook gave us a warning glance. He then laid hold of the rope that was made +fast to a shears overhead, swung out, and slid down to the very keelson. +Silently, one at a time, we followed. The only sound was our sibilant +breathing and the very faint shuffle of feet. Now we could see, almost +midway between the hatches, the dim light of a candle and a man at work. +While we watched, the man cautiously struck several blows. Was he scuttling +the ship? Then, as Roger and the cook tiptoed forward, I suddenly tripped +over a piece of plank and sprawled headlong. + +As I fell, I saw Roger and the cook leap ahead, then the man doused the +light. There was a sound of scuffling, a crash, a splutter of angry words. +A moment later I heard the click of flint on steel, a tiny blaze sprang +from the tinder, and the candle again sent up its bright flame. + +"Come, Ben, hold the light," Roger called. He and Frank had the man from +Boston down on the limber board and were holding him fast. The fight, +though fierce while it lasted, already was over. + +The second mate now handed me the candle, and bent over and examined the +hole the man had cut in the ceiling. "Is the scoundrel trying to sink us?" +he asked hotly. + +Roger smiled. "I suspect there's more than that behind this little +project," he replied. + +The man from Boston groaned. "Don't--don't twist my arm," he begged. + +"Heee-ha-ha!" laughed the cook. "Guess Ah knows whar dat money is." + +"Open up the hole, Ben," said Roger. + +I saw now that there was a chalk-line, as true as the needle, from +somewhere above us in the darkness, drawn along the skin of the hold +perpendicular to the keelson, and that the man from Boston had begun to cut +at the bilge where the line crossed it. + +He blinked at me angrily as I sawed through the planks. But when with +chisel and saw I had removed a square yard of planking and revealed only +the bilge-water that had backed up from the pump well, he brightened. Had +the Island Princess not been as tight as you could wish, we should have had +a wetter time of it than we had. Our feet were wet as it was, and the man +from Boston was sadly drabbled. + +"There's nothing there?" said Roger, interrogatively. "Hm! Put your hand in +and feel around." + +I reluctantly obeyed. Finding nothing at first, I thrust my arm deeper, +then higher up beyond the curve. My fingers touched something hard that +slipped away from them. Regardless of the foul water, I thrust my arm in +still farther, and, securing my hold on a cord, drew out a leather bag. It +was black and slimy, and so heavy that I had to use both hands to lift it, +and it clinked when I set it down. + +"I thought so," said Roger. "There'll be more of them in there. Fish them +out, Bennie." + +While Roger and the cook sat on the man from Boston and forced him down +into the evil-smelling bilge-water, the second mate and I felt around under +the skin of the hold and drew out bag after bag, until the candle-light +showed eighteen lying side by side. + +"There ought to be two more," said Roger. + +"I can't find another one, sir," the second mate replied. + +I now hit upon an idea. "Here," said I, "here's what will do the work." I +had picked up a six-foot pole and the others eagerly seized upon my +suggestion. + +I worked the pole into the space between the inner and outer planking while +the man from Boston blinked at me angrily, and fished about with it until I +discovered and pried within reach two more leather bags. + +"Well done!" Roger cried. "Cook, suppose you take this fellow in +tow,--we've a good strong set of irons waiting for him,--and I'll help +carry these bags over under the hatch." + +Calling up to Mr. Cledd, Roger then instructed him to throw down a +tarpaulin, which he did, and this we made fast about the twenty bags. +Having taken several turns of a rope's end round the whole, Roger, carrying +the other end, climbed hand-over-hand the rope by which we had lowered +ourselves, and I followed at his heels; then we rigged a tackle and, with +several men to help us, hauled up the bundle. + +"Cap'n Hamlin, sah," the cook called, "how's we gwine send up dis yeh +scound'l?" + +"Let him come," said Roger. "We'll see to him. Prick his calves with a +knife if he's slow about it." + +We heard the cook say in a lower voice, "G'wan, you ol' scalliwaggle"; +then, "Heah he is, cap'n, heah he come! Watch out foh him. He's +nimble--yass, sah, he's nimble." + +The rope swayed in the darkness below the hatch, then the fellow's head and +shoulders appeared; but, as we reached to seize him, he evaded our +outstretched fingers by a quick wriggle, flung himself safely to the deck +on the far side of the hatch, and leaping to the bulwark, dove into the +river with scarcely a splash. + +Some one fired a musket at the water; the flash illuminated the side of the +ship, and an echo rolled solemnly back from the shore. Three or four men +pointed and called, "There he goes--there--there! See him swimming!" For a +moment I myself saw him, a dark spot at the apex of a V-shaped ripple, then +he disappeared. It was the last we ever knew of the man from Boston. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +HOMEWARD BOUND + + +We had the gold, though, twenty leather bags of it; and we carried it to +the cabin and packed it into the safe, which it just filled. + +"Now," said Roger, "we _have_ a story to tell Mr. Johnston." + +"So we have!" exclaimed Mr. Cledd, who had heard as yet but a small part of +this eventful history. "Will you tell me, though, how that beggar ever knew +those bags were just there?" + +"Certainly." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "He put them there. When the +islanders were everywhere aboard ship, and the rest of us were so much +taken up with them and with the fight we'd just been through that we +didn't know what was on foot,--it was still so dark that he could work +unnoticed,--he sneaked below and opened the safe, which he had the craft to +lock again behind him, and hauled the money forward to the hatch, a few +bags at a time. Eventually he found a chance to crawl over the cargo, start +a plank in the ceiling, drop the bags down inside the jacket one by one, +and mark the place. Then, holding his peace until the cargo was out of the +hold, he drew a chalk line straight down from his mark to the lower deck, +took bearings from the hatch, and continued the line from the beam-clamp to +the bilge, and cut on the curve. There, of course, was where the money had +fallen. He worked hard--and failed." + +Then I remembered the hatch that had been pried off when the natives were +ranging over the boat. + +Early next morning Roger, Mr. Cledd, and I, placing the money between us in +the boat and arming ourselves and our men, each with a brace of pistols, +went ashore. That brief trip seems a mere trifle as I write of it here and +now, so far in distance and in time from the river at Whampoa, but I truly +think it was as perilous a voyage as any I have made; for pirates, or +Ladronesers as they were called, could not be distinguished from ordinary +boatmen, and enough true stories of robbery and murder on that river passed +current among seafaring men in my boyhood to make the everlasting fortune +of one of those fellows who have nothing better to do than sit down and +spin out a yarn of hair-raising adventures. But we showed our cocked +pistols and passed unmolested through the press, and came at last safe to +the landing. + +Laboring under the weight of gold, we went by short stages up to the +factory, where Mr. Johnston in his dressing-gown met us, blessing his soul +and altogether upset. + +"Never in my life," he cried, clasping his hands, "have I seen such men as +you. And now, pray, what brings you here?" + +"We have come with one hundred thousand dollars," said Roger, "to be paid +to the Chinese gentleman of whom you and I have spoken together." + +Mr. Johnston looked at the lumpy bundles wrapped now in canvas and for once +rose to an emergency. "Come in," he said. "I'll dispatch a messenger +immediately. Come in and I'll join you at breakfast." + +We ate our breakfast that morning with a fortune in gold coin under the +table; and when the boat came down the river, bringing a quiet man whom Mr. +Johnston introduced as the very person we were seeking, and who himself in +quaint pidgin English corroborated the statement that he it was who had +sent to Thomas Webster the five teakwood chests, we paid him the money and +received in return his receipt beautifully written with small flourishes of +the brush. + +"That's done," said Roger, when all was over, "in spite of as rascally a +crew as ever sailed a Salem ship. I am, I fear, a pirate, a mutineer, and +various other unsavory things; but I declare, Mr. Cledd, in addition to +them all, I am an honest man." + +The coolies already had begun to pass chests of tea into the hold when we +came aboard; and under the eye of the second mate, who was proving himself +in every respect a competent officer,--in his own place the equal, perhaps, +of Mr. Cledd in his,--all hands were industriously working. The days passed +swiftly. Work aboard ship and business ashore crowded every hour; and so +our stay on the river drew to an end. + +Before that time, however, Blodgett hesitantly sought me out one night. +"Mr. Lathrop," he said with a bit of constraint, "I and Davie and Neddie +and cook was a-thinkin' we'd like to do something for poor Bill Hayden's +little girl. Of course we ain't got no great to give, but we've taken up a +little purse of money, and we wondered wouldn't you, seein' you was a good +friend to old Bill, like to come in with us?" + +That I was glad of the chance, I assured him. "And Captain Hamlin will come +in, too," I added. "Oh, I'm certain he will." + +Blodgett seemed pleased. "Thinks I, he's likely to, but it ain't fit I +should ask the captain." + +Promising to present the plea as if it were my own, I sent Blodgett away +reassured, and eventually we all raised a sum that bought such a royal doll +as probably no merchant in Newburyport ever gave his small daughter, and +enough silk to make the little maid, when she should reach the age for it, +as handsome a gown as ever woman wore. Nor was that the end. The night +before we sailed from China, Blodgett came to me secretly, after a +mysterious absence, and pressed a small package into my hand. + +"Don't tell," he said. "It's little enough. If we'd stopped off on some o' +them islands I might ha' done better. Thinks I last night, I'd like to send +her a bit of a gift all by myself as a kind of a keepsake, you know, sir, +seeing I never had a little lass o' my own. So I slips away from the others +and borrows a boat that was handy to the shore and drops down stream +quiet-like till I comes in sight of one of them temples where there's gongs +ringing and all manner of queer goings-on. Says I,--not aloud, you +understand,--'Here, my lad, 's the very place you're looking for, just +a-waiting for you!' So I sneaks up soft and easy,--it were a rare dark +night,--and looks in, and what do I see by the light o' them there crazy +lanterns? There was one o' them heathen idols! Yes, sir, a heathen idol as +handy as you please. 'Aha!' says I,--not aloud, you understand, sir,--'Aha! +I'll wager you've got a fine pair o' rubies in your old eye-sockets, you +blessed idol.' And with that I takes a squint at the lay o' the land and +sees my chance, and in I walks. The old priest, he gives a squawk, but I +cracks him with a brass pot full of incense, which scatters and nigh chokes +me, and I grabs the ear-rings and runs before they catches me, for all +there's a million of 'em a-yammering at my heels. I never had a chance at +the eyes--worse luck! But I fared well, when all's said and done. It was a +dark night, thank heaven, and the boat was handy. The rings is jade. She'll +like 'em some day." + +I restrained my chuckles until he had gone, and added the stolen treasures +to the rest of the gifts. What else could I do? Certainly it was beyond my +power to restore them to the rightful owners. + +The last chest of tea and the last roll of silk were swung into the hold, +the hatches were battened down, and all was cleared for sailing as soon as +wind and tide should favor us. + +That morning Mr. Johnston came aboard, more brisk and pompous than ever, +and having critically inspected the ship, met us in the cabin for a final +word. My new duties as supercargo had kept me busy and my papers were +scattered over the table; but when I started to gather them up and +withdraw, he motioned me to stay. + +"Never in all my experience has such a problem as this arisen," he +exclaimed, rubbing his chin lugubriously. "Bless my soul! Who ever heard of +such a thing? Captain and chief mate murdered--crew mutinied--bless my +soul! Well, Captain Hamlin--I suppose you've noticed before, that I give +you the title of master?--well, Captain Hamlin, I fear I'm compounding +felony, but after all that's a matter to be settled in the courts. I'm +confident that I cannot be held criminally responsible for not +understanding a nice point in admiralty. Whatever else happens, the ship +must go home to Salem, and you, sir, are the logical man to take her home. +Well, sir, although in a way you represent the owners more directly than I +do, still your authority is vicariously acquired and I've that here +which'll protect you against interruption in the course of the voyage by +any lawful process. I doubt, from all I've heard, if Falk will go to law; +but here's a paper--" he drew it out of his pocket and laid it on the +table--"signed, sealed and witnessed, stating that I, Walter Johnston, +agent in China for Thomas Webster and Sons, do hereby recognize you as +master of the ship Island Princess, and do invest you, as far as my +authority goes, with whatever privileges and responsibilities are attached +to the office. All questions legal and otherwise, ensuing from this +investure, must be settled on your arrival at the United States of America. +That, sir, is the best I can do for you, and I assure you that I hope +sincerely you may not be hanged as a pirate but that I am by no means +certain of it." + +Thus he left-handedly concluded his remarks, and murmuring under his +breath, "Bless my soul," as if in final protest against everything without +precedent, folded his fat hands over his expansive waist-band. + +"I thank you, Mr. Johnston," Roger replied gravely, though he could not +completely hide the amusement in his eyes. "I'm sure it is handsome of you +to do so much for us, and I certainly hope no act of piracy or violence, of +which we may have been guilty, will compromise you in the slightest +degree." + +"Thank _you_, Captain Hamlin. I hope so myself." + +If I had met Roger's glance, I must have laughed outright. The man was so +unconscious of any double edge to Roger's words, and so complacent, that +our meeting was all but farce, when he bethought himself of another subject +of which he had intended to speak. + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "I well nigh forgot. Shall you--but of +course you will not!--go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +Mr. Cledd, who hitherto had sat with a slight smile on his lean Yankee +face, now looked at Roger with keener interest. + +"Yes," said Roger, "I shall go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"Now surely, Captain Hamlin, that would be folly; there are other courses." + +"But none so direct." + +"A long way round is often the shortest way home. Why, bless my soul, that +would be to back your sails in the face of Providence." + +Roger leaned forward. "Why should I not go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +"Why, my dear sir, if any one were--er-er--to wish you harm,--and if your +own story is to be believed, there are those who do wish you harm,--Sunda +Strait, of all places in the world, is the easiest to cut you off." + +"Mr. Johnston, that is nonsense," said Roger. "Such things don't happen. I +will go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"But, Captain Hamlin,--" the good man rubbed his hands more nervously than +ever,--"but, Captain Hamlin, bless my soul, I consider it highly +inadvisable." + +Roger smiled. "Sir, I will not back down. By Sunda Strait we came. By Sunda +Strait we'll return. If any man wishes to see us there--" He finished the +sentence with another smile. + +Mr. Cledd spoke up sharply. "Ay, and if a certain man we all know of should +appear, I'm thinking he'd be unpleasantly surprised to find me aboard." + +Mr. Johnston rubbed his hands and tapped the table and rubbed his hands +again. So comfortable did he appear, and so well-fed, that he seemed quite +out of place in that severely plain cabin, beside Roger and Mr. Cledd. That +he had a certain mercantile shrewdness I was ready to admit; but the others +were men fearless and quick to act. + +"Bless my soul!" he said at last, beating a tattoo on the table with his +soft fingers. "Bless my soul!" + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THROUGH SUNDA STRAIT + + +Laden deep with tea and silk, we dropped down the Chu-Kiang, past Macao and +the Ladrone Islands, and out through the Great West Channel. Since the +northeast monsoon now had set in and the winds were constant, we soon +passed the tide-rips of St. Esprit, and sighting only a few small islands +covered with brush and mangroves, where the seas broke in long lines of +silver under an occasional cocoanut palm, we left astern in due time the +treacherous water of the Paracel Reefs. + +Each day was much like every other until we had put the China Sea behind +us. We touched at the mouth of the Saigon, but found no promise of trade, +and weighed anchor again with the intention of visiting Singapore. Among +other curious things, we saw a number of pink porpoises and some that were +mottled pink and white and brown. Porpoises not infrequently are spotted by +disease; but those that we saw appeared to be in excellent health, and +although we remarked on their odd appearance, we believed their strange +colors to be entirely natural. A fleet of galleys, too, which we saw in the +offing, helped break the monotony of our life. There must have been fifty +of them, with flags a-flutter and arms bristling. Although we did not +approach them near enough to learn more about them, it seemed probable that +they were conveying some great mandarin or chief on affairs of state. + +"That man Blodgett is telling stories of one kind or another," Mr. Cledd +remarked one afternoon, after watching a little group that had gathered by +the forecastle-hatch during the first dog-watch. "The fortuneteller fellow, +too, Benson, is stirring up the men." + +As I looked across the water at the small island of palms where the waves +were rolling with a sullen roar, which carried far on the evening air, I +saw a native boat lying off the land, and dimly through the mists I saw the +sail of an old junk. I watched the junk uneasily. Small wonder that the men +were apprehensive, I thought. + +After leaving Singapore, we passed the familiar shores of eastern Sumatra, +Banka Island and Banka Strait, and the mouths of the Palambang, but in an +inverted order, which made them seem as strange as if we never before had +sighted them. Then one night, heading west against the tide, we anchored in +a rolling swell, with Kodang Island to the northeast and Sindo Island to +the north. On the one hand were the Zutphen Islands; on the other was Hog +Point; and almost abeam of us the Sumatran coast rose to the steep bluff +that across some miles of sea faces the Java shore. We lay in Sunda Strait. + +I came on deck after a while and saw the men stirring about. + +"They're uneasy," said Mr. Cledd. + +"I'm not surprised," I replied. + +The trees on the high summit of the island off which we lay were +silhouetted clearly against the sky. What spying eyes might not look down +upon us from those wooded heights? What lawless craft might not lurk beyond +its abrupt headlands? + +"No, I don't wonder, either," said Mr. Cledd, thoughtfully. + +At daybreak we again weighed anchor and set sail. Three or four times a +far-away vessel set my heart leaping, but each in turn passed and we saw it +no more. A score of native proas manoeuvring at a distance singly or by +twos caused Roger to call up the watch and prepare for any eventuality; but +they vanished as silently as they had appeared. At nightfall we once more +hove to, having made but little progress, and lay at anchor until dawn. + +In the darkness that night the cook came up to me in the waist whither I +had wandered, unable to sleep. "Mistah Lathrop," he muttered, "Ah don't +like dis yeh nosing and prying roun' islands whar a ship's got to lay up +all night jes' like an ol' hen with a mess of chickens." + +We watched phosphorescent waves play around the anchor cable. The spell of +uneasiness weighed heavily on us both. + +The next evening, still beating our way against adverse winds, we rounded +Java Head, which seemed so low by moonlight that I scarcely could believe +it was the famous promontory beyond which lay the open sea. I went to my +stateroom, expecting once again to sleep soundly all night long. Certainly +it seemed now that all our troubles must be over. Yet I could not compose +myself. After a time I came on deck, and found topsails and royals set and +Mr. Cledd in command. + +"All goes well, Mr. Lathrop," he said with a smile, "but that darky cook +seems not to believe it. He's prowling about like an old owl." + +"Which is he?" I asked; for several of the men were pacing the deck and at +the moment I could not distinguish between them. + +"They do seem to be astir. That nearest man walks like Blodgett. Has the +negro scared them all?" + +When, just after Mr. Cledd had spoken, Blodgett came aft, we were +surprised; but he approached us with an air of suppressed excitement, which +averted any reprimand Mr. Cledd may have had in mind. + +"If you please, sir," he said, "there's a sail to windward." + +"To windward? You're mistaken. You ought to call out if you see a sail, but +it's just as well you didn't this time." + +Mr. Cledd turned his back on Blodgett after looking hard up the wind. + +"If you please, sir, I've got good eyes." Blodgett's manner was such that +no one could be seriously offended by his persistence. + +"My eyes are good, too," Mr. Cledd replied rather sharply. "I see no +sail." + +Nor did I. + +Blodgett leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness like a cat. "If +you please, sir," he said, "I beg your pardon, but I _can_ see a sail." + +Now, for the first time I thought that I myself saw something moving. "I +see a bank of fog blowing westward," I remarked, "but I don't think it's a +sail." + +After a moment, Mr. Cledd spoke up frankly. "I'll take back what I've just +said. I see it too. It's only a junk, but I suppose we'd better call the +captain." + +"Only a junk!" Blodgett repeated sharply. "When last we saw 'em, a junk was +all they had." + +"What's that?" Mr. Cledd demanded. + +"Ay, ay, sir, they was sailing away in a junk, sir." + +Mr. Cledd stepped to the companionway. "Captain Hamlin," he called. + +The junk was running free when we first sighted her, but just as she was +passing astern of us, she began to come slowly about. I could see a great +number of men swaying in unison against the helm that controlled the +gigantic rudder. Others were bracing the curious old sails. + +"I wish she were near enough for us to watch them handle the sails on the +after masts," I said. + +She had a pair of mizzen-masts, one on the larboard side, one on the +starboard, and I was puzzled to know how they were used. + +"She'll pass close aboard on this next tack," Mr. Cledd replied. "I think +we'll be able to see." He had paused to watch her manoeuvres. + +"Here's the doctor," Blodgett murmured. + +Black Frank was coming aft with a quick humpy walk. "'Scuse me, sah, 'scuse +me!" he said. "But I's skeered that we--" + +Mr. Cledd now had gone to the companion. "Captain Hamlin," he called again, +"there's a junk passing close aboard." + +I heard Roger's step on the companion-way. It later transpired that he had +not heard the first summons. + +"Mah golly! Look dah!" the cook exclaimed. + +The junk was looming up dangerously. + +Mr. Cledd caught my arm. "Run forward quick--quick--call up all hands," he +cried. Then raising the trumpet, "Half a dozen of you men loose the +cannon." + +Leaping to the spar deck, I ran to do his bidding, for the junk now was +bearing swiftly down upon us. On my way to the forecastle-hatch I noted the +stacked pikes and loaded muskets by the mainmast, and picked out the most +likely cover from which to fire on possible boarders. That my voice was +shaking with excitement, I did not realize until I had sent my summons +trembling down into the darkness. + +I heard the men leaping from their bunks; I heard Roger giving sharp +commands from the quarter-deck; I heard voices on the junk. By accident or +by malice, she inevitably was going to collide with the Island Princess. As +we came up into the wind with sails a-shiver, I scurried back to the stack +of muskets. + +Neddie Benson was puffing away just behind me. "I didn't ought to 'ave +come," he moaned. "I had my warning. Oh, it serves me right--I might 'a' +married the lady." + +"Bah, that's no way for a _man_ to talk," cried Davie Paine. + +It all was so unreal that I felt as if I were looking at a picture. It did +not seem as if it could be Ben Lathrop who was standing shoulder to +shoulder with Neddie Benson and old Davie. There was running and calling on +all sides and aloft. Blocks were creaking as the men hauled at braces and +halyards; and when the ship rolled I saw that the men on the yard-arms were +shaking the courses from the gaskets. Although our crew was really too +small to work the ship and fight at the same time, it was evident that +Roger intended so far as possible to do both. + +But meanwhile the junk had worn ship and she still held her position to +windward. Suddenly there came from her deck the flash of a musket and a +loud report. Then another and another. Then Roger's voice sounded sharply +above the sudden clamor and our own long gun replied. + +Flame from its muzzle burst in the faces of the men at the bow of the junk, +and the ball, mainly by chance, I suppose, hit her foremast and brought +down mast and sail. Then the junk came about and bumped into us abreast, +with a terrific crash that stove in the larboard bulwark and showered us +with fragments of carved and gilded wood broken from her towering bow. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +PIKES, CUTLASSES, AND GUNS + + +As I hastily poured powder into the pan of my musket, a man sprang to our +deck and dashed at Davie Paine, who thrust out a pike and impaled him as if +he were a fowl on a spit, then reached for a musket. Another came and +another; I saw them leap down singly. One of our new men whom we had signed +at Canton raised his cutlass and sliced down the third man to board us; +then they came on in an overwhelming stream. + +Seeing that it would be suicide to attempt to maintain our ground, and that +we already were cut off from the party on the quarter-deck, we retreated +forward, fighting off the enemy as we went, and ten or a dozen of us took +our stand on the forecastle. + +Kipping and Falk and the beach-combers they had gathered together had +conducted their campaign well. Some half of us were forward, half aft, so +that we could not fire on the boarders without danger of hitting our own +men. Davie Paine clubbed his musket and felled a strange white man, and +Neddie Benson went down with a bullet through his thigh; then the pirates +surged forward and almost around us. Before we realized what was happening, +we had been forced back away from Neddie and had retreated to the +knightheads. We saw a beast of a yellow ruffian stab Neddie with a kris, +then one of our own men saw a chance to dart back under the very feet of +our enemies and lay hold of Neddie's collar and drag him groaning up to us. + +They came at us hotly, and we fought them off with pikes and cutlasses; but +we were breathing hard now and our arms ached and our feet slipped. The +circle of steel blades was steadily drawing closer. + +That the end of our voyage had come, I was convinced, but I truly was not +afraid to die. It was no credit to me; simply in the heat of action I found +no time for fear. Parry and slash! Slash and parry! Blood was in my eyes. A +cut burned across my right hand. My musket had fallen underfoot and I +wielded a rusty blade that some one else had dropped. Fortunately the flesh +wound I got from the musket-ball in our other battle had healed cleanly, +and no lameness handicapped me. + +We had no idea what was going on aft, and for my own part I supposed that +Roger and the rest were in straits as sore as our own; but suddenly a +tremendous report almost deafened us, and when our opponents turned to see +what had happened we got an instant's breathing-space. + +"It's the stern-chasers," Davie gasped. "They've faced 'em round!" + +The light of a torch flared up and I saw shadowy shapes darting this way +and that. + +There were two cannon; but only one shot had been fired. + +Suddenly Davie seized me by the shoulder. "See! See there!" he cried +hoarsely in my ear. + +I turned and followed his finger with my eyes. High on the stern of the +junk, black against the starlit sky, I saw the unmistakable figure of +Kipping. He was laughing--mildly. The outline of his body and the posture +and motion of his head and shoulders all showed it. Then he leaped to the +deck and we lost sight of him. Where he had mustered that horde of +slant-eyed pirates, we never stopped to wonder. We had no time for idle +questions. + +I know that I, for one, finding time during the lull in the fighting to +appraise our chances, expected to die there and then. A vastly greater +force was attacking us, and we were divided as well as outnumbered. But if +we were to die, we were determined to die fighting; so with our backs to +the bulwark and with whatever weapons we had been able to snatch up in our +hands, we defended ourselves as best we could and had no more respite to +think of what was going on aft. + +Only one stern gun, you remember, had been fired. Now the second spoke. + +There was a yell of anguish as the ball cut through the midst of the +pirates, a tremendous crash that followed almost instantly the report of +the cannon, a sort of brooding hush, then a thunderous reverberation +compared with which all other noises of the night had been as nothing. + +Tongues of flame sprang skyward and a ghastly light shot far out on the +sea. The junk heaved back, settled, turned slowly over and seemed to spread +out into a great mass of wreckage. Pieces of timber and plank and spar came +tumbling down and a few men scrambled to our decks. We could hear others +crying out in the water, as they swam here and there or grasped at planks +and beams to keep themselves afloat. + + +The cannon ball had penetrated the side of the junk and had exploded a +great store of gunpowder. + +Part of the wreckage of the junk was burning, and the flames threw a red +glare over the strange scene aboard the ship, where the odds had been so +suddenly altered. Our assailants, who but a moment before had had us at +their mercy, now were confounded by the terrific blow they had received; +instead of fighting the more bravely because no retreat was left them, they +were confused and did not know which way to turn. + +Davie Paine, sometimes so slow-witted, seemed now to grasp the situation +with extraordinary quickness. "Come on, lads," he bellowed, "we've got 'em +by the run." + +Again clubbing his musket, he leaped into the gangway so ferociously that +the pirates scrambled over the side, brown men and white, preferring to +take their chances in the sea. As he charged on, I lost sight of him in the +maelstrom of struggling figures. On my left a Lascar was fighting for his +life against one of our new crew. On every side men were splashing and +shouting and cursing. + +Now, high above the uproar, I heard a voice, at once familiar and strange. +For a moment I could not place it; it had a wild note that baffled me. Then +I saw black Frank, cleaver in hand, come bounding out of the darkness. His +arms and legs, like the legs of some huge tarantula, flew out at all angles +as he ran, and in fierce gutturals he was yelling over and over again:-- + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +He peered this way and that. + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +Out of the corner of my eye I saw some one stir by the deck-house, and the +negro, seeing him at the same moment, leaped at my own conclusion. + +In doubt whither to flee, too much of a coward at heart either to throw +himself overboard or to face his enemy if there was any chance of escape, +the unhappy Kipping hesitated one second too long. With a mighty lunge the +negro caught him by the throat, and for a moment the two swayed back and +forth in the open space between us and our enemies. + +I thought of the night when they had fought together in the galley door. +Momentarily Kipping seemed actually to hold his own against the mad negro; +but his strength was of despair and almost at once we saw that it was +failing. + +"Stop!" Kipping cried. "I'll yield! Stop--stop! Don't kill me!" + +For a moment the negro hesitated. He seemed bewildered; his very passion +seemed to waver. Then I saw that Kipping, all the while holding the negro's +wrist with his left hand, was fumbling for his sheath-knife with his right. +With basest treachery he was about to knife his assailant at the very +instant when he himself was crying for quarter. My shout of warning was +lost in the general uproar; but the negro, though taken off his guard, had +himself perceived Kipping's intentions. + +By a sudden jerk he shook Kipping's hand off his wrist and raised high his +sharp weapon. + +From the shadow of the deck-house one of Kipping's own adherents sprang to +his rescue, but Davie Paine--blundering old Davie!--knocked him flat. + +For an instant the cook's weapon shone bright in the glare of the torches. +Kipping snatched vainly at the black wrist above him, then jerked his knife +clean out of the sheath--but too late. + +"Ah got you now, you pow'ful fighter, you! Ah got you now, you dirty scut!" +the cook yelled, and with one blow of his cleaver he split Kipping's skull +to the chin. + + + * * * * * + + +When at last we braced the yards and drew away from the shattered fragments +of the junk, which were drifting out to sea, we found that of the lawless +company that so confidently had expected to murder us all, only five living +men, one of whom was Captain Nathan Falk, were left aboard. They were a +glum and angry little band of prisoners. + +Lights and voices ashore indicated that some of our assailants had saved +themselves, and by their cries and confused orders we knew that they in +turn were rescuing others. Of their dead we had no record, but the number +must have been large. + +Of us six who had defied Falk in that time long ago, which we had come to +regard almost as ancient history, only Neddie Benson had fallen. Although +we had laughed time and again at the charming plump lady who had prophesied +such terrible events, it had proved in bitter earnest a sad last voyage for +Neddie. + +From the low and distant land there continued to come what seemed to be +only faint whispers of sound, yet we knew that they really were the cries +of men fighting for their lives where the sea beat against the shore. + +"Ah wonder," said the cook, grimly, "how dem yeh scalliwaggles gwine git +along come Judgment when Gab'el blows his ho'n and Peter rattles his keys +and all de wicked is a-wailin' and a-weepin' and a-gnashin' and can't git +in nohow. Yass, sah. Ah guess dis yeh ol' nigger, he's gwine sit on de +pearly gate and twiddle his toes at 'em." + +He folded his arms and stood in the lantern light, with a dreamy expression +on his grotesque face such as I had seen there once or twice before. When +he glanced at me with that strange affection shining from his great eyes, +he seemed like some big, benign dog. Never had I seen a calmer man. It +seemed impossible that passion ever had contorted those homely black +features. + +But the others were discussing the fate of our prisoners. I heard Roger +say, "Let me look at them, Mr. Cledd. I'll know them--some of them anyway. +Ah, Captain Falk? And the carpenter? Well, well, well! We hadn't dared hope +for the pleasure of your company on the return voyage. In fact, we'd quite +given it up. I may add that we'd reconciled ourselves to the loss of it." + +I now edged toward them, followed by the cook. + +"Ay, Mr. Hamlin, it's all very well for you to talk like that," Falk +replied in a trembling voice from which all arrogance had not yet vanished. +"I'm lawful master of this here vessel, as you very well know. You're +nothing but a mutineer and a pirate. Go ahead and kill me! Why don't you? +You know I can tell a story that will send you to the gallows. What have I +done, but try to get back the owners' property and defend it? To think that +I could have knocked you and that addle-pated Ben Lathrop on the head any +day I wished! And I wished it, too, but Kipping he said--" + +Falk stopped suddenly. + +"So Kipping had a finger in the pie, did he?" said Roger. "Well, Mr. Falk, +what did Kipping say?" + +Falk bit his lip sullenly and remained silent. + +There really was something pathetic in the man's plight. He had been +ambitious, and ambition alone, which often is a virtue, had gone far to +contribute to his downfall. In many ways he was so weak! A quality that in +other men might have led to almost anything good, in him had bred +resentment and trickery and at last downright crime. He stood there now, +ruined in his profession, the leader of a defeated band of criminals and +vagabonds. Yet if he had succeeded in capturing the ship and putting the +rest of us to death, he could have sailed her home to Salem, and by +spreading his own version of the mutiny have gained great credit, and +probably promotion, for himself. + +"Well, Chips," said Roger, "I hope you, at least, are pleased with your +prospects." + +The carpenter likewise made no reply. + +"Hm, Mr. Cledd, they haven't a great deal to say, have they?" + +"Aha," the negro murmured just behind me, "dey's got fine prospec's, dey +has. Dey's gwine dance, dey is, yass, sah, on de end of a rope, and after +dey's done dance a while dey's gwine be leetle che'ubs, dey is, and flap +dey wings and sing sweet on a golden harp. Yass, sah." + +The carpenter shot an angry glance at the cook, but no one else paid him +any attention. + +A fire was flaming now on the distant shore. The seas rushed and gurgled +along the side of the ship. Our lights dipped with the rigging as the ship +rolled and tossed, now lifting her dripping sides high out of water, now +plunging them again deep into the trough. + +"Mr. Cledd, I think we can spare those five men a boat," Roger said, after +a time. + +"You're not going to let them go!" Mr. Cledd exclaimed. + +"Yes." + +Mr. Cledd raised his eyebrows, but silently acceded. + +I thought that an expression of relief crossed Falk's face, yet dismay was +mingled with it. Those were dark, inhospitable lands to leeward. The +carpenter opened his mouth as if to speak, closed it without a word, and +vacantly stared at Roger. The rest of us exchanged glances of surprise. + +When we had hove to, they lowered the boat, fumbling at the falls while +they did so, as if they were afraid to leave the ship. The seas caught the +boat and bumped it against the side, but Falk still lingered, even when +Roger indicated by a gesture that he was to go. + +"Ay," he cried, "it's over the side and away. You're sending us to our +death, Mr. Hamlin." + +"To your death?" said Roger. "Sir, do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Falk glared sullenly, but made no reply. + +"Sir," Roger repeated sharply, "do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Still there was no response. + +"Ah, I thought not. Stay here, if you wish. I shall have you put in irons; +I should not be justified in any other course. But in Salem we'll lay our +two stories before the owners--ay, and before the law. Then, sir, if you +are in the right and I am in the wrong, your triumph will repay you many +times over for the discomforts of a few months in irons. No? Will you not +come?" + +Still Falk did not reply. + +"Sir," Roger sternly cried, "if I were to take you back a prisoner to +Salem, you'd go to the gallows by way of the courts. Here you can steer +your own course--though in all probability the port will be the same." + +Without another word Falk went over the side, and down by the chains to the +boat that was bumping below. But before we cast off the painter, he looked +up at us in the light of a lantern that some one held over the bulwark and +cried bitterly, "I hope, Mr. Hamlin, you're satisfied now. I'm rightful +master of that vessel in spite of all your high-handed tricks." + +For the first time I noticed the marks of wounds that he had got in the +fight off the island. His face was white and his eyes were at once fierce +and hunted. + +"You're mistaken," Roger replied. "I have papers from the firm's agent that +appoint me as master." Then he laughed softly and added, "But any time you +wish to carry our little dispute to the courts, you'll find me ready and +willing to meet you there. Too ready, Mr. Falk, for your own good. No, Mr. +Falk, it's better for you that you leave us here. Go your own gait. May you +fare better than you deserve!" + +We cast off the painter, and they rowed into the dark toward the shore of +Java. They were men of broken fortunes, whose only hope for life lay in a +land infested with cut-throat desperadoes. I thought of Kipping who lay +dead on our deck. It seemed to me after all that Falk had got the worse +punishment; he had aspired to better things; weak though he was, there had +been the possibility of much good in his future. Now his career was +shattered; never again could he go home to his own country. + +Yet when all was said and done, it was more merciful to set him adrift than +to bring him home to trial. Though he must suffer, he would suffer alone. +The punishment that he so fully deserved would not be made more bitter by +his knowing that all who knew him knew of his ruined life. + +"Poor Falk!" I thought, and was amazed at myself for thinking almost kindly +of him. + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +"SO ENDS" + + +Through the watches that followed I passed as if everything were unreal; +they were like a succession of nightmares, and to this day they are no more +than shadows on my memory. Working in silence, the men laid the dead on +clean canvas and washed down the decks; cut away wreckage, cleared the +running rigging, and replaced with new sails those that had been cut or +burned in battle. Then came the new day with its new duties; and a sad day +it was for those of us who had stood together through so many hardships, +when Neddie Benson went over the side with a prayer to speed him. We were +homeward bound with all sail set, but things that actually had happened +already seemed incredible, and concerning the future we could only +speculate. + +We had gone a long way on our journey toward the Cape of Good Hope before +our new carpenter had repaired the broken bulwark and the various other +damages the ship had suffered, and before the rigging was thoroughly +restored. Weeks passed, their monotony broken only by the sight of an +occasional sail; days piled on end, morning and night, night and morning, +until weeks had become months. In the fullness of time we rounded Good +Hope, and now swiftly with fair winds, now slowly with foul, we worked up +to the equator, then home across the North Atlantic. + +On the afternoon of a bright day in the fall, more than a year after we +first had set sail, we passed Baker Island and stood up Salem Harbor. + +Bleak and bare though they were, the rough, rocky shores were home. To +those of us who hailed from Salem, every roof and tree gave welcome after +an absence of eighteen months. Already, we knew, reports of our approach +would have spread far and wide. Probably a dozen good old captains, +sweeping the sea, each with his glass on his "captain's walk," had sighted +our topsails while we were hull down and had cried out that Joseph Whidden +was home again. Such was the penetration of seafaring men in those good old +days when they recognized a ship and its master while as yet they could spy +nothing more than topgallantsails. + +We could see the people gathering along the shore and lining the wharf and +calling and cheering and waving hands. We thought of our comrades whom we +had left in far seas; we longed and feared to ask a thousand questions +about those at home, of whom we had thought so tenderly and so often. + +Already boats were putting out to greet us; and now, in the foremost of +them, one of the younger Websters stood up. "Mr. Hamlin, ahoy!" he called, +seeing Roger on the quarter-deck. "Where is Captain Whidden?" + +Roger did not answer until the boat had come fairly close under the rail, +and meanwhile young Webster stood looking up at him as if more than half +expecting bad news. + +Only when the boat was so near that each could see the other's expression +and hear every inflection of the other's voice, did Roger reply. + +"He is dead." + +"We heard a story," young Webster cried in great excitement, coming briskly +aboard. "One Captain Craigie, brig Eve late from Bencoolen, brought it. An +appalling tale of murder and mutiny. As he had it, the men mutinied against +Mr. Thomas and against Mr. Falk when he assumed command. They seized the +ship and killed Mr. Thomas and marooned Mr. Falk, who, while Captain +Craigie was thereabouts, hustled a crew of fire-eating Malays and white +adventurers and bought a dozen barrels of powder and set sail with a fleet +of junks to retake the ship. But that, of course, is stuff and nonsense. +Where's Falk?" + +"Falk," said Roger with a wry smile, "decided to spend the rest of his days +at the Straits." + +"Oh!" Young Webster looked hard at Roger and then looked around the deck. +All was ship-shape, but there were many strange faces. + +"Oh," he said again. "And you--" He stopped short. + +"And I?" Roger repeated. + +Again young Webster looked around the ship. He bit his lip. "What is _your_ +story, Mr. Hamlin?" he said sharply. + +"Is your father here, Mr. Webster?" Roger asked. + +"No," the young man replied stiffly, "he is at Newburyport, but I have no +doubt whatsoever that he will return at once when he hears you have +arrived. This seems to be a strange situation, Mr. Hamlin. Who is in +command here?" + +"I am, sir." + +"Oh!" After a time he added, "I heard rumors, but I refused to credit +them." + +"What do you mean by that, sir?" Roger asked. + +"Oh, nothing much, sir. You evaded my question. What is _your_ story?" + +"_My_ story?" Roger looked him squarely in the eye. In Roger's own eyes +there was the glint of his old humorous twinkle, and I knew that the young +man's bustling self-importance amused him. + +"My story?" Roger repeated. "Why, such a story as I have to tell, I'll tell +your father when I report to him." + +Young Webster reddened. "Oh!" he said with a sarcastic turn of his voice. +"Stuff and nonsense! It may be--or it may not." And with that he stationed +himself by the rail and said no more. + +When at last we had come to anchor and young Webster had gone hastily +ashore and we had exchanged greetings at a distance with a number of +acquaintances, Roger and Mr. Cledd and I sat down--perhaps more promptly +than need be--over our accounts in the great cabin. I felt bitterly +disappointed that none of my own people had come to welcome me; but +realizing how silly it was to think that they surely must know of our +arrival, I jumped at Roger's suggestion that we gather up our various +documents and then leave Mr. Cledd in charge--he was not a Salem man--and +hurry home as fast as we could go. + +As we bent to our work, Mr. Cledd remarked with a dry smile, "I'm thinking, +sir, there's going to be more of a sting to this pirate-and-mutiny business +than I'd believed. That smug, sarcastic young man means trouble or I've no +eye for weather." + +"He's the worst of all the Websters," Roger replied thoughtfully. "And I'll +confess that Captain Craigie's story knocks the wind out of _my_ canvas. +Who'd have looked for a garbled story of our misfortunes to outsail us? +However,--" he shook his head and brushed away all such anxieties,--"time +will tell. Now, gentlemen, to our accounts." + +Before we had more than got well started, I heard a voice on deck that +brought me to my feet. + +There was a step on the companionway, and then, "Father!" I cried, and +leaped up with an eagerness that, boy-like, I thought I concealed with +painstaking dignity when I shook his hand. + +"Come, come, come, you young rascals!" my father cried. "What's the meaning +of this? First hour in the home port and you are as busy at your books as +if you were old students like myself. Come, put by your big books and your +ledgers, lads. Roger, much as I hate to have to break bad news, your family +are all in Boston, so--more joy to us!--there's nothing left but you shall +come straight home with Benny here. Unless, that is--" my father's eyes +twinkled just as Roger's sometimes did--"unless you've more urgent business +elsewhere." + +"I thank you, sir," said Roger, "but I have _no_ more urgent business, and +I shall be--well, delighted doesn't half express it." + +His manner was collected enough, but at my father's smile he reddened and +his own eyes danced. + +"Pack away your books and come along, then. There's some one will be glad +to see you besides Benny's mother. Leave work till morning. I'll wager come +sun-up you'll be glad enough to get to your tasks if you've had a little +home life meanwhile. Come, lads, come." + +Almost before we fully could realize what it meant, we were walking up to +the door of my own home, and there was my mother standing on the threshold, +and my sister, her face as pink now as it had been white on the day long +ago when she had heard that Roger was to sail as supercargo. + +Many times more embarrassed than Roger, whom I never had suspected of such +shamelessness, I promptly turned my back on him and my sister; where upon +my father laughed aloud and drew me into the house. From the hall I saw +the dining-table laid with our grandest silver, and, over all, the +towering candle-sticks that were brought forth only on state occasions. + +"And now, lads," said my father, when we sat before such a meal as only +returning prodigals can know, "what's this tale of mutiny and piracy with +which the town's been buzzing these two weeks past? Trash, of course." + +"Why, sir, I think we've done the right thing," said Roger, "and yet I +can't say that it's trash." + +When my father had heard the story he said so little that he frightened me; +and my mother and sister exchanged anxious glances. + +"Of course," Roger added, "we are convinced absolutely, and if that fellow +hadn't got away at Whampoa, we'd have proof of Kipping's part in it--" + +"But he got away," my father interposed, "and I question if his word is +good for much, in any event. Poor Joseph Whidden! We were boys together." + +He shortly left the table, and a shadow seemed to have fallen over us. We +ate in silence, and after supper Roger and my sister went into the garden +together. What, I wondered, was to become of us now? + +That night I dreamed of courts and judges and goodness knows what penalties +of the law, and woke, and dreamed again, and slept uneasily until the +unaccustomed sound of some one pounding on our street door waked me in the +early morning. + +After a time a servant answered the loudly repeated summons. Low voices +followed, then I heard my father open his own door and go out into the +hall. + +"Is that you, Tom Webster?" he called. + +"It is. I'm told you've two of my men here in hiding. Rout 'em out. What +brand of discipline do you call this? All hands laying a-bed at four in the +morning. I've been up all night. Called by messenger just as I turned in at +that confounded tavern, charged full price for a night's lodging,--curse +that skinflint Hodges!--and took a coach that brought me to Salem as fast +as it could clip over the road. I'm too fat to straddle a horse. Come, +where's Hamlin and that young scamp of yours?" + +I scrambled out of bed and was dressing as fast as I could, when I heard +Roger also in the hall. + +"Aha! Here he is," Mr. Webster cried. "Fine sea-captain you are, you young +mutineer, laying abed at cockcrow! Come, stir a leg there. I've been aboard +ship this morning, after a ride that was like to shake my liver into my +boots. Where's Ben Lathrop? Come, come, you fine-young-gentleman +supercargo." + +Crying, "Here I am," I pulled on my boots and joined the others in the +lower hall, and the three of us, Mr. Webster, Roger, and I, hurried down +the street in time to the old man's testy exclamations, which burst out +fervently and often profanely whenever his lame foot struck the +ground harder than usual. "Pirates--mutineers--young cubs--laying abed-- +cockcrow--" and so on, until we were in a boat and out on the harbor, where +the Island Princess towered above the morning mist. + +"Lathrop'll row us," the old man snapped out. "Good for him--stretch his +muscles." + +Coming aboard the ship, we hailed the watch and went directly to the cabin. + +"Now," the old man cried, "bring out your log-book and your papers." + +He slowly scanned the pages of the log and looked at our accounts with a +searching gaze that noted every figure, dot and comma. After a time he +said, "Tell me everything." + +It was indeed a strange story that Roger told, and I thought that I read +incredulity in the old man's eyes; but he did not interrupt the narrative +from beginning to end. When it was done, he spread his great hands on the +table and shot question after question, first at one of us, then at the +other, indicating by his glance which he wished to answer him. + +"When first did you suspect Falk?--What proof had you?--Did Captain Whidden +know anything from the start?--How do you know that Falk was laying for Mr. +Thomas?--Do you know the penalty for mutiny?--Do you know the penalty for +piracy?--Hand out your receipts for all money paid over at Canton.--Who in +thunder gave you command of my ship?--Do you appreciate the seriousness of +overthrowing the lawful captain?--How in thunder did you force that paper +out of Johnston?" + +His vehemence and anger seemed to grow as he went on, and for twenty +minutes he snapped out his questions till it seemed as if we were facing a +running fire of musketry. His square, smooth-shaven chin was thrust out +between his bushy side-whiskers, and his eyes shot fiercely, first at +Roger, then at me. + +A small swinging lantern lighted the scene. Its rays made the corners seem +dark and remote. They fell on the rough features of the old merchant +mariner who owned the ship and who so largely controlled our fortunes, +making him seem more irascible than ever, and faded out in the early +morning light that came in through the deadlights. + +At last he placed his hands each on the opposite shoulder, planted his +elbows on the table, and fiercely glared at us while he demanded, "Have you +two young men stopped yet to think how it'll seem to be hanged?" + +The lantern swung slowly during the silence that followed. The shadows +swayed haltingly from side to side. + +"No," cried Roger hotly, "we have not, Captain Webster. We've been too busy +looking after _your_ interests." + +The scar where the case-knife had slashed his cheek so long ago stood +starkly out from the dull red of his face. + +At that the old man threw back his head and burst into a great guffaw of +laughter. He laughed until the lantern trembled, until his chair leaned so +far back that I feared he was about to fall,--or hoped he was,--until it +seemed as if the echoes must come booming back from the farthest shore. + +"Lads, lads!" he cried, "you're good lads. You're the delight of an old +man's heart! You've done fine! Roger Hamlin, I've a new ship to be finished +this summer. You shall be master, if you'll be so kind, for an old man that +wishes you well, and"--here he slyly winked at me--"on the day you take a +wife, there'll come to your bride a kiss and a thousand dollars in gold +from Thomas Webster. As for Ben, here, he's done fine as supercargo of the +old Island Princess,--them are good accounts, boy,--and I'll recommend he +sails in the new ship with you." + +He stopped short then and looked away as if through the bulkhead and over +the sea as far, perhaps, as Sunda Strait, and the long line of Sunda +Islands bending like a curved blade to guard the mysteries of the East +against such young adventurers as we. + +After a time he said in a very different voice, "I was warned of one man in +the crew, just after you sailed." His fingers beat a dull tattoo on the +polished table. "It was too late then to help matters, so I said never a +word--not even to my own sons. But--" the old man's voice hardened--"if +Nathan Falk ever again sets foot on American soil he'll hang higher than +ever Haman hung, if I have to build the gallows with my own two hands, Mr. +Hamlin--ay, he or any man of his crew. The law and I'll work together to +that end, Mr. Hamlin." + +So for a long time we sat and talked of one thing and another. + +When at last we went on deck, Mr. Cledd spoke to Roger of something that +had happened early in the watch. I approached them idly, overheard a phrase +or two and joined them. + +"It was the cook," Mr. Cledd was saying. "He was trying to sneak aboard in +the dark. I don't think he had been drinking. I can't understand it. He had +a big bag of dried apples and said that was all he went for. I don't like +to discipline a man so late in the voyage." + +"Let it pass," Roger replied. "Cook's done good work for us." + +I didn't understand then what it meant; but later in the day I heard some +one say softly, "Mistah Lathrop, Ah done got an apple pie, yass, sah. Young +gen'lems dey jest got to have pie. You jest come long with dis yeh ol' +nigger." + +There were tears in my eyes when I saw the great pie that the old African +had baked. I urged him to share it with me, and though for a time he +refused, at last he hesitantly consented. "Ah dunno," he remarked, "Ah +dunno as Ah had ought to. Pies, dey's foh young gen'lems and officers, but +dis yeh is a kind of ambigoo-cous pie--yass, sah, seeing you say so, Ah +will." + +Never did eating bread and salt together pledge a stronger or more enduring +friendship. To this very day I have the tenderest regard for the old man +with whom I had passed so many desperate hours. + +That old Blodgett and Davie Paine should take our gifts to "the tiny wee +girl" at Newburyport we all agreed, when they asked the privilege. "It +ain't but a wee bit to do for a good ship-mate," Blodgett remarked with a +deprecatory wave of his hand. "I'd do more 'n that for the memory of old +Bill Hayden." And just before he left for the journey he cautiously +confided to me, "I've got a few more little tricks I picked up at that 'ere +temple. It don't do to talk about such trinkets,--not that I'm +superstitious,--but she'll never tell if she don't know where they come +from. Ah, Mr. Lathrop, it's sad to lose a fortune, and that's what we done +when we let all them heathen islands go without a good Christian expedition +to destroy the idols and relieve them of their ill-gotten gains." + +The two departed side by side, with their bundles swung over their +shoulders. They and the cook had received double wages to reward their +loyal service, and they carried handsome presents for the little girl of +whom we had heard so much; but it was a sad mission for which they had +offered themselves. No gift on all the green earth could take the place of +poor, faithful old Bill, the father who was never coming home. + +That night, when Roger and I again went together to my own father's house, +eager to tell the news of our good fortune, we found my mother and my +sister in the garden waiting for us. I was not wise enough then to +understand that the tears in my mother's eyes were for a young boy and a +young girl whom she had had but yesterday, but of whom now only memories +remained--memories, and a youth and a woman grown. Nor could I read the +future and see the ships of the firm of Hamlin and Lathrop sailing every +sea. I only thought to myself, as I saw Roger stand straight and tall +beside my sister, with the white scar on his face, that _there_ was a +brother of whom I could be proud. + + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mutineers, by Charles Boardman Hawes + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + +This file should be named 7mutn10.txt or 7mutn10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 7mutn11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 7mutn10a.txt + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu +and the PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: The Mutineers + +Author: Charles Boardman Hawes + +Release Date: January, 2006 [EBook #9657] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on October 13, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + + + + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu +and the PG Distributed Proofreaders + + + + +THE MUTINEERS + + + +_A tale of old days at sea and of adventures in the Far East as Benjamin +Lathrop set it down some sixty years ago_ + + + +by Charles Boardman Hawes + + + + + +_Illustrated_ + + + + +_To_ D.C.H. + + + + +_TO PAY MY SHOT_ + + +_To master, mate, and men of the ship Hunter, whose voyage is the backbone +of my story; to Captain David Woodard, English mariner, who more than a +hundred and twenty years ago was wrecked on the island of Celebes; to +Captain R.G.F. Candage of Brookline, Massachusetts, who was party to the +original contract in melon seeds; and to certain blue-water skippers who +have left sailing directions for eastern ports and seas, I am grateful for +fascinating narratives and journals, and indebted for incidents in this +tale of an earlier generation._ + +_C.B.H._ + + + + + +CONTENTS + + +I +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + I My Father and I Call on Captain Whidden + II Bill Hayden + III The Man Outside the Galley + IV A Piece of Pie + V Kipping + + +II +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + + VI The Council in the Cabin + + VII The Sail with a Lozenge-Shaped Patch + VIII Attacked + IX Bad Signs + X The Treasure-Seeker + + + +III +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + + XI A Hundred Thousand Dollars in Gold + XII A Strange Tale + XIII Trouble Forward + XIV Bill Hayden Comes to the End of His Voyage + + + +IV +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + + XV Mr. Falk Tries to Cover His Tracks + XVI A Prayer for the Dead + XVII Marooned +XVIII Adventures Ashore + + + +V +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + + XIX In Last Resort + XX A Story in Melon Seeds + XXI New Allies + XXII We Attack +XXIII What We Found in the Cabin + + + +VI +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + + XXIV Falk Proposes a Truce + XXV Including a Cross-Examination + XXVI An Attempt to Play on Our Sympathy +XXVII We Reach Whampoa, but Not the End of Our Troubles + + + +VII +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +XXVIII A Mystery Is Solved and a Thief Gets Away + XXIX Homeward Bound + XXX Through Sunda Strait + XXXI Pikes, Cutlasses, and Guns +XXXII "So Ends" + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + +"_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!" + +_Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a +pistol shot rang out sharply, and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and +fall_. + +_We helped him pile his belongings into his chest ... and gave him a hand +on deck_. + +"_Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk_. + +_He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo_. + + + + +[Illustration: "_At 'em, men! At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull_!"] + + + + +I + +IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR CANTON, CHINA + + + +CHAPTER I + +MY FATHER AND I CALL ON CAPTAIN WHIDDEN + + +My father's study, as I entered it on an April morning in 1809, to learn +his decision regarding a matter that was to determine the course of all my +life, was dim and spacious and far removed from the bustle and clamor of +the harbor-side. It was a large room paneled with dark wood. There were +books along the walls, and paintings of ships, and over the fireplace there +stood a beautiful model of a Burmese junk, carved by some brown artist on +the bank of the Irawadi. + +My father sat by the open window and looked out into the warm sunshine, +which was swiftly driving the last snow from the hollows under the +shrubbery. + +Already crocuses were blossoming in the grass of the year before, which was +still green in patches, and the bright sun and the blue sky made the study +seem to me, entering, dark and sombre. It was characteristic of my father, +I thought with a flash of fancy, to sit there and look out into a warm, gay +world where springtime was quickening the blood and sunshine lay warm on +the flowers; he always had lived in old Salem, and as he wrote his sermons, +he always had looked out through study windows on a world of commerce +bright with adventure. For my own part, I was of no mind to play the +spectator in so stirring a drama. + +With a smile he turned at my step. "So, my son, you wish to ship before the +mast," he said, in a repressed voice and manner that seemed in keeping with +the dim, quiet room. "Pray what do you know of the sea?" + +I thought the question idle, for all my life I had lived where I could look +from my window out on the harbor. + +"Why, sir," I replied, "I know enough to realize that I want to follow the +sea." + +"To follow the sea?" + +There was something in my father's eyes that I could not understand. He +seemed to be dreaming, as if of voyages that he himself had made. Yet I +knew he never had sailed blue water. "Well, why not?" he asked suddenly. +"There was a time--" + +I was too young to realize then what has come to me since: that my father's +manner revealed a side of his nature that I never had known; that in his +own heart was a love of adventure that he never had let me see. My sixteen +years had given me a big, strong body, but no great insight, and I thought +only of my own urgent desire of the moment. + +"Many a boy of ten or twelve has gone to sea," I said, "and the Island +Princess will sail in a fortnight. If you were to speak to Captain +Whidden--" + +My father sternly turned on me. "No son of mine shall climb through the +cabin windows." + +"But Captain Whidden--" + +"I thought you desired to follow the sea--to ship before the mast." + +"I do." + +"Then say no more of Captain Whidden. If you wish to go to sea, well and +good. I'll not stand in your way. But we'll seek no favoritism, you and I. +You'll ship as boy, but you'll take your medicine like a man." + +"Yes, sir," I said, trying perversely to conceal my joy. + +"And as for Captain Whidden," my father added, "you'll find he cuts a very +different figure aboard ship from that he shows in our drawing-room." + +Then a smile twinkled through his severity, and he laid his hand firmly on +my shoulder. + +"Son, you have my permission ungrudgingly given. There was a time--well, +your grandfather didn't see things as I did." + +"But some day," I cried, "I'll have a counting-house of my own-- +some day--" + +My father laughed kindly, and I, taken aback, blushed at my own eagerness. + +"Anyway," I persisted, "Roger Hamlin is to go as supercargo." + +"Roger--as supercargo?" exclaimed a low voice. + +I turned and saw that my sister stood in the door. + +"Where--when is he going?" + +"To Canton on the Island Princess! And so am I," I cried. + +"Oh!" she said. And she stood there, silent and a little pale. + +"You'll not see much of Roger," my father remarked to me, still smiling. He +had a way of enjoying a quiet joke at my expense, to him the more pleasing +because I never was quite sure just wherein the humor lay. + +"But I'm going," I cried. "I'm going--I'm going--I'm going!" + +"At the end of the voyage," said my father, "we'll find out whether you +still wish to follow the sea. After all, I'll go with you this evening, +when supper is done, to see Joseph Whidden." + +The lamps were lighted when we left the house, and long beams from the +windows fell on the walk and on the road. We went down the street side by +side, my father absently swinging his cane, I wondering if it were not +beneath the dignity of a young man about to go to sea that his parent +should accompany him on such an errand. + +Just as we reached the corner, a man who had come up the street a little +distance behind us turned in at our own front gate, and my father, seeing +me look back when the gate slammed, smiled and said, "I'll venture a guess, +Bennie-my-lad, that some one named Roger is calling at our house this +evening." + +Afterwards--long, long afterwards--I remembered the incident. + +When my father let the knocker fall against Captain Whidden's great front +door, my heart, it seemed to me, echoed the sound and then danced away at a +lively pace. A servant, whom I watched coming from somewhere behind the +stairs, admitted us to the quiet hall; then another door opened silently, a +brighter light shone out upon us, and a big, grave man appeared. He +welcomed us with a few thoughtful words and, by a motion of his hand, sent +us before him into the room where he had been sitting. + +"And so," said Captain Whidden, when we had explained our errand, "I am to +have this young man aboard my ship." + +"If you will, sir," I cried eagerly, yet anxiously, too, for he did not +seem nearly so well pleased as I had expected. + +"Yes, Ben, you may come with us to Canton; but as your father says, you +must fill your own boots and stand on your own two feet. And will you, +friend Lathrop,"--he turned to my father,--"hazard a venture on the +voyage?" + + +My father smiled. "I think, Joe," he said, "that I've placed a considerable +venture in your hands already." + +Captain Whidden nodded. "So you have, so you have. I'll watch it as best I +can, too, though of course I'll see little of the boy. Let him go now. I'll +talk with you a while if I may." + +My father glanced at me, and I got up. + +Captain Whidden rose, too. "Come down in the morning," he said. "You can +sign with us at the Websters' counting-house.--And good-bye, Ben," he +added, extending his hand. + +"Good-bye? You don't mean--that I'm not to go with you?" + +He smiled. "It'll be a long time, Ben, before you and I meet again on quite +such terms as these." + +Then I saw what he meant, and shook his hand and walked away without +looking back. Nor did I ever learn what he and my father talked about after +I left them there together. + + + +CHAPTER II + +BILL HAYDEN + + +More than two-score years and ten have come and gone since that day when I, +Benjamin Lathrop, put out from Salem harbor, a green hand on the ship +Island Princess, and in them I have achieved, I think I can say with due +modesty, a position of some importance in my own world. But although +innumerable activities have crowded to the full each intervening year, +neither the aspirations of youth nor the successes of maturity nor the +dignities of later life have effaced from my memory the picture of myself, +a boy on the deck of the Island Princess in April, 1809. + +I thought myself very grand as the wind whipped my pantaloons against my +ankles and flapped the ribbons of the sailor hat that I had pulled snugly +down; and I imagined myself the hero of a thousand stirring adventures in +the South Seas, which I should relate when I came back an able seaman at +the very least. Never was sun so bright; never were seas so blue; never was +ship so smart as the Island Princess. + +On her black hull a nicely laid band of white ran sheer from stem to stern; +her bows swelled to meet the seas in a gentle curve that hinted the swift +lines of our clippers of more recent years. From mainmast heel to truck, +from ensign halyard to tip of flying jib-boom, her well-proportioned masts +and spars and taut rigging stood up so trimly in one splendidly +coördinating structure, that the veriest lubber must have acknowledged her +the finest handiwork of man. + +It was like a play to watch the men sitting here and there on deck, or +talking idly around the forecastle, while Captain Whidden and the chief +mate conferred together aft. I was so much taken with it all that I had no +eyes for my own people who were there to see me off, until straight out +from the crowded wharf there came a young man whom I knew well. His gray +eyes, firm lips, square chin, and broad shoulders had been familiar to me +ever since I could remember. + +As he was rowed briskly to the ship, I waved to him and called out, "O +Roger--ahoy!" + +I thought, when he glanced up from the boat, that his gray eyes twinkled +and that there was the flutter of a smile on his well-formed lips; but he +looked at me and through me and seemed not to see me, and it came over me +all at once that from the cabin to the forecastle was many, many times the +length of the ship. + +With a quick survey of the deck, as if to see who had spoken, yet seeming +not to see me at all, Roger, who had lived all his life within a cable's +length of the house where I was born, who had taught me to box the compass +before I learned my ABC's, whose interest in my own sister had partly +mystified, partly amused her younger brother--that very Roger climbed +aboard the Island Princess and went on into the cabin without word or sign +of recognition. + +It was not the first time, of course, that I had realized what my chosen +apprenticeship involved; but the incident brought it home to me more +clearly than ever before. No longer was I to be known as the son of Thomas +Lathrop. In my idle dreams I had been the hero of a thousand imaginary +adventures; instead, in the strange experiences I am about to relate, I was +to be only the ship's "boy"--the youngest and least important member of +that little isolated community banded together for a journey to the other +side of the world. But I was to see things happen such as most men have +never dreamed of; and now, after fifty years, when the others are dead and +gone, I may write the story. + +When I saw that my father, who had watched Roger Hamlin with twinkling eyes +ignore my greeting, was chuckling in great amusement, I bit my lip. What if +Roger _was_ supercargo, I thought: he needn't feel so big. + +Now on the wharf there was a flutter of activity and a stir of color; now a +louder hum of voices drifted across the intervening water. Captain Whidden +lifted his hand in farewell to his invalid wife, who had come in her +carriage to see him sail. The mate went forward on the forecastle and the +second mate took his position in the waist. + +"Now then, Mr. Thomas," Captain Whidden called in a deep voice, "is all +clear forward?" + +"All clear, sir," the mate replied; and then, with all eyes upon him, he +took charge, as was the custom, and proceeded to work the ship. + +While the men paid out the riding cable and tripped it, and hove in the +slack of the other, I stood, carried away--foolish boy!--by the thought +that here at last I was a seaman among seamen, until at my ear the second +mate cried sharply, "Lay forward, there, and lend a hand to cat the +anchor." + +The sails flapped loose overhead; orders boomed back and forth; there was +running and racing and hauling and swarming up the rigging; and from the +windlass came the chanteyman's solo with its thunderous chorus:-- + + "Pull one and all! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + On this catfall! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Answer the call! + Hoy! Hoy! Cheery men. + Hoy! Haulee! + Hoy! Hoy!!! + Oh, cheery men!" + +As the second anchor rose to the pull of the creaking windlass, we sheeted +home the topsails, topgallantsails and royals and hoisted them up, braced +head-yards aback and after-yards full for the port tack, hoisted the jib +and put over the helm. Thus the Island Princess fell off by the head, as we +catted and fished the anchor; then took the wind in her sails and slipped +slowly out toward the open sea. + +Aft, by the lee rail, I saw Roger Hamlin watching the group, a little apart +from the others, where my own people had gathered. My father stood half a +head above the crowd, and beside him were my mother and my sister. When I, +too, looked back at them, my father waved his hat and I knew his eyes were +following me; I saw the flutter of white from my mother's hand, and I knew +that her heart was going out with me to the uttermost parts of the earth. + +Then, almost timidly, my sister waved her handkerchief. But I saw that she +was looking at the quarter-deck. + +As land fell astern until it became a thin blue line on the western +horizon, and as the Island Princess ran free with the wind full in her +sails, I took occasion, while I jumped back and forth in response to the +mate's quick orders, to study curiously my shipmates in our little kingdom. +Now that we had no means of communication with that already distant shore, +we were a city unto ourselves. + +Yonder was the cook, a man as black as the bottom of his iron pot, whose +frown, engraved deeply in his low forehead, might have marked him in my +eyes as the villain of some melodrama of the sea, had I not known him for +many years to be one of the most generous darkies, so far as hungry small +boys were concerned, that ever ruled a galley. The second mate, who was now +in the waist, I had never seen before--to tell the truth, I was glad that +he held no better berth, for I disliked the turn of his too full lips. +Captain Whidden and the chief mate, Mr. Thomas, I had known a long time, +and I had thought myself on terms of friendship with them, even +familiarity; but so far as any outward sign was concerned, I might now have +been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate. + +We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin--Captain Whidden, Mr. +Thomas, Mr. Falk, and Roger, whose duties included oversight of the cargo, +supervision of matters purely of business and trade in foreign ports, and a +deal of clerical work that Captain Whidden had no mind to be bothered with; +three in the steerage--the cook (contrary, perhaps, to the more usual +custom), the steward, and the carpenter; and fourteen in the forecastle. + +All in all I was well pleased with my prospects, and promised myself that I +would "show them a thing or two," particularly Roger Hamlin. I'd make a +name for myself aboard the Island Princess. I'd let all the men know that +it would not take Benjamin Lathrop long to become as smart a seaman as +they'd hope to see. + +Silly lad that I was! + +Within twenty minutes of that idle dream the chain of circumstances had +begun that was to bring every man aboard the Island Princess face to face +with death. Like the small dark cloud that foreruns a typhoon, the first +act in the wild drama that came near to costing me my own life was so +slight, so insignificant relatively, that no man of us then dreamed of the +hidden forces that brought it to pass. + +On the forecastle by the larboard rigging stood a big, broad-shouldered +fellow, who nodded familiarly at the second mate, cast a bit of a leer at +the captain as if to impress on the rest of us his own daring and +independence, and gave me, when I caught his eye, a cold, noncommittal +stare. His name, I shortly learned, was Kipping. Undeniably he was +impudent; but he had, nevertheless, a mild face and a mild manner, and when +I heard him talk, I discovered that he had a mild voice; I could find no +place for him in the imaginary adventures that filled my mind--he was quite +too mild a man. + +I perceived that he was soldiering at his work, and almost at the same +moment I saw the mate come striding down on him. + +"You there," Mr. Thomas snapped out, "bear a hand! Do you think you're +waiting for the cows to come home?" + +"No-o-o, sir," the mild man drawled, starting to walk across the deck. + +The slow reply, delivered with a mocking inflection, fanned to sudden +laughter chuckles that the mate's words had caused. + + +Mr. Thomas reddened and, stepping out, thrust his face close to the +other's. "You try any of your slick tricks on me, my man," he said slowly +and significantly, "you try any of your slick tricks on me, and so help me, +I'll show you." + +"Ye-e-es, sir," the man replied with the same inflection, though not so +pronounced this time. + +Suddenly the deck became very still. The listeners checked their laughter. +Behind me I heard some one mutter, "Hear that, will you?" Glancing around, +I saw that Captain Whidden had gone below and that Mr. Thomas was in +command. I was confident that the mild seaman was mocking the mate, yet so +subtle was his challenge, you could not be sure that he actually was +defiant. + +Although Mr. Thomas obviously shared the opinion of the men, there was so +little on which to base a charge of insubordination or affront that he +momentarily hesitated. + +"What is your name?" he suddenly demanded. + +"Kipping, sir," the mild man replied. + +This time there was only the faintest suggestion of the derisive +inflection. After all, it might have been but a mannerism. The man had such +a mild face and such a mild manner! + +"Well, Kipping, you go about your work, and after this, let me warn you, +keep busy and keep a civil tongue in your head. We'll have no slick tricks +aboard this ship, and the sooner you men realize it, the easier it will be +for all hands." + +Turning, the mate went back to the quarter-deck and resumed his station by +the weather rail. + +While his back was toward us, however, and just as I myself, who had +listened, all ears, to the exchange of words between them, was turning to +the forecastle, I saw--or thought I saw--on Kipping's almost averted face +just such a leer as I had seen him cast at the captain, followed, I could +have taken my oath, by a shameless wink. When he noticed me gazing at him, +open-mouthed, he gave me such another cold stare as he had given me before +and, muttering something under his breath, walked away. + +I looked aft to discover at whom he could have winked, but I saw only the +second mate, who scowled at me angrily. + +"Now what," thought I, "can all this mean?" Then, being unable to make +anything of it, I forgot it and devoted myself industriously to my own +affairs until the hoarse call of "All hands on deck" brought the men who +were below tumbling up, to be summoned aft and addressed by the captain. + +Apparently Captain Whidden was not aware that there was a soul on board +ship except himself. With his eyes on the sea and his hands clasped behind +him, he paced the deck, while we fidgeted and twisted and grew more and +more impatient. At last, with a sort of a start, as if he had just seen +that we were waiting, he stopped and surveyed us closely. He was a fine +figure of a man and he affected the fashions of a somewhat earlier day. +A beaver with sweeping brim surmounted his strong, smooth-shaven face, and +a white stock, deftly folded, swathed his throat to his resolute chin. Trim +waistcoat, ample coat, and calmly folded arms completed his picture as he +stood there, grave yet not severe, waiting to address us. + +What he said to us in his slow, even voice was the usual speech of a +captain in those times; and except for a finer dignity than common, he did +not deviate from the well-worn customary phrases until he had outlined the +voyage that lay before us and had summed up the advantages of prompt, +willing obedience and the penalties of any other course. His tone then +suddenly changed. "If any man here thinks that he can give me slovenly work +or back talk and arguing," he said, "it'll be better for that man if he +jumps overboard and swims for shore." I was certain--and I still am--that +he glanced sharply at Kipping, who stood with a faint, nervous smile, +looking at no one in particular. "Well, Mr. Thomas," he said at last, +"we'll divide the watches. Choose your first man." + +When we went forward, I found myself, as the green hand of the voyage, one +of six men in the starboard watch. I liked the arrangement little enough, +for the second mate commanded us and Kipping was the first man he had +chosen; but it was all in the day's work, so I went below to get my jacket +before eight bells should strike. + +The voices in the forecastle suddenly stopped when my feet sounded on the +steps; but as soon as the men saw that it was only the boy, they resumed +their discussion without restraint. + +"I tell you," some one proclaimed from the darkest corner, "the second +mate, he had it all planned to get the chief mate's berth this voyage, and +the captain, he put him out no end because he wouldn't let him have it. +Yes, sir. And he bears a grudge against the mate, he does, him and that sly +friend of his, Kipping. Perhaps you didn't see Kipping wink at the second +mate after he was called down. I did, and I says to myself then, says I, +'There's going to be troublous times ere this voyage is over.' Yes, sir." + +"Right you are, Davie!" a higher, thinner voice proclaimed, "right you are. +I was having my future told, I was, and the lady--" + +A roar of laughter drowned the words of the luckless second speaker, and +some one yelled vociferously, "Neddie the fortune-teller! Don't tell me +he's shipped with us again!" + +"But I tell you," Neddie persisted shrilly, "I tell you they hit it right, +they do, often. And the lady, she says, 'Neddie Benson, don't you go +reckless on this next voyage. There's trouble in store,' she says. +'There'll be a dark man and a light man, and a terrible danger.' And I paid +the lady two dollars and I--" + +Again laughter thundered in the forecastle. + +"All the same," the deep-voiced Davie growled, "that sly, slippery--" + +"Hist!" A man raised his hand against the light that came faintly from on +deck. + +Then a mild voice asked, "What are you men quidding about anyway? One of +you's sitting on my chest." + +"Listen to them talk," some one close beside me whispered. "You'd think +this voyage was all of life, the way they run on about it. Now it don't +mean so much to me. My name's Bill Hayden, and I've got a little wee girl, +I have, over to Newburyport, that will be looking for her dad to come home. +Two feet long she is, and cute as they make them." + +Aware that the speaker was watching me closely, I perfunctorily nodded. At +that he edged nearer. "Now I'm glad we're in the same watch," he said. "So +many men just cut a fellow off with a curse." + +I observed him more sharply, and saw that he was a stupid-looking but +rather kindly soul whose hair was just turning gray. + +"Now I wish you could see that little girl of mine," he continued. "Cute? +there ain't no word to tell you how cute she is. All a-laughing and +gurgling and as good as gold. Why, she ain't but a little old, and yet she +can stand right up on her two little legs as cute as you please." + +I listened with mild interest as he rambled on. He seemed such a friendly, +homely soul that I could but regard him more kindly than I did some of our +keener-witted fellow seamen. + +Now we heard faintly the bell as it struck, _clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang-clang_. Feet scuffled overhead, and some one called down the hatch, +"Eight bells, starbow-lines ahoy!" + +Davie's deep voice replied sonorously, "Ay-ay!" And one after another we +climbed out on deck, where the wind from the sea blew cool on our faces. + +I had mounted the first rung of the ladder, and was regularly signed as a +member of the crew of the Island Princess, bound for Canton with a cargo of +woolen goods and ginseng. There was much that puzzled me aboard-ship--the +discontent of the second mate, the perversity of the man Kipping (others +besides myself had seen that wink), and a certain undercurrent of +pessimism. But although I was separated a long, long way from my old +friends in the cabin, I felt that in Bill Hayden I had found a friend of a +sort; then, as I began my first real watch on deck at sea, I fell to +thinking of my sister and Roger Hamlin. + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE MAN OUTSIDE THE GALLEY + + +Strange events happened in our first month at sea--events so subtle as +perhaps to seem an unimportant part of this narrative of a strange voyage, +yet really as necessary to the foundation of the story as the single bricks +and the single dabs of mortar at the base of a tall chimney are necessary +to the completed structure. I later had cause to remember each trivial +incident as if it had been written in letters of fire. + +In the first dog watch one afternoon, when we were a few days out of port, +I was sitting with my back against the forward deck-house, practising +splices and knots with a bit of rope that I had saved for the purpose. I +was only a couple of feet from the corner, so of course I heard what was +going on just out of sight. + +The voices were low but distinct. + +"Now leave me alone!" It was Bill Hayden who spoke. "I ain't never troubled +you." + +"Ah, so you ain't troubled me, have you, you whimpering old dog?" + +"No, I ain't troubled you." + +"Oh, no! You was so glad to let me take your nice dry boots, you was, when +mine was filled with water." + +The slow, mild, ostensibly patient voice could be none other than +Kipping's. + +"I had to wear 'em myself." + +"Oh, had to wear 'em yourself, did you?" + +"Let go o' my arm!" + +"So?" + +"Let go, I tell you; let go or I'll--I swear I'll hammer you good." + +"Oh, you'll hammer me good, will you?" + +"Let go!" + +There was a sudden scuffle, then out from the corner of the deck-house +danced Kipping with both hands pressed over his jaw. + +"You bloody scoundrel!" he snarled, meek no longer. "You wait--I'll get +you. I'll--" Seeing me sitting there with my bit of rope, he stopped short; +then, with a sneer, he walked away. + +Amazed at the sudden departure of his tormentor, Bill Hayden stuck his own +head round the corner and in turn discovered me in my unintentional +hiding-place. + +Bill, however, instead of departing in chagrin, joined me with a puzzled +expression on his kind, stupid face. + +"I don't understand that Kipping," he said sadly. "I've tried to use him +right. I've done everything I can to help him out and I'm sure I don't want +to quarrel with him, yet for all he goes around as meek as a cat that's +been in the cream, he's always pecking at me and pestering me, till just +now I was fair drove to give him a smart larrup." + +Why, indeed, should Kipping or any one else molest good, dull old Bill +Hayden? + +"I'm a family man, I am," Bill continued, "with a little girl at home. I +ain't a-bothering no one. I'm sure all I want is to be left alone." + +For a time we sat in silence, watching the succession of blue waves through +which the Island Princess cut her swift and almost silent passage. A man +must have been a cowardly bully to annoy harmless old Bill. Yet even then, +young though I was, I realized that sometimes there is no more dangerous +man than a coward and a bully, "He's great friends with the second mate," +Bill remarked at last. "And the second mate has got no use at all for Mr. +Thomas because he thought he was going to get Mr. Thomas's berth and +didn't; and for the same reason he don't like the captain. Well, I'm glad +he's only _second mate_. He ain't got his hands out of the tar-bucket yet, +my boy." + +"How do you know he expected to get the mate's berth?" I asked. + +"It's common talk, my boy. The supercargo's the only man aft he's got any +manner of use for, and cook says the steward says Mr. Hamlin ain't got no +manner of use for him. There you are." + +"No," I thought,--though I discreetly said nothing,--"Roger Hamlin is not +the man to be on friendly terms with a fellow of the second mate's +calibre." + +And from that time on I watched Mr. Falk, the second mate, and the +mild-voiced Kipping more closely than ever--so closely that one night I +stumbled on a surprising discovery. + +Ours was the middle watch, and Mr. Falk as usual was on the quarter-deck. +By moonlight I saw him leaning on the weather rail as haughtily as if he +were the master. His slim, slightly stooped figure, silhouetted against the +moonlit sea, was unmistakable. But the winds were inconstant and drifting +clouds occasionally obscured the moon. Watching, I saw him distinctly; +then, as the moonlight darkened, the after part of the ship became as a +single shadow against a sea almost as black. While I still watched, there +came through a small fissure in the clouds a single moonbeam that swept +from the sea across the quarter-deck and on over the sea again. By that +momentary light I saw that Mr. Falk had left the weather rail. + +Certainly it was a trifling thing to consider twice, but you must remember, +in the first place, that I was only a boy, with all a boy's curiosity about +trifles, and in the second place that of the four men in the cabin no other +derived such obvious satisfaction from the minor prerogatives of office as +Mr. Falk. He fairly swelled like a frog in the sun as he basked in the +prestige that he attributed to himself when, left in command, he occupied +the captain's place at the weather rail. + +Immediately I decided that under the cover of darkness I would see what had +become of him. So I ran lightly along in the shelter of the lee bulwark, +dodging past the galley, the scuttle-butt, and the cabin in turn. At the +quarter-deck I hesitated, knowing well that a sound thrashing was the least +I could expect if Mr. Falk discovered me trespassing on his own territory, +yet lured by a curiosity that was the stronger for the vague rumors on +which it had fed. + +On hands and knees I stopped by the farther corner of the cabin. Clouds +still hid the moon and low voices came to my ears. Very cautiously I peeked +from my hiding-place, and saw that Mr. Falk and the helmsman had put their +heads together and were talking earnestly. + +While they talked, the helmsman suddenly laughed and prodded Mr. Falk in +the ribs with his thumb. Like a flash it came over me that it was Kipping's +trick at the wheel. Here was absolute proof that, when the second mate and +the mild man thought no one was spying upon them, they were on uncommonly +friendly terms. Yet I did not dream that I had stumbled on anything graver +than to confirm one of those idle rumors that set tongues wagging in the +forecastle, but that really are too trifling to be worth a second thought. + +When the crew of a ship is cut off from all communication with the world at +large, it is bound, for want of greater interests, to find in the +monotonous daily round something about which to weave a pretty tale. + +At that moment, to my consternation, the bell struck four times. As the two +dark figures separated, I started back out of sight. Kipping's trick at the +wheel was over, and his relief would come immediately along the very route +that I had chosen; unless I got away at once I should in all probability be +discovered on the quarterdeck and trounced within an inch of my life. Then +suddenly, as if to punish my temerity, the cloud passed and the moonlight +streamed down on deck. + +Darting lightly back to the companion-ladder, I slipped down it and was on +the point of escaping forward when I heard slow steps. In terror lest the +relief spy me and reveal my presence by some exclamation that Kipping or +the second mate would overhear, I threw myself down flat on the deck just +forward of the scuttle-butt, where the moon cast a shadow; and with the +fervent hope that I should appear to be only a heap of old sail, I lay +without moving a muscle. + +The steps came slowly nearer. They had passed, I thought, when a pause set +my heart to jumping madly. Then came a low, cautious whisper:-- + +"You boy, what you doin' dah?" + +It was not the relief after all. It was the good old villainous-looking +black cook, with a cup of coffee for Mr. Falk. + +"Put yo' head down dah," he whispered, "put yo' head down, boy." + +With a quick motion of his hand he jerked some canvas from the butt so that +it concealed me, and went on, followed by the quick steps of the real +relief. + +Now I heard voices, but the only words I could distinguish were in the +cook's deep drawl. + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah. Ah brought yo' coffee, sah, Yass, sah, Ah'll wait +fo' yo' cup, sah." + +Next came Kipping's step--a mild step, if there is such a thing; even in +his bullying the man was mild. Then came the slow, heavy tread of the +returning African. + +Flicking the canvas off me, he muttered, "All's cleah fo' you to git away, +boy. How you done come to git in dis yeh scrape sho' am excruciatin'. You +just go 'long with you while dey's a chanst." + +So, carrying with me the very unimportant discovery that I had made, I ran +cautiously forward, away from the place where I had no business to be. + +When, in the morning, just before eight bells, I was sent to the galley +with the empty kids, I found the worthy cook in a solemn mood. + +"You boy," he said, fixing on me a stare, which his deeply graven frown +rendered the more severe, "you boy, what you think you gwine do, prowlin' +round all hours? Hey? You tell dis nigger dat. Heah Ah's been and put you +onto all de ropes and give you more infohmative disco'se about ships and +how to behave on 'em dan eveh Ah give a green hand befo' in all de years Ah +been gwine to sea, and heah you's so tarnation foolish as go prowlin' round +de quarter-deck whar you's like to git skun alive if Mistah Falk ketches +you." + +I don't remember what I replied, but I am sure it was flippant; to the day +of my death I shall never forget the stinging, good-natured cuff with which +the cook knocked my head against the wall. "Sho' now," he growled, "go +'long!" + +I was not yet ready to go. "Tell me, doctor," I said, "does the second mate +get on well with the others in the cabin?" + +The title mollified him somewhat, but he still felt that he must uphold the +dignity of his office. "Sho' now, what kind of a question is dat fo' a +ship's boy to be askin' de cook?" He glanced at me suspiciously, then +challenged me directly, "Who put dose idea' in yo' head?" + +By the tone of the second question, which was quite too straightforward to +be confused with the bantering that we usually exchanged, I knew that he +was willing, if diplomatically coaxed, to talk frankly. I then said +cautiously, "Every one thinks so, but you're the only man forward that's +likely to know." + +"Now ain't dat jest like de assumptivity of dem dah men in de forecastle. +How'd Ah know dat kind of contraptiveness, tell me?" + +Looking closely at me he began to rattle his pans at a great rate while I +waited in silence. He was not accomplishing much; indeed, he really was +throwing things into a state of general disorder. But I observed that he +was working methodically round the galley toward where I stood, until at +last he bumped into me and started as if he hadn't known that I was there +at all. + +"You boy," he cried, "you still heah?" He scowled at me with a particularly +savage intensity, then suddenly leaned over and tapped me on the shoulder. +"You's right, boy," he whispered. "He ain't got no manner of use foh dem +other gen'lems, and what's mo', dey ain't got no manner of use foh him. +Ah's telling you, boy, it's darn lucky, you bet, dat Mistah Falk he eats at +second table. Yass, sah. Hark! dah's de bell--eight bells! Yo' watch on +deck, hey?" After a short pause, he whispered, "Boy, you come sneakin' +round to-morrow night when dat yeh stew'd done gone to bed, an' Ah'll jest +gadder you up a piece of pie f'om Cap'n's table--yass, sah! Eight bells is +struck. Go 'long, you." And shoving me out of his little kingdom, the +villainous-looking darky sent after me a savage scowl, which I translated +rightly as a token of his high regard and sincere friendship. + +In my delight at the promised treat, and in my haste to join the watch, I +gave too little heed to where I was going, and shot like a bullet squarely +against a man who had been standing just abaft the galley window. He +collapsed with a grunt. My shoulder had knocked the wind completely out of +him. + +"Ugh!--" he gasped--"ugh! You son of perdition--ugh! Why in thunder don't +you look where you're running--ugh!--I'll break your rascally young +neck--ugh--when I get my wind." + +It was Kipping, and for the second time he had lost his mildness. + +As he clutched at me fiercely, I dodged and fled. Later, when I was hauling +at his side, he seemed to have forgotten the accident; but I knew well +enough that he had not. He was not the kind that forgets accidents. His +silence troubled me. How much, I wondered, had he heard of what was going +on in the galley? + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A PIECE OF PIE + + +At two bells there sounded the sonorous call, "Sail ho!" + +"Where away?" cried Mr. Falk. + +"One point off the larboard bow." + +In all the days since we had lost sight of land, we had seen but one other +sail, which had appeared only to disappear again beyond the horizon. It +seemed probable, however, that we should speak this second vessel, a brig +whose course crossed our own. Captain Whidden came on deck and assumed +command, and the men below, getting wind of the excitement, trooped up and +lined the bulwarks forward. Our interest, which was already considerable, +became even keener when the stranger hove out a signal of distress. We took +in all studding-sails and topgallantsails fore and aft, and lay by for her +about an hour after we first had sighted her. + +Over the water, when we were within hailing distance, came the cry: "Ship +ahoy!" + +Captain Whidden held the speaking trumpet. "Hullo!" + +"What ship is that, pray?" + +"The ship Island Princess, from Salem, bound to Canton. Where are you +from?" + +"The brig Adventure, bound from the Straits to Boston. Our foretopmast was +carried away four hours ago. Beware of--" + +Losing the next words, the Captain called, "I didn't hear that last." + +"Beware,"--came again the warning cry, booming deeply over the sea while +one and all we strained to hear it--"beware of any Arab ship. Arabs have +captured the English ship Alert and have murdered her captain and fifteen +men." + +Squaring her head-yards, the brig dropped her mainsail, braced her cross +jack-yard sharp aback, put her helm a-weather and got sternway, while her +after sails and helm kept her to the wind. So she fell off from us and the +two vessels passed, perhaps never to meet again. + +Both forward and aft, we aboard the Island Princess were sober men. Kipping +and the second mate were talking quietly together, I saw (I saw, too, that +Captain Whidden and some of the others were watching them sharply) Mr. +Thomas and Roger Hamlin were leaning side by side upon the rail, and +forward the men were gathering in groups. It was indeed an ominous message +that the brig had given us. But supper broke the tension, and afterwards a +more cheerful atmosphere prevailed. + +As I was sweeping down the deck next day, Roger, to my great surprise,--for +by now I was accustomed to his amused silence,--came and spoke to me with +something of the old, humorous freedom that was so characteristic of him. + +"Well, Bennie," said he, "we're quite a man now, are we not?" + +"We are," I replied shortly. Although I would not for a great deal have +given him the satisfaction of knowing it, I had been much vexed, secretly, +by his rigidly ignoring me. + +"Bennie," he said in a low voice, "is there trouble brewing in the +forecastle?" + +I was startled. "Why, no. I've seen no sign of trouble." + +"No one has talked to you, then?" + +"Not in such a way as you imply." + +"Hm! Keep your eyes and ears open, anyway, and if you hear anything that +sounds like trouble, let me know--quietly, mind you, even secretly." + +"What do you mean?" + +"We are carrying a valuable cargo, and we have very particular orders. All +must be thus and so,--exactly thus and so,--and it means more to the +owners, Bennie, than I think you realize. Now you go on with your work. But +remember--eyes and ears open." + +That night, as I watched the restless sea and the silent stars, my +imagination was stirred as never before. I felt the mystery and wonder of +great distances and far places. We were so utterly alone! Except for the +passing hail of some stranger, we had cut ourselves off for months from all +communication with the larger world. Whatever happened aboard ship, in +whatever straits we found ourselves, we must depend solely upon our own +resources; and already it appeared that some of our shipmates were scheming +and intriguing against one another. Thus I meditated, until the boyish and +more natural, perhaps more wholesome, thought of the cook's promise came to +me. + +Pie! My remembrance of pie was almost as intangible as a pleasant dream +might be some two days later. With care to escape observation, I made my +way to the galley and knocked cautiously. + +"Who's dah?" asked softly the old cook, who had barricaded himself for the +night according to his custom, and was smoking a villainously rank pipe. + +"It's Ben Lathrop," I whispered. + +"What you want heah?" the cook demanded. + +"The pie you promised me," I answered. + +"Humph! Ain't you fo'got dat pie yet? You got de most miraculous memorizer +eveh Ah heared of. You wait." + +I heard him fumbling inside the galley; then he opened the door and stepped +out on deck as if he had just decided to take a breath of fresh air. Upon +seeing me, he pretended to start with great surprise, and exclaimed rather +more loudly than before:-- + +"What you doin' heah, boy, at dis yeh hour o' night?" + +But all this was only crafty by-play. Having made sure, so he thought, +that no one was in sight, he grabbed me by the collar and yanked me into +the galley, at the same time shutting the door so that I almost stifled in +the rank smoke with which he had filled the place. + +Scowling fiercely, he reached into a little cupboard and drew out half an +apple pie that to my eager eyes seemed as big as a half moon on a clear +night. + + +"Dah," he said. "Eat it up. Mistah Falk, he tell stew'd he want pie and he +gotta have pie, and stew'd he come and he say, 'Frank,' says he, 'dat +Mistah Falk, his langwidge is like he is in liquo'. He _gotta_ have pie.' +'All right,' Ah say, 'if he gotta have pie, he gotta wait twill Ah make +pie. Cap'n, he et hearty o' pie lately.' Stew'd he say, 'Cap'n ain't had +but one piece and Mistah Thomas, he ain't had but one piece, and Mistah +Hamlin, he ain't had any. Dah's gotta be pie. You done et dat pie yo'se'f,' +says he. 'Oh, no,' says Ah. 'Ah never et no pie. You fo'get 'bout dat pie +you give Cap'n foh breakfas'.' Den stew'd he done crawl out. He don' know +Ah make two pies yestidday. Dat's how come Ah have pie foh de boy. Boys dey +need pie to make 'em grow. It's won'erful foh de indignation, pie is." + +I was appalled by the hue and cry that my half-circle of pastry had +occasioned, and more than a little fearful of the consequences if the truth +ever should transpire; but the pie in hand was compensation for many such +intangible difficulties in the future, and I was making great inroads on a +wedge of it, when I thought I heard a sound outside the window, which the +cook had masked with a piece of paper. + +I stopped to listen and saw that Frank had heard it too. It was a scratchy +sound as if some one were trying to unship the glass. + +"Massy sake!" my host gasped, taking his vile pipe out of his mouth. + +Although it was quite impossible for pallor to make any visible impression +on his surpassing blackness, he obviously was much disturbed. + +"Gobble dat pie, boy," he gasped, "gobble up ev'y crumb an' splinter." + +Now, as the scratchy noise sounded at the door, the cook laid his pipe on a +shelf and glanced up at a big carving-knife that hung from a rack above his +head. + +"Who's dah?" he demanded cautiously. + +"Lemme in," said a mild, low voice, "I want some o' that pie." + +"Massy sake!" the cook gasped in disgust, "ef it ain't dat no 'count +Kipping." + +"Lemme in," persisted the mild, plaintive voice. "Lemme in." + +"Aw, go 'long! Dah ain't no pie in heah," the cook retorted. "You's +dreamin', dat's what you is. You needs a good dose of medicine, dat's what +you needs." + +"I'm dreaming, am I?" the mild voice repeated. "Oh, yes, I'm dreaming I am, +ain't I? I didn't sneak around the galley yesterday morning and hear you +tell that cocky little fool to come and get a piece of pie tonight. Oh, no! +I didn't see him come prowling around when he thought no one was looking. +Oh, no! I didn't see you come out of the galley like you didn't know there +was anybody on deck, and walk right under the rigging where I was waiting +for just such tricks. Oh, no! I was dreaming, I was. Oh, yes." + + +"Dat Kipping," the cook whispered, "he's hand and foot with Mistah Falk." + +"Lemme in, you woolly-headed son of perdition, or I swear I'll take the +kinky scalp right off your round old head." + +"He's gettin' violenter," the cook whispered, eyeing me questioningly. + +Saying nothing, I swallowed the last bit of pie. I had made the most of my +opportunity. + +Kipping now shook the door and swore angrily. Finally he kicked it with the +full weight of his heel. + +It rattled on its hinges and a long crack appeared in the lower panel. + +"He's sho' coming in," the African said slowly and reflectively. "He's sho' +coming in and when he don't get no pie, he's gwine tell Mistah Falk, and +you and me's gwine have trouble." Putting his scowling face close to my +ear, the cook whispered, "Ah's gwine scare him good." + +Amazed by the dramatic turn that events were taking, I drew back into a +corner. + +From the rack above his head the cook took down the carving-knife. Dropping +on hands and knees and creeping across the floor, he held the weapon +between his even white teeth, sat up on his haunches, and noiselessly +drew the bolt that locked the door. Then with a deft motion of an +extraordinarily long arm he put out the lantern behind him and threw the +galley into darkness. + + + +CHAPTER V + +KIPPING + + +I thought that Kipping must have abandoned his quest. In the darkness of +the galley the silence seemed hours long. The coals in the stove glowed +redly, and the almost imperceptible light of the starry sky came in here +and there around the door. Otherwise not a thing was visible in the +absolute blackness that shrouded my strange host, who seemed for the moment +to have reverted to the savage craft of his Slave Coast ancestors. Surely +Kipping must have gone away, I thought. He was so mild a man, one could +expect nothing else. Then somewhere I heard the faint sigh of indrawn +breath. + +"You blasted nigger, open that door," said the mild, sad voice. "If you +don't, I'm going to kick it in on top of you and cut your heart out right +where you stand." + +The silence, heavy and pregnant, was broken by the shuffling of feet. +Evidently Kipping drew off to kick the door a second time. His boot struck +it a terrific blow, but the door, instead of breaking, flew open and +crashed against the pans behind it. + +Then the cook, who so carefully had prepared the simple trap, swinging the +carving-knife like a cutlass, sprang with a fierce, guttural grunt full in +Kipping's face. Concealed in the dark galley, I saw it all silhouetted +against the starlit deck. With the quickness of a weasel, Kipping evaded +the black's clutching left hand and threw himself down and forward. Had the +cook really intended to kill Kipping, the weapon scarcely could have failed +to cut flesh in its terrific swing, but he gave it an upward turn that +carried it safely above Kipping's head. When Kipping, however, dived under +Frank's feet, Frank, who had expected him to turn and run, tripped and +fell, dropping the carving-knife, and instantly black man and white +wriggled toward the weapon. + +It would have been funny if it hadn't been so dramatic. The two men +sprawled on their bellies like snakes, neither of them daring to take time +to stand, each, in the snap of a finger, striving with every tendon and +muscle to reach something that lay just beyond his finger-tips. I found +myself actually laughing--they looked so like two fish just out of water. + +But the fight suddenly had become bitter earnest, Kipping unquestionably +feared for his life, and the cook knew well that the weapon for which they +fought would be turned against him if his antagonist once got possession of +it. + +As Kipping closed his fingers on the handle, the cook grabbed the blade. +Then the mate appeared out of the dark. + + +"Here, what's this?" he demanded, looming on the scene of the struggle. + +I saw starlight flash on the knife as it flew over the bulwark, then I +heard it splash. Kipping got away by a quick twist and vanished. The cook +remained alone to face the mate, for you can be very sure that I had every +discreet intention not to reveal my presence in the dark galley. + +"Yass, sah," said the cook, "yass, sah. Please to 'scuse me, sah, but Ah +didn't go foh no premeditation of disturbance. It is quite unintelligible, +sah, but one of de men, sah, he come round, sah, and says Ah gotta give him +a pie, sah, and of co'se Ah can't do nothin' like dat, sah. Pies is foh de +officers and gen'lems, sah, and of co'se Ah don't give pie to de men, sah, +not even in dey vittles, sah, even if dey was pie, which dey wa'n't, sah, +fob dis we'y day Mistah Falk he wants pie and stew'd he come, and me and +he, sah, we sho' ransack dis galley, sah, and try like we can, not even two +of us togetheh, sah, can sca' up a piece of pie foh Mistah Falk, sah, and +he--" + +Unwilling to listen longer, the mate turned with a grunt of disgust and +walked away. + +After he had gone, the cook stood for a time by the galley, looking +pensively at the stars. Long-armed, broad-shouldered, bullet-headed, he +seemed a typical savage. Yet in spite of his thick lips and protruding +chin, his face had a certain thoughtful quality, and not even that deeply +graven scowl could hide the dog-like faithfulness of his dark eyes. + +After all, I wondered, was he not like a faithful dog: loyal to the last +breath, equally ready to succor his friend or to fight for him? + +"Boy," he said, when he came in, "Ah done fool 'em. Dey ain' gwine believe +no gammon dat yeh Kipping tells 'em--leastwise, no one ain't onless it's +Mistah Falk. Now you go 'long with you and don't you come neah me foh a +week without you act like Ah ain't got no use foh you. And boy," he +whispered, "you jest look out and keep clear of dat Kipping. Foh all he +talk' like he got a mouth full of butter, he's an uncommon fighter, he is, +yass sah, an uncommon fighter." + +He paused for a moment, then added in such a way that I remembered it long +afterward, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +I reached the forecastle unobserved, and as I started to climb into my +bunk, I felt very well satisfied with myself indeed. Not even Kipping had +seen me come. But a disagreeable surprise awaited me; my hand encountered a +man lying wrapped in my blankets. + +It was Kipping! + +He rolled out with a sly smile, looked at me in silence a long time, and +then pretended to shake with silent laughter. + +"Well," I whispered, "what's the matter with you?" + +"There wasn't any pie," he sighed--so mildly. "How sad that there wasn't +any pie." + +He then climbed into his own bunk and almost immediately, I judged, went to +sleep. + +If he desired to make me exceedingly uncomfortable, he had accomplished his +purpose. For days I puzzled over his queer behavior. I wondered how much he +knew, how much he had told Mr. Falk; and I recalled, sometimes, the cook's +remark, "Ah sho' would like to know whar Ah done see dat Kipping befo'." + +Of one thing I was sure: both Kipping and Mr. Falk heartily disliked me. +Kipping took every occasion to annoy me in petty ways, and sometimes I +discovered Mr. Falk watching me sharply and ill-naturedly. But he always +looked away quickly when he knew that I saw him. + +We still lacked several days of having been at sea a month when we sighted +Madeira, bearing west southwest about ten leagues distant. Taking a fresh +departure the next day from latitude 32° 22' North, and longitude 16° 36' +West of London, we laid our course south southwest, and swung far enough +away from the outshouldering curve of the Rio de Oro coast to pass clear of +the Canary Islands. + + + * * * * * + + +"Do you know," said Bill Hayden one day, some five weeks later, when we +were aloft side by side, "they don't like you any better than they do me." + +It was true; both Kipping and Mr. Falk showed it constantly. + +"And there's others that don't like us, too," Bill added. "I told 'em, +though, that if they got funny with me or you, I'd show 'em what was what." + +"Who are they?" I asked, suddenly remembering Roger Hamlin's warning. + +"Davie Paine is one." + +"But I thought he didn't like Kipping or Mr. Falk!" + +"He didn't for a while; but there was something happened that turned his +mind about them." + +I worked away with the tar-bucket and reflected on this unexpected change +in the attitude of the deep-voiced seaman who, on our first day aboard +ship, had seen Kipping wink at the second mate. It was all so trivial that +I was ready to laugh at myself for thinking of it twice, and yet stupid +old Bill Hayden had noticed it. A new suspicion startled me. "Bill, did +any one say anything to you about any plan or scheme that Kipping is +concerned in?" I asked. + +"Why, yes. Didn't they speak to you about it?" + +"About what?" + +"Why, about a voyage that all the men was to have a venture in. I thought +they talked to every one. I didn't want anything to do with it if Kipping +was to have a finger in the pie. I told 'em 'No!' and they swore at me +something awful, and said that if ever I blabbed I'd never see my little +wee girl at Newburyport again. So I never said nothing." He looked at me +with a frightened expression. "It's funny they never said nothing to you. +Don't you tell 'em I talked. If they thought I'd split, they'd knock me in +the head, that's what they' d do." + +"Who's in it besides Kipping and Davie Paine?" + +"The two men from Boston and Chips and the steward. Them's all I know, but +there may be others. The men have been talking about it quiet like for a +good while now." + +As Mr. Falk came forward on some errand or other, we stopped talking and +worked harder than ever at tarring down the rigging. + +Presently Bill repeated without turning his head, "Don't you tell 'em I +said anything, will you, Bennie? Don't you tell 'em." + +And I replied, "No." + +We then had passed the Canaries and the Cape Verdes, and had crossed the +Line; from the most western curve of Africa we had weathered the narrows of +the Atlantic almost to Pernambuco, and thence, driven by fair winds, we had +swept east again in a long arc, past Ascension Island and Tristan da Cunha, +and on south of the Cape of Good Hope. + +The routine of a sailor's life is full of hard work and petty detail. Week +follows week, each like every other. The men complain about their duties +and their food and the officers grow irritable. There are few stories worth +telling in the drudgery of life at sea, but now and then in a long, long +time fate and coincidence conspire to unite in a single voyage, such as +that which I am chronicling, enough plots and crimes and untoward incidents +to season a dozen ordinary lifetimes spent before the mast. + +I could not, of course, even begin as yet to comprehend the magnitude that +the tiny whirlpool of discontented and lawless schemers would attain. But +boy though I was, in those first months of the voyage I had learned +enough about the different members of the crew to realize that serious +consequences might grow from such a clique. + +Kipping, whom I had thought at first a mild, harmless man, had proved +himself a vengeful bully, cowardly in a sense, yet apparently courageous +enough so far as physical combat was concerned. Also, he had disclosed an +unexpected subtlety, a cat-like craft in eavesdropping and underhanded +contrivances. The steward I believed a mercenary soul, tricky so far as his +own comfort and gain were concerned, who, according to common report, had +ingratiated himself with the second mate by sympathizing with him on every +occasion because he had not been given the chief mate's berth. The two men +from Boston I cared even less for; they were slipshod workmen and +ill-tempered, and their bearing convinced me that, from the point of view +of our officers and of the owners of the ship, they were a most undesirable +addition to such a coterie as Kipping seemed to be forming. Davie Paine and +the carpenter prided themselves on being always affable, and each, although +slow to make up his mind, would throw himself heart and body into whatever +course of action he finally decided on. But significant above all else was +Kipping's familiarity with Mr. Falk. + +The question now was, how to communicate my suspicions secretly to Roger +Hamlin. After thinking the matter over in all its details, I wrote a few +letters on a piece of white paper, and found opportunity to take counsel +with my friend the cook, when I, as the youngest in the crew, was left in +the galley to bring the kids forward to the men in the forecastle. + +"Doctor," I said, "if I wanted to get a note to Mr. Hamlin without +anybody's knowing,--particularly the steward or Mr. Falk,--how should I go +about it?" + +The perpetually frowning black heaped salt beef on the kids. "Dah's enough +grub foh a hun'erd o'nary men. Dey's enough meat dah to feed a whole +regiment of Sigambeezel cavalry--yass, sah, ho'ses and all. And yet Ah'll +bet you foh dollahs right out of mah pay, doze pesky cable-scrapers fo'ward +'ll eat all dat meat and cuss me in good shape 'cause it ain't mo', and +den, mah golly, dey'll sot up all night, Ah'll bet you, yass, sah, +a-kicking dey heads off 'cause dey ain't fed f'om de cabin table. Boy, if +you was to set beefsteak and bake' 'taters and ham and eggs down befo' dem +fool men ev'y mo'ning foh breakfas', dey'd come heah hollerin' and cussin' +and tellin' me dey wah n't gwine have dey innards spiled on all dat yeh +truck jest 'cause dem aft can't eat it." + +Turning his ferocious scowl full upon me, the savage-looking darky handed +me the kids. "Dah! you take doze straight along fo'ward." Then, dropping +his voice to a whisper, he said, "Gimme yo' note." + +Knowing now that the cook approached every important matter by an +extraordinarily indirect route, I had expected some such conclusion, and I +held the note ready. + +"Go long," he said, when I had slipped it into his huge black hand. "Ah'll +do it right." + +So I departed with all confidence that my message would go secretly and +safely to its destination. Even if it should fall into other hands than +those for which it was intended, I felt that I had not committed myself +dangerously. I had written only one word: "News." + + +[Illustration] + + + + +II + +IN WHICH WE ENCOUNTER AN ARAB SHIP + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER VI + +THE COUNCIL IN THE CABIN + + +Sometimes in the night I dream of the forecastle of the Island Princess, +and see the crew sitting on chests and bunks, as vividly as if only +yesterday I had come through the hatchway and down the steps with a kid of +"salt horse" for the mess, and had found them waiting, each with his pan +and spoon and the great tin dipper of tea that he himself had brought from +the galley. There was Chips, the carpenter, who had descended for the +moment from the dignity of the steerage; calmly he helped himself to twice +his share, ignoring the oaths of the others, and washed down his first +mouthful with a great gulp of tea. Once upon a time Chips came down just +too late to get any meat, and tried to kill the cook; but as the cook +remarked to me afterwards, "Foh a drea'ful impulsive pusson, he wah n't +ve'y handy with his fists." There was Bill Hayden, who always got last +chance at the meat, and took whatever the doubtful generosity of his +shipmates had left him--poor Bill, as happy in the thought of his little +wee girl at Newburyport as if all the wealth of the khans of Tartary were +waiting for him at the end of the voyage. There was the deep-voiced Davie, +almost out of sight in the darkest corner, who chose his food carefully, +pretending the while to be considerate of the others, and growled amiably +about his hard lot. Also there was Kipping, mild and evasive, yet amply +able to look out for his own interests, as I, who so often brought down the +kids, well knew. + +When, that evening, Bill Hayden had scraped up the last poor slivers of +meat, he sat down beside me on my chest. + +"If I didn't have my little wee girl at Newburyport," he said, "I might +be as gloomy as Neddie Benson. Do you suppose if I went to see a +fortune-teller I'd be as gloomy as Neddie is? I never used to be gloomy, +even before I married, and I married late. I was older than Neddie is +now when I married. Neddie ought to get a wife and stop going to see +fortune-tellers, and then he wouldn't be so gloomy." + +Bill would run on indefinitely in his stupid, kindly way, for I was almost +the only person aboard ship who listened to him at all, and, to tell the +truth, even I seldom more than half listened. But already he had given me +valuable information that day, and now something in the tone of his +rambling words caught my attention. + +"Has Neddie Benson been talking about the fortuneteller again?" I asked. + +"He's had a lot to say about her. He says the lady said to him--" + +"But what started him off?" + +"He says things is bound to come to a bad end." + +"What things?" + +As I have said before, I had a normal boy's curiosity about all that was +going on around us. Perhaps, I have come to think, I had more than the +ordinary boy's sense for important information. Roger Hamlin's warning had +put me on my guard, and I intended to learn all I could and to keep my +mouth shut where certain people were concerned. + +"It's queer they don't say nothing to you about what's going on," Bill +remarked. + +For my own part I understood very well why they should say nothing of any +underhanded trickery to one who ashore was so intimately acquainted with +Captain Whidden and Roger Hamlin. But I kept my thoughts to myself and +persisted in my questions. + +"What is going on?" + +"Oh, I don't just make out what." Bill's stupidity was exasperating at +times. "It's something about Mr. Falk. Kipping, he--" + +"Yes?" said that eternally mild voice. "Mr. Falk? And Kipping? What else +please?" + +Both Bill and I were startled to find Kipping at our elbows. But before +either of us could answer, some one called down the hatch:-- + +"Lathrop is wanted aft." + +Relieved at escaping from an embarrassing situation, I jumped up so +promptly that my knife fell with a clatter, and hastened on deck, calling +"Ay, ay," to the man who had summoned me. I knew very well why I was wanted +aft. + +Mr. Falk, who was on duty on the quarter-deck, completely ignored me as I +passed him and went down the companionway. + +"At least," I thought, "he can't come below now." + +The steward, when I appeared, raised his eyebrows and almost dropped his +tray; then he paused in the door, inconspicuously, as if to linger. But +Captain Whidden glanced round and dismissed him by a sharp nod, and I found +myself alone in the cabin with the captain, Mr. Thomas, and Roger Hamlin. + +"I understand there's news forward, Lathrop," said Captain Whidden. + +Roger looked at me with that humorous, exasperating twinkle of his eyes,--I +thought of my sister and of how she had looked when she learned that he was +to sail for Canton,--and Mr. Thomas folded his arms and leaned back in his +chair. + +"Yes, sir," I replied, "although it seems pretty unimportant to be worth +much as news." + +"Tell us about it." + +To all that I had gathered from Bill Hayden I added what I had learned by +my own observations, and it seemed to interest them, although for my own +part I doubted whether it was of much account. + +"Has any one approached you directly about these things?" Captain Whidden +asked when I was through. + +"No, sir." + +"Have you heard any one say just what this little group is trying to +accomplish, or just when it is going to act?" + +"No, sir." + +"Do you, Lathrop, know anything about the cargo of the Island Princess? Or +anything about the terms under which it is carried?" + +"Only in a general way, sir, that it is made up of ginseng and woolen goods +shipped to Canton." + +Captain Whidden looked at me very sharply indeed. "You are positive that +that is all you know?" + +"Yes, sir--except, in a general way, that the cargo is uncommonly +important." + +The three men exchanged glances, and Roger Hamlin nodded as if to +corroborate my reply. + +"Lathrop," Captain Whidden began again, "I want you to say nothing about +this interview after you leave the cabin. It is more important that you +hold your peace than you may ever realize--than, I trust, you ever _will_ +realize. I am going to ask you to give me your word of honor to that +effect." + +It seemed to me then that I saw Captain Whidden in a new light. We of the +younger generation had inclined to belittle him because he continued to +follow the sea at an age when more successful men had established their +counting-houses or had retired from active business altogether. But twice +his mercantile adventures had proved unfortunate, and now, though nearly +sixty years old and worth a very comfortable fortune, he refused to leave +again for a less familiar occupation the profession by which he had amassed +his competence. I noticed that his hair was gray on his temples, and that +his weathered face revealed a certain stern sadness. I felt as if suddenly, +in spite of my minor importance on board his ship, I had come closer to the +straightforward gentleman, the true Joseph Whidden, than in all the years +that I had known him, almost intimately, it had seemed at the time, in my +father's house. + +"I promise, sir," I said. + +He took up a pencil and with the point tapped a piece of paper. + +"Tell me who of all the men forward absolutely are not influenced by this +man Kipping." + +"The cook," I returned, "and Bill Hayden, and, I think, Neddie Benson. +Probably there are a number of others, but only of those three am I +absolutely sure." + +"That's what I want--the men you are absolutely sure of. Hm! The cook, +useful but not particularly quick-witted. Hayden, a harmless, negative +body. Benson, a gloomy soul if ever there was one. It might be better +but--" He looked at Mr. Thomas and smiled. "That is all, Lathrop; you may +go now. Just one moment more, though: be cautious, keep your eyes and ears +open, and if anything else comes up, communicate with Mr. Hamlin or,--" he +hesitated, but finally said it,--"or directly with me." + +As I went up on deck, I again passed Mr. Falk and again he pretended not to +see me. But although he seemed to be intent on the rolling seas to +windward, I was very confident that, when I had left the quarter-deck, he +turned and looked after me as earnestly as if he hoped to read in my step +and carriage everything that had occurred in the cabin. + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE SAIL WITH A LOZENGE-SHAPED PATCH + + +It was not long before we got another warning even more ominous than the +one from the captain of the Adventure. On Friday, July 28, in latitude +19° 50' South, longitude 101° 53' East,--the log of the voyage, kept beyond +this point in Mr. Thomas's own hand, gives me the dates and figures to the +very day for it still is preserved in the vaults of Hamlin, Lathrop & +Company,--we sighted a bark to the south, and at the captain's orders wore +ship to speak her. When she also came about, we served out pikes and +muskets as a precaution against treachery, and Mr. Falk saw that our guns +were shotted. But she proved to be in good faith, and in answer to our hail +she declared herself the Adrienne of Liverpool, eight days from the +Straits, homeward bound. Her master, it appeared, wished to compare notes +on longitude, and a long, dull discussion followed; but in parting Captain +Whidden asked if there was news of pirates or marauders. + +"Yes," was the reply. "Much news and bad news." And the master of the +Adrienne thereupon launched into a tale of piracy and treachery such, as I +never had heard before. Leaning over the taffrail, his elbows out-thrust +and his big hands folded, he roared the story at us in a great booming +voice that at times seemed to drown the words in its own volume. Now, as +the waves and the wind snatched it away, it grew momentarily fainter and +clearer; now it came bellowing back again, loud, hoarse, and indistinct. + +It was all about an Arab ship off Benkulen; Ladronesers and the havoc they +had wrought among the American ships in the China Sea; a warning not to +sail from Macao for Whampoa without a fleet of four or five sail; and +again, about the depredations of the Malays. The grizzled old captain +seemed to delight in repeating horrible yarns of the seas whence he came, +whither we were going. He roared them after us until we had left him far +astern; and at the last we heard him laughing long and hoarsely. + +"What dat yeh man think we all am? He think we all gwine believe dat yeh? +Hgh!" the cook growled. + +But Neddie Benson dolefully shook his head. + +Parting, the Adrienne and the Island Princess continued, each on her +course, the one back round the Cape of Good Hope and north again to +Liverpool, the other on into strange oceans beset with a thousand dangers. + +We sailed now a sea of opalescent greens and purples that shimmered and +changed with the changing lights. Strange shadows played across it, even +when the sky was cloudless, and it rolled past the ship in great, regular +swells, ruffled by favoring breezes and bright beneath the clear sun. + +At daylight on August 3 we saw land about nine miles away, bearing from +east by south to north, a long line of rugged hills, which appeared to be +piled one above another, and which our last lunar observations indicated +were in longitude 107° 15' East; and we made out a single sail lying off +the coast to the north. + +The sail caught and held our attention--not that, so far as we then could +see, that particular sail was at all remarkable: any sail, at that time and +in that place, would have interested us unusually. Mindful of the warnings +we had received, we paused in our work to watch it. Kipping, with a sly +glance aft, left the winch with which he was occupied and leaned on the +rail. Here and there the crew conversed cautiously, and on the quarter-deck +a lively discussion, I could see, was in progress. + +We were so intent on that distant spot of canvas which pricked the horizon, +that a fierce squall, sweeping down upon us, almost took us aback. + +The cry, "All hands on deck!" brought the sleeping watch from the bunks +below, and the carpenter, steward, and sailmaker from the steerage. The +foresail ripped from its bolt ropes with a deafening crack, and tore to +ribbons in the gale. As the ship lay into the wind, I could hear the +captain's voice louder than the very storm, "Meet her!--Meet her!--Ease her +off!" But the reply of the man at the wheel was lost in the rush of wind +and rain. + +I had been well drilled long since in furling the royals, for on them the +green hands were oftenest practised; and now, from his post on the +forecastle, Mr. Thomas spied me as I slipped and fell half across the deck. +I alone at that moment was not hard at work, and, in obedience to the +captain's orders, during a lull that gave us a momentary respite, he sent +me aloft. + +It was quite a different thing from furling a royal in a light breeze. When +I had got to the topgallant masthead, the yard was well down by the lifts +and steadied by the braces, but the clews were not hauled chock up to the +blocks. Leaning out precariously, I won Mr. Thomas's attention with +greatest difficulty, and shrieked to have it done. This he did. Then, +casting the yard-arm gaskets off from the tye and laying them across +between the tye and the mast, I stretched out on the weather yard-arm and, +getting hold of the weather leech, brought it in to the slings taut along +the yard. Mind you, all this time I, only a boy, was working in a gale of +wind and driven rain, and was clinging to a yard that was sweeping from +side to side in lurching, unsteady flight far above the deck and the angry +sea. Hauling the sail through the clew, and letting it fall in the bunt, I +drew the weather clew a little abaft the yard, and held it with my knee +while I brought in the lee leech in, the same manner. Then, making up my +bunt and putting into it the slack of the clews, the leech and footrope and +the body of the sail, I hauled it well up on the yard, smoothed the skin, +brought it down abaft, and made fast the bunt-gasket round the mast. +Passing the weather and lee yard-arm gaskets round the yard in turn, and +hauling them taut and making them fast, I left all snug and trim. + +From aft came faintly the clear command, "Full and by!" And promptly, for +by this time the force of the squall was already spent, the answer of the +man at the wheel, "Full and by, sir." + +In this first moment of leisure I instinctively turned, as did virtually +every man aboard ship, to look for the sail that had been reported to the +north of us. But although we looked long and anxiously, we saw no sail, no +trace of any floating craft. It had disappeared during the squall, utterly +and completely. Only the wild dark sea and the wild succession of mountain +piled on mountain met our searching eyes. + +A sail there had been, beyond all question, where now there was none. +Driven by the storm, it had vanished completely from our sight. + +As well as we could judge by our lunar observations, the land was between +Paga River and Stony Point, and when we had sailed along some forty miles, +the shore, as it should be according to our reckoning, was less +mountainous. + +It was my first glimpse of the Sunda Islands, of which I had heard so much, +and I well remember that I stood by the forward rigging watching the +distant land from where it seemed on my right to rise from the sea, to +where it seemed on my left to go down beyond the horizon into the sea +again, and that I murmured to myself in a small, awed voice:-- + +"This is Java!" + +The very name had magic in it. Already from those islands our Salem +mariners had accumulated great wealth. Not yet are the old days forgotten, +when Elias Hasket Derby's ships brought back fortunes from Batavia, and +when Captain Carnes, by one voyage in Jonathan Peele's schooner Rajah to +the northern coast of Sumatra for wild pepper, made a profit of seven +hundred per cent of both the total cost of the schooner itself and the +whole expense of the entire expedition. I who lived in the exhilarating +atmosphere of those adventurous times was thrilled to the heart by my first +sight of lands to which hundreds of Salem ships had sailed. + +It really was Java, and night was falling on its shores. Far to the +northeast some tiny object pricked above the skyline, and a point of light +gleamed clearly, low against the blue heavens in which the stars had just +begun to shine. + +"A sail!" I cried. + +Before the words had left my lips a deep voice aloft sonorously +proclaimed:-- + +"Sa-a-ail ho!" + +"Where away?" Mr. Thomas cried. + +"Two points off the larboard bow, sir." + +The little knot of officers on the quarter-deck already were intent on the +tiny spot of almost invisible canvas, and we forward were crowding one +another for a better sight of it. Then in the gathering darkness it faded +and was gone. Could it have been the same that we had seen before? + +There was much talk of the mysterious ship that night, and many strange +theories were offered to account for it. Davie Paine, in his deep, rolling +voice, sent shivers down our backs by his story of a ghost-ship manned by +dead men with bony fingers and hollow eyes, which had sailed the seas in +the days of his great-uncle, a stout old mariner who seemed from Davie's +account to have been a hard drinker. Kipping was reminded of yarns about +Malay pirates, which he told so quietly, so mildly, that they seemed by +contrast thrice as terrible. Neddie Benson lugubriously recalled the +prophecy of the charming fortune-teller and argued the worst of our +mysterious stranger. "The lady said," he repeated, "that there'd be a dark +man and a light man and no end o' trouble. She was a nice lady, too." But +Neddie and his doleful fortune-teller as usual banished our gloom, and the +forecastle reechoed with hoarse laughter, which grew louder and louder when +Neddie once again narrated the lady's charms, and at last cried angrily +that she was as plump as a nice young chicken. + +"If you was to ask me," Bill Hayden murmured, "I'd say it was just a sail." +But no one asked Bill Hayden, and with a few words about his "little wee +girl at Newburyport," he buried himself in his old blankets and was soon +asleep. + +During the mid-watch that same night, the cook prowled the deck forward +like a dog sneaking along the wharves. Silently, the whites of his eyes +gleaming out of the darkness, he moved hither and thither, careful always +to avoid the second mate's observation. As I watched him, I became more and +more curious, for I could make nothing of his veering course. He went now +to starboard, now to larboard, now to the forecastle, now to the steerage, +always silently, always deliberately. After a while he came over and stood +beside me. + +"It ain't right," he whispered. "Ah tell you, boy, it ain't right." + +"What's not right?" I asked. + +"De goin's on aboa'd dis ship." + +"What goings on?" + +"Boy, Ah's been a long time to sea and Ah's cooked foh some bad crews in my +time, yass, sah, but Ah's gwine tell you, boy, 'cause Ah done took a fancy +to you, dis am de most iniquitous crew Ah eveh done cook salt hoss foh. +Yass, sah." + +"What do you mean?" + +The negro ignored my question. + +"Ah's gwine tell you, boy, dis yeh crew am bad 'nough, but when dah come a +ha'nt boat a-sailin' oveh yondeh jest at dahk, boy, Ah wish Ah was back +home whar Ah could somehow come to shoot a rabbit what got a lef' +hind-foot. Yass, sah." + +For a long time he silently paced up and down by the bulwark; but finally I +saw him momentarily against the light of his dim lantern as he entered his +own quarters. + +Morning came with fine breezes and pleasant weather. At half-past four we +saw Winerow Point bearing northwest by west. At seven o'clock we took in +all studding-sails and staysails, and the fore and mizzen topgallant-sails. +So another day passed and another night. An hour after midnight we took in +the main topgallantsail, and lay by with our head to the south until six +bells, when we wore ship, proceeding north again, and saw Java Head at nine +o'clock to the minute. + +We now faced Sunda Strait, the channel that separates Java from Sumatra and +unites the Indian Ocean with the Java Sea. From the bow of our ship there +stretched out on one hand and on the other, far beyond the horizon, Borneo, +Celebes, Banka and Billiton; the Little Sunda Islands--Bali and Lombok, +Simbawa, Flores and Timor; the China Sea, the Philippines, and farther and +greater than them all, the mainland of Asia. + +While we were still intent on Java Head there came once more the cry, "Sail +ho!" + +This time the sail was not to be mistaken. Captain Whidden trained on it +the glass, which he shortly handed to Mr. Thomas. "See her go!" the men +cried. It was true. She was running away from us easily. Now she was hull +down. Now we could see only her topgallant-sails. Now she again had +disappeared. But this time we had found, besides her general appearance and +the cut of her sails, which no seaman could mistake, a mark by which any +landsman must recognize her: on her fore-topsail there was a white +lozenge-shaped patch. + +At eleven o'clock in the morning, with Prince's Island bearing from north +to west by south, we entered the Straits of Sunda. At noon we were due east +of Prince's Island beach and had sighted the third Point of Java and the +Isle of Cracato. + +Fine breezes and a clear sky favored us, and the islands, green and blue +according to their distance, were beautiful to see. Occasionally we had +glimpses of little native craft, or descried villages sleeping amid the +drowsy green of the cocoanut trees. It was a peaceful, beautiful world +that met our eyes as the Island Princess stood through the Straits and up +the east coast of Sumatra; the air was warm and pleasant, and the leaves of +the tufted palms, lacily interwoven, were small in the distance like the +fronds of ferns in our own land. But Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas +remained on deck and constantly searched the horizon with the glass; and +the men worked uneasily, glancing up apprehensively every minute or two, +and starting at slight sounds. There was reason to be apprehensive, we +all knew. + +On the evening of Friday, August 11, beyond possibility of doubt we sighted +a ship; and that it was the same which we already had seen at least once, +the lozenge-shaped patch on the foresail proved to the satisfaction +of officers and men. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +ATTACKED + + +In the morning we were mystified to see that the sail once again had +disappeared. But to distract us from idle speculations, need of fresh water +now added to our uneasiness, and we anchored on a mud bottom while the +captain and Mr. Thomas went ashore and searched in vain for a +watering-place. + +During the day we saw a number of natives fishing in their boats a short +distance away; but when our own boat approached them, they pulled for the +shore with all speed and fled into the woods like wild men. Thus the day +passed,--so quietly and uneventfully that it lulled us into confidence that +we were safe from harm,--and a new day dawned. + +That morning, as we lay at anchor, the strange ship, with the sun shining +brightly on her sails, boldly reappeared from beyond a distant point, and +hove to about three miles to the north-northeast. As she lay in plain sight +and almost within earshot, she seemed no more out of the ordinary than any +vessel that we might have passed off the coast of New England. But on her +great foresail, which hung loose now with the wind shaken out of it, there +was a lozenge-shaped patch of clean new canvas. + +Soon word passed from mouth to mouth that the captain and Mr. Falk would go +in the gig to learn the stranger's name and port. + +To a certain extent we were relieved to find that our phantom ship was +built of solid wood and iron; yet we were decidedly apprehensive as we +watched the men pull away in the bright sun. The boat became smaller and +smaller, and the dipping oars flashed like gold. + +With his head out-thrust and his chin sunk below the level of his +shoulders, the cook stood by the galley, in doubt and foreboding, and +watched the boat pull away. + +His voice, when he spoke, gave me a start. + +"Look dah, boy! Look dah! Dey's sumpin' funny, yass, sah. 'Tain't safe foh +to truck with ha'nts, no sah! You can't make dis yeh nigger think a winkin' +fire-bug of a fly-by-night ship ain't a ha'nt." + +"Ha'nts," said Kipping mildly, "ha'nts is bad things for niggers, but they +don't hurt white men." + +"Lemme tell you, you Kipping, it ain't gwine pay you to be disrespectable +to de cook." Frank stuck his angry face in front of the mild man's. "Ef you +think--ha!"--He stopped suddenly, his eyes fixed on something far beyond +Kipping, over whose shoulder he now was looking. "Look dah! Look dah! What +Ah say? Hey? What Ah say? Look dah! Look dah!" + +Startled by the cook's fierce yell, we turned as if a gun had been fired; +but we saw only that the boat was coming about. + +"Look dah! Look dah! See 'em row! Don' tell me dat ain't no ha'nt!" Jumping +up and down, waving his arms wildly, contorting his irregular features till +he resembled a gorilla, he continued to yell in frenzy. + +Although there seemed to be no cause for any such outburst, the rest of us +now were alarmed by the behavior of the men in the boat. Having come about, +they were racing back to the Island Princess as fast as ever they could, +and the captain and Mr. Falk, if we could judge by their gestures, were +urging them to even greater efforts. + +"Look dah! Look dah! Don't you tell me dey ain't seen a ha'nt, you +Kipping!" + +As they approached, I heard Roger Hamlin say sharply to the mate, "Mr. +Thomas, that ship yonder is drifting down on us rapidly. See! They're +sheeting home the topsail." + +I could see that Mr. Thomas, who evidently thought Roger's fear groundless, +was laughing, but I could not hear his reply. In any case he gave no order +to prepare for action until the boat came within earshot and the captain +abruptly hailed him and ordered him to trip anchor and prepare to make +sail. + +As the boat came aboard, we heard news that thrilled us. "She's an Arab +ship," spread the word. "They were waiting for our boat, with no sign of +hostility until Mr. Falk saw the sunlight strike on a gun-barrel that was +intended to be hidden behind the bulwark. As the boat veered away, the man +with the gun started to fire, but another prevented him, probably because +the distance was so great." + +Instantly there was wild activity on the Island Princess. While we loosed +the sails and sheeted them home and, with anchor aweigh, braced the yards +and began to move ahead, the idlers were tricing up the boarding nettings +and double-charging our cannon, of which we carried three--a long gun +amidships and a pair of stern chasers. Men to work the ship were ordered to +the ropes. The rest were served pikes and loaded muskets. + +We accomplished the various preparations in an incredibly short time, and, +gathering way, stood ready to receive the stranger should she force us to +fight. + +For the time being we were doubtful of her intentions, and seeing us armed +and ready, she stood off as if still unwilling to press us more closely. +But some one aboard her, if I guess aright, resented so tame an end to a +long pursuit and insisted on at least an exchange of volleys. + +[Illustration: Suddenly, in the brief silence that followed the two +thunderous reports, a pistol shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain +Whidden spin around and fall.] + +Now she came down on us, running easily with the wind on her quarter, and +gave us a round from her muskets. + +"Hold your fire," Captain Whidden ordered. "They're feeling their way." + +Emboldened by our silence, she wore ship and came nearer. It seemed now +that she would attempt to board us, for we spied men waiting with +grapnels, and she came steadily on while our own men fretted at their +guns, not daring to fire without the captain's orders, till we could see +the triumphant sneer on the dark face of her commander. + +Now her muskets spoke again. I heard a bullet sing over my head and saw one +of our own seamen in the waist fall and lie quite still. Should we never +answer her in kind? In three minutes, it seemed, we should have to meet her +men hand to hand. + +Now our helmsman luffed, and we came closer into the wind, which gave our +guns a chance. + +"Now, then," Captain Whidden cried, "let them have the long gun and hold +the rest." + +With a crash our cannon swept the deck of the Arab, splintering the cabin +and accomplishing ten times as much damage as all her muskets had done to +us. But she in turn, exasperated by the havoc we had wrought, fired +simultaneously her two largest guns at point-blank range. + +I ducked behind the bulwark and looked back along the deck. One ball had +hit the scuttle-butt and had splashed the water fifteen feet in every +direction. Another had splintered the cross jack-yard. Suddenly, in the +brief silence that followed the two thunderous reports, a single +pistol-shot rang out sharply and I saw Captain Whidden spin round and fall. + +Our own guns, as we came about, sent an answer that cut the Arab's lower +sail to ribbons, disabled many men and, I am confident, killed several. But +there was no time to load again. Although by now we showed our stern to the +enemy, and had a fair--chance to outstrip her in a long race, her greater +momentum was bringing her down upon us rapidly. From aft came the order--it +was Mr. Thomas who gave it,--"All hands to the pikes and repel boarders!" + +There was, however, no more fighting. Our assailants took measure of the +stout nets and the strong battery of pikes, and, abandoning the whole +unlucky adventure, bore away on a new course. + +One man forward was killed and four were badly hurt. Mr. Thomas sat with +his back against the cabin, very white of face, with streams of red running +from his nostrils and his mouth; and Captain Whidden lay dead on the deck. +An hour later word passed through the ship that Mr. Thomas, too, had died. + + + +CHAPTER IX + +BAD SIGNS + + +It was strange that, while some of us in the forecastle were much cast down +by the tragic events of the day, others should seem to be put in really +good humor by it all. Neddie Benson soberly shook his head from time to +time; old Bill Hayden lay in his bunk without even a word about his "little +wee girl in Newburyport," and occasionally complained of not feeling well; +and various others of the crew faced the future with frank hopelessness. + +For my own part, it seemed to me as unreal as a nightmare that Captain +Joseph Whidden actually had been shot dead by a band of Arab pirates. I was +bewildered--indeed, stunned--by the incredible suddenness of the calamity. +It was so complete, so appallingly final! To me, a boy still in his 'teens, +that first intimate association with violent death would have been in +itself terrible, and I keenly felt the loss of our chief mate. But Captain +Whidden to me was far more than master of the ship. He had been my father's +friend since long before I was born; and from the days when I first +discriminated between the guests at my father's house, I had counted him as +also a friend of mine. Never had I dreamed that so sad an hour would darken +my first voyage. + +Kipping, on the other hand, and Davie Paine and the carpenter seemed +actually well pleased with what had happened. They lolled around with an +air of exasperating superiority when they saw any of the rest of us looking +at them; and now and then they exchanged glances that I was at a loss to +understand until all at once a new thought dawned on me: since the captain +and the first mate were dead, the command of the ship devolved upon +Mr. Falk, the second mate. + +No wonder that Kipping and Davie and the carpenter and all the rest of that +lawless clique were well pleased. No wonder that old Bill Hayden and some +of the others, for whom Kipping and his friends had not a particle of use +were downcast by the prospect. + +I was amazed at my own stupidity in not realizing it before, and above all +else I now longed to talk with someone whom I could trust--Roger Hamlin by +preference; as second choice, my friend the cook. But for the time being I +was disappointed in this. Almost immediately Mr. Falk summoned all hands +aft. + +"Men," he said, putting on a grave face that seemed to me assumed for the +occasion, "men, we've come through a dangerous time, and we are lucky to +have come alive out of the bad scrape that we were in. Some of us haven't +come through so well. It's a sad thing for a ship to lose an officer, and +it is twice as sad to lose two fine officers like Captain Whidden and Mr. +Thomas. I'll now read the service for the burial of the dead, and after +that I'll have something more to say to you." + +One of the men spoke in an undertone, and Mr. Falk cried, "What's that?" + +"If you please, sir," the man said, fidgeting nervously, "couldn't we go +ashore and bury them decently?" + +Others had thought of the same thing, and they showed it by their faces; +but Mr. Falk scowled and replied, "Nonsense! We'd be murdered in cold +blood." + +So we stood there, bareheaded, silent, sad at heart, and heard the droning +voice of the second mate,--even then he could not hide his unrighteous +satisfaction,--who read from a worn prayer-book, that had belonged to +Captain Whidden himself, the words committing the bodies of three men to +the deep, their souls to God. + +When the brief, perfunctory service was over, Mr. Falk put away the +prayer-book,--I verily believe he put away with it all fear of the +Lord,--folded his arms and faced us arrogantly. + +"By the death of Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas," he said, "I have become +the rightful master of this ship. Now I've got a few things to say to you, +and I'm going to have them understood. If you heed them and work smartly, +you'll get along as well as you deserve. If you don't heed them, you'd +better be dead and done with it. If you don't heed them--" he sneered +disagreeably--"if you don't heed them I'll lash the skin off the back of +every bloody mother's son of ye. This voyage from now on is to be carried +out for the best interests of all concerned." He stopped and smiled and +repeated significantly, "_Of_ ALL _concerned_." After another pause, in +which some of the men exchanged knowing glances, he went on, "I have no +doubt that the most of us will get along as well as need be. So far, well +and good. But if there's those that try to cross my bows,"--he swore +roundly,--"heaven help'em! They'll need it. That's all. Wait! One thing +more: we've got to have officers, and as I know you'll not be bold to pick +from among yourselves, I'll save you the trouble. Kipping from this time on +will be chief mate. You'll take his things aft, and you'll obey him from +now on and put the handle to his name. Paine will be second mate. That's +all. Go forward." + +Kipping and Davie Paine! I was thunderstruck. But some of the men exchanged +glances and smiles as before, and I saw by his expression that Roger, +although ill pleased, was by no means so amazed as I should have expected +him to be. + +For the last time as seaman, Kipping, mild and quiet, came to the +forecastle. But as he packed his bag and prepared to leave us, he smiled +constantly with a detestable quirk of his mouth, and before going he +stopped beside downcast old Bill Hayden. "Straighten up, be a man," he said +softly; "I'll see that you're treated right." He fairly drawled the words, +so mildly did he speak; but when he had finished, his manner instantly +changed. Thrusting out his chin and narrowing his eyes, he deliberately +drew back his foot and gave old Bill one savage kick. + +I was right glad that chance had placed me in the second mate's watch. + +As for Davie Paine, he was so overcome by the stroke of fortune that had +resulted in his promotion, that he could not even collect his belongings. +We helped him pile them into his chest, which he fastened with trembling +fingers, and gave him a hand on deck. But even his deep voice had failed +him for the time being, and when he took leave of us, he whispered +piteously, '"Fore the Lord, I dunno how it happened. I ain't never learned +to figger and I can't no more than write my name." + +What was to become of us? Our captain was a weak officer. Our present chief +mate no man of us trusted. + +Our second mate was inexperienced, incompetent, illiterate. More than ever +I longed to talk with Roger Hamlin, but there was no opportunity that +night. + +Our watch on deck was a farce, for old Davie was so unfamiliar with his new +duties and so confused by his sudden eminence that, according to the men at +the wheel, he didn't know north from south or aloft from alow. Evading his +confused glances, I sought the galley, and without any of the usual +complicated formalities was admitted to where the cook was smoking his rank +pipe. + +Rolling his eyes until the whites gleamed, he told me the following +astounding story. + +"Boy," he said, "dis am de most unmitigated day ol' Frank ever see. Cap'n, +he am a good man and now he's a dead un. Mistah Thomas he am a good man and +now _he's_ a dead un. What Ah tell you about dem ha'nts? Ef Ah could have +kotched a rabbit with a lef' hind-leg, Ah guess we'd be better off. Hey? +Mistah Falk, he am cap'n--Lo'd have mercy on us! Dat Kipping, he am chief +mate--Lo'd have mercy on us mis'able sinners! Davie Paine, he am second +mate--Lo'd perserve ou' souls! Ah guess you don't know what Ah heah Mistah +Falk say to stew'd! He says, 'Stew'd, we got ev'ything--ev'ything. And we +ain't broke a single law!' Now tell me what he mean by dat? What's stew'd +got, Ah want to know? But dat ain't all--no, sah, dat ain't all." + +He leaned forward, the whites of his eyes rolling, his fixed frown more +ominous than ever. "Boy, Ah see 'em when dey's dead, Ah did. Ah see 'em +all. Mistah Thomas, he have a big hole in de middle of his front, and dat +po' old sailo' man he have a big hole in de middle of his front. Yass, sah, +Ah see 'em! But cap'n, he have a little roun' hole in the back of his +head.--Yass, sah--_he was shot f'om behine_!" + +The sea that night was as calm and as untroubled as if the day had passed +in Sabbath quiet. It seemed impossible that we had endured so much, that +Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas were dead, that the space of only +twenty-four hours had wrought such a change in the fortunes of all on +board. + +[Illustration: We helped him pile his belongings into his chest +and gave him a hand on deck.] + +I could not believe that one of our own men had shot our captain. Surely +the bullet must have hit him when he was turning to give an order or to +oversee some particular duty. And yet I could not forget the cook's words. +They hummed in my ears. They sounded in the strumming of the rigging, in +the "talking" of the ship:-- + +"A little roun' hole in the back of his head--yass, sah--he was shot f'om +behine." + +Without the captain and Mr. Thomas the Island Princess was like a strange +vessel. Both Kipping and Davie Paine had been promoted from the starboard +watch, leaving us shorthanded; so a queer, self-confident fellow named +Blodgett was transferred from the chief mate's watch to ours. But even so +there were fewer hands and more work, and the spirit of the crew seemed to +have changed. Whereas earlier in the voyage most of the men had gone +smartly about their duties, always glad to lend a hand or join in a +chantey, and with an eye for the profit and welfare of the owners as well +as of themselves, now there came over the ship, silently, imperceptibly, +yet so swiftly and completely that, although no man saw it come, in +twenty-four hours it was with us and upon us in all its deadening and +discouraging weight, a spirit of lassitude and procrastination. You would +have expected some of the men to find it hard to give old Davie Paine quite +all the respect to which his new berth entitled him, and for my own part I +liked Kipping less even than I had liked Mr. Falk. But although my own +prejudice should have enabled me to understand any minor lapses from the +strict discipline of life aboard ship, much occurred in the next +twenty-four hours that puzzled me. + +For one thing, those men whom I had thought most likely to accord Kipping +and Mr. Falk due respect were most careless in their work and in the small +formalities observed between officers and crew. The carpenter and the +steward, for example, spent a long time in the galley at an hour when they +should have been busy with their own duties. I was near when they came out, +and heard the cook's parting words: "Yass, sah, yass, sah, it ain't +neveh no discombobilation to help out gen'lems, sah. Yass, sah, no, sah." + +And when, a little later, I myself knocked at the door, I got a reception +that surprised me beyond measure. + +"Who dah," the cook cried in his usual brusque voice. "Who dah knockin' at +mah door?" + +Coming out, he brushed past me, and stood staring fiercely from side to +side. I knew, of course, his curiously indirect methods, and I expected him +by some quick motion or muttered command to summon me, as always before, +into his hot little cubby-hole. Never was boy more taken aback! "Who dah +knockin' at mah door?" he said again, standing within two feet of my elbow, +looking past me not two inches from my nose. "Humph! Somebody knockin' at +mah door better look at what dey doin' or dey gwine git into a peck of +trouble." + +He turned his back on me and reentered the galley. + +Then I looked aft, and saw Kipping and the steward grinning broadly. +Before, I had been disconcerted. Now I was enraged. How had they turned old +black Frank against me, I wondered? Kipping and the steward, whom the negro +disliked above all people on board! So the steward and the carpenter and +Kipping were working hand in glove! And Mr. Falk probably was in the same +boat with them. Where was Roger Hamlin, and what was he doing as supercargo +to protect the goods below decks? Then I laughed shortly, though a little +angrily, at my own childish impatience. + +Certainly any suspicions of danger to the cargo were entirely without +foundations. Mr. Falk--Captain Falk, I must call him now--might have a +disagreeable personality, but there was nothing to indicate that he was not +in most respects a competent officer, or that the ship and cargo would +suffer at his hands. The cook had been companionable in his own peculiar +way and a very convenient friend indeed; but, after all, I could get along +very well on my own resources. + +The difference that a change of officers makes in the life and spirit of a +ship's crew is surprising to one unfamiliar with the sea. Captain Whidden +had been a gentleman and a first-class sailor; by ordering our life +strictly, though not harshly or severely, he had maintained that efficient, +smoothly working organization which is best and pleasantest for all +concerned. But Captain Falk was a master whose sails were cut on another +pattern. He lacked Captain Whidden's straightforward, searching gaze. From +the corners of his mouth lines drooped unpleasantly around his chin. His +voice was not forceful and commanding. I was confident that under ordinary +conditions he never would have been given a ship; I doubted even if he +would have got a chief mate's berth. But fortune had played into his hands, +and he now was our lawful master, resistance to whom could be construed as +mutiny and punished in any court in the land. + +Never, while Captain Whidden commanded the ship, would the steward and the +carpenter have deserted their work and have hidden themselves away in the +cook's galley. Never, I was positive, would such a pair of officers as +Kipping and old Davie Paine have been promoted from the forecastle. To be +sure, the transgressions of the carpenter and the steward were only petty +as yet, and if no worse came of our new situation, I should be very foolish +to take it all so seriously. But it was not easy to regard our situation +lightly. There were too many straws to show the direction of the wind. + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE TREASURE-SEEKER + + +It was a starlit night while we still lingered off the coast of Sumatra for +water and fresh vegetables. The land was low and black against the steely +green of the sky, and a young moon like a silver thread shone in the west. +Blodgett, the new man in our watch, was the centre of a little group on the +forecastle. + +He was small and wrinkled and very wise. The more I saw and heard of him, +the more I marveled that he had not attracted my attention before; but up +to this point in the voyage it was only by night that he had appeared +different from other men, and I thought of him only as a prowler in the +dark. + +In some ways he was like a cat. By day he would sit in corners in the sun +when opportunity offered, or lurk around the galley, shirking so brazenly, +that the men were amused rather than angry. Even at work he was as slow and +drowsy as an old cat, half opening his sleepy eyes when the officers called +him to account, and receiving an occasional kick or cuff with the same mild +surprise that a favorite cat might show. But once darkness had fallen, +Blodgett was a different man. He became nervously wakeful. His eyes +distended and his face lighted with strange animation. He walked hither and +yon. He fairly arched his neck. And sometimes, when some ordinary incident +struck his peculiar humor, he would throw back his head, open his great +mouth, and utter a screech of wild laughter for all the world like the yowl +of a tom-cat. + +On that particular night he walked the forecastle, keeping close to the +bulwarks, till the rest of us assembled by the rigging and watched him with +a kind of fascination. After a time he saw us gathered there and came over +to where we were. His eyes were large and his wrinkled features twitched +with eagerness. He seemed very old; he had traveled to the farthest lands. + +"Men," he cried in his thin, windy voice, "yonder's the moon." + +The moon indeed was there. There was no reason to gainsay him. He stood +with it over his left shoulder and extended his arms before him, one +pointing somewhat to the right, the other to the left. "The right hand is +the right way," he cried, "but the left we'll never leave." + +We stared at the man and wondered if he were mad. + +"No," he said, smiling at our puzzled glances, "we'll never leave the +left." + +"Belay that talk," said one of the men sharply. "Ye'll have to steer a +clearer course than that if you want us to follow you." + +Blodgett smiled. "The course is clear," he replied. "Yonder"--he waved his +right hand--"is Singapore and the Chinese Sea and Whampoa. It's the right +course. Our orders is for that course. Our cargo is for that course. It's +the course that will make money for the owners. It's the right--you +understand?--my right hand and the right course according to orders. But +yonder"--this time he waved his left hand--"is the course that won't be +left. And yet it's the left you know--my left hand." + +He explained his feeble little joke with an air of pride. + +"Why won't it be left?" the gruff seaman demanded. + +"Because," said Blodgett, "we ain't going to leave it. There's gold there +and no end of treasure. Do you suppose Captain Falk is going to leave it +all for some one else to get? He's going to sail through Malacca Strait and +across the Bay of Bengal to Calcutta. That's what he's going to do. I've +been in India myself and seen the heaps of gold lying on the ground by the +money-changer's door and no body watching it but a sleepy Gentoo." + +"But what's this treasure you're talking about," some one asked. + +"Sure," said Blodgett in a husky whisper, "it's a treasure such as never +was heard of before. There's barrels and barrels of gold and diamonds and +emeralds and rubies and no end of such gear. There's idols with crowns of +precious stones, and eyes in their carved heads that would pay a king's +ransom. There's money enough in gold mohurs and rupees to buy the Bank of +England." + +It was a cock-and-bull story that the little old man told us; but, absurd +though it was, he had an air of impressive sincerity; and although every +one of us would have laughed the yarn out of meeting had it been told of +Captain Whidden, affairs had changed in the last days aboard ship. +Certainly we did not trust Captain Falk. I thought of the cook's dark +words, "A little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine!" As we followed the direction of Blodgett's two hands,--the right +to the northeast and the Chinese shore, the left to the northwest and the +dim lowlands of Sumatra that lay along the road to Burma,--anything seemed +possible. Moon-madness was upon us, and we were carried away by the mystery +of the night. + +Such madness is not uncommon. Of tales in the fore-castle during a long +voyage there is no end. Extraordinary significance is attributed to trivial +happenings in the daily life of the crew, and the wonders of the sea and +the land are overshadowed completely by simple incidents that superstitious +shipmates are sure to exaggerate and to dwell upon. + +After a time, though, as Blodgett walked back and forth along the bulwark, +like a cat that will not go into the open, my sanity came back to me. + +"That's all nonsense," I said--perhaps too sharply; "Mr. Falk is an honest +seaman. His whole future would be ruined if he attempted any such thing as +that." + +"Ay, hear the boy," Blodgett muttered sarcastically. "What does the boy +think a man rich enough to buy all the ships in the king's navy will care +for such a future as Captain Falk has in front of him? Hgh! A boy that +don't know enough to call his captain by his proper title!" + +Blodgett fairly bristled in his indignation, and I said no more, although I +knew well enough--or thought I did--that such a scheme was quite too wild +to be plausible. Captain Falk might play a double game, but not such a +silly double game as that. + +"No," said Bill Hayden solemnly, as if voicing my own thought, "the captain +ain't going to spoil his good name like that." Poor, stupid old Bill! + +Blodgett snorted angrily, but the others laughed at Bill--silly old butt of +the forecastle, daft about his little girl!--and after speculating at +length concerning the treasure that Blodgett had described so vaguely, fell +at last into a hot argument about how far a skipper could disobey the +orders of his owners without committing piracy. + +Thus began the rumor that revealed the scatterwitted convictions so +characteristic of the strange, cat-like Blodgett, which later were to lead +almost to death certain simple members of the crew; which served, by a +freak of chance, to involve poor Bill Hayden in an affair that came to a +tragic end; and which, by a whim of fortune almost as remote, though +happier, placed me in closer touch with Roger Hamlin than I had been since +the Island Princess sailed from Salem harbor. + +An hour later I saw the cook standing silently by his galley. He gave me +neither look nor word, although he must have known that I was watching him, +but only puffed at his rank old pipe and stared at the stars and the hills. +I wondered if the jungle growth reminded him of his own African tropics; if +behind his grim, seamed face an unsuspected sense of poetry lurked, a sort +of half-beast, half-human imagination. + +Never glancing at me, never indicating by so much as a quiver of his black +features that he had perceived my presence, he sighed deeply, walked to the +rail and knocked the dead ashes from his pipe into the water. He then +turned and went into the galley and barricaded himself against intruders, +there to stay until, some time in the night, he should seek his berth in +the steerage for the few hours of deep sleep that were all his great body +required. But as he passed me I heard him murmuring to himself, "Dat Bill +Hayden, he betteh look out, yass, sah. He say Mistah Captain Falk don't +want to go to spoil his good name. Dat Hay den he betteh look out." + +With a bang of his plank door the old darky shut himself away from all of +us in the darkness of his little kingdom of pots and pans. + + +[Illustration] + + + + +III + +WHICH APPROACHES A CRISIS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XI + +A HUNDRED THOUSAND DOLLARS IN GOLD + + +Unquestionably the negro had known that I was there. Never otherwise could +he have ignored me so completely. I was certain too, that his cryptic +remarks about Bill Hayden were intended for my ears, for he never acted +without a reason, obscure, perhaps, and far-fetched, but always, according +to his own queer notions, sufficient. + +Sometimes it seemed as if he despised me; sometimes, as if he were +concealing a warm, friendly regard for me. + +An hour later, hearing the murmer of low voices, I discovered a little +group of men by the mainmast; and moved by the curiosity that more than +once had led me where I had no business to go, I silently approached. + +"Ah," said one of the men, "so you're keeping a weather eye out for my good +name, are you?" It was Captain Falk. + +I was startled. It seemed as if the old African were standing at my +shoulder, saying, "What did Ah told you, hey?" The cook had used almost +those very words. Where, I wondered, had he got them? It was almost +uncanny. + +"No, sir," came the reply,--it was poor Bill Hayden's voice,--"no, sir, I +didn't say that. I said--" + +"Well, what _did_ you say? Speak up!" + +"Why, sir, it--well, it wasn't that, I know. I wouldn't never ha' said +that. I--well, sir, it sounded something like that, I got to admit--I--I +ain't so good at remembering, sir, as I might be." + +The shadowy figures moved closer together. + +"You'll admit, then, that it _sounded_ like that?" There was the thud of a +quick blow. "I'll show you. I don't care what you _said_, as long as that +was what you _meant_. Take that! I'll show you." + +"Oh!--I--that's just it, sir, don't hit me!--It may have sounded like that, +but--Oh!--it never meant anything like that. I can't remember just how the +words was put together--I ain't so good at remembering but--Oh!--" + +The scene made me feel sick, it was so brutal; yet there was nothing that +the rest of us could do to stop it. + +Captain Falk was in command of the ship. + +I heard a mild laugh that filled me with rage. "That's the way to make 'em +take back their talk, captain. Give him a good one," said the mild voice. +"He ain't the only one that 'll be better for a sound beating." + + +There was a scuffle of footsteps, then I heard Bill cry out, "Oh--oh!--oh!" + +Suddenly a man broke from the group and fled along the deck. + +"Come back here, you scoundrel!" the captain cried with vile oaths; "come +back here, or I swear I'll seize you up and lash you to a bloody pulp." + +The fugitive now stood in the bow, trembling, and faced those who were +approaching him. "Don't," he cried piteously, "I didn't go to do nothing." + +"Oh, no, not you!" said the mild voice, followed by a mild laugh. "He +didn't do nothing, captain." + +"Not he!" Captain Falk muttered. "I'll show him who's captain here." + +There was no escape for the unfortunate man. They closed in on him and +roughly dragged him from his retreat straight aft to the quarter-deck, and +there I heard their brief discussion. + +"Hadn't you better call up the men, captain?" asked the mild voice. "It'll +do 'em good, I'll warrant you." + +"No," the captain replied, hotly. "This is a personal affair. Strip him and +seize him up." + +I heard nothing more for a few minutes, but I could see them moving about, +and presently I distinguished Bill's bare back and arms as they +spread-eagled him to the rigging. + +Then the rope whistled in the air and Bill moaned. + +Unable to endure the sight, I was turning away, when some one coming from +the cabin broke in upon the scene. + +"Well," said Roger Hamlin, "what's all this about?" + +Roger's calm voice and composed manner were so characteristic of him that +for the moment I could almost imagine myself at home in Salem and merely +passing him on the street. + +"I'll have you know, sir," said Captain Falk, "that I'm master here." + +"Evidently, sir." + +"Then what do you mean, sir, by challenging me like that?" + +"From what I have heard, I judge that the punishment is out of proportion +to the offense, even if the steward's yarn was true." + +"I'll have you know, that I'm the only man aboard this ship that has any +judgment," Falk snarled. + +"Judgment ?" Roger exclaimed; and the twist he gave the word was so funny +that some one actually snickered. + +"Yes, judgment !" Falk roared; and he turned on Roger with all the anger of +his mean nature choking his voice. "I'll--I'll beat you, you young upstart, +you! I'll beat you in that man's place," he cried, with a string of oaths. + +"No," said Roger very coolly, "I think you won't." + +"By heaven, I will!" + +The two men faced each other like two cocks in the pit at the instant +before the battle. There was a deathly silence on deck. + +Such a scene, as I saw it there, if put on the stage in a theatre, would be +a drama in itself without word or action. The sky was bright with stars; +the land lay low and dark against the horizon; the sea whispered round the +ship and sparkled with golden phosphorescence. Over our heads the masts +towered to slender black shafts, which at that lofty height seemed far too +frail to support the great network of rigging and spars and close-furled +canvas. Dwarfed by the tall masts, by the distances of the sea, and by the +vastness of the heavens, the small black figures stood silent on the +quarter-deck. But one of those men was bound half-naked to the rigging, and +two faced each other in attitudes that by outline alone, for we could +discern the features of neither, revealed antagonism and defiance. + +"No," said Roger once more, very coolly, "I think you won't." + +As the captain lifted his rope to hit Bill again, Roger stepped forward. + +The captain looked sharply at him; then with a shrug he said, "Oh, well, +the fellow's had enough. Cut him down, cut him down." + +So they unlashed Bill, and he came forward with his clothes in his arms and +one long, raw welt across his back. + +"Now, what did I say?" he whimpered. "What did I say to make 'em do like +that?" + +What had he said, indeed? Certainly nothing culpable. Some one had twisted +his innocent remarks in such a way as to irritate the captain and had +carried tales to the cabin. With decent officers such a thing never would +have happened. Affairs had run a sad course since Captain Falk had read the +burial service over Captain Whidden and Mr. Thomas, both of whom had been +strict, fair, honorable gentlemen. There was a sober time in the forecastle +that night, and none of us had much to say. + +Next day we sent a boat ashore again, and got information that led us to +sail along five miles farther, where there was a settlement from which we +got a good supply of water and vegetables. This took another day, and on +the morning of the day following we made sail once more and laid our course +west of Lingga Island, which convinced us for a time that we really were +about to bear away through Malacca Strait and on to Burma, at the very +least. + +I almost believed it myself, India seemed so near; and Blodgett, sleepy by +day, wakeful by night, prowled about with an air of triumph. But in the +forenoon watch Roger Hamlin came forward openly and told me certain things +that were more momentous than any treasure-hunting trip to India that +Blodgett ever dreamed of. + +Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping--I suppose they must be given their titles +now--watched him, and I could see that they didn't like it. They exchanged +glances and stared after him suspiciously, even resentfully; but there +was nothing that they could do or say. So he came on slowly and +confidently, looking keenly from one man to another as he passed. + +By this time the two parties on board were sharply divided, and from the +attitude of the men as they met Roger's glance their partisanship was +pretty plainly revealed. The two from Boston, who were, I was confident, +on friendly and even familiar terms with Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping, gave +him a half-concealed sneer. There was no doubt where their sympathies would +lie, should Roger cross courses with our new master. The carpenter, working +on a plank laid on deck, heard him coming, glanced up, and seeing who it +was, continued at his labor without moving so much as a hair's breadth to +let him by; the steward looked him in the eye brazenly and impersonally; +and others of the crew, among them the strange Blodgett, treated him with a +certain subtle rudeness, even contempt. Yet here and there a man was glad +to see him coming and gave him a cordial nod, or a cheerful "Ay, ay, sir," +in answer to whatever observation he let fall. + +The cook alone, as I watched the scene with close interest, I could not +understand. To a certain extent he seemed surly, to a certain extent, +subservient. Perhaps he intended that we--and others--should be mystified. + +One thing I now realized for the first time: although the crew was divided +into two cliques, the understanding was much more complete on the side of +Captain Falk. Among those who enjoyed the favor of our new officers there +was, I felt sure, some secret agreement, perhaps even some definite +organization. There seemed to be a unity of thought and manner that only a +common purpose could explain, whereas the rest drifted as the wind blew. + +"Ben," Roger said, coming to me where I sat on the forecastle, "I want to +talk to you. Step over by the mast." + +I followed him, though surprised. + +"Here we can see on all sides," he said. "There are no hiding-places within +earshot. Ben"--He hesitated as if to find the right words. + +All were watching us now, the captain and the mate from the quarter-deck, +the others from wherever they happened to be. + +"I am loath to draw your sister's younger brother into danger," Roger +began. His adjective was tactfully chosen. "I am almost equally reluctant +to implicate you in what seems likely to confront us, because you are an +old friend of mine and a good deal younger than I am. But when the time +comes to go home, Ben, I'm sure we want to be able to look your sister and +all the others squarely in the eyes, with our hands clean and our +consciences clear--if we go home. How about it, Ben?" + + +I was too bewildered to answer, and in Roger's eyes something of his old +twinkle appeared. + +"Ultimately," he continued, grave once more and speaking still in enigmas, +"we shall be vindicated in any case. But I fear that, before then, I, for +one, shall have to clasp hands with mutiny, perhaps with piracy. How would +you like that, Ben, with a thundering old fight against odds, a fight that +likely enough will leave us to sleep forever on one of these green islands +hereabouts?" + +Still I did not understand. + +Roger regarded me thoughtfully. "Tell me all that you know about our +cargo." + +"Why," said I, finding my tongue at last, "it's ginseng and woollen goods +for Canton. That's all I know." + +"Then you don't know that at this moment there is one hundred thousand +dollars in gold in the hold of the Island Princess?" + +"What?" I gasped. + +"One hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +I could not believe my ears. Certainly, so far as I was concerned, the +secret had been well kept. + +Then a new thought came to me, "Does Captain Falk know?" I asked. + +"Yes," said Roger, "Captain Falk knows." + + + +CHAPTER XII + +A STRANGE TALE + + +Roger Hamlin's words were to linger a long time in my ears, and so far as I +then could see, there was little to say in reply. A hundred thousand +dollars in gold had bought, soul and body, many a better man than Captain +Falk. At that very moment Falk was watching us from the quarter-deck with +an expression on his face that was partly an amused smile, partly a sneer. +Weak and conceited though he was, he was master of that ship and crew in +more ways than one. + +But Roger had not finished. "Do you remember, Ben," he continued in a low +voice, but otherwise unmindful of those about us, "that some half a dozen +years ago, when Thomas Webster was sore put to it for enough money to +square his debts and make a clean start, the brig Vesper, on which he had +sent a venture, returned him a profit so unbelievably great that he was +able to pay his creditors and buy from the Shattucks the old Eastern +Empress, which he fitted out for the voyage to Sumatra that saved his +fortunes?" + +I remembered it vaguely--I had been only a small boy when it happened--and +I listened with keenest interest. The Websters owned the Island Princess. + +"Not a dozen people know all the story of that voyage. It's been a kind of +family secret with the Websters. Perhaps they're ashamed to be so deeply +indebted to a Chinese merchant. Well, it's a story I shouldn't tell under +other conditions, but in the light of all that's come to pass, it's best +you should hear the whole tale, Ben; and in some ways it's a fine tale, +too. The Websters, as you probably know, had had bad luck, what with three +wrecks and pirates in the West Indies. They were pretty much by the head in +those days, and it was a dark outlook before them, when young Webster +signed the Vesper's articles as first officer and went aboard, with all +that the old man could scrape together for a venture, and with the future +of his family hanging in the balance. At Whampoa young Webster went up to +the Hong along with the others, and drove what bargains he could, and +cleared a tidy little sum. But it was nowhere near enough to save the +family. If only they could get the money to tide them over, they'd weather +the gale. If not, they'd go on a lee shore. Certain men--you'd know their +names, but such things are better forgotten--were waiting to attach the +ships the Websters had on the ways, and if the ships were attached there +would be nothing left for the Websters but stools in somebody's +counting-house. + +"As I've heard the story, young Webster was waiting by the river for his +boat, with a face as long as you'd hope to see, when a Chinese who'd been +watching him from a little distance came up and addressed him in such +pidgin English as he could muster and asked after his father. Of course +young Webster was taken by surprise, but he returned a civil answer, and +the two fell to talking together. It seemed that, once upon a time, when +the Chinese was involved, head and heels, with some rascally down-east +Yankee, old man Webster had come to the rescue and had got him out of the +scrape with his yellow hide whole and his moneybags untapped. + +"The Chinaman seemed to suspect from the boy's long face that all was not +as it should be, and he squeezed more or less of the truth out of the +young fellow, had him up to the Hong again, gave him various gifts, and +sent him back to America with five teak-wood chests. Just five ordinary +teak-wood chests--but in those teak-wood chests, Ben, was the money that +put the Websters on their feet again. The hundred thousand dollars below +is for that Chinese merchant." + +It was a strange tale, but stranger tales than that were told in the old +town from which we had sailed. + +"And Captain Falk--?" I began questioningly. + +"Captain Falk was never thought of as a possible master of this ship." + +"Will he try to steal the money?" + +Roger raised his brows. "Steal it? Steal is a disagreeable word. He thinks +he has a grievance because he was not given the chief mate's berth to begin +with. He says, at all events, that he will not hand over any such sum to a +yellow heathen. He thinks he can return it to the owners two-fold. Although +he seldom reads his Bible, I believe he referred to the man who was given +ten talents." + +"But the owners' orders!" I exclaimed. + +"The owners' orders in that respect were secret. They were issued to +Captain Whidden and to me, and Captain Falk refuses to accept my version of +them." + +"And you?" + +Roger smiled and looked me hard in the eye. "I am going to see that they +are carried out," he said. "The Websters would be grievously disappointed +if this commission were not discharged. Also--" his eyes twinkled in the +old way--"I am not convinced that Captain Falk is in all respects an +honest--no, let us not speak too harshly--let us say, a _reliable_ man." + +"So there'll be a fight," I mused. + +"We'll see," Roger replied. "In any case, you know the story. Are you with +me?" + +After fifty years I can confess without shame that I was frightened when +Roger asked me that question, for Roger and I were only two, and Falk, by +hook or by crook, had won most of the others to his side. There was Bill +Hayden, to be sure, on whom we could count; but he was a weak soul at best, +and of the cook's loyalty to Roger and whatever cause he might espouse I +now held grave doubts. Yet I managed to reply, "Yes, Roger, I am with you." + +I thought of my sister when I said it, and of the white flutter of her +handkerchief, which had waved so bravely from the old wharf when Roger and +I sailed out of Salem harbor. After all, I was glad even then that I had +answered as I did. + +"I'll have more to say later," said Roger; "but if I stay here much longer +now, Falk and Kipping will be breaking in upon us." And, turning, he coolly +walked aft. + +Falk and Kipping were still watching us with sneers, and not a few of the +crew gave us hostile glances as we separated. But I looked after Roger with +an affection and a confidence that I was too young fully to appreciate. I +only realized that he was upright and fearless, and that I was ready to +follow him anywhere. + +More and more I was afraid of the influence that Captain Falk had +established in the forecastle. More and more it seemed as if he actually +had entered into some lawless conspiracy with the men. Certainly they +grumbled less than before, and accepted greater discomforts with better +grace; and although I found myself excluded from their councils without any +apparent reason, I overheard occasional snatches of talk from which I +gathered that they derived great satisfaction from their scheme, whatever +it was. Even the cook would have none of me in the galley of an evening; +and Roger in the cabin where no doubt he was fighting his own battles, was +far away from the green hand in the forecastle. I was left to my own +devices and to Bill Hayden. + +To a great extent, I suppose, it counted against me that I was the son of a +gentleman. But if I was left alone forward, so Roger, I learned now and +then, was left alone aft. + +Continually I puzzled over the complacency of the men. They would nod and +smile and glance at me pityingly, even when I was getting my meat from the +same kids and my tea from the same pot; and chance phrases, which I caught +now and then, added to my uneasiness. + +Once old Blodgett, prowling like a cat in the night, was telling how he was +going to "take his money and buy a little place over Ipswich way. There's +nice little places over Ipswich way where a man can settle snug as you +please and buy him a wife and end his days in comfort. We'll go home by way +of India, too, I'll warrant you, and take each of us our handful of round +red rubies. Right's right, but right'll be left--mind what I tell you." +Another time--on the same day, as I now recall it--I overheard the +carpenter saying that he was going to build a brick house in Boston up on +Temple Place. "And there'll be fan-lights over the door," he said, "their +panels as thin as rose-leaves, and leaded glass in a fine pattern." The +carpenter was a craftsman who aspired to be an artist. + +But where did old Blodgett or the carpenter hope to get the money to +indulge the tastes of a prosperous merchant? I suspected well enough the +answer to that question, and I was not far wrong. + +The cook remained inscrutable. I could not fathom the expressions of his +black frowning face. Although Captain Falk of course had no direct +communication with him openly, I learned through Bill Hayden that +indirectly he treated him with tolerant and friendly patronage. It even did +not surprise me greatly to be told that sometimes he secretly visited the +galley after dark and actually hobnobbed with black Frank in his own +quarters. It was almost incredible, to be sure; but so was much else in +which Captain Falk was implicated, and I could see revealed now in the game +that he was playing his desire to win and hold the men until they had +served his ends, whatever those ends might be. + +"Yass, sah," black Frank would growl absently as he passed me without a +glance, "dis am de most appetizin' crew eveh Ah cooked foh. Dey's got no +mo' bottom to dey innards dan a sponge has. Ah's a-cookin' mah head off to +feed dat bunch of wuthless man-critters, a-a-a-a-h!" And he would stump to +the galley with a brimming pail of water in each hand. + +I came sadly to conclude that old Frank had found other friends more to his +taste than the boy in the forecastle, and that Captain Falk, by trickery +and favoritism, really was securing his grip on the crew. In all his petty +manoeuvres and childish efforts to please the men and flatter them and make +them think him a good officer to have over them, he had made up to this +point only one or two false steps. + +Working our way north by west to the Straits of Singapore, and thence on +into the China Sea, where we expected to take advantage of the last weeks +of the southwest monsoon, we left far astern the low, feverous shores of +Sumatra. There were other games than a raid on India to be played for +money, and the men thought less and less now of the rubies of Burma and the +gold mohurs and rupees of Calcutta. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +TROUBLE FORWARD + + +In the starboard watch, one fine day when there was neither land nor sail +in sight, Davie Paine was overseeing the work on the rigging and badly +botching it. The old fellow was a fair seaman himself, but for all his deep +voice and big body, his best friend must have acknowledged that as an +officer he was hopelessly incompetent. "Now unlay the strands so," he would +say. "No, that ain't right. No, so! No, that ain't right either. Supposing +you form the eye so. No, that ain't right either." + +After a time we were smiling so broadly at his confused orders that we +caught the captain's eye. + +He came forward quickly--say what you would against Captain Falk as an +officer, no one could deny that he knew his business--and instantly he took +in the whole unfortunate situation. "Well, _Mister_ Paine," he cried, +sarcastically stressing the title, "are n't you man enough to unlay a bit +of rope and make a Flemish eye?" + +Old Davie flushed in hopeless embarrassment, and even the men who had been +chuckling most openly were sorry for him. That the captain had reason to be +dissatisfied with the second mate's work, we were ready enough to admit; +but he should have called him aside and rebuked him privately. We all, I +think, regarded such open interference as unnecessary and unkind. + +"Why--y-yes, sir," Davie stammered. + +"To make you a Flemish eye," Captain Falk continued in cold sarcasm, "you +unlay the end of the rope and open up the yarns. Then you half-knot some +half the inside yarns over that bit of wood you have there, and scrape the +rest of them down over the others, and marl, parcel, and serve them +together. That's the way you go to make a Flemish eye. Now then, _Mister_ +Paine, see that you get a smart job done here and keep your eyes open, you +old lubber. I thought you shipped for able seaman. A fine picture of an +able seaman you are, you doddering old fool!" + +It is impossible to reproduce the meanness with which he gave his little +lecture, or the patronizing air with which he walked away. Old Davie was +quite taken aback by it and for a time he could not control his voice +enough to speak. It was pitiful to see him drop all the pretensions of his +office and, as if desiring only some friendly word, try to get back on the +old familiar footing of the forecastle. + +"I know I ain't no great shakes of a scholar," he managed to mutter at +last, "and I ain't no great shakes of a second mate. But he made me second +mate, he did, and he hadn't ought to shame me in front of all the men, now +had he? It was him that gave me the berth. If he don't like me in it, now +why don't he take it away from me? I didn't want to be second mate when he +made me do it, and I can't read figures good nor nothing. Now why don't he +send me forrard if he don't like the way I do things?" + +The old man ran on in a pathetic monologue, for none of us felt exactly at +liberty to put in our own oars, and he could find relief only in his +incoherent talk. It had been a needless and unkind thing and the men almost +unanimously disapproved of it. Why indeed should Captain Falk not send +Davie back to the forecastle rather than make his life miserable aft? The +captain was responsible only to himself for the appointment, and its tenure +depended only on his own whims; but that, apparently, he had no intention +of doing. + +"'Tain't right," old Blodgett murmured, careful not to let Captain Falk see +him talking. "He didn't ought to use a man like that." + +"No, he didn't," Neddie Benson said in his squeaky voice, turning his face +so that neither Davie nor Captain Falk should see the motion of his lips. +"I didn't ought to ship for this voyage, either. The fortune teller--she +was a lady, she was, a nice lady--she says, 'Neddie, there'll be a dark man +and a light man and a store of trouble.' She kind of liked me, I think. But +I up and come. I'm always reckless." + +A ripple of low, mild laughter, which only Kipping could have uttered, +drifted forward, and the men exchanged glances and looked furtively at old +Davie. + +The murmur of disapproval went from mouth to mouth, until for a time I +dared hope that Captain Falk had quite destroyed the popularity that he had +tried so hard to win. But, though Davie was grieved by the injustice and +though the men were angry, they seemed soon to forget it in the excitement +of that mysterious plot from which Roger and I were virtually the only ones +excluded. + +Nevertheless, like certain other very trivial happenings aboard the Island +Princess, Captain Falk's unwarrantable insult to Davie Paine--it seems +incongruous to call him "mister"--was to play its part later in events that +as yet were only gathering way. + +We had not seen much of Kipping for a time, and perhaps it was because he +had kept so much to himself that to a certain extent we forgot his sly, +tricky ways. His laugh, mild and insinuating, was enough to call them to +mind, but we were to have a yet more disagreeable reminder. + +All day Bill Hayden had complained of not feeling well and now he leaned +against the deck-house, looking white and sick. Old Davie would never have +troubled him, I am sure, but Kipping was built by quite another mould. + +Unaware of what was brewing, I turned away, sorry for poor Bill, who seemed +to be in much pain, and in response to a command from Kipping, I went aloft +with an "Ay, ay sir," to loose the fore-royal. Having accomplished my +errand, I was on my way down again, when I heard a sharp sound as of +slapping. + +Startled, I looked at the deck-house. I was aware at the same time that the +men below me were looking in the same direction. + +The sound of slapping was repeated; then I heard a mild, gentle voice +saying, "Oh, he's sick, is he? Poor fellow! Ain't it hard to be sick away +from home?" Slap--slap. "Well, I declare, what do you suppose we'd better +do about it? Shan't we send for the doctor? Poor fellow!" Slap--slap. "Ah! +ah! ah!" Kipping's voice hardened. "You blinking, bloody old fool. You +would turn on me, would you? You would give me one, would you? You would +sojer round the deck and say you're sick, would you? I 'll show you--take +that--I'll show you!" + +Now, as I sprang on deck and ran out where I could see what was going +forward, I heard Bill's feeble reply. "Don't hit me, sir. I didn't go to do +nothing. I'm sick. I've got a pain in my innards. I _can't_ work--so help +me, I _can't_ work." + +"Aha!" Again Kipping laughed mildly. "Aha! _Can't_ work, eh? I'll teach you +a lesson." + +Bill staggered against the deck-house and clumsily fell, pressing his hands +against his side and moaning. + +"Hgh!" Kipping grunted. "Hgh!" + +At that moment the day flashed upon my memory when I had sat on one side of +that very corner while Kipping attempted to bully Bill on the other side of +it--the day when Bill had turned on his tormentor. I now understood some of +Kipping's veiled references, and a great contempt for the man who would use +the power and security of his office to revenge himself on a fellow seaman +who merely had stood up bravely for his rights swept over me. But what +could I or the others do? Kipping now was mate, and to strike him would be +open mutiny. Although thus far, in spite of the dislike with which he and +Captain Falk regarded me, my good behavior and my family connections had +protected me from abuse, I gladly would have forfeited such security to +help Bill; but mutiny was quite another affair. + +We all stood silent, while Kipping berated Bill with many oaths, though +poor Bill was so white and miserable that it was almost more than we could +endure. I, for one, thought of his little girl in Newburyport, and I +remember that I hoped she might never know of what her loving, stupid old +father was suffering. + +Enraged to fury by nothing more or less than Bill's yielding to his +attacks, Kipping turned suddenly and reached for the carpenter's mallet, +which lay where Chips had been working nearby. With a round oath, he +yelled, "I'll make you grovel and ask me to stop." + +Kipping had moved quickly, but old Bill moved more quickly still. Springing +to his feet like a flash, with a look of anguish on his face such as I hope +I never shall see again, he warded off a blow of the mallet with his hand +and, running to the side, scrambled clean over the bulwark into the sea. + +We stood there like men in a waxwork for a good minute at the very least; +and if you think a minute is not a long time, try it with your eyes shut. +Kipping's angry snarl was frozen on his mean features,--it would have been +ludicrous if the scene had not been so tragic,--and his outstretched hand +still held the mallet at the end of the blow. The carpenter's mouth was +open in amazement. Neddie Benson, the first to move or break the silence, +had spread his hands as if he were about to clutch at a butterfly or a +beetle; dropping them to his side, he gasped huskily, "She said there'd be +a light man and a dark man--I--oh, Lord!" + +It was the cook, as black as midnight and as inscrutable as a figurehead, +who brought us to our senses. Silently observing all that had happened, he +had stood by the galley, without lifting his hand or changing the +expression of a single feature; but now, taking his pipe from his mouth, he +roared, "Man ovehboa'd!" Then, snatching up the carpenter's bench with one +hand and gathering his great body for the effort, he gave a heave of his +shoulders and tossed the bench far out on the water. + +As if waking from a dream, Mr. Kipping turned aft, smiling scornfully, and +said with a deliberation that seemed to me criminal, "Put down the helm!" + +So carelessly did he speak, that the man at the wheel did not hear him, and +he was obliged to repeat the order a little more loudly. "Didn't you hear +me? I say, put down the helm." + +"Put down the helm, sir," came the reply; and the ship began to head up in +the wind. + +At this moment Captain Falk, having heard the cook's shout, appeared on +deck, breathing hard, and took command. However little I liked Captain +Falk, I must confess in justice to him that he did all any man could have +done under the circumstances. While two or three hands cleared away a +quarter-boat, we hauled up the mainsail, braced the after yards and raised +the head sheets, so that the ship, with her main yards aback, drifted down +in the general direction in which we thought Bill must be. + +Not a man of us expected ever to see Bill again. He had flung himself +overboard so suddenly, and so much time had elapsed, that there seemed to +be no chance of his keeping himself afloat. I saw that the smile actually +still hovered on Kipping's mean, mild mouth. But all at once the cook, near +whom I was standing, grasped my arm and muttered almost inaudibly, "If dey +was to look behine, dey'd get ahead, yass, sah." + +Taking his hint, I looked astern and cried out loudly. Something was +bobbing at the end of the log line. It was Bill clinging desperately. + +When we got him on board, he was nearer dead than alive, and even the stiff +drink that the captain poured between his blue lips did not really revive +him. He moaned continually and now and then he cried out in pain. +Occasionally, too, he tried to tell us about his little girl at +Newburyport, and rambled on about how he had married late in life and had a +good wife and a comfortable home, and before long, God willing, he would be +back with them once more and would never sail the seas again. It was all so +natural and homely that I didn't realize at the time that Bill was +delirious; but when I helped the men carry him below, I was startled to +find his face so hot, and presently it came over me that he did not +recognize me. + +Poor old stupid Bill! He meant so well, and he wished so well for all of +us! It was hard that he should be the one who could not keep out of harm's +way. + +But there were other things to think of, more important even than the fate +of Bill Hayden, and one of them was an extraordinary interview with the +cook. + +I heard laughter in the galley that night, and lingered near as long as I +dared, with a boy's jealous desire to learn who was enjoying the cook's +hospitality. By his voice I soon knew that it was the steward, and +remembering how black Frank once was ready to deceive him for the sake of +giving me a piece of pie, I was more disconsolate than ever. After a while +I saw him leave, but I thought little of that. I still had two more hours +to stand watch, so I paced along in the darkness, listening to the sound of +the waves and watching the bright stars. + +When presently I again passed the galley I thought I heard a suspicious +sound there. Later I saw something move by the door. But neither time did I +go nearer. I had no desire for further rebuffs from the old negro. + +When I passed a third time, at a distance of only a foot or two, I was +badly startled. A long black arm reached out from the apparently closed +door; a black hand grasped me, lifted me bodily from the floor, and +silently drew me into the galley, which was as dark as Egypt. I heard the +cook close the door behind me and bolt it and cover the deadlight with a +tin pan. What he was up to, I had not the remotest idea; but when he had +barricaded and sealed every crack and cranny, he lighted a candle and set +it on a saucer and glared at me ferociously. + +"Mind you, boy," he said in a very low voice, "don't you think Ah'm any +friend of yo's. No, sah. Don't you think Ah'm doing nothin' foh you. No, +sah. 'Cause Ah ain't. No, sah. Ah'm gwine make a fo'tune dis yeh trip, Ah +am. Yass, sah. Dis yeh nigger's gwine go home putty darn well off. Yass, +sah. So don't you think dis yeh nigger's gwine do nothin' foh you. No, +sah." + +For a moment I was completely bewildered; then, as I recalled the darky's +crafty and indirect ways, my confidence returned and I had the keenest +curiosity to see what would be forthcoming. + +"Boys, dey's a pest," he grumbled. "Dey didn't had ought to have boys +aboa'd ship. No, sah. Cap'n Falk, he say so, too." + +The negro was looking at me so intently that I searched his words for some +hidden meaning; but I could find none. + +"No, sah, boys am de mos' discombobulationest eveh was nohow. Yass, sah. +Dey's been su'thin' happen aft. Yass, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy, +nohow. No, sah. 'Taint dis nigger would go tell a boy dat Mistah Hamlin he +have a riot with Mistah Cap'n Falk, no sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat +Mistah Hamlin, he say dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he ain't holdin' to de right +co'se, no, sah; nor dat Mistah Cap'n Falk he bristle up like a guinea +gander and he say, while he's swearin' most amazin', dat he know what co'se +he's sailin', no, sah. Ah ain't gwine tell no boy dat Mistah Hamlin, he say +he am supercargo, an' dat he reckon he got orders f'om de owners; and +Mistah Cap'n Falk, he say he am cap'n and he cuss su'thin' awful 'bout dem +orders; and Mistah Roger Hamlin he say Mistah Cap'n Falk his clock am a +hour wrong and no wonder Mistah Kipping am writing in de log-book dat de +ship am whar she ain't; and Mistah Kipping he swear dre'ful pious and he +say by golly he am writer of dat log-book and he reckon he know what's what +ain't. No, sah, Ah ain't gwine tell a boy dem things 'cause Ah tell stew'd +Ah ain't, an' stew'd, him an' me is great friends, what's gwine make a +fo'tune _when Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +He said those last words in a whisper, and stared at me intently; in that +same whisper, he repeated them, "When Mistah Cap'n Falk git dat money_!" + +Then, in a strangely meditative way, as if an unfamiliar process of thought +suddenly occupied all his attention, he muttered absently, letting his eyes +fall, "Seem like Ah done see dat Kipping befo'; Ah jes' can't put mah +finger on him." It was the second time that he had made such a remark in my +hearing. + +The candle guttered in the saucer that served for a candlestick, and its +crazy, wavering light shone unsteadily on the black face of the cook, who +continued to stare at me grimly and apparently in anger. A pan rattled as +the ship rolled. Water splashed from a bucket. I watched the drops falling +from the shelf. One--two--three--four--five--six--seven! Each with its +_pht_, its little splash. They continued to drip interminably. I lost all +count of them. And still the black face, motionless except for the wildly +rolling eyes, stared at me across the galley stove. + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +BILL HAYDEN COMES TO THE END OF HIS VOYAGE + + +I was ejected from the galley as abruptly and strangely as I had been drawn +into it. The candle went out at a breath from the great round lips; the big +hand again closed on my shoulder and lifted me bodily from my chair. The +door opened and shut, and there was I, dazed by my strange experience and +bewildered by the story I had heard, outside on the identical spot from +which I had been snatched ten minutes before. + +In my ears the negro's parting message still sounded, "Dis nigger wouldn't +tell a boy one word, no sah, not dis nigger. If he was to tell a boy jest +one leetle word, dat boy, he might lay hisself out ready foh a fight. Yass, +sah." + +For a long time I puzzled over the whole extraordinary experience. It was +so like a dream, that only the numbness of my arm where the negro's great +fist had gripped it convinced me that the happenings of the night were +real. But as I pondered, I found more and more significance in the cook's +incoherent remarks, and became more and more convinced that their +incoherence was entirely artful. Obviously, first of all, he was trying to +pacify his conscience, which troubled him for breaking the promise of +secrecy that he probably had given the steward, from whom he must have +learned the things at which he had hinted. Also he had established for +himself an alibi of a kind, if ever he should be accused of tattling about +affairs in the cabin. + +That Captain Falk had promised to divide the money among the crew, I long +had suspected; consequently that part of the cook's revelations did not +surprise me. But the picture he gave of affairs in the cabin, disconnected +though it was, caused me grave concern. After all, what could Roger do to +preserve the owners' property or to carry out their orders? Captain Falk +had all the men on his side, except me and perhaps poor old Bill Hayden. +Indeed, I feared for Roger's own safety if he had detected that rascally +pair in falsifying the log; he then would be a dangerous man when we all +went back to Salem together. I stopped as if struck: what assurance had I +that we should go back to Salem together--or singly, for that matter? There +was no assurance whatever, that all, or any one of us, would ever go back +to Salem. If they wished to make way with Roger, and with me too, for that +matter, the green tropical seas would keep the secret until the end of +time. + +I am not ashamed that I frankly was white with fear of what the future +might bring. You can forgive in a boy weaknesses of which a man grown might +have been guilty. But as I watched the phosphorescent sea and the stars +from which I tried to read our course, I gradually overcame the terror that +had seized me. I think that remembering my father and mother, and my +sister, for whom I suspected that Roger cared more than I, perhaps, could +fully realize, helped to compose me; and I am sure that the thought of the +Roger I had known so long,--cool, bold, resourceful, with that twinkle in +his steady eyes--did much to renew my courage. When eight bells struck and +some one called down the hatch, "Larbowlines ahoy," and the dim figures of +the new watch appeared on deck, and we of the old watch went below, I was +fairly ready to face whatever the next hours might bring. + +"Roger and I against them all," I thought, feeling very much a martyr, +"unless," I mentally added, "Bill Hayden joins us." At that I actually +laughed, so that Blodgett, prowling restlessly in the darkness, asked me +crossly what was the matter. I should have been amazed and incredulous if +anyone had told me that poor Bill Hayden was to play the deciding part in +our affairs. + +He lay now in his bunk, tossing restlessly and muttering once in a while to +himself. When I went over and asked if there was anything that I could do +for him, he raised himself on his elbow and stared at me more stupidly than +ever. It seemed to come to him slowly who I was. After a while he made out +my face by the light of the dim, swinging lantern, and thanked me, and said +if I would be so good as to give him a drink of water--He never completed +the sentence; but I brought him a drink carefully, and when he had finished +it, he thanked me again and leaned wearily back. + +His face seemed dark by the lantern-light, and I judged that it was still +flushed. Muttering something about a "pain in his innards," he apparently +went to sleep, and I climbed into my own bunk. The lantern swung more and +more irregularly, and Bill tossed with ever-increasing uneasiness. When at +last I dozed off, my own sleep was fitful, and shortly I woke with a start. + +Others, too, had waked, and I heard questions flung back and forth:-- + +"Who was that yelled?" + +"Did you hear that? Tell me, did you hear it?" + +Some one spoke of ghosts,--none of us laughed,--and Neddie Benson whimpered +something about the lady who told fortunes. "She said the light man and the +dark man would make no end o' trouble," he cried; "and he--" + +"Keep still," another voice exclaimed angrily. "It was Bill Hayden," the +voice continued. "He hollered." + +Getting out of my bunk, I crossed the forecastle. "Bill," I said, "are you +all right?" + +He started up wildly. "Don't hit me!" he cried. "That wasn't what I said-- +it--I don't remember _just_ what I said, because I ain't good at +remembering, but it wasn't that--don't-oh! oh!--I _know_ it wasn't that." + +Two of the men joined me, moving cautiously for the ship was pitching now +in short, heavy seas. + +"What's that he's saying?" one of them asked. + +Before I could answer, Bill seemed suddenly to get control of himself. +"Oh," he moaned. "I've got such a pain in my innards! I've got a rolling, +howling old pain in my innards." + +There was little that we could do, so we smoothed his blankets and went +back to our own. The Island Princess was pitching more fiercely than ever +now, and while I watched the lantern swing and toss before I went to sleep, +I heard old Blodgett saying something about squalls and cross seas. There +was not much rest for us that night. No sooner had I hauled the blankets to +my chin and closed my eyes, than a shout came faintly down to us, +"All-hands--on deck!" + +Some one called, "Ay, ay," and we rolled out again wearily--all except Bill +Hayden whose fitful tossing seemed to have settled at last into deep sleep. + +Coming on deck, we found the ship scudding under close-reefed maintopsail +and reefed foresail, with the wind on her larboard quarter. A heavy sea +having blown up, all signs indicated that a bad night was before us; and +just as we emerged from the hatch, she came about suddenly, which brought +the wind on the starboard quarter and laid all aback. + +In the darkness and rain and wind, we sprang to the ropes. Mr. Kipping was +forward at his post on the forecastle and Captain Falk was on the +quarter-deck. As the man at the wheel put the helm hard-a-starboard, we +raised the fore tack and sheet, filled the foresail and shivered the +mainsail, thus bringing the wind aft again, where we met her with the helm +and trimmed the yards for her course. For the moment we were safe, but +already it was blowing a gale, and shortly we lay to, close-reefed, under +what sails we were carrying. + +In a lull I heard Blodgett, who was pulling at the ropes by my side, say to +a man just beyond him, "Ay, it's a good thing for _us_ that Captain Falk +got command. We'd never make our bloody fortunes under the old officers." + +As the wind came again and drowned whatever else may have been said, I +thought to myself that they never would have. Plainly, Captain Falk and +Kipping had won over the simple-minded crew, which was ready to follow them +with never a thought of the chance that that precious pair might run off +with the spoils themselves and leave the others in the lurch. + +But now Kipping's indescribably disagreeable voice, which we all by this +time knew so well, asked, "Has anybody seen that sojering old lubber, +Hayden?" + +"Ay, ay, sir," Blodgett replied. "He's below sick." + +"Sick?" said the mild voice. "Sick is he? Supposing Blodgett, you go below +and bring him on deck. He ain't sick, he's sojering." + +"But, sir,--" Blodgett began. + +"But what?" roared Kipping. His mildness changed to fierceness. "_You go_!" +He snapped out the words, and Blodgett went. + +Poor stupid old Bill! + +When he appeared, Blodgett had him by the arm to help him. + +"You sojering, bloody fool," Kipping cried; "do you think I'm so blind I +can't see through such tricks as yours?" + +A murmur of remonstrance came from the men, but Kipping paid no attention +to it. + +"You think, do you, that I ain't on to your slick tricks? Take that." + +Bill never flinched. + +"So!" Kipping muttered. "So! Bring him aft." + +Though heavy seas had blown up, the squalls had subsided, and some of the +men, for the moment unoccupied, trailed at a cautious distance after the +luckless Bill. We could not hear what those on the quarterdeck said; but +Blodgett, who stood beside me and stared into the darkness with eyes that I +was convinced could see by night, cried suddenly, "He's fallen!" + +Then Captain Falk called, "Come here, two or three of you, and take this +man below." + +Old Bill was moaning when we got there. "Sure," he groaned, "I've got a +rolling--howling--old Barney's bull of a pain in my innards." But when we +laid him in his bunk, he began to laugh queerly, and he seemed to pretend +that he was talking to his little wee girl; for we heard him saying that +her old father had come to her and that he was never going to leave her +again. + +To me--only a boy, you must remember--it was a horrible experience, even +though I did not completely understand all that was happening; and to the +others old Bill's rambling talk seemed to bring an unnamed terror. + +All night he restlessly tossed, though he soon ceased his wild talking and +slept lightly and fitfully. The men watching him were wakeful, too, and as +I lay trying to sleep and trying not to see the swaying lantern and the +fantastic shadows, I heard at intervals snatches of their low conversation. + +"They hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. It warn't human. A sick man has +got _some_ rights," one of the men from Boston repeated interminably. He +seemed unable to hold more than one idea at a time. + +Then Blodgett would say, "Ay, it don't seem right. But we've all got to +stand by the skipper. That's how we'll serve our ends best. It don't do to +get too much excited." + +I imagined that Blodgett's voice did not sound as if he were fully +convinced of the doctrine he was preaching. + +"Ay," the other would return, "but they hadn't ought to 'a' called him out. +It warn't human. A sick man has got _some_ rights, and he was allers +quiet." + +They talked on endlessly, while I tried in vain to sleep and while poor +Bill tossed away, getting no good from the troubled slumber that the Lord +sent him. + +No sooner, it seemed to me, did I actually close my eyes than I woke and +heard him moaning, "Water--a--drink--of--water." + +The others by then had left him, so I got up and fetched water, and he +muttered something more about the "pain in his innards." Then my watch was +called and I went on deck with the rest. + +For the most part it was a day of coarse weather. Now intermittent squalls +from the southwest swept upon us with lightning and thunder, driving before +them rain in solid sheets; now the ship danced in choppy waves, with barely +enough wind to give her steerage-way and with a warm, gentle drizzle that +wet us to the skin and penetrated into the forecastle, where blankets and +clothing soon became soggy and uncomfortable. But the greater part of the +time we lurched along in a gale of wind, with an occasional dash of rain, +which we accepted as a compromise between those two worse alternatives, the +cloudbursts that accompanied the squalls, and the enervating warm drizzle. + +That Bill Hayden did not stand watch with the others, no one, apparently, +noticed. The men were glad enough to forget him, I think, and the officers +let his absence pass, except Davie Paine, who found opportunity to inquire +of me secretly about him and sadly shook his gray head at the tidings I +gave. + +Below we could not forget him. I heard the larboard watch talking of it +when they relieved us; and no sooner had we gone below in turn than +Blodgett cried, "Look at old Bill! His face is all of a sweat." + +He was up on his elbow when we came down, staring as if he had expected +some one; and when he saw who it was, he kept his eyes on the hatch as if +waiting for still another to come. Presently he fell back in his bunk. "Oh, +I've got such a pain in my innards," he moaned. + +By and by he began to talk again, but he seemed to have forgotten his pain +completely, for he talked about doughnuts and duff, and Sundays ashore when +he was a little shaver, and going to church, and about the tiny wee girl on +the bank of the Merrimac who would be looking for her dad to come home, and +lots of things that no one would have thought he knew. He seemed so natural +now and so cheerful that I was much relieved about him, and I whispered to +Blodgett that I thought Bill was better. But Blodgett shook his head so +gravely that I was frightened in spite of my hopes, and we lay there, some +of us awake, some asleep, while Bill rambled cheerily on and the lantern +swung with the motion of the ship. + +To-day I remember those watches below at +that time in the voyage as a succession of short unrestful snatches of +sleep broken by vivid pictures of the most trivial things--the swinging +lantern, the distorted shadows the muttered comments of the men, Bill +leaning on his elbow at the edge of his bunk and staring toward the hatch +as if some one long expected were just about to come. I do not pretend to +understand the reason, but in my experience it is the trifling unimportant +things that after a time of stress or tragedy are most clearly remembered. + +When next I woke I heard the bell--_clang-clang, clang-clang, clang-clang, +clang_--faint and far off. Then I saw that Blodgett was sitting on the edge +of his bunk, counting the strokes on his fingers. When he had finished he +gravely shook his head and nodded toward Bill who was breathing harder now. +"He's far gone," Blodgett whispered. "He ain't going to share in no +split-up at Manila. He ain't going to put back again to India when we've +got rid of the cargo. His time's come." + +I didn't believe a word that Blodgett said then, but I sat beside him as +still as the grave while the forecastle lantern nodded and swung as +casually as if old Bill were not, for all we knew, dying. By and by we +heard the bell again, and some one called from the hatch, "Eight bells! +Roll out!" + +The very monotony of our life--the watches below and on deck, each like +every other, marked off by the faint clanging of the ship's bell--made +Bill's sickness seem less dreadful. There is little to thrill a lad or +even, after a time, to interest him, in the interminable routine of a long +voyage. + +When we came on deck Davie Paine looked us over and said, "Where's Bill?" + +Blodgett shook his head. Even this simple motion had a sleepy quality that +made me think of a cat. + +"I'm afraid, sir," he replied, "that Bill has stood his last watch." + +"So!" said old Davie, reflectively, in his deep voice, "so!--I was afraid +of that." Ignorant though Davie was, and hopelessly incompetent as an +officer, he had a certain kindly tolerance, increased, perhaps, by his own +recent difficulties, that made him more approachable than any other man in +the cabin. After a time he added, "I cal'ate I got to tell the captain." +Davie's manner implied that he was taking us into his confidence. + +"Yes," Neddie Benson muttered under his breath, "tell the captain! If it +wasn't for Mr. Kipping and the captain, Bill would be as able a man this +minute as any one of us here. It didn't do to abuse him. He ain't got the +spirit to stand up under it." + +Davie shuffled away without hearing what was said, and soon, instead of +Captain Falk, Mr. Kipping appeared, bristling with anger. + +"What's all this?" he snapped, with none of the mildness that he usually +affected. "Who says Bill Hayden has stood his last watch? Is mutiny +brewing? I'll have you know I'm mate here, legal and lawful, and what's +more I'll show you I'm mate in a way that none of you won't forget if he +thinks he can try any more of his sojering on me. I'll fix him. You go +forward, Blodgett, and drag him out by the scalp-lock." + +Blodgett walked off, keeping close to the bulwark, and five minutes later +he was back again. + +Mr. Kipping grew very red. "Well, my man," he said in a way that made my +skin creep, "are you a party to this little mutiny?" + +"N-no, sir," Blodgett stammered. "I--he-it ain't no use, he _can't_ come." + +The mate looked sternly at Blodgett, and I thought he was going to hit +him; but instead, after a moment of hesitation, he started forward alone. + +We scarcely believed our eyes. + +By and by he came back again, but to us he said nothing. He went into the +cabin, and when next we saw him Captain Falk was by his side. + +"I don't like the looks of it," Kipping was saying, "I don't at all." + +As the captain passed me he called, "Lathrop, go to the galley and get a +bucket of hot water." + +Running to the deck-house, I thrust my head into the galley and made known +my want with so little ceremony that the cook was exasperated. Or so at +least his manner intimated. + +"You boy," he roared in a voice that easily carried to where the others +stood and grinned at my discomfiture, "you boy, what foh you come +promulgatin' in on me with 'gimme dis' and 'gimme dat' like Ah wahn't ol' +enough to be yo' pa? Ain't you got no manners nohow? You vex me, yass, sah, +you vex me. If we gotta have a boy on boa'd ship, why don' dey keep him out +of de galley?" + +Then with a change of voice that startled me, he demanded in an undertone +that must have been inaudible a dozen feet away, "Have things broke? Is de +fight on? Has de row started?" + +Bewildered, I replied, "Why, no--it's only Bill Hayden." + +Instantly he resumed his loud and abusive tone. "Well, if dey gwine send a +boy heah foh wateh, wateh he's gotta have. Heah, you wuthless boy, git! Git +out of heah!" + +Filling a bucket with boiling water, he thrust it into my hand and shoved +me half across the deck so roughly that I narrowly escaped scalding myself, +then returned to his work, muttering imprecations on the whole race of +boys. He was too much of a strategist for me. + +When I took the bucket to the forecastle, I found the captain and Mr. +Kipping looking at poor old Bill. + +"Dip a cloth in the water," the captain said carelessly, "and pull his +clothes off and lay the cloth on where it hurts." + +I obeyed as well as I could, letting the cloth cool a bit first; and +although Bill cried out sharply when it touched his skin, the heat eased +him of pain, and by and by he opened his eyes for all the world as if he +had been asleep and looked at Captain Falk and said in a scared voice, "In +heaven's name, what's happened?" + +The captain and Mr. Kipping laughed coldly. It seemed to me that they +didn't care whether he lived or died. + +Certainly the men of the larboard watch, who were lying in their bunks at +the time, didn't like the way the two behaved. I caught the word +"heartless" twice repeated. + +"Well," said Captain Falk at last, "either he'll live or he'll not. How +about it, Mr. Kipping?" + +The mate laughed as if he had heard a good joke. "That's one of the truest +things ever was said aboard a ship," he replied, in his slow, insincere +way. "Yes, sir, it hits the nail on the head going up and coming down." + +"Well, then, let's leave him to make up his mind." + +So the two went aft together as if they had done a good day's work. But +there was a buzz of disapproval in the forecastle when they had gone, and +one of the men from Boston, of whom I hitherto had had a very poor opinion, +actually got out of his blankets and came over to help me minister to poor +Bill's needs. + +"It ain't right," he said dipping the cloth in the hot water; "they never +so much as gave him a dose of medicine. A man may be only a sailor, but +he's worth a dose of medicine. There never come no good of denying poor +Jack his pill when he's sick." + +"Ay, heartless!" one of the others exclaimed. _"I could tell things if I +would."_ + +That remark, I ask you to remember. The man who made it, the other of the +two from Boston, had black hair and a black beard, and a nose that +protruded in a big hook where he had broken it years before. It was easy to +recognize his profile a long way off because of the peculiar shape of the +nose. The remark itself is of little importance, of course; but a story is +made up of things that seem to be of little importance, yet really are more +significant by far than matters that for the moment are startling. + +It was touching to see the solicitude of the men and the clumsy kindness of +their efforts to help poor Bill when the captain and the mate had left him. +They crowded up to his bunk and smoothed out his blankets and spoke to him +more gently than I should have believed possible. So angry were they at the +brutality of the two officers, that the coldest and hardest of them all +gave the sick man a muttered word of sympathy or an awkward helping hand. + +We worked over him, easing him as best we could, while the bell struck the +half hours and the hours; and for a while he seemed more comfortable. In a +moment of sanity he looked up at me with a sad smile and said, "I wish, +lad, I surely wish I could do something for _you_." But long before the +watch was over he once more began to talk about the tiny wee girl at +Newburyport--"Cute she is as they make 'em," he reiterated weakly, +"a-waiting for her dad to come home." And by and by he spoke of his wife, +--"a good wife," he called her,--and then he made a little noise in his +throat and lay for a long time without moving. + +"He's dead," the man from Boston said at last; there was no sound in the +forecastle except the rattle of the swinging lantern and the chug-chug of +waves. + +I was younger than the others and more sensitive, so I went on deck and +leaned on the bulwark, looking at the ocean and seeing nothing. + + [Illustration] + + + + +IV + +IN WHICH THE TIDE OF OUR FORTUNES EBBS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XV + +MR. FALK TRIES TO COVER HIS TRACKS + + +How long I leaned on the bulwark I do not know; I had no sense of passing +time. But after a while some one told me that the captain wished to see me +in the cabin, and I went aft with other tragic memories in mind. I had not +entered the cabin since Captain Whidden died--"_shot f'om behine_." The +negro's phrase now flashed upon my memory and rang over and over again in +my ears. + +The cabin itself was much as it had been that other day: I suppose no +article of its furnishings had been changed. But when I saw Captain Falk in +the place of Captain Whidden and Kipping in the place of Mr. Thomas, I felt +sick at heart. All that encouraged me was the sight of Roger Hamlin, and I +suspected that he attended uninvited, for he came into the cabin from his +stateroom at the same moment when I came down the companionway, and there +was no twinkle now in his steady eyes. + +Captain Falk glanced at him sharply. "Well, sir?" he exclaimed testily. + +"I have decided to join you, sir," Roger said, and calmly seated himself. + +For a moment Falk hesitated, then, obviously unwilling, he assented with a +grimace. + +"Lathrop," he said, turning to me, "you were present when Hayden died, and +also you had helped care for him previously. Mr. Kipping has written a +statement of the circumstances in the log and you are to sign it, Here's +the place for your name. Here's a pen and ink. Be careful not to blot or +smudge it." + +He pushed the big, canvas-covered book over to me and placed his finger on +a vacant line. All that preceded it was covered with paper. + +"Of course," said Roger, coldly, "Lathrop will read the statement before +signing it." He was looking the captain squarely in the eye. + +Falk scowled as he replied, "I consider that quite unnecessary." + +"A great many of the ordinary decencies of life seem to be considered +unnecessary aboard this ship." + +"If you are making any insinuations at me, Mr. Hamlin, I'll show you who's +captain here." + +"You needn't. You've done it sufficiently already. Anyhow, if Lathrop were +foolish enough to sign the statement without reading it, I should know that +he hadn't read it and I assure you that it wouldn't pass muster in any +court of law." + +As Captain Falk was about to retort even more angrily, Kipping touched his +arm and whispered to him. + +"Oh, well," he said with ill grace, "as you wish, Mr. Kipping. There's +nothing underhanded about this. Of course the account is absolutely true +and the whole world could read it; only I don't intend a silly young fop +shall think he can bully me on my own ship. Show Lathrop the statement." + +Kipping withdrew the paper and I began to read what was written in the log, +but Roger now interrupted again. + +"Read it aloud," he said. + +"What in heaven's name do you think you are, you young fool? If you think +you can bully Nathan Falk like that, I'll lash you to skin and pulp." + +"Oh, well," said Roger comically, in imitation of the captain's own air of +concession, "since you feel so warmly on the subject, I'm quite willing to +yield the point. It's enough that Lathrop should read it before he signs." +Then, turning to me suddenly, he cried, "Ben, what's the course according +to the log?" + +The angry red of Captain Talk's face deepened, but before he could speak, I +had seen and repeated it:-- + +"Northeast by north." + +Roger smiled. "Go on," he said. "Read the statement." + +The statement was straightforward enough for the most part--more +straightforward, it seemed to me, than either of the two men who probably +had collaborated in writing it; but one sentence caught my attention and I +hesitated. + +"Well," said Roger who was watching me closely, "is anything wrong?" + +"Why, perhaps not exactly wrong," I replied, "though I do think most of the +men forward would deny it." + +"See here," cried Captain Falk, cutting off Kipping, who tried to speak at +the same moment, "I tell you, Mr. Hamlin, if you thrust your oar in here +again I'll thrash you within an inch of your life! I'll keelhaul you, so +help me! I'll--" He wrinkled up his nose and twisted his lips into a sneer +before he added, almost in a whisper, "I'll do worse than that." + +"No," said Roger calmly, "I don't think you will. What's the sentence, +Benny?" + +Without waiting for another word from anyone I read aloud as follows:-- + +"'And the captain and the chief mate tended Hayden carefully and did what +they might to make his last hours comfortable.'" + +"Well," said Falk, "didn't we?" + +"No, by heaven, you didn't," Roger cried suddenly, taking the floor from +me. "I know how you beat Hayden. I know how you two drove him to throw +himself overboard. You're a precious pair! And what's more, all the men +forward know it. While we're about it, Captain Falk, here's something else +I know. According to the log, which you consistently have refused to let me +see the course is northeast by north. According to the men at the wheel,--I +will not be still! I will not close my mouth! If you assault me, sir, I +will break your shallow head,--according to the men at the wheel, of whom I +have inquired, according to the ship's compass when I've taken a chance to +look at it, according to the tell-tale that you yourself can see at this +very minute and--" Roger laid on the table a little box of hard wood bound +with brass--"according to this compass of my own, which I know is a good +one, our course is now and has been for two days east-northeast. Captain +Falk, do you think you can make us believe that Manila is Canton?" + +"It may be that I do, and it may be that I do not," Falk retorted hotly. +"As for you, Mr. Hamlin, I'll attend to your case later. Now sign that +statement, Lathrop." + +Falk was standing. His hands, a moment before lifted for a blow, rested on +the table; but the knuckles were streaked with red along the creases, and +the nails of his fingers, which were bent under, he had pressed hard +against the dull mahogany. When he had finished speaking, he sat down +heavily. + +"Sign it, Ben," said Roger; "but first draw your pen through that +particular sentence." + +Quick as thought I did what Roger told me, leaving a single broad line +through the words "and did what they might to make his last hours +comfortable"; then I wrote my name and laid the pen on the table. + +[Illustration: "Sign that statement, Lathrop," said Captain Falk.] + +Leaning over to see what I had done, Falk leaped up white with passion. +"Good God!" he yelled, "that's worse than nothing." + +"Yes," said Roger coolly, "I think it is." + +"What--" Falk stopped suddenly. Kipping had touched his sleeve. "Well?" + +Kipping whispered to him. + +"No," Falk snarled, glancing at me, "I'm going to take that young pup's +hide off his back and salt it." + +Again Kipping whispered to him. + +This time he seemed half persuaded. He was a weak man, even in his +passions. "All right," he said, after reflecting briefly. "As you say, it +don't make so much odds. Myself, I'm for slitting the young pup's ears--but +later on, later on. And though I'd like to straighten out the record as far +as it goes--Well, as you say." + +For all of Captain Falk's bluster and pretension, I was becoming more and +more aware that the subtle Kipping could twist him around his little +finger, and that for some end of his own Kipping did not wish affairs to +come yet to a head. + +He leaned back in his chair, twirling his thumbs behind his interlocked +fingers, and smiled at us mildly. His whole bearing was odious. He fairly +exhaled hypocrisy. I remembered a dozen episodes of his career aboard the +Island Princess--the wink he had given Captain Falk, then second mate; his +coming to the cook's galley for part of my pie; his bullying poor old Bill +Hayden; his cold selfishness in taking the best meat from the kids, and +many other offensive incidents. Was it possible that Captain Falk was not +at the bottom of all our troubles? that Captain Falk had been from the +first only somebody's tool? + +We left the cabin in single file, the captain first, Kipping second, then +Roger, then I. + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +A PRAYER FOR THE DEAD + + +In the last few hours we had sighted an island, which lay now off the +starboard bow; and as I had had no opportunity hitherto to observe it +closely, I regarded it with much interest when I came on deck. Inland there +were several cone-shaped mountains thickly wooded about the base; to the +south the shore was low and apparently marshy; to the north a bold and +rugged promontory extended. Along the shore and for some distance beyond it +there were open spaces that might have been great tracts of cleared land; +and a report prevailed among the men that a fishing boat had been sighted +far off, which seemed to put back incontinently to the shore. Otherwise +there was no sign of human habitation, but we knew the character of the +natives of such islands thereabouts too well to approach land with any +sense of security. + +Captain Falk and Kipping were deep in consultation, and the rest were +intent upon the sad duty that awaited us. On the deck there lay now a shape +sewed in canvas. The men, glancing occasionally at the captain, stood a +little way off, bare-headed and ill at ease, and conversed in whispers. For +the moment I had forgotten that we were to do honor for the last time--and, +I fear me, for the first--to poor Bill Hayden. Poor, stupid Bill! He had +meant so well by us all, and life had dealt so hardly with him! Even in +death he was neglected. + +As time passed, the island became gradually clearer, so that now we could +see its mountains more distinctly and pick out each separate peak. Although +the wind was light and unsteady, we were making fair progress; but Captain +Falk and Mr. Kipping remained intent on their conference. + +I could see that Roger Hamlin, who was leaning on the taffrail, was +imperturbable; but Davie Paine grew nervous and walked back and forth, +looking now and then at the still shape in canvas, and the men began to +murmur among themselves. + +"Well," said the captain at last, "what does all this mean, Mr. Paine? What +in thunder do you mean by letting the men stand around like this?" + +He knew well enough what it meant, though, for all his bluster. If he had +not, he would have been ranting up the deck the instant he laid eyes on +that scene of idleness such as no competent officer could countenance. + +Old Davie, who was as confused as the captain had intended that he should +be, stammered a while and finally managed to say, "If you please, sir, Bill +Hayden's dead." + +"Yes," said the captain, "it looks like he's dead." + +We all heard him and more than one of us breathed hard with anger. + +"Well, why don't you heave him over and be done with it?" he asked shortly, +and turned away. + + +The men exchanged glances. + + +"If you please, sir,--" it was Davie, and a different Davie from the one we +had known before,--"if you please, sir, ain't you goin' to read the service +and say the words?" + +I turned and stared at Davie in amazement. His voice was sharper now than +ever I had heard it and there was a challenge in his eyes as well. + +"What?" Falk snapped out angrily. + +"Ain't you goin' to read the Bible and say the words, sir?" + +I am convinced that up to this point Captain Falk had intended, after +badgering Davie enough to suit his own unkind humor, to read the service +with all the solemnity that the occasion demanded. He was too eager for +every prerogative of his office to think of doing otherwise. But his was +the way of a weak man; at Davie's challenge he instantly made up his mind +not to do what was desired, and having set himself on record thus, his +mulish obstinacy held him to his decision in spite of whatever better +judgment he may have had. + +"Not I!" he cried. "Toss him over to suit yourself." + +When an angry murmur rose on every side, he faced about again. "Well," he +said, "what do you want, anyway? I'm captain here, and if you wish I'll +_show_ you I'm captain here. I'll read the service or I'll not read it, +just as I please. If any man here's got anything to say about it, I'll do +some saying myself. If any man here wants to read the service over that +lump of clay, let him read it." Then, turning with an air of indifference, +he leaned on the rail with a sneer, and smiled at Kipping. + +What would have happened next I do not know, so angry were the men at this +wretched exhibition on the part of the captain, if Roger had not stepped +forward. + +"Very well, sir," he said facing the captain, "since you put it that way, +_I'll read the service_." And without ceremony he took from the captain's +hand the prayer-book that Falk had brought on deck. + +Disconcerted by this unexpected act and angered by the murmur of approval +from the men, Falk started to speak, then thought better of it and sidled +over beside Kipping, to whom he whispered something at which they both +laughed heartily. Then they stood smiling scornfully while Roger went down +beside poor Bill's body. + +Roger opened the prayer-book, turned the pages deliberately, and began to +read the service slowly and with feeling. He was younger and more slender +than many of the men, but straight and tall and handsome, and I remember +how proud of him I felt for taking affairs in his own hands and making the +best of a bad situation. + +"We therefore commit his body to the deep," he read "looking for the +general Resurrection in the last day, and the life of the world to come, +through our Lord Jesus Christ; at whose second coming in glorious majesty +to judge the world, the sea shall give up her dead; and the corruptible +bodies of those who sleep in Him shall be changed and made like unto his +glorious body; according to the mighty working whereby He is able to subdue +all things unto Himself." + +Then Blodgett, Davie Paine, the cook, and the man from Boston lifted the +plank and inclined it over the bulwark, and so passed all that was mortal +of poor Bill Hayden. + +Suddenly, in the absolute silence that ensued when Roger closed the +prayer-book, I became aware that he was signaling me to come nearer, and I +stepped over beside him. At the same instant the reason for it burst upon +me. Now, if ever, was the time to turn against Captain Falk. + +"Men," said Roger in a low voice, "are you going to stand by without +lifting a hand and see a shipmate's dead body insulted?" + +The crew came together in a close group about their supercargo. With stern +faces and with the heavy breathing of men who contemplate some rash or +daring deed, they were, I could see, intent on what Roger had to say. + +He looked from one to another of them as if to appraise their spirit and +determination. "I represent the owners," he continued tersely. "The owners' +orders are not being obeyed. Mind what I tell you--_the owners' orders are +not being obeyed._ You know why as well as I do, and you remember this: +though it may seem on the face of it that I advocate mutiny or even piracy, +if we take the ship from the present captain and carry out the voyage and +obey the owners' orders, I can promise you that there'll be a fine rich +reward waiting at Salem for every man here. What's more, it'll be an honest +reward, with credit from the owners and all law-abiding men. But enough of +that! It's a matter of ordinary decency--of common honesty! The man who +will conspire against the owners of this ship is a contemptible cur, a fit +shipmate with the brute who horsed poor Bill to death." + +I never had lacked faith in Roger, but never before had I appreciated to +the full his reckless courage and his unyielding sense of personal honor. + +He paused and again glanced from face to face. "What say, men? Are you with +me?" he cried, raising his voice. + +Meanwhile Captain Falk, aware that something was going on forward, shouted +angrily, "Here, here! What's all this! Come, lay to your work, you sons of +perdition, or I'll show you what's what. You, Blodgett, go forward and +heave that lead as you were told." + +In his hand Blodgett held the seven-pound dipsey lead, but he stood his +ground. + +"Well?" Falk came down on us like a whirlwind. "Well? You, Hamlin, what in +Tophet are you backing and hauling about?" + +"I? Backing and hauling?" Roger spoke as calmly as you please. "I am merely +advocating that the men take charge of the ship in the name of the lawful +owners and according to their orders." + +As Captain Falk sprang forward to strike him down, there came a thin, windy +cry, "No you don't; no, you don't!" + +To my amazement I saw that it was old Blodgett. + +"It don't do to insult the dead," he cried in a voice like the yowl of a +tom-cat. "You can kill us all you like. It's captain's rights. But, by the +holy, you ain't got no rights whatsoever to refuse a poor sailor a decent +burial." + +With a vile oath, Captain Falk contemplated this new factor in the +situation. Suddenly he yelled, "Kipping! It's mutiny! Help!" And with a +clutch at his hip he drew his pistol. + +"'Heave the lead' is it?" Blodgett muttered. "Ay, I'll heave the lead." He +whipped up his arm and hurled the missile straight at Captain Falk's head. + +The captain dodged, but the lead struck his shoulder and felled him. + +Seeing Kipping coming silently with a pistol in each hand, I ducked and +tried to pull Roger over beside Blodgett; but Roger, instantly aware of +Kipping's move, spun on his heel as the first bullet flew harmlessly past +us, and lithely stepped aside. With a single swing of his right arm he cut +Kipping across the face with a rope's end and stopped him dead. + +As the welt reddened on his face, Kipping staggered, leveled his other +pistol point-blank and pulled the trigger. + +For the moment I could not draw breath, but the pistol missed fire. + +"Flashed in the pan!" Roger cried, and tugged at his own pistol, which had +caught inside his shirt where he had carried it out of sight. "That's not +all--that's flashed in the pan!" + +"Now then, you fools," Kipping shrieked. "Go for 'em! Go for'em! The bell's +struck! Now's the time!" + +So far it all had happened so suddenly and so extraordinarily swiftly, with +one event fairly leaping at the heels of another, that the men were +completely dazed. + +Captain Falk sat on the deck with his hand pressed against his injured +shoulder and with his pistol lying beside him where he had dropped it when +he fell. Kipping, the red bruise showing across his face, confronted us +with one pistol smoking, the other raised; Blodgett, having thrown the +lead, was drawing his knife from the sheath; Roger was pulling desperately +at his own pistol; and for my part I was in a state of such complete +confusion that to this day I don't know what I did or said. In the moments +that followed we were to learn once and for all the allegiance of every man +aboard the Island Princess. + +One of the men from Boston, evidently picking me out as the least +formidable of the trio, shot a quick glance back at Kipping as if to be +sure of his approval, and springing at me, knocked me flat on my back. I +felt sure he was going to kill me when he reached for my throat. But I +heard behind me a thunderous roar, "Heah Ah is! Heah Ah is!" And out of the +corner of my eye I saw the cook, the meat-cleaver in his hand, leaping to +my rescue, with Roger, one hand still inside his shirt, scarcely a foot +behind him. + +The man from Boston scrambled off me and fled. + +"Ah's with you-all foh one," the cook cried, swinging his cleaver. "Ah +ain't gwine see no po' sailor man done to death and me not say 'What foh!'" + +"You fool! You black fool!" Chips shrieked, shaking his fist, "Stand by and +share up! Stand by and share up!" + + +Neddie Benson jumped over beside the cook. "Me too!" he called shrilly. +"Bad luck or good luck, old Bill he done his best and was fair murdered." + +Poor Bill! His martyrdom stood us in good stead in our hour of need. + +On the other side of the deck there was a lively struggle from which came +fierce yells as each man sought to persuade his friends to his own way of +thinking: + +"Stand by, lads, stand by--" + +"----the bloody money!--" + +"Hanged for mutiny--" + +"I know where my bed's made soft--" + +The greater part of the men, it seemed, were lining up behind Kipping and +Captain Falk, when a scornful shout rose and I was aware that some one else +had come over to our side. It was old Davie Paine. "He didn't ought to +shame me in front of all the men," Davie muttered. "No, sir, it wa'n't +right. And what's more, there's lots o' things aboard this ship that ain't +as they should be. I may be poor and ignorant and no shakes of a scholar, +but I ain't goin' to put up with 'em." + +So we six faced the other twelve with as good grace as we could +muster,--Roger, the cook, Blodgett, Neddie Benson, Davie, and I,--and there +was a long silence. But Roger had got out his pistol now, and the lull in +the storm was ominous. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +MAROONED + + +That it was important to control the after part of the ship, I was well +aware, and though we were outnumbered two to one, I hoped that by good +fortune we might win it. + +I was not long in doubt of Roger's sharing my hope. He analyzed our +opponents' position at a single glance, and ignoring their advantage in +numbers, seized upon the only chance of taking them by surprise. Swinging +his arm and crying, "Come, men! All for the cabin!" he flung himself +headlong at Falk. I followed close at his heels--I was afraid to be left +behind. I heard the cook grunt hoarsely as he apprehended the situation and +sprang after us. Then the others met us with knives and pistols. + +Our attack was futile and soon over, but while it lasted there was a merry +little fight. As a man slashed at Roger with a case-knife, laying open a +long gash in his cheek, Roger fired a shot from his pistol, and the fellow +pitched forward and lay still except for his limbs, which twitched +sickeningly. For my own part, seeing another who had run aft for a weapon +swing at me with a cutlass, I threw myself under his guard and got my arms +round both his knees. As something crashed above me, I threw the fellow +back and discovered that the cook had met the cutlass in full swing with +the cleaver and had shattered it completely. Barely in time to escape a +murderous blow that the carpenter aimed at me with his hammer, I scrambled +to my feet and leaped back beside Roger, who held his cheek with his hand. + +I believe it was the cook's cleaver that saved our lives for the time +being. Falk and Kipping had fired the charges in their pistols, and no one +was willing to venture within reach of the black's long arm and brutal +weapon. So, having spent our own last charge of powder, we backed away into +the bow with our faces to the enemy, and the only sounds to be heard were +flapping sails and rattling blocks, the groans of the poor fellow Roger had +shot, and the click of a powder-flask as Falk reloaded and passed his +ammunition to Kipping. + +"So," said Falk at last, "we have a fine little mutiny brewing, have we?" +He looked first at us, then at those who remained true to him and his +schemes. "Well, Mr. Kipping, with the help of Chips here, we can make out +to work the ship at a pinch. Yes, I think we can dispense with these young +cocks altogether. Yes,--" he raised his voice and swore roundly--"yes, we +can follow our own gait and fare a damned sight better without them. We'll +let them have a boat and row back to Salem. A voyage of a few thousand +miles at the oars will be a rare good thing to tone down a pair of young +fighting cocks." Then he added, smiling, "If they meet with no Ladronesers +or Malays to clip their spurs." + +Captain Falk looked at Kipping and his men, and they all laughed. + +"Ay, so it will," cried Kipping. "And old Davie Paine 'll never have a +mister to his name again. You old lubber, you, your bones will be rotting +at the bottom of the sea when we're dividing up the gold." + +Again the men laughed loudly. + +Davie flushed and stammered, but Blodgett spoke out bitterly. + +"So they will, before you or Captain Falk divide with any of the rest. Ah! +Red in the face, are ye? That shot told. Davie 'd rather take his chances +with a gentleman than be second mate under either one o' you two. He may +not know when he's well off, but he knows well when he ain't." + +For all Blodgett spoke so boldly, I could see that Davie in his own heart +was still afraid of Kipping. But Kipping merely smiled in his mean way and +slowly looked us over. + +"If we was to walk them over a plank," he suggested, deferentially, to the +captain, "there would be an end to all bother with them." + +"No," said Falk, "give them a boat. It's all the same in the long run, and +I ain't got the stomach to watch six of them drown one after another." + +Kipping raised his eyebrows at such weakness; then a new thought seemed to +dawn on him. His accursed smile grew broader and he began to laugh softly. +For the moment I could not imagine what he was laughing at, but his next +words answered my unspoken question. "Ha ha ha! Right you are, captain! +Just think of 'em, a-sailing home in a ship's boat! Oh, won't they have a +pretty time?" + +The predicament of six fellow men set adrift in an open boat pleased the +man's vile humor. We knew that he believed he was sending us to certain +death, and that he delighted in it. + +"This fine talk is all very well," said Roger, "and I've no doubt you think +yourselves very witty, but let that be as it may. As matters stand now, +you've got the upper hand--though I wish you joy of working the ship. +However, if you give us the long-boat and a fair allowance of water and +bread, we'll ask nothing more." + +"Ah," said Falk, with a leer at Kipping who was smiling quietly, "the +long-boat and a fair allowance of water and bread! Ay, next they'll be +wanting us to set 'em up in their own ship." He changed suddenly from a +leer to a snarl. "You'll take what I give you and nothing more nor less. +Now then, men, we'll just herd these hearties overboard and bid them a gay +farewell." + +He stood there, pointing the way with a grand gesture and the late +afternoon sun sparkled on the buttons of his coat and shone brightly on the +fine white shirt he wore, which in better days had belonged to Captain +Whidden. "Murderer and thief!" I thought. For although about Captain +Whidden's death I knew nothing more than the cook's never-to-be-forgotten +words, "a little roun' hole in the back of his head--he was shot f'om +behine," I laid Bill Hayden's death at Captain Falk's door, and I knew well +by now that our worthy skipper would not scruple at stealing more than +shirts. + +When Falk pointed to the quarter-boat, the men, laughing harshly, closed in +on us and drove us along by threatening us with pistols and pikes, which +the bustling steward by now had distributed. And all the while Kipping +stood just behind the captain, smiling as if no unkind thought had ever +ruffled his placid nature. I could not help but be aware of his meanness, +and I suppose it was because I was only a boy and not given to looking +under the surface that I did not yet completely recognize in him the real +leader of all that had gone astray aboard the Island Princess. + +We let ourselves be driven toward the boat. Since we were outnumbered now +eleven to six,--not counting the wounded man of course,--and since, +compared with the others, we were virtually unarmed, we ought, I suppose, +to have been thankful that we were not murdered in cold blood, as doubtless +we should have been if our dangerous plight had not so delighted Kipping's +cruel humor, and if both Falk and Kipping had not felt certain that they +would never see or hear of us again. But we found little comfort in +realizing that, as matters stood, although in our own minds we were +convinced absolutely that Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping had conspired with +the crew to rob the owners, by the cold light of fact we could be proved in +the wrong in any court of admiralty. + +So far as Roger and I were concerned, our belief was based after all +chiefly on supposition; and so craftily had the whole scheme been phrased +and manoeuvred that, if you got down to categorical testimony, even +Blodgett and Davie Paine would have been hard put to it to prove anything +culpable against the other party. Actually we were guilty of mutiny, if +nothing more. + +The cook still carried his great cleaver and Blodgett unobtrusively had +drawn and opened a big dirk knife; but Neddie Benson, Davie, and I had no +weapons of any kind, and Roger's pistol was empty. + +We worked the boat outboard in silence and made no further resistance, +though I knew from Roger's expression as he watched Falk and Kipping and +their men, that, if he had seen a fair chance to turn the scales in our +favor, he would have seized it at any cost. + +Meanwhile the sails were flapping so loudly that it was hard to hear +Roger's voice when he again said, "Surely you'll give us food and water." + +"Why--no," said Falk. "I don't think you'll need it. You won't want to row +right home without stopping to say how-d'y'-do to the natives." + +Again a roar of laughter came from the men on deck. + +As the boat lay under the side of the ship, they crowded to the rail and +stared down at us with all sorts of rough gibes at our expense. +Particularly they aimed then-taunts at Davie Paine and Blodgett, who a +short time before had been hand-in-glove with them; and I was no little +relieved to see that their words seemed only to confirm the two in their +determination, come what might, never to join forces again with Falk and +Kipping. But Kipping singled out the cook and berated him with a stream of +disgusting oaths. + +"You crawling black nigger, you," he yelled. "Now what'll _you_ give _me_ +for a piece of pie?" + +Holding the cleaver close at his side, the negro looked up at the fox who +was abusing him, and burst into wild vituperation. Although Kipping only +laughed in reply, there was a savage and intense vindictiveness in the +negro's impassioned jargon that chilled my blood. I remember thinking then +that I should dread being in Kipping's shoes if ever those two met again. + +As we cast off, we six in that little boat soon to be left alone in the +wastes of the China Sea, we looked up at the cold, laughing faces on which +the low sun shone with an orange-yellow light, and saw in them neither pity +nor mercy. The hands resting on the bulwark, the hands of our own +shipmates, were turned against us. + +The ship was coming back to her course now, and some of us were looking at +the distant island with the cone-shaped peaks, toward which by common +consent we had turned our bow, when the cook, who still stared back at +Kipping, seemed to get a new view of his features. Springing up suddenly, +he yelled in a great voice that must have carried far across the sea:-- + +"You Kipping, Ah got you--Ah got you--Ah knows who you is--Ah knows who you +is--you crimp's runner, you! You blood-money sucker, you! Ah seen you in +Boston! Ah seen you befo' now! A-a-a-ah!--a-a-a-ah!" And he shook his great +black fist at the mate. + +The smile on Kipping's face was swept away by a look of consternation. With +a quick motion he raised his loaded pistol, which he had primed anew, and +fired on us; then, snatching another from one of the crew, he fired again, +and stood with the smoking weapons, one in each hand, and a snarl fixed on +his face. + +Captain Falk was staring at the negro in wrath and amazement, and there was +a stir on the deck that aroused my strong curiosity. But the cook was +groaning so loudly that we could hear no word of what was said, so we bent +to the oars with all our strength and rowed out of range toward the distant +island. + +Kipping's second ball had grazed the negro's head and had left a deep +furrow from which blood was running freely. But for the thickness of his +skull I believe it would have killed him. + +Once again the sails of the Island Princess, as we watched her, filled with +wind and she bore away across the sapphire blue of the sea with all her +canvas spread, as beautiful a sight as I have ever seen. The changing +lights in the sky painted the water with opalescent colors and tinted the +sails gold and crimson and purple, and by and by, when the sun had set and +the stars had come out and the ocean had darkened, we still could make her +out, smaller and ghostlike in the distance, sailing away before light winds +with the money and goods all under her hatches. + +Laboring at the oars, we rowed on and on and on. Stars, by which we now +held our course, grew bright overhead, and after a time we again saw dimly +the shores of the island. We dared not stay at sea in a small open boat +without food or water, and the island was our only refuge. + +Presently we heard breakers and saw once more the bluff headlands that we +had seen from the deck of the Island Princess. Remembering that there had +been low shores farther south, we rowed on and on, interminably and at +last, faint and weary, felt the keel of the boat grate on a muddy beach. + +At all events we had come safely to land. + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +ADVENTURES ASHORE + + +As we rested on our oars by the strange island, and smelled the warm odor +of the marsh and the fragrance of unseen flowers, and listened to the +_wheekle_ of a night-hawk that circled above us, we talked of one thing and +another, chiefly of the men aboard the Island Princess and how glad we were +to be done with them forever. + +"Ay," said Davie Paine sadly, "never again 'll I have the handle before my +name. But what of that? It's a deal sight jollier in the fo'castle than in +the cabin and I ain't the scholar to be an officer." He sighed heavily. + +"It warn't so jolly this voyage," Neddie Benson muttered, "what with Bill +Hayden passing on, like he done." + +We were silent for a time. For my own part, I was thinking about old Bill's +"little wee girl at Newbury-port" waiting for her stupid old dad to come +back to her, and I have an idea that the others were thinking much the same +thoughts. But soon Blodgett stirred restlessly, and the cook, the cleaver +on his knees, cleared his throat and after a premonitory grunt or two began +to speak. + +"Boy, he think Ah ain't got no use foh boys," he chuckled. "Hee-ha ha! Ah +fool 'em. Stew'd, he say, 'Frank, am you with us o' without us?' He say, +'Am you gwine like one ol' lobscozzle idjut git cook's pay all yo' life?' + +"'Well,' Ah says, 'what pay you think Ah'm gwine fob to git? Cap'n's pay, +maybe? 0' gin'ral's pay? Yass, sah. Ef Ah'm cook Ah'm gwine git cook's +pay.' + +"Den he laff hearty and slap his knee and he say 'Ef you come in with us, +you won't git cook's pay, no' sah. You is gwine git pay like no admiral +don't git if you come in with us. Dah's money 'board dis yeh ol' +ship.' + +"'Yass, sah,' says I, suspicionin' su'thin' was like what it didn't had +ought to be. 'But dat's owner's money.' + +"Den stew'd, he say, 'Listen! You come in with me and Cap'n Falk and Mistah +Kipping, and we's gwine split dat yeh money all up'twix' one another. Yass, +sah! But you all gotta have nothin' to do with dat yeh Mistah Hamlin and +dat yeh cocky li'le Ben Lathrop.' + +"'Oh no,' Ah says inside, so stew'd he don't heah me. 'Guess you all don't +know me and dat yeh Ben Lathrop is friends.' + +"Den Ah stop sudden. 'Mah golly,' Ah think, 'dey's a conspiration a-foot, +yass, sah, and if dis yeh ol' nigger don't look out dey gwine hu't de boy.' +If Ah gits into dat yeh conspiration, den Ah guess Ah'll snoop roun' and +learn what Ah didn't had ought to, and when time come, den mah golly, Ah'll +took good keer of dat boy. So Ah done like Ah'm sayin' now, and Ah says to +stew'd, 'Yass, sah, yass, sah,' and Ah don't let boy come neah de galley +and Ah don't give him no pie nor cake, but when time come Ah take good keer +of him, and Ah's tellin' you, Ah knows a lot 'bout what dem crawlin' +critters yonder on ship think dey gwine foh to do." + +With a glance toward me in the darkness that I verily believe expressed as +much genuine affection as so villainous a black countenance could show, +Frank got out his rank pipe and began packing it full of tobacco. + +Here was further evidence of what we so long had suspected. But as I +reflected on it, with forgiveness in my heart for every snub the faithful, +crafty old darky had given me and with amusement at the simple way he had +tricked the steward and Falk and Kipping, I recalled his parting remarks to +our worthy mate. + +"What was that you said to Mr. Kipping just as we gave way this afternoon?" +I asked. + +"Hey, what dat?" Frank growled. + +"When had you seen Kipping before?" + +There was a long silence, then Frank spoke quietly and yet with obvious +feeling. "Ah got a bone to pick with Kipping," he said, "but dat yeh's a +matter 'twix' him and me." + +All this time Roger had watched and listened with a kindly smile. + +"Well, men," he now said, "we've had a chance to rest and get our wind. +It's time we set to work. What do you say, hadn't we better haul the boat +out?" + +Although we tacitly had accepted Roger as commander of our expedition, he +spoke always with a certain deference to the greater age and experience of +Blodgett and Davie Paine, which won them so completely that they would have +followed him anywhere. + +They both looked at the sky and at the darkly rolling sea on which there +now rested a low incoming mist; but Davie left the burden of reply to old +Blodgett, who spoke nervously in his thin, windy voice. + +"Ay, sir, that we had. There's not much wind, nor is there, I think, likely +to be much; but if we was to haul up into some bushes like those yonder, +there won't be a thousand savages scouring the coast, come daylight, +a-hunting for the men that came in the boat." + +That was sound common sense. + +We got out and, standing three on a side, hauled the boat by great effort +clean out of water. Then we bent ropes to each end of three thwarts, and +thrust an oar through the bights of each pair of ropes. Thus, with one of +us at each end of an oar, holding it in the crooks of his elbows, we made +out to lift the boat and drag it along till we got it safely hidden in the +bushes with the oars tucked away under it. We then smoothed out our tracks +and restored the branches as well as we could, and held a counsel in which +every man had an equal voice. + +That it would be folly to remain on the beach until daylight, we were all +agreed. Immediately beyond the muddy shore there was, so far as we could +tell, only a salt marsh overgrown with rank grass and scattered clumps of +vegetation, which might conceal us after a fashion if we were willing to +lie all day long in mud that probably swarmed with reptile life, but which +would afford us no real security and would give us no opportunity to forage +for fresh water and food. + +Blodgett, wide-eyed and restless, urged that we set out inland and travel +as far as possible before daybreak. "You can't tell about a country like +this," he said. "Might be we'd stumble on a temple with a lot of heathen +idols full of gold and precious stones to make our everlasting fortunes, or +a nigger or two with a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string." + +"Yeah!" the cook grunted, irritated by Blodgett's free use of the word +"nigger," "and Ah's tellin' you he'll have a Malay kris what'll slit yo' +vitals and chop off yo' head; and nex' time when you gwine come to say +howdy, you'll find yo' ol' skull a-setting in de temple, chockfull of dem +rubies and grinnin' like he was glad to see you back again. Ah ain't gwine +on no such promulgation, no sah! What Ah wants is a good, cool drink and a +piece of pie. Yass, sah," + +"Now that's like I feel," said Neddie Benson. "I never thought when the +lady was tellin' me about trouble in store, that there warn't goin' to be +enough victuals to go round--" + +"Ah, you make me tired," Blodgett snapped out. "Food, food, food! And +here's a chance to find a nice little temple an' better our fortunes. Of +course it ain't like India, but if these here slant-eyed pirates have stole +any gold at all, it'll be in the temples." + +"What I'd like"--it was Davie Paine's heavy, slow voice--"is just a drink +of water and some ship's bread." + +"Well," said Roger, "we'll find neither bread nor rubies lying on the +beach, and since we're agreed that it's best to get out of sight, let's set +off." + +He was about to plunge blindly into the marsh, when Blodgett, who had been +ranging restlessly while we talked, cried, "Here's a road! As I'm alive +here's a road!" + +We trooped over to where he stood, and saw, sure enough, an opening in the +brush and grass where the ground was beaten hard as if by the passing of +many feet. + +"Well, let's be on our way," said Blodgett, starting forward. + +"No, sah, dat ain't no way foh to go!" the cook exclaimed. He stood there, +head thrown forward, chin out-thrust, the cleaver, which he had carried all +the time since we left the ship, hanging at his side. + +"Why not?" asked Roger. + +"'Cause, sah, whar dey's a road dey's humans and humans heahbouts on dese +yeh islands is liable to be drefful free with strangers. Yass, sah, if we +go a-walkin' along dat yeh road, fust thing we know we's gwine walk into a +whole mob of dem yeh heathens. Den whar'll we be?" In answer to his +question, the negro thrust out his left hand and, grasping an imaginary +opponent by the throat, raised the cleaver, and swept it through the air +with a slicing motion. Looking keenly at us to be sure that we grasped the +significance of his pantomime he remarked, "Ah want mah ol' head to stay +put." + +"There ain't going to be no village till we come to trees," said Davie +Paine slowly. "If there is, we can see it anyhow, and if there isn't, this +road'll take us across the marsh. Once we're on the other side, we can +leave the road and take to the hills." + +"There's an idea," Roger cried. "How about it, Bennie?" + +I nodded. + +Blodgett eagerly went first and the cook, apparently fearing that he was on +his way to be served as a particularly choice tidbit at somebody else's +banquet, came last. The rest of us just jostled along together. But Davie +Paine, I noticed, held his head higher than I ever had seen it before; for +Roger's appreciation of his sound common sense had pleased him beyond +measure and had done wonders to restore his self-confidence. + +First there were interwoven bushes and vines beside the road, and then tall +reeds and marsh grasses; now there was sand underfoot, now mud. But it was +a better path by far than any we could have beaten out for ourselves, and +we all--except the cook--were well pleased that we had taken it. + +The bushes and tall grasses, which shut us in, prevented our seeing the +ocean behind us or the hills ahead, and the miasmic mist that we had +noticed some time since billowed around our knees. But the stars were very +bright above us, and phosphorescent creatures like fire-flies fluttered +here and there, and, all things considered, we made excellent progress. + +As it had been Blodgett in his eternal peering and prowling who had found +the path, so now it was Blodgett, bending low as he hurried at the head of +our irregular line, who twice stopped suddenly and said that he had heard +hoarse, distant calls. + +Each time, when the rest of us came up to him and listened, they had died +away, but Blodgett now had lost his confident air. He bent lower as he +walked and he peered ahead in a way that seemed to me more prowling and +catlike than ever. As we advanced his uneasiness grew on him, until +presently he turned and raised his hand. The five of us crowded close +together behind him and listened intently. + +For a while, as before, we heard nothing; then suddenly a new, strange +noise came to our ears. It was an indistinct sound of trampling, and it +certainly was approaching. + +The cook grasped my arm. "'Fo' de good Lo'd!" he muttered, "dey's voices!" + +Now I, too, and all the others heard occasional grunts and gutturals. We +dared not flee back to the beach, for there or in the open marshy land we +could not escape observation, and since it had taken us a good half hour to +carry our boat to its hiding-place, it would be utter folly to try to +launch it and put out to sea. + +Not knowing which way to turn, the six of us stood huddled together like +frightened sheep, in the starlight, in the centre of that great marsh, with +the white mist sweeping up around the bushes, and waited for we knew not +what. + +As the noise of tramping and the guttural voices grew louder, Blodgett +gasped, "Look! In heaven's name, look there!" + +Where the path wound over a gentle rise, which was blurred to our eyes by +the mist, there appeared a moving black mass above which swayed and rose +and fell what seemed to our excited vision the points of a great number of +spears. + +With one accord we turned and plunged from the path straight into the marsh +and ran with all our might and main. The cook, who hitherto had brought up +the rear, now forged to the front, springing ahead with long jumps. +Occasionally, as he leaped even higher to clear a bush or a stump, I could +see his kinky round head against the sky, and catch the flash of starlight +on his cleaver, which he still carried. Close behind him ran Neddie Benson, +who saw in the adventures of the night a more terrible fulfillment of the +plump lady's prophecies than ever he had dreamed of; then came Roger and I, +and at my shoulder I heard Davie's heavy breathing and Blodgett's hard +gasps. + +To snakes or other reptiles that may have inhabited the warm pools through +which we splashed, we gave no thought. Somewhere ahead of us there was high +land--had we not rowed close enough to the promontory to hear breakers? +When Davie and Blodgett fairly panted to us to stop for breath, the cook +and Neddie Benson with one voice urged us on to the hills where we could +find rocks or trees for a shelter from which to stand off whatever savages +might pursue us. + +Though we tried to make as little noise as possible, our splashing and +crashing as we raced now in single file, now six abreast, now as +irregularly as half a dozen sheep, must have been audible to keen ears a +mile away. When we came at last to woods and drier ground, we settled down +to a steady jog, which was much less noisy, but even then we stumbled and +fell and clattered and thrashed as we labored on. + +At first we had heard in the night behind us, repeated over and over again, +those hoarse, unintelligible calls and certain raucous blasts, which we +imagined came from some crude native trumpet; but as we climbed, the rising +mist floated about us, and hearing less of the calling and the blasts, we +slowed down to a hard walk and went on up, up, up, through trees and over +rocks, with the mist in our faces and obscuring the way until we could not +see three feet in front of us, but had to keep together by calling +cautiously now and then. + +Blodgett, coming first to a ridge of rock, stopped high above us like a +shadow cast by the moonlight on the mist. + +"Here's the place to make a stand," he cried in his thin voice. "A nat'ral +fort to lay behind. Come, lads, over we go!" + +Up on the rock we scrambled, all of us ready to jump down on the other +side, when Neddie Benson called on us to stop, and with a queer cry let +himself fall back the way he had come. Fearing that he was injured, we +paused reluctantly. + +"Don't go over that rock," he cried. + +"Why not?" Roger asked. + +"It gives me a sick feeling inside." + +"Stuff!" exclaimed Blodgett. "Behind that rock we'll be safe from all the +heathen in the Chinese Sea." + +"The lady she said there'd be trouble," Neddie wailed insistently, "and I +ain't going over that rock. No, sir, not when I feel squeamish like I do +now." + +With an angry snort Blodgett hesitated on the very summit of the ledge. +"Come on, come on," he said. + +"Listen dah!" the cook whispered. + +I thought of savage yells and trampling feet when, crouching on hands and +knees, I listened; but I heard none of them. The sound that came to my ears +was the faint, distant rumble of surf breaking on rocks. + +Now Roger spoke sharply: "Steady, men, go slow." + +"The sea's somewhere beyond us," I said. + +"Come, come," Blodgett repeated tiresomely in his thin windy voice, "over +these rocks and we'll be safe." He was so confident and eager that we were +on the very point of following him. I actually leaned out over the edge +ready to leap down. Never did a man's strange delusion come nearer to +leading his comrades to disaster! + +The cook raised his hand. "Look--look dah!" + +He was staring past Blodgett's feet, past my hands, down at the rocks +whither we were about to drop. The mist was opening slowly. There was +nothing for more than six feet below us--for more than twelve feet. Now the +mist eddied up to the rock again; now it curled away and opened out until +we could look down to the ghostly, phosphorescent whiteness of waves +breaking on rough stones almost directly under us. Blodgett, with a queer, +frightened expression, crawled back to Neddie Benson. + +We were sitting at the brink of a sheer precipice, which fell away more +than two hundred feet to a mass of jagged rock on which the sea was booming +with a hollow sound like the voice of a great bell. + +"Well, here we'll have to make our stand if they follow us," said Davie. + +Although the rest were white with horror at the death we so narrowly had +avoided, old Davie did not even breathe more quickly. The man had no more +imagination than a porpoise. + +Gathering in the lee of the rocky ridge, we took stock of our weapons and +recovered our self-possession. The cook again ran his thumb-nail along the +edge of the cleaver; Roger examined the lock of his pistol--I saw a queer +expression on his face at the time, but he said nothing; Blodgett sharpened +his knife on his calloused palm and the rest of us found clubs and stones. +We could flee no farther. Here, if we were pursued, we must fight. But +although we waited a long time, no one came. The mist gradually passed off; +the stars again shone brightly, and the moon presently peeped out from +between the cone-shaped mountains on our eastern horizon. + +[Illustration] + + + + +V + +IN WHICH THE TIDE TURNS + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +IN LAST RESORT + + +"They're not on our heels at all events," said Roger, when we had sat +silent and motionless until we were cramped from head to foot. Of our +little band, he was by far the least perturbed. "If we should set an anchor +watch, we could sleep, turn and turn about. What do you say to that?" + + +He had a way with him, partly the quiet humor that twinkled in his eyes, +partly his courteous manner toward all of us, particularly the older men, +that already had endeared him to every member of our company, and a general +murmur of assent answered him. + +"Blodgett, Neddie, and I'll stand first watch, then. We'll make the watches +three hours on deck and three below, if you say so. You others had best +hunt out an easy place to sleep, but let every man keep his knife or club +where he can snatch it up in case of attack." + +Remembering his comfortable quarters in the steerage of the Island +Princess, the cook groaned; but we found a spot where there was some +sun-baked earth, which we covered with such moss as we could lay our hands +on, threw ourselves down, and fell asleep forthwith. + +We were so stiff when the other three waked us that we scarcely could stand +without help; but we gradually worked new life into our sore muscles and +took our stations with as much good-will as we could muster. Roger gave us +his watch to tell the time by, and we agreed on separate posts from which +to guard against surprise--the cook a little way down the hill to the +right, Davie Paine farther to the left, and I on the summit of the rocks +whence I could see in all directions. + +The wild view from that rock would have been a rare sight for old and +experienced voyagers, and to me, a boy in years and in travels, it was +fascinating both for its uncommon beauty and for the thousand perils that +it might conceal. Who could say what savages were sleeping or prowling +about under the dark branches of yonder shadowy woods? What wild creatures +lurked in their depths? What pirate prows were steering their course by +yonder cone-shaped peaks or by those same bright stars that twinkled +overhead? + +I studied the outline of the island, with its miles of flat marshland deep +in grass and tangled vines, its palms and dense forests, its romantic +mountains, and its jagged northern cliffs; I watched the moonbeams +sparkling on the water; I watched a single light shining far out at sea. By +and by I saw inland, on the side of one of the hills, a light shining in +the jungle, and stared at it with a sort of unwilling fascination. + +A light in the jungle could mean so many things! + +Startled by a sound down in our own camp, I quickly turned and saw old +Blodgett scrambling up to where I sat. + +"It ain't no use," he said in an undertone. "I can't sleep." He twisted his +back and writhed like a cat that wants to scratch itself against a +doorpost. "What an island for temples! Ah, Benny, here's our chance to make +our everlasting fortunes." + +I touched him and pointed at the distant light shining out of the darkness. + +Sitting down beside me, he watched it intently. "I tell ye, Benny," he +murmured thoughtfully, "either me and you and the rest of us is going to +make our everlasting fortunes out o' these here natives, or we're going to +lay out under these here trees until the trumpet blows for Judgment." + +After a time he spoke again. "Ah, but it's a night to be stirring! I'll +stake all my pay for this unlucky voyage that there's not a native on the +island who hasn't a bag of rubies tied round his neck with a string, or +maybe emeralds--there's a stone for you! Emeralds are green as the sea by a +sandy shore and bright as a cat's eyes in the dark." + +Morning came quickly. Pink and gold tinted the cone-shaped peaks, the sky +brightened from the color of steel to a clear cobalt, and all at once the +world lay before us in the cool morning air, which the sun was soon to warm +to a vapid heat. As we gathered at the summit of the cliff over which +Blodgett nearly had let us into eternity, we could see below, flying in and +out, birds of the variety, as I afterwards learned, that make edible nests. + +It now was apparent that the light I had seen at sea was that of a ship's +lantern, for to our amazement the Island Princess lay in the offing. +Landward unbroken verdure extended from the slope at our feet to the base +of the cone-shaped peaks, and of the armed force that had frightened us so +badly the evening before we saw no sign; but when we looked at the marsh we +rubbed our eyes and stared anew. + +There was the rough hillside that we had climbed in terror; there was the +marsh with its still pools, its lush herbage, and the "road" that wound +from the muddy beach to the forest on our left. But in the marsh, scattered +here and there--! The truth dawned on us slowly. All at once Blodgett +slapped his thin legs and leaned back and laughed until tears started from +his faded eyes; Neddie Benson stared at him stupidly, then poured out a +flood of silly oaths. The cook burst into a hoarse guffaw, and Roger and +Davie Paine chuckled softly. We stopped and looked at each other and then +laughed together until we had to sit down on the ground and hold our aching +sides. + +In the midst of the marsh were feeding a great number of big, long-horned +water buffaloes. We now realized that the road we had followed was one of +their trails that the guttural calls and blasts from rude trumpets were +their snorts and blats, that the spears we had seen were their horns viewed +from lower ground. + +The ebbing tide had left our boat far from the water, and since we were +faint from our long fast, it was plain that, if we were to survive our +experience, we must find help soon. + +"If I was asked," Davie remarked thoughtfully, "I'd say the thing to do was +to follow along the edge of that there swamp to the forest, where maybe +we'll find a bit of a spring and some kind of an animal Mr. Hamlin can +shoot with that pistol of his." + +Roger drew the pistol from his belt and regarded it with a wry smile. +"Unfortunately," he said, "I have no powder." + +At all events there was no need to stay longer where we were; so, retracing +our steps of the evening before, we skirted the marsh and came to a place +where there were many cocoanut trees. We were bitterly disappointed to find +that our best efforts to climb them were of no avail. We dared not try to +fell them with the cook's cleaver, lest the noise of chopping attract +natives; for we were convinced by the light we had seen shining in the +jungle that the island was inhabited. So we set off cautiously into the +woods, and slowly tramped some distance through an undergrowth that +scratched our hands and faces and tore our clothes. On the banks of a small +stream we picked some yellow berries, which Blodgett ate with relish, but +which the rest of us found unpalatable. We all drank water from the hollows +of trees,--we dared not drink from the boggy stream,--and Neddie Benson ate +the leaves of some bushes and urged the rest of us to try them. That we +refused, we later had reason to be deeply thankful. + +Following the stream we crossed a well-marked path, which caused us +considerable uneasiness, and came at last to an open glade, at the other +end of which we saw a person moving. At that we bent double and retreated +as noiselessly as possible. Once out of sight in the woods, we hurried off +in single file till we thought we had put a safe distance behind us; but +when we stopped to rest we were terrified by a noise in the direction from +which we had come, and we hastened to conceal ourselves under the leaves +and bushes. + +The noise slowly drew nearer, as if men were walking about and beating the +undergrowth as they approached. Blodgett stared from his covert with beady +eyes; Neddie gripped my wrist; the cook rubbed his thumb along the blade of +the cleaver, and Roger fingered the useless pistol. Still the noises +approached. At the sight of something that moved I felt my heart leap and +stand still, then Blodgett laughed softly; a pair of great birds which flew +away as soon as they saw us stirring, had occasioned our fears. + +Having really seen a man in the glade by the stream, we were resolved to +incur no foolish risks; so we cautiously returned to the hill, whence we +could watch the beach and the broad marsh and catch between the mountains a +glimpse of a bay to the northeast where we now saw at a great distance some +men fishing from canoes. While the rest of us prepared another hiding-place +among the bushes, Roger and Blodgett sallied forth once more to reconnoitre +in a new direction. + +Although we no longer could see the ship, we were much perplexed that she +had lingered off the island, and we talked of it at intervals throughout +the day. Whatever her purpose, we were convinced that for us it augured +ill. + +Presently Roger and Blodgett returned in great excitement and reported that +the woods were full of Malays. Apparently the natives were unaware of our +presence but we dared not venture again in search of food, so we resumed +our regular watches and slept in our turns. As soon as the sun should set +we planned to skirt the mountains under the cover of darkness, in desperate +hope of finding somewhere food and water with which we could return to our +boat and defy death by putting out to sea; but ere the brief twilight of +the tropics had settled into night, Neddie Benson was writhing and groaning +in mortal agony. We were alarmed, and for a time could think of no +explanation; but after a while black Frank looked up from where he crouched +by the luckless Neddie and fiercely muttered:-- + +"What foh he done eat dem leaves? Hey? Tell me dat!" + +It was true that Neddie alone had eaten the leaves. A heavy price he was +paying for it! We all looked at Blodgett with an anxiety that it would have +been kinder, perhaps, to hide, and Blodgett himself seemed uneasy lest he +should be poisoned by the berries he had eaten. But no harm came of them, +and by the time the stars were shining again Neddie appeared to be over the +worst of his sickness and with the help of the rest of us managed to +stagger along. So we chose a constellation for our guide and set off +through the undergrowth. + +Even Blodgett by this time had got over his notion of robbing temples. + +"If only we was to run on a yam patch," he said to me as together we +stumbled forward, "or maybe some chickens or a little rice or a vegetable +garden or a spring of cold water--" + +But only a heavy sigh answered him, a grunt from the cook, and a moan from +Neddie. Our spirits were too low to be stirred even by Blodgett's visionary +tales. It was hard to believe that the moon above the mountains was the +same that had shone down upon us long before off the coast of Sumatra. + +The woods were so thick that we soon lost sight of our constellation, but +we kept on our way, stopping often to rest, and made what progress we +could. More than once we heard at a little distance noises that indicated +the presence of wild beasts; and the brambles and undergrowth tore our +clothes and scratched and cut our skin till blood ran from our hands and +faces. But the thing that alarmed us most we heard one time when we had +thrown ourselves on the ground to rest. Though it came from a great +distance it unmistakably was four distinct gunshots. + +Too weak and exhausted to talk, yet determined to carry through our +undertaking, we pushed on and on till we could go no farther; then we +dropped where we stood, side by side, and slept. + +Morning woke us. Through the trees we saw a cone-shaped peak and a great +marsh where buffalo were feeding. We unwittingly had circled in the night +and had come back to within a quarter of a mile of the very point from +which we had set forth. + + + +CHAPTER XX + +A STORY IN MELON SEEDS + + +We were all gaunt and unkempt after our hardships of the past two days, but +Neddie, poor fellow, looked more like a corpse than a living man and moaned +with thirst and scarcely could sit up without help. Finding about a pint of +water close at hand in the hollow of a tree, we carried him to it and he +sucked it up with a straw till it was all gone; but though it relieved his +misery, he was manifestly unable to walk, even had we dared stir abroad, so +we stayed where we were while the sun rose to the meridian. We could find +so little water that we all suffered from thirst, and with Neddie's +sickness in mind none of us dared eat more leaves or berries. + +The afternoon slowly wore away; the tide came in across the flats; the +shadows lengthened hour by hour. But no breath of wind cooled our hot +faces. Neddie lay in a heap, moaning fitfully; Blodgett and Davie Paine +slept; Roger sat with his back to a tree and watched the incoming tide; the +cook stirred about uneasily and muttered to himself. + +Coming over to me, he crouched at my side and spoke of Kipping. He was +savagely vindictive. "Hgh!" he grunted, "dat yeh crimp! He got dis nigger +once, yass, sah. Got me to dat boa'din' house what he was runner foh. Yass, +sah. Ah had one hunnerd dollahs in mah pants pocket, yass, sah. Nex' +mohnin' Ah woke up th'ee days lateh 'boa'd ship bound foh London. Ah ain' +got no hunnerd dollah in mah pants pocket. Dat yeh Kipping he didn't leave +me no pants pocket." The old black pulled open his shirt and revealed a +jagged scar on his great shoulder. "Look a' dat! Cap'n done dat--dat yeh +v'yage. Hgh!" + +At dusk Neddie's moaning woke the sleepers, and we held a council in which +we debated plans for the future. Daring neither to venture abroad nor to +eat the native fruits and leaves, exhausted by exposure, perishing of +hunger and thirst, we faced a future that was dark indeed. + +"As for me," said Davie calmly, "I can see only one way to end our misery." +He glanced at the cook's cleaver as he spoke. + +"No, no!" Roger cried sharply. "Let us have no such talk as that, Davie." +He hesitated, looking first at us,--his eyes rested longest on Neddie's +hollow face,--then at the marsh; then he leaned forward and looked from one +to another. "Men," he said, "I see no better way out of our difficulties +than to surrender to the natives." + +"Oh, no, no, sah! No, sah! Don' do dat, sah! No, no no!" With a yell black +Frank threw himself on his knees. "No, sah, no, sah! Dey's we'y devils, +sah, dey's wuss 'n red Injuns, sah!" + +"Fool." Roger cried. "Be still!" Seeming to hold the negro in contempt, he +turned to the rest of us and awaited our answer. + +At the time we were amazed at his harshness, and the poor cook was +completely overwhelmed; for little as Roger said, there was something in +his manner of saying it that burned like fire. But later, when we looked +back on that day and remembered how bitterly we were discouraged, we saw +reason to thank God that Roger Hamlin had had the wisdom and the power to +crush absolutely the first sign of insubordination. + +Staring in a curious way at the cook, who was fairly groveling on the +earth, Blodgett spoke up in a strangely listless voice. "I say yes, sir. If +we're to die, we're to die anyhow, and there's a bare chance they'll feed +us before they butcher us." + +"Ay," said Davie. "Me, too!" + +And Neddie made out to nod. + +The cook, watching the face of each man in turn, began to blubber; and when +I, the youngest and last, cast my vote with the rest, he literally rolled +on the ground and bellowed. + +"Get up!" Roger snapped out at him. + +He did so in a kind of stupid wonder. + +"Now then, cook, there's been enough of this nonsense. Come, let's sleep. +At daylight to-morrow we'll be on our way." + +Apparently the negro at first doubted his ears; but Roger's peremptory tone +brought him to his senses, and the frank disapproval of the others ended +his perversity. + +A certain confidence that our troubles were soon to be ended in one way or +another, coupled with exhaustion, enabled me to sleep deeply that night, +despite the numberless perils that beset us. + +I was aware that the cook continually moaned to himself and that at some +time in the night Roger and Blodgett were throwing stones at a wild beast +that was prowling about. Then the sun shone full on my face and I woke with +a start. + +Roger and Davie Paine each gave Neddie Benson an arm, Blodgett and I pushed +ahead to find the best footing, and the cook, once more palsied with fear, +again came last. To this day I have not been able to account for Frank's +strange weakness. In all other circumstances he was as brave as a lion. + +Staggering along as best we could, we arrived at the stream we had found +before--we dared not drink its water, even in our extremity--and followed +it to the glade, which this time we boldly entered. At first we saw no one, +but when we had advanced a few steps, we came upon three girls fishing from +the bank of the stream. As they darted off along the path that led up the +glade, we started after them, but we were so weak that, when we had gone +only a short distance, we had to sit down on the trunk of a large tree to +rest. + +About a quarter of an hour later we heard steps, and shortly seven men +appeared by the same path. + +Indicating by a motion of his hand that he wished the rest of us to remain +seated, Roger rose and went fearlessly to meet the seven. When he had +approached within a short distance, they stopped and drew their krises, or +knives with waved points. Never hesitating, Roger continued to advance +until he was within six feet of them, then falling on his knees and +extending his empty hands, he begged for mercy. + +For a long time they stood with drawn knives, staring at him and at us; +then one of them put up his kris, and knelt in front of him and offered him +both hands, which, it seemed, was a sign of friendship. + +When we indicated by gestures that we were hungry, they immediately gave us +each a cocoanut; but meanwhile some twenty or thirty more natives had +arrived at the spot where we were, and they now proceeded to take our hats +and handkerchiefs, and to cut the buttons from our coats. + +Presently they gave us what must have been an order to march. At all events +we walked with them at a brisk pace along a well-marked trail, between +great ferns and rank canes and grasses, and after a time we came to a +village composed of frail, low houses or bungalows, from which other +natives came running. Some of them shook their fists at us angrily; some +picked up sticks and clubs or armed themselves with knives and krises, and +came trailing along behind. Children began to throw clods and pebbles at +us. The mob was growing rapidly, and for some cause, their curiosity to see +the white men, the like of whom most of them probably never had seen +before, was unaccountably mixed with anger. + +If they were going to kill us, why did they not cut our throats and have it +done with? Still the people came running, till the whining of their voices +almost deafened us; and still they hustled us along, until at last we came +to a house larger than any we had passed. + +Here they all stopped, and our captors, with as many of the clamoring mob +as the place would hold, drove us through the open door into what appeared +to be the judgment-hall of the village. Completely at their mercy, we stood +by the judgment-seat in the centre of a large circle and waited until, at +the end of perhaps half an hour, an even greater uproar arose in the +distance. + +There was much stirring and talking and new faces continued to appear. From +where I stood I could see that the growing throng was armed with spears and +knives. More and more natives pressed into the ring that surrounded us and +listened intently to a brisk discussion, of which none of us could +understand a word. + +In one corner was a heap of melons; in another were spears and shields. I +was looking at them curiously when something familiar just above them +caught my eye and sent a stab of fear through my heart. In that array of +savage weapons were _three ship's cutlasses_. I was familiar enough with +the rife of those Eastern islands to know what that meant. + +Everywhere in the dim hall were bared knives, and muttering voices now and +then rose to loud shrieks. What with faintness and fatigue and fear, I felt +myself growing weak and dizzy. The circle of hostile faces and knives and +spears seemed suddenly dim and far-away. In all the hut I could see only +the three ship's cutlasses in the corner, and think only of what a grand +history theirs must have been. + +The distant roar that came slowly nearer seemed so much like a dream that I +thought I must be delirious, and rubbed my eyes and ears and tried to +compose myself; but the roar continued to grow louder, and now a more +intense clamor arose. The crowd parted and in through the open lane came a +wild, tall man, naked except for a pair of short breeches, a girdle, and a +red handkerchief on his head, who carried a drawn kris. Coming within the +circle, he stopped and stared at us. Then everything grew white and I found +myself lying on my back on the floor, looking up at them all and wondering +if they had killed me already. Small wonder that starvation and exposure +had proved too much for me! + +Roger was down on his knees beside me,--he told me long afterwards that +nothing ever gave him such a start as did my ghastly pallor,--and the +others, in the face of our common danger, gathered round me solicitously. +All, that is, except the cook; for, although our captors had exhibited a +lively curiosity about those of us who were white, they had frightened the +poor negro almost out of his wits by feeling of his cheeks and kinky hair +and by punching his ribs with their fingers, until now, having been +deprived of his beloved cleaver, he cowered like a scared puppy before the +gravely interested natives. "O Lo'd," he muttered between chattering teeth, +"O Lo'd, why am dis yeh nigger so popolous? O Lo'd, O Lo'd, dah comes +anotheh--dah comes anotheh!" + +Of the hostility of our captors there now could be no doubt. The sinister +motion of their weapons, the angry glances that they persistently darted at +us, the manner and inflection of their speech, all were threatening. But +Roger, having made sure that I was not injured, was on his feet and already +had faced boldly the angry throng. + +Though we could not understand the savages and they could not understand +us, Roger's earnestness when he began to speak commanded their attention, +and the chief fixed his eyes on him gravely. But some one else repeated it +twice a phrase that sounded like "Pom-pom, pom-pom!" And the rest burst +into angry yells. + +Roger indignantly threw his hands down,--palms toward the chief,--as if to +indicate that we had come in friendship; but the man laughed scornfully and +repeated the phrase, "Pom-pom!" + +Again Roger spoke indignantly; again he threw his hands down, palms out. +But once more the cry, "Pom-pom, pom-pom," rose fiercely, and the angry +throng pressed closer about us. The rest of us had long since despaired of +our lives, and for the moment even Roger was baffled. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" + +What the phrase meant we had not the remotest idea, but that our state now +was doubly perilous the renewed hubbub and the closing circle of weapons +convinced us. + +"Pom-pom, pom-pom!" Again and again in all parts of the hall we heard the +mysterious words. + +Was there nothing that we could do to prove our good faith? Nothing to show +them that at least we did not come as enemies? + +Over Davie Fame's face an odd expression now passed. He was staring at the +heap of melons. + +"Mr. Hamlin," he said in a low voice, "if we was to cut a ship out of one +of them melons, and a boat and some men, we could show these 'ere heathen +how we didn't aim to bother them, and then maybe they'd let us go away +again." + +"Davie, Davie, man," Roger cried, "there's an idea!" + +I was completely bewildered. What could Davie mean, I wondered. Melons and +a ship? Were he and Roger mad? From Roger's actions I verily believed they +were. + +He faced our captors for a moment as if striving to think of some way to +impress them; then, with a quick gesture, he deliberately got down on the +floor and took the chief's foot and placed it on his head, to signify that +we were completely in the fellow's power. Next he rose and faced the man +boldly, and began a solemn and impressive speech. His grave air and stern +voice held their attention, though they could not understand a word he +said; and before their interest had time to fail, he drew from his pocket a +penknife, a weapon so small that it had escaped their prying fingers, and +walking deliberately to the corner where the melons were heaped up, took +one of them and began to cut it. + +At first they started forward; but when Roger made no hostile motion, they +gathered round him in silence to see what he was doing. + +"Here, men, is the ship," he said gravely, "and here the boats." Kneeling +and continuing his speech, he cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped +model of a ship, and stuck in it, to represent masts, three slivers of +bamboo, which he split from a piece that lay on the floor; then he cut a +smaller model, which he laid on the deck of the ship, to represent a boat. +On one side of the deck he upright six melon seeds, on the other twelve. +Pointing at the six seeds and holding up six fingers, he pointed at each +of us in turn. + +Suddenly one of the natives cried out in his own tongue; then another and +another seemed to understand Roger's meaning as they jabbered among +themselves and in turn pointed at the six seeds and at the six white men +whom they had captured. + +Roger then imitated a fight, shaking his fists and slashing as if with a +cutlass, and, last of all, he pointed his finger, and cried, "Bang! Bang!" + +At this the natives fairly yelled in excitement and repeated over and over, +"Pom--pom--pom--pom!" + +"Bang-bang!"--"Pom-pom!" We suddenly understood the phrase that they had +used so often. + +Now in dead silence, all in the hut, brown men and white, pressed close +around the melon-rind boat on the floor. So moving the melon seeds that it +was obvious that the six men represented by six seeds were being driven +overboard, Roger next set the boat on the floor and transferred them to it. +Lining up all the rest along the side of the ship, he cried loudly, "Bang +bang!" + +"Cook," he called, beckoning to black Frank, "come here!" + +As the negro reluctantly obeyed, Roger pointed to the long gash that +Kipping's bullet had cut in his kinky scalp. Crying again, "Bang-bang!" he +pointed at one of the seeds in the boat and then at the cook. + +Not one of them who could see the carved boats failed to understand what +Roger meant, and the brown men looked at Frank and laughed and talked more +loudly and excitedly than ever. Then the chief stood up and cried to some +one in the farthest corner of the room, and at that there was more laughing +and shouting. The man in the corner seemed much abashed; but those about +him pushed him forward, and he was shoved along through the crowd until he, +too, stood beside the table, where a dozen men pointed at his head and +cried "Bang-bang!" or "Pom-pom!" as the case might be. + +To our amazement we saw that just over his right temple there was torn the +path of a bullet, exactly that on the cook's head. + +[Illustration: +He cut from the melon-rind a roughly shaped model of a ship and stuck in +it, to represent masts, three slivers of bamboo.] + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +NEW ALLIES + + +Now the chief reached for Roger's knife and deftly whittled out the shape +of a native canoe. In it he placed several seeds, then, pushing it against +the carved ship, he pointed to the man with the bullet wound on his temple +and cried, "Pom-pom!" Next he pointed at two seeds in the boat and said, +"Pom-pom," and snapped them out of the canoe with his finger. + +"Would you believe it!" Blodgett gasped. "The heathens went out to the ship +in one o' them boats, and Falk fired on 'em!" + +"And two of 'em was killed!" Davie exclaimed unnecessarily. + +Roger now laid half a melon on the floor, its flat side down, and moved the +boat slowly over to it. + +That the half-melon represented the island was apparent to all. The natives +crowded round us, jabbering questions that we could not understand and of +course could not answer; they examined the cook's wound and compared it +with the wound their friend had suffered; they pointed at the little boats +cut out of melon-rind and laughed uproariously. + +Now one of them made a suggestion, the others took it up, and the chief +split melons and offered a half to each of us. + +We ate them like the starving men we were, and did not notice that the +chief had assembled his head men for a consultation, until he sent a man +running from the hall, returned shortly with six pieces of betel nut, which +the natives chew instead of tobacco, and gave them to the chief, who handed +one to each of us as a mark of friendship. Next, to our amazement, one of +the natives produced Roger's useless pistol and handed it back to him; and +as if that were a signal, one after another they restored our knives and +clubs, until, last of all, a funny little man with a squint handed the +cleaver back to the cook. + +With a tremendous sigh of relief, Frank seized the mighty weapon and laid +it on his knee and buried his big white teeth in half a melon. "Mah golly!" +he muttered, when he had swallowed the huge mouthful and had wiped his lips +and chin with the back of his hand, "Ah neveh 'spected to see dis yeh +felleh again. No, sah!" And he tapped the cleaver lovingly. + +The chief, who had been talking earnestly with his counselors, now made +signs to attract our attention. Obviously he wished to tell us a story of +his own. He cut out a number of slim canoes from the melon-rind and laid +them on the half-melon that represented the island; next, he pushed the +ship some distance away on the floor. Blowing on it through pursed lips, he +turned it about and drew it back toward the half-melon that represented the +island. When it was in the lee of the island, he stopped it and looked up +at us and smiled and pointed out of the door. We were puzzled. Seeing our +blank expressions, he repeated the process. Still we could not understand. + +Persisting in his efforts, he now launched three roughly carved canoes, in +which he placed a number of seeds, pointing at himself and various others; +then in each of the prows he placed two seeds and pointed at the six of us, +two at a time. Pointing next at the roof of the hut, he waved his hand from +east to west and closed his eyes as if in sleep, after which he placed his +finger on his lips, pushed the carved canoes very slowly across the floor +toward the ship, then, with a screech that made our hair stand on end, he +rushed them at the seeds that represented Captain Falk and his men, +yelling, "Pom-pom-pom-pom!" and snapped the seeds off on the floor. + +Leaning back, he bared his teeth and laughed ferociously. + +Here was a plot to take the ship! Although we probably had missed the fine +points of it, we could not mistake its general character. + +"Ay," said Blodgett, as if we had been discussing the matter for hours, +"but we'll be a pack of bloody pirates to be hanged from the yard-arms of +the first frigate that overhauls us." + +It was true. We should be liable as pirates in any port in Christendom. + +"Men," said Roger coolly, "there's no denying that in the eyes of the law +we'd be pirates as well as mutineers. But if we can take the ship and sail +it back to Salem, we'll be acquitted of any charge of mutiny or piracy, I +can promise you. It'll be easy to ship a new crew at Canton, and we can +settle affairs with the Websters' agents there so that at least we'll have +a chance at a fair trial if we are taken on our homeward voyage. Shall we +venture it?" + +The cook rolled his eyes. "Gimme dat yeh Kipping!" he cried, and with a +savage cackle he swung his cleaver. + +"Falk for me, curse him!" Davie Paine muttered with a neat that surprised +me. I had not realized that emotions as well as thoughts developed so +slowly in Davie's big, leisurely frame that he now was just coming to the +fullness of his wrath at the indignities he had undergone. + +Turning to the native chief, Roger cried, "We're with you!" And he +extended his hand to seal the bargain. + +Of course the man could not understand the words but in the nods we had +exchanged and in the cook's fierce glee, he had read our consent, and he +laughed and talked with the others, who laughed, too, and pointed at +Roger's pistol and cried, "Pom-pom!" and at the cook's cleaver and cried, +"Whish!" + +When by signs Roger indicated that we needed sleep the chief issued orders, +and half a dozen natives led us to a hut that seemed to be set apart for +our use. But although we were nearly perishing with fatigue, they urged by +signs that we follow them, and so insistent were they that we reluctantly +obeyed. + +Climbing a little hill beyond the village, we came to a cleared spot +surrounded by bushes through which we looked across between the mountains +to where we could just see the open ocean. There, not three miles away, the +Island Princess rode at anchor. + +I remember thinking, as I fell asleep, of the chance that Falk and Kipping +would sail away before it was dark enough to attack them, and I spoke of it +to Roger and the others, who shared my fear; but when our savage hosts +wakened us, we knew by their eagerness that the ship still lay at her +anchor. Why she remained, we could not agree. We hazarded a score of +conjectures and debated them with lively interest. + +Presently the natives brought us rice and sago-bread and peas. + +As I ate and looked out into the darkness where fires were twinkling, I +wondered which was the light I had seen that night when I watched from the +summit of the headland. + +Though a gentle rain was falling, the whole village was alive with people. +Men armed with spears and krises squatted in all parts of the hut. Boys +came and went in the narrow circle of light. Women and girls looked from +the door and from the farthest corners. Now and then some one would point +at Roger's pistol and cry, "Pom-pom!" or, to the pride and delight of the +cook, point at the cleaver and cry, "Whish!" and laugh loudly. + +Even black Frank had got over his terror of having natives come up without +warning and feel of his arm or his woolly head, though he muttered +doubtfully, "Ah ain't sayin' as Ah likes it. Dah's su'thin' so kind of +hongry de way dey comes munchin' an' proddin' round dis yeh ol' niggeh." + +At midnight we went out into the dark and the rain, and followed single +file after our leader along a narrow path that led through dripping ferns +and pools of mud and water, over roots and rocks, and under low branches, +which time and again swung back and struck our faces. + +We were drenched to the skin when we came at last to a sluggish, black +little stream, which ran slowly under thick overhanging trees, and in other +circumstances we should have been an unhappy and rebellious crew. But now +the spell of adventure was upon us. Our savage guides moved silently and +surely, and the forest was so mysterious and strange that I found its +allurement all but irresistible. The slow, silent stream, on which now and +then lights as faint and elusive as wisps of cloud played fitfully, +reflected from I knew not where, had a fascination that I am sure the +others felt as strongly as I. So we followed in silence and watched all +that the dense blackness of the night let us see. + +Now the natives launched canoes, which slipped out on the water and lay +side by side in the stream. Roger and Neddie Benson got into one; Blodgett +and Davie Paine another; the cook and I into a third, Whatever thoughts or +plans we six might have, we could not express them to the natives, and we +were too widely separated to put them into practice ourselves. We could +only join in the fight with good-will when the time came, and I assure you, +the thought made me very nervous indeed. Also, I now realized that the +natives had taken no chance of treachery on our part: _behind each of us +sat an armed man_. + +The canoes shot ahead so swiftly under the pressure of the paddles that +they seemed actually to have come to life. But they moved as noiselessly as +shadows. We glided down the stream and out in a long line into a little +bay, where we gathered, evidently to arrange the last details of the +attack. I heard Roger say in a low voice, "We'll reach the ship about three +bells and there couldn't be a better hour." Then, with a few low words of +command from the native chief, we spread out again into an irregular, +swiftly moving fleet, and swept away from the shore. + +As I looked back at the island I could see nothing, for the cloudy sky and +the drizzly rain completely obscured every object beyond a limited circle +of water; but as I looked ahead, my heart leaped and my breath came +quickly. We had passed the farthest point of land and there, dimly in the +offing, shone a single blurred light, which I knew was on the Island +Princess. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +WE ATTACK + + +In the darkness and rain we soon lost sight even of those nearest us on +each side, but we knew by the occasional almost imperceptible whisper of a +paddle in the water, or by the faintest murmur of speech, that the others +were keeping pace with us. + +To this day I do not understand how the paddlers maintained the proper +intervals in our line of attack; yet maintain them they did, by some means +or other, according to a preconcerted plan, for we advanced without hurry +or hesitation. + +Approaching the ship more closely, we made out the rigging, which the soft +yellow light of the lantern dimly revealed. We saw, too, a single dark +figure leaning on the taffrail, which became clear as we drew nearer. I was +surprised to perceive that we had come up astern of the ship--quite without +reason I had expected to find her lying bow on. Now we rode the gentle +swell without sound or motion. The slow paddles held us in the same place +with regard to the ship, and minutes passed in which my nervousness rose to +such a pitch that I felt as if I must scream or clap my hands simply to +shatter that oppressive, tantalizing, almost unendurable silence. But when +I started to turn and whisper to the cook, something sharp and cold pricked +through the back of my shirt and touched my skin, and from that time on I +sat as still as a wooden figurehead. + +After a short interval I made out other craft drawing in on our right and +left, and I later learned that, while we waited, the canoes were forming +about the ship a circle of hostile spears. But it then seemed at every +moment as if the man who was leaning on the taffrail must espy us,--it +always is hard for the person in the dark, who sees what is near the light, +to realize that he himself remains invisible,--and a thousand fears swept +over me. + +There came now from somewhere on our right a whisper no louder than a +mouse's hiss of warning or of threat. I scarcely was aware of it. It might +have been a ripple under the prow of the canoe, a slightest turn of a +paddle. Yet it conveyed a message that the natives instantly understood. +The man just behind me repeated it so softly that his repetition was +scarcely audible, even to me who sat so near that I could feel his breath, +and at once the canoe seemed silently to stir with life. Inch by inch we +floated forward, until I could see clearly the hat and coat-collar of the +man who was leaning against the rail. It was Kipping. + +From forward came the cautious voices of the watch. The light revealed the +masts and rigging of the ship for forty or fifty feet from the deck, but +beyond the cross-jack yard all was hazy, and the cabin seemed in the odd +shadows twice its real size. I wondered if Falk were asleep, too, or if we +should come on him sitting up in the cabin, busy with his books and charts. +I wondered who was in the galley, where I saw a light; who was standing +watch; who was asleep below. Still we moved noiselessly on under the stern +of the ship, until I almost could have put my hands on the carved letters, +"Island Princess." + +Besides things on deck, the light also revealed our own attacking party. +The man in front of me had laid his paddle in the bottom of the canoe and +held a spear across his knees. In the boat on our right were five natives +armed with spears and krises; in the one on our left, four. Beyond the +craft nearest to us I could see others less distinctly--silent shadows on +the water, each with her head toward our prey, like a school of giant fish. +In the lee of the ship, the pinnace floated at the end of its painter. + +Still the watch forward talked on in low, monotonous voices; still Kipping +leaned on the rail, his head bent, his arms folded, to all appearances fast +asleep. + +I had now forgotten my fears. I was keenly impatient for the word to +attack. + +A shrill wailing cry suddenly burst on the night air. The man in front of +me, holding his spear above his head with one hand, made a prodigious leap +from the boat, caught the planking with his fingers, got toe-hold on a +stern-port, and went up over the rail like a wild beast. With knives +between their teeth, men from the proas on my right and left boarded the +ship by the chains, by the rail, by the bulwark. + +I saw Kipping leap suddenly forward and whirl about like a weasel in his +tracks. His yell for all hands sounded high above the clamor of the +boarders. Then some one jabbed the butt of a spear into my back and, +realizing that mine was not to be a spectator's part in that weird battle, +I scrambled up the stern as best I could. + +The watch on deck, I instantly saw, had backed against the forecastle where +the watch below was joining it. Captain Falk and some one else, of whose +identity I could not be sure, rushed armed from the cabin. Then a missile +crashed through the lantern, and in the darkness I heard sea-boots banging +on the deck as those aft raced forward to join the crew. + +I clambered aboard, waving my arms and shouting; then I stood and listened +to the chorus of yells fore and aft, the _slip-slip-slip_ of bare feet, the +thud of boots as the Americans ran this way and that. I sometimes since +have wondered how I escaped death in that wild mêlée in the darkness. +Certainly I was preserved by no effort of my own, for not knowing which way +to turn, ignored by friend and foe alike, almost stunned by the terrible +sounds that rose on every side, I simply clutched the rail and was as +unlike the hero that my silly dreams had made me out to be--never had I +dreamed of such a night!--as is every half-grown lad who stands side by +side with violent death. + +Of Kipping I now saw nothing, but as a light momentarily flared up, I +caught a glimpse of Captain Falk and his party sidling along back to back, +fighting off their assailants while they struggled to launch a boat. Time +and time again I heard the spiteful crack of their guns and their oaths and +exclamations. Presently I also heard another sound that made my heart +throb; a man was moaning as if in great pain. + +Then another cried, with an oath, "They've got me! O Tom, haul out that +spear!" A scream followed and then silence. + +Some one very near me, who as yet was unaware of my presence, said, "He's +dead." + +"Look out!" cried another. "See! There behind you!" + +I was startled and instinctively dodged back. There was a crashing report +in my face; the flame of a musket singed my brows and hair, and powder +stung my skin. Then, as the man clubbed his gun, I dashed under his guard, +scarcely aware of the pain in my shoulder, and locking my right heel behind +his left, threw him hard to the deck, where we slipped and slid in a warm +slippery stream that was trickling across the planks. + +Back and forth we rolled, neither of us daring to give the other a moment's +breathing-space in which to draw knife or pistol; and all the time the +fight went on over our heads. I now heard Roger crying to the rest of us to +stand by. I heard what I supposed to be his pistol replying smartly to the +fire from Falk's party, and wondered where in that scene of violence he had +got powder and an opportunity to load. But for the most part I was rolling +and struggling on the slippery deck. + +When some one lighted a torch and the flame flared up and revealed the grim +scene, I saw that Falk and his remaining men were trying at the same time +to stand off the enemy and to scramble over the bulwark, and I realized +that they must have drawn up the pinnace. But I had only the briefest +glimpse of what was happening, for I was in deadly terror every minute lest +my antagonist thrust a knife between my ribs. I could hear him gasping now +as he strove to close his hands on my throat, and for a moment I thought he +had me; but I twisted away, got half on my knees with him under me, sprang +to my feet, then slipped once more on the slow stream across the planks, +and fell heavily. + +In that moment I had seen by torchlight that the pinnace was clear of the +ship and that the men with their guns and spikes were holding off the +natives. I had seen, too, a spear flash across the space of open water and +cut down one of the men. But already my adversary was at me again, and with +his two calloused hands he once more was gripping my throat. I exerted all +my strength to keep from being throttled. I tried to scream, but could only +gurgle. His head danced before me and seemed to swing in circles. I felt +myself losing strength. I rallied desperately, only to be thrown. + +Then, suddenly, I realized that he had let me go and had sat down beside me +breathing heavily. It was the man from Boston whose nose had been broken. +He eyed me curiously as if an idea had come upon him by surprise. + +"I didn't go to fight so hard, mate," he gasped, "but you did act so kind +of vicious that I just had to." + +"You what?" I exclaimed, not believing my ears. + +"It's the only way I had to come over to your side," he said with a +whimper. "Falk would 'a' killed me if I'd just up an' come, though I wanted +to, honest I did." + +I put my hand on my throbbing shoulder, and stared at him incredulously. + +"You don't need to look at me like that," he sniveled. "Didn't I stand by +Bill Hayden to the last along with you? Ain't I human? Ain't I got as much +appreciation as any man of what it means to have a murderin' pair of +officers like Captain Falk and Mr. Kipping? You don't suppose, do you, that +I'd stay by 'em without I had to?" + +I was somewhat impressed by his argument, and he, perceiving it, continued +vehemently, "I _had_ to fight with you. They'd 'a' killed you, too, if I +hadn't." + +There was truth in that. Unquestionably they would have shot me down +without hesitation if we two had not grappled in such a lively tussle that +they could not hit one without hitting the other. + +We got up and leaned on the bulwark and looked down at the boat, which rode +easily on the slow, oily swell. There in the stern-sheets the torchlight +now revealed Falk. + +"I'm lawful master of this vessel," he called back, looking up at the men +who lined the side. "I'll see you hanged from the yard-arm yet, you +white-livered wharf-rats, and you, too, you cabin-window popinjay!"--I knew +that he meant me.--"There'll come a day, by God! There'll come a day!" + +The men in the boat gave way, and it disappeared in the darkness and mist, +its sides bristling with weapons. + +But still Falk's voice came back to us shrilly, "I'll see you yet a-hanging +by your necks," until at last we could only hear him cursing. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +WHAT WE FOUND IN THE CABIN + + +Now some one called, "Ben! Ben Lathrop! Where are you?" + +"Here I am," I cried as loudly as I could. + +"Well, Ben, what's this? Are you wounded?" + +It was Roger, and when he saw with whom I was talking he smiled. + +"Well, Bennie," he cried, "so we've got a prisoner, have we?" + +"No, sir," whimpered the man from Boston, "not a prisoner. I come over, I +did." + +"You what?" + +"I come over--to your side, sir." + +"How about it, Ben?" + +"Why, so he says. We were having a pretty hard wrestling match, but he says +it was to cover up his escape from the other party." + +"How was I to get away, sir, if I didn't have a subterfoog," the prisoner +interposed eagerly. "I _had_ to wrastle. If I hadn't have, they'd 'a' shot +me down as sure as duff on Sunday." + +For my own part I was not yet convinced of his good faith. He had gripped +my throat quite too vindictively. To this very day, when I close my eyes I +can feel his hard fingers clenched about my windpipe and his knees forcing +my arms down on the bloody deck. He had let me go, too, only when we both +knew that Captain Falk and his men had put off from the ship. It seemed +very much as if he were trying to make the best of a bad bargain. But if, +on the other hand, he was entirely sincere in his protestations, it might +well be true that he did not dare come over openly to our side. The problem +had so many faces that it fairly made me dizzy, so I abandoned it and tore +open my clothes to examine the flesh wound on my shoulder. + +"Ay," I thought, when I saw where the musket-ball had cut me at close +range, "that was a friendly shot, was it not?" + +Roger himself was not yet willing to let the matter fall so readily. His +sharp questions stirred the man from Boston to one uneasy denial after +another. + +"But I tell you, sir, I come over as quick as I could." + +Again Roger spoke caustically. + +"But I tell you, sir, I did. And what's more, I can tell you a lot of +things you'd like to know. Perhaps you'd like to know--" He stopped short. + +Roger regarded him as if in doubt, but presently he said in a low voice, +"All right! Say nothing of this to the others. I'll see you later." + +Captain Falk and his crew, meanwhile, had moved away almost unmolested. +Their pikes and guns had held off the few natives who made a show of +pursuing them, and the great majority of our allies were running riot on +the ship, which was a sad sight when we turned to take account of the +situation. + +Three natives were killed and two were wounded, not to mention my injured +shoulder among our own casualties; and two members of the other party in +the crew were sprawled in grotesque attitudes on the deck. Counting the one +who was hit by a spear and who had fallen out of the boat, it meant that +Falk had lost three dead, and if blood on the deck was any sign, others +must have been badly slashed. In other words, our party was, numerically, +almost the equal of his. Considering the man from Boston as on our side, we +were seven to their eight. The lantern that we now lighted revealed more of +the gruesome spectacle, and it made me feel sick to see that both the man +from Boston and I were covered from head to foot with the gore in which we +had been rolling; but to the natives the sight was a stupendous triumph; +and the cook, when I next saw him, was walking down the deck, looking at +the face of one dead man after another. + +By and by he came to me where, overcome by a wave of nausea, I had sat down +on the deck with my back against the bulwark. "Dey ain't none of 'em +Kipping," he said grimly. Then he saw my bleeding shoulder and instantly +got down beside me. "You jest let dis yeh ol' nigger took a hand," he +cried. "Ah's gwine fix you all up. You jest come along o' me!" And helping +me to my feet, he led me to the galley, where once more he was supreme and +lawful master. + +In no time at all he had a kettle of water on the stove, in which the coals +of a good fire still lingered, and with a clean cloth he washed my wound so +gently that I scarcely could believe his great, coarse hands were actually +at work on me. "Dah you is," he murmured, bending over the red, shallow +gash that the bullet had cut, "dah you is. Don' you fret. Ah's gwine git +you all tied up clean an' han'some, yass, sah." + +The yells and cries of every description alarmed and agitated us both. It +was far from reassuring to know that that mob of natives was ranging the +ship at will. + +"Ef you was to ask me," Frank muttered, rolling his eyes till the whites +gleamed starkly, "Ah's gwine tell you dis yeh ship is sottin', so to speak, +on a bar'l of gunpowder. Yass, sah!" + +An islander uttered a shrill catcall just outside the galley and thrust his +head and half his naked body in the door. He vanished again almost +instantly, but Frank jumped and upset the kettle. "Yass, sah, you creepy +ol' sarpint," he gasped. "Yass, sah, we's sottin' on a bar'l of gunpowder." + +I am convinced, as I look back on that night from the pinnacle of more than +half a century, that not one man in ten thousand has ever spent one like +it. Allied with a horde whose language we could not speak, we had boarded +our own ship and now--mutineers, pirates, or loyal mariners, according to +your point of view--we shared her possession with a mob of howling heathens +whose goodwill depended on the whim of the moment, and who might at any +minute, by slaughtering us out of hand, get for their own godless purposes +the ship and all that was in her. + +The cook cautiously fingered the keen edge of his cleaver as we looked out +and saw that dawn was brightening in the east. + +"Dat Falk, he say he gwine git us yet," the cook muttered. "Maybe so--maybe +not. Maybe we ain't gwine last as long as dat." + +"All hands aft!" + +Frank and I looked at each other. The galley was as safe and comfortable as +any place aboard ship and we were reluctant to leave it. + +"_All hands aft!_" came the call again. + +"Ah reckon," Frank said thoughtfully, "me and you better be gwine. When +Mistah Hamlin he holler like dat, he want us." + +Light had come with amazing swiftness, and already we could see the deck +from stem to stern without help of the torches, which still flamed and sent +thin streamers of smoke drifting into the mist. + +As we emerged from the galley, I noticed that the after-hatch was half +open. That in itself did not surprise me; stranger things than that had +come to pass in the last hour or two; but when some one cautiously emerged +from the hold, with a quick, sly glance at those on the quarter-deck, I'll +confess that I was surprised. It was the man from Boston. + +Smiling broadly and turning his black rat-like eyes this way and that, the +chief of our wild allies, who held a naked kris from which drops of blood +were falling, stood beside Roger. Blodgett was at the wheel, nervously +fingering the spokes; Neddie Benson stood behind him, obviously ill at +ease, and Davie Paine, who had got from the cabin what few of his things +were left there, to take them forward, was a little at one side. But the +natives were swarming everywhere, aloft and alow, and we knew only too well +that no small movable object would escape their thieving fingers. + +"Ef on'y dem yeh heathen don't took to butcherin'!" the cook muttered. + +The prophetic words were scarcely spoken when what we most feared came to +pass. One of the islanders, by accident or design, bumped into Blodgett,-- +always erratic, never to be relied on in a crisis,--who, turning without a +thought of the consequences, struck the man with his fist a blow that +floored him, and flashed out his knife. + +That single spark threatened an explosion that would annihilate us. Spears +enclosed us from all sides; krises leaped at our throats. + +"Come on, lads! Stand together," Blodgett shrieked. + +With a yell of terror the cook sprang to join the others, and bellowing in +panic, swung his cleaver wildly. + +The man from Boston and Neddie Benson shrank back against the taffrail as a +multitude of moving brown figures seemed to swarm about us. Then I saw +Roger leap forward, his arms high in air, his hands extended. + +"Get back!" he cried, glancing at us over his shoulders. + +As all stopped and stared at him, he coolly turned to the chief and handed +him his pistol, butt foremost. Was Roger mad, I wondered? He was the sanest +man of all our crew. The chief gravely took the proffered weapon and looked +at Blodgett, whose face was contorted with fear, and at the Malay, who by +now was sitting up on deck blinking about him in a dazed way. Then he +smiled and raised his hand and the points of the weapons fell. + +In truth I was nearly mad myself, for now it all struck me as funny and I +laughed until I cried, and all the others looked at me, and soon the +natives began to point and laugh themselves. I suppose I was hysterical, +but it created a diversion and helped to save the day; and Neddie Benson +and the man from Boston, whom Roger had sent below, returned soon with +bolts of cloth and knives and pistols and threw them in a heap on the +quarter-deck. + +Some word that I suppose meant gifts, went from lip to lip and our allies +eagerly crowded around us. + +"Get behind me, men," Roger said in an undertone. "Whatever happens, guard +the companionway. I think we're safe, but since by grace of Providence +we're all here together, we'll take no chances that we can avoid." + +The first rays of sunlight shone on the heap of bright stuffs and polished +metal, but the sun itself was no brighter than the face of the chief when +Roger draped over him a length of bright cloth and presented him with a +handsome knife. He threw back his head, laughing aloud, and strutted across +the deck. Turning in grave farewell, he grasped his booty with one arm and, +after a few sharp words to his men, swung himself down by the chains with +the other. To man after man we gave gaudy cloths or knives or, when all +the knives were given away, a cutlass or a gun; and when at last the only +canoes in sight were speeding toward shore like comets with tails of red +flannel and purple calico, we breathed deeply our relief. + +"Now, men," said Roger, "we have a hard morning's work in front of us. +Cook, break out a cask of beef and a cask of bread, and get us something to +eat. Davie, you stand watch and keep your eye out either for a native canoe +or for any sign of Falk or his party. The rest of you--all except Lathrop-- +wash down the deck and sew those bodies up in a piece of old sail with +plenty of ballast. Ben, you and I have a little job in front of us. Come +into the cabin with me." + +I gladly followed him. He was as composed as if battle and death were all +in the routine of a day at sea, and I was full of admiration for his +coolness and courage. + +The cabin was in complete disorder, but comparatively few things had been +stolen. Apparently not many of the natives had found their way thither. + +"Fortunately," Roger said, unlocking Captain Whidden's chest of which he +had the key, "they've left the spare quadrant. We have instruments to +navigate with, so, when all's said and done, I suppose we're lucky." + +He closed the chest and locked it again; then he took from his pocket a +second key. "Benny, my lad," he said, "let's have a look at that one +hundred thousand dollars in gold." + +Going into the captain's stateroom, we shut the door and knelt beside the +iron safe. The key turned with difficulty. + +"It needs oil," Roger muttered, as he worked over it. "It turns as hard as +if some one has been tinkering with it." By using both hands he forced it +round and opened the door. + +The safe was empty. + +[Illustration: ] + + + + +VI + +IN WHICH WE REACH THE PORT OF OUR DESTINATION + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +FALK PROPOSES A TRUCE + + +As we faced each other in amazed silence, we could hear the men working on +deck and the sea rippling against the hull of the ship. I felt that strange +sensation of mingled reality and unreality which comes sometimes in dreams, +and I rather think that Roger felt it, too, for we turned simultaneously to +look again into the iron safe. But again only its painted walls met our +eyes. + +The gold actually was gone. + +Roger started up. "Now how did Falk manage that?" he cried. "I swear he +hadn't time to open the safe. We took them absolutely by surprise--I could +swear we did." + +I suggested that he might have hidden it somewhere else. + +"Not he," said Roger. + +"Would Kipping steal from Captain Falk?" + +"From Captain Falk!" Roger exclaimed. "If his mother were starving, he'd +steal her last crust. How about the bunk?" + +We took the bunk apart and ripped open the mattress. We sounded the +woodwork above and below. With knives we slit the cushion of Captain +Whidden's great arm-chair, and pulled out the curled hair that stuffed it. +We ransacked box, bag, cuddy, and stove; we forced our way into every +corner of the cabin and the staterooms. But we found no trace of the lost +money. + +It seemed like sacrilege to disturb little things that once had belonged +to that upright gentleman, Captain Joseph Whidden. His pipe, his +memorandum-book, and his pearl-handled penknife recalled him to my mind as +I had seen him so many times of old, sitting in my father's drawing-room, +with his hands folded on his knee and his firm mouth bent in a whimsical +smile. I thought of my parents, of my sister and Roger, of all the old +far-away life of Salem; I must have stood dreaming thus a long time when my +eyes fell on Nathan Falk's blue coat, which he had thrown carelessly on the +cabin table and had left there, and with a burst of anger I came back to +affairs of the moment. + +"They've got it away, Benny," said Roger, soberly. "How or when I don't +know, but there's no question that it's gone from the cabin. Come, let's +clear away the disorder." + +As well as we could we put back the numerous things we had thrown about, +and such litter as we could not replace we swept up. But wisps of hair +still lay on the tables and the chairs, and feathers floated in the air +like thistle-down. We had little time for housewifery. + +We found the others gathered round the galley, eating a hearty meal of salt +beef, ship's bread, and coffee, at which we were right glad to join them. +Roger had a way with the men that kept them from taking liberties, yet that +enabled him to mingle with them on terms far more familiar than those of a +ship's officer. I watched him as he sat down by Davie Paine, and grinned at +the cook, and asked Neddie Benson how his courage was and laughed heartily +at Blodgett who had spilled a cup of coffee down his shirt-front--yet in +such a way that Blodgett was pleased by his friendliness rather than +offended by his amusement. I suppose it was what we call "personality." +Certainly Roger was a born leader. After our many difficulties we felt so +jolly and so much at home,--all, that is, except the man from Boston, who +sat apart from the rest and stared soberly across the long, slow seas,-- +that our little party on deck was merrier by far than many a Salem +merrymaking before or since. + +I knew that Roger was deeply troubled by the loss of the money and I +marveled at his self-control. + +Presently I saw something moving off the eastern point of the island. +Thinking little of it, I watched it idly until suddenly it burst upon me +that it was a ship's boat. With a start I woke from my dream and shouted, +"Sail ho! Off the starboard bow!" + +In an instant our men were on their feet, staring at the newcomer. In all +the monotonous expanse of shining, silent ocean only the boat and the +island and the tiny sails of a junk which lay hull down miles away, were to +be seen. But the boat, which now had rounded the point, was approaching +steadily. + +"Ben, lay below to the cabin and fetch up muskets, powder, and balls," +Roger cried sharply. "Lend a hand, Davie, and bring back all the pikes and +cutlasses you can carry. You, cook, clear away the stern-chasers and stand +by to load them the minute the powder's up the companionway. Blodgett, you +do the same by the long gun. You, Neddie, bear a hand with me to trice up +the netting!" + +Spilling food, cups, pans, and kids in confusion on the deck, we sprang to +do as we were bid. In the sternsheets of the approaching boat we could make +out at a distance the slim form of Captain Nathan Falk. + +The rain had stopped long since, and the hot sun shining from a cloudless +sky was rapidly burning off the last vestige of the night mist as Captain +Falk's boat came slowly toward us under a white flag. A ground-swell gave +it a leisurely motion and the men approached so cautiously that their oars +seemed scarcely more than to dip in and out of the water. + +With double-charged cannon, with loaded muskets ready at hand, and with +pikes and cutlasses laid out on deck, one for each man, where we could +snatch them up as soon as we had spent our first fire, we grinned from +behind the nettings at our erstwhile shipmates. Tables had turned with a +vengeance since we had rowed away from the ship so short a time before. +They now were a sad-looking lot of men, some of them with bandages on their +limbs or round their heads, all of them disheveled, weary, and unkempt. But +they approached with an air of dignity, which Falk tried to keep up by +calling with a grand fling of his hand and his head, "Mr. Hamlin, we come +to parley under a flag of truce." + +I think we really were impressed for a moment. His face was pale, and he +had a blood-stained rag tied round his forehead, so that he looked very +much as if he were a wounded hero returning after a brave fight to arrange +terms of an honorable peace. But the cook, who heartily disapproved of +admitting the boat within gunshot, shattered any such illusion that we may +have entertained. + +"Mah golly!" he exclaimed in a voice audible to every man in both parties, +"ef dey ain't done h'ist up cap'n's unde'-clothes foh a flag of truce!" + +The remark came upon us so suddenly and we were all so keyed up that, +although it seems flat enough to tell about it now, then it struck us as +irresistibly funny and we laughed until tears started from our eyes. I +heard Blodgett's cat-yowl of glee, Davie Paine's deep guffaw, Neddie +Benson's shrill cackle of delight. But when, to clear my eyes, I wiped away +my tears, the men in the other boat were glaring at us in glum and angry +silence. + +"Ah, it's funny is it?" said Falk, and his voice me think of the times when +he had abused Bill Hayden. "Laugh, curse you, laugh! Well, that's all +right. There's no law against laughing. I've got a proposition to put up to +you. You've had your little fling and a costly one it's like to be. You've +mutinied and unlawfully confined the master of the ship, and for that +you're liable for a fine of one thousand dollars and five years in prison. +You've usurped the command of a vessel on the high seas unlawfully and by +force, and for that you're liable to a fine of two thousand dollars and ten +years in prison. Think about that, some o' you men that haven't a hundred +dollars in the world. The law'll strip and break you. But if that ain't +enough, we've got evidence to convict you in every court of the United +States of America of being pirates, felons, and robbers, and the punishment +for that is death. Think of that, you men." + +Falk lowered his head until his red scarf, which he had knotted about his +throat, made the ghastly pallor of his face seem even more chalky than it +was, and thrust his chin forward and leveled at us the index finger of his +right hand. The slowly rolling boat was so near us now that as we waited to +see what he would say next we could see his hand tremble. + +"Now, men," he continued, "you've had your little fling, and that's the +price you'll have to pay the piper. I'll get you, never you fear. Ah, by +the good Lord's help, I'll see you swinging from a frigate's yard-arm yet, +unless"--he stopped and glared at us significantly--"unless you do like I'm +going to tell you. + +"You've had your fling and there's a bad day of reckoning coming to you, +don't you forget it. But if you drop all this nonsense now, and go forward +where you belong and work the ship like good seamen and swear on the Book +to have no more mutinous talk, I'll forgive you everything and see that no +one prosecutes you for all you've done so far. How about it? Nothing could +be handsomer than that." + +"Oh, you always was a smooth-tongued scoundrel" Blodgett, just behind me, +murmured under his breath. + +The men in the two parties looked at each other in silence for a moment, +and if ever I had distrusted Captain Falk, I distrusted him four times more +when I saw the mild, sleek smile on Kipping's face. It was reassuring to +see the gleam in black Frank's eyes as he fingered the edge of his cleaver. + +I turned eagerly to Roger, upon whom we waited unanimously for a reply. + +"Yes, that's very handsome of you," he said reflectively. "But how do we +know you'll do all that you promise?" + +Falk's white face momentarily lighted. I thought that for an instant his +eyes shone like a tiger's. But he answered quietly, "Ain't my word good?" + +"Why, a _gentleman's_ word is always good security." + +There was just enough accent on the word "gentleman" to puzzle me. The +remark sounded innocent enough, certainly, and yet the stress--if stress +was intended--made it biting sarcasm. Obviously the men in the boat were +equally in doubt whether to take offense or to accept the statement in good +faith. + +"Well, you have my word," said Falk at last. + + +"Yes, we have your word. But there's one other thing to be settled. How +about the owners' money?" + +For a moment Falk seemed disconcerted, and I, thinking now that Roger was +merely badgering him, smiled with satisfaction. But Falk answered the +question after only brief hesitation, and Roger's next words plunged me +deep in a sea of doubt. + +"Why, I shall guard the owners' money with all possible care, Mr. Hamlin, +and expend it in their best interests," said Falk. + +"If that's the case," said Roger, "come alongside." + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +INCLUDING A CROSS-EXAMINATION + + +Falk tried, I was certain, to conceal a smile of joy at Roger's simplicity, +and I saw that others in the boat were averting their faces. Also I saw +that they were shifting their weapons to have them more readily available. + +Our own men, on the contrary, were remonstrating audibly, and to my lasting +shame I joined them. + +A queer expression appeared on Roger's face and he looked at us as if +incredulous. I suddenly perceived that our rebellious attitude hurt him +bitterly. He had led us so bravely through all our recent difficulties! And +now, when success seemed assured, we manifested in return doubt and +disloyalty! I literally hung my head. The others were abashed and silent, +but I knew that my own defection was more contemptible by far than theirs, +and had Roger reproached me sharply, I might have felt better for it. +Instead, he spoke without haste or anger in a voice pitched so low that +Falk could not possibly overhear him. + +"We simply _have_ to hold together, men. All to the gangway, now, and stand +by for orders." + +That was all he said, but it was enough. Thoroughly ashamed of ourselves, +we followed him to the gangway whither the boat was coming slowly. + +Roger assumed an air of neutral welcome as he reached for the bow of the +pinnace; but to us behind him he whispered sharply, "Stand ready, all +hands, with muskets and pikes." + +"Now, then, Captain Falk," he cried, "hand over the money first. We'll stow +it safe on board." + +"Come, come," Falk replied. "Belay that talk." He was +standing ready to climb on deck. + +"The money first," said Roger coolly. + +Suddenly he tried to hook the bow of the pinnace, but missed it as the +pinnace dipped in the trough. + +The rest of us, waiting breathlessly, for the first time comprehended +Roger's strategy. + +Falk looked up at him angrily. "That'll get you nowhere," he retorted. +"Come, stand away, or so help me, I'll see you hanged anyhow." + +Roger smiled at him coldly. "The word of a gentleman? The money first, +Captain Falk." + +"Well, if you are so stupid that you haven't discovered the truth yet, I +haven't the money." + +"Where is the money?" + +"In the safe in the cabin, as you very well know," replied Falk. + +"You lie!" Roger responded. + +With a ripping oath, Captain Falk whipped out his pistol. + +"You lie!" Roger cried again, hotly. "Put down that pistol or I'll blow you +to hell. Stand by, boys. We'll show them!" + +Though we were fewer than they, we had them at a tremendous disadvantage, +for we were protected by the bulwarks and could pour our musket-fire into +the open boat at will, and in a battle of cutlasses and pikes our advantage +would be even greater. + +"Don't a flag of truce give us no protection?" Kipping asked in that +accursedly mild voice--I could not hear it without thinking of poor Bill +Hayden, and to the others, they told me later, it brought the same bitter +memory. + + +"How long since Cap'n Falk's ol' unde' shirt done be a p'tection?" muttered +the cook grimly. + +"Yes, laugh! Laugh, you black baboon! Laugh, you silly little fool, +Lathrop!" Falk yelled. "I'll have you laughing another time one of these +days. Give way men! We'll have out their haslets yet." + +A hundred feet from the ship, the men rested on their oars, and Falk put on +a very different manner. "Roger Hamlin," he cried, "you ain't going to send +us away, are you?" + +I was astounded. As long as I had known Falk, I had never realized how many +different faces the man could assume at the shortest notice. But Roger +seemed not at all surprised. "Yes," he said, shortly, "we're going to send +you away, you black-hearted scoundrel." + +"Good God! We'll perish!" + +Although obvious retorts were many, Roger made no reply. + +Now Kipping spoke up mildly and innocently:-- + +"What'll we do? We can't land--the Malays was waiting for us on shore with +knives, all ready to cut our throats. We can't go to sea like this. What'll +we do?" + +"Supposing," cried old Blodgett, sarcastically, "supposing you row back to +Salem. It's only three thousand miles or more. You'll find it a pleasant +voyage, I'm sure, and you'd ought to run into enough Ladronesers and Malays +to make it interesting along the way." + +"Ain't we human?" Kipping whined, as if trying to wring pity from even +Blodgett. "Ain't you going at least to give us a keg o' water and some +bread?" + +"If you're not out of gunshot in five minutes," Roger cried, "I'll train +the long gun and blow you clean out of water." + +Without more ado they rowed slowly away, growing smaller and smaller, until +at last they passed out of sight round the point. + +"Ah me," sighed Neddie Benson, "I'm glad they're gone. It's funny Falk +ain't quite a light man nor yet a real dark man." + +"_Gone_!" Davie repeated ominously. "_I_ wish they was gone." He looked up +at the furled sails. "They ain't--and neither is we." + +"There's work to be done," said Roger, "and we must be about it. Leave the +nets as they are. Stack the muskets in the waist, pile the pikes handy by +the deckhouse, and all lay aft. We'd best have a few words together before +we begin." + +A moment later, as I was busy with the pikes, Roger came to me and +murmured, "There's something wrong afoot. The after-hatch has been pried +off." + +I noticed the hatch once more the next time I passed it, and I remembered +seeing the man from Boston emerge from the hold. But there was so much else +to be attended to that it was a long, long time before I thought of it +again. + +When we had done as Roger told us, we gathered round him where he waited, +leaning against the cabin, with his hands in his pockets. + +"We're all in the same boat together, men," he began. "We knew what the +chances were when we took them. If you wish to have it so, in the eyes of +the law we're pirates and mutineers, and since Falk seems to have got away +with what money there was on board, things may go hard with us. _But_--" he +spoke the word with stern emphasis--"_but_ we've acted for the best, and I +think there's no one here wants to try to square things up by putting Falk +in command again. How about it?" + +"Square things up, is it?" cried Blodgett. "The dirty villain would have us +hanged at the nearest gallows for all his buttery words." + +"Exactly!" Roger threw back his head. "And when we get to Salem, I can +promise you there's no man here but will be better off for doing as he's +done so far." + +"But whar's all dat money gone?" the cook demanded unexpectedly. + +"I don't know," said Roger. + +"What! Ain' dat yeh money heah?" + +"No." + +At that moment my eye chanced to fall on the man from Boston, who was +looking off at the island as if he had no interest whatever in our +conversation. The circumstances under which he had stayed with us were so +strange and his present preoccupation was so carefully assumed, that I was +suddenly exceedingly suspicious of him, although when I came to examine the +matter closely, I could find no very definite grounds for it. + +Blodgett was watching him, too, and I think that Roger followed our gaze +for suddenly he cried, "You there!" in a voice that brought the man from +Boston to his feet like the snap of a whip. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" he replied briskly. + +"What are you doing here, anyway?" Roger demanded. The fellow, who had +begun to assume as many airs and as much self-confidence as if he had been +one of our own party from the very first, was sadly disconcerted. "Why I +come over to your side first chance I had," he replied with an aggrieved +air. + +"What were you doing in the cabin when the natives were running all over +the ship?" + +The five of us, startled by the quick, sharp questions, looked keenly at +the man from Boston. But he, recovering his self-possession, replied coolly +enough, "I was just a-keeping watch so they wouldn't steal--I kept them +from running off with the quadrant." + +"Keeping watch so _nobody'd_ steal, I suppose," said Roger. + +"Yes, sir! Yes, sir! That's it exactly." + +Suddenly my mind leaped back to the night when Bill Hayden had died, and +the man from Boston had made that cryptic remark, to which I called +attention long since. "He said he could tell something, Roger," I burst +out. But Roger silenced me with a glance. + +Turning on the fellow again, he said, "If I find that you are lying to me, +I'll shoot you where you stand. What do you know about who killed Captain +Whidden?" + +For once the fellow was taken completely off his guard. He glanced around +as if he wished to run away, but there was no escape. He saw only hostile +faces. + +"What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" + +"Mr. Kipping killed him," the fellow gasped, startled out of whatever +reticence he may have intended to maintain. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir!" + +"Do you expect me to believe that Kipping shot the captain? If you lie to +me--" Roger drew his pistol. By eyes and voice he held the man in a +hypnosis of terror. + +"He did! I swear he did. Don't shoot me, sir! I'm telling you the very +gospel truth. He cursed awful and said--don't point that pistol at me, sir! +I swear I'll tell the truth!--'Mr. Thomas is as good as done for,' he said. +'There's only one man between us and a hundred thousand dollars in gold.' +And Falk--Kipping was talking to Falk low-like and didn't know I was +anywhere about--and Falk says, 'No, that's too much.' Then he says, +wild-like, 'Shoot--go on and shoot.' Then Kipping laughs and says, 'So +you've got a little gumption, have you?' and he shot Captain Whidden and +killed him. Don't point that pistol at _me_, sir! I didn't do it." + +Roger had managed the situation well. His sudden and entirely unexpected +attack had got from the man a story that a month of ordinary +cross-examinations might not have elicited; for although the fellow had +volunteered to tell all he knew, his manner convinced me that under other +circumstances he would have told no more than he had to. Also he had +admitted being in the cabin while the natives were roaming over the ship! + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +AN ATTEMPT TO PLAY ON OUR SYMPATHY + + +For the time being we let the matter drop and, launching a quarter-boat for +work around the ship, turned our attention to straightening out the rigging +and the running gear so that we could get under way at the earliest +possible moment. Twice natives came aboard, and a number of canoes now and +then appeared in the distance; but we were left on the whole pretty much to +our own devices, and we had great hopes of tripping anchor in a few hours +at the latest. + +Roger meanwhile got out the quadrant and saw that it was adjusted to take +an observation at the first opportunity; for there was no doubt that by +faulty navigation or, more probably, by malicious intent, Falk had brought +us far astray from the usual routes across the China Sea. + +Occasionally bands of natives would come out from shore in their canoes and +circle the ship, but we gave them no further encouragement to come aboard, +and in the course of the morning Roger divided us anew into anchor watches. +All in all we worked as hard, I think, as I ever have worked, but we were +so well contented with the outcome of our adventures that there was almost +no grumbling at all. + +When at last I went below I was dead tired. Every nerve and weary muscle +throbbed and ached, and flinging myself on my bunk, I fell instantly into +the deepest sleep. When I woke with the echo of the call, "All hands on +deck," still lingering in my ears, it seemed as if I scarcely had closed my +eyes; but while I hesitated between sleeping and waking, the call sounded +again with a peremptory ring that brought me to my feet in spite of my +fatigue. + +"All hands on deck! Tumble up! Tumble up!" It was the third summons. + +When we staggered forth, blinded by the glaring sunlight, the other watch +already had snatched up muskets and pikes and all were staring to the +northeast. Thence, moving very slowly indeed, once more came the boat. + +Falk was sitting down now; his chin rested on his hands and his face was +ghastly pale; the bandage round his head appeared bloodier than ever and +dirtier. The men, too, were white and woe-begone, and Kipping was scowling +disagreeably. + +It seemed shameful to take arms against human beings in such a piteous +plight, but we stood with our muskets cocked and waited for them to speak +first. + +"Haven't you men hearts?" Falk cried when he had come within earshot. "Are +you going to sit there aboard ship with plenty of food and drink and see +your shipmates a-dying of starvation and thirst?" + +The men rested on their oars while he called to us; but when we did not +answer, he motioned with his hand and they again rowed toward us with +short, feeble strokes. + +"All we ask is food and water," Falk said, when he had come so near that we +could see the lines on the faces of the men and the worn, hunted look in +their eyes. + +They had laid their weapons on the bottom of the boat, and there was +nothing warlike about them now to remind us of the bloody fight they had +waged against us. With a boy's short memory of the past and short sight for +the future, I was ready to take the poor fellows aboard and to forgive them +everything; and though it undoubtedly was foolish of me, I am not ashamed +of my generous weakness. They seemed so utterly miserable! But fortunately +wiser counsels prevailed. + +"You ain't really going to leave us to perish of hunger and thirst, are +you?" Falk cried. "We can't go ashore, even to get water. Those cursed +heathen are laying to butcher us. Guns pointed at friends and shipmates is +no kind of a 'welcome home.'" + +"Give us the money, then--" Roger began. + +The cook interrupted him in an undertone that was plainly audible though +probably not intended for all ears. + +"Yeee-ah! Heah dat yeh man discribblate! He don't like guns pointed at +shipmates, hey? How about guns pointed at a cap'n when he ain't lookin'? +Hey?" + +Falk obviously overheard the cook's muttered sally and was disconcerted by +it; and the murmur of assent with which our men received it convinced me +that it went a long way to reinforce their determination to withstand the +other party at any cost whatsoever. + +After hesitating perceptibly, Falk decided to ignore it. "All we want's +bread and water," he whined. + +"Give us the money, then," Roger repeated, "and we'll see that you don't +starve." His voice was calm and incisive. He absolutely controlled the +situation. + +Falk threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. "But we ain't got the +money. So help me God, we ain't got a cent of it." + +"Hand over the money," Roger repeated, "and we'll give you food and water." +He pointed at the quarter-boat, which swung at the end of a long painter. +"Come no nearer. Put the money in that boat and we'll haul it up." + +"We _ain't got the money_, I tell you. I swear on my immortal soul, we +ain't got it." Falk seemed to be on the point of weeping. He was so weak +and white! + +When Roger did not reply, I turned to look at him. There was a thoughtful +expression on his face, and following the direction of his eyes, my own +gaze rested on the face of the man from Boston. He was smiling. But when +he saw us looking at him, he stopped and changed color. + +"I believe you," Roger declared suddenly. "You'll have to keep your +distance or I'll blow your boat to pieces; but if you obey orders, I'll +help you out as far as a few days' supply of food will go. Cook, haul in +that boat and put half a hundredweight of ship's bread and four buckets of +water in it. That'll keep 'em for a while." + +"You ain't gwine to feed dat yeh Kipping, sah, is you?" + +"Yes." + +The cook turned in silence to do Roger's bidding. + +Twice the man from Boston started forward as if to speak. The motion was so +slight that it almost escaped me, but the second time I was sure that I +really had detected such an impulse, and at the same moment I perceived +that Falk, whose fingers were twitching nervously, was shooting an angry +glance at him. This byplay to a considerable extent distracted my +attention; but when the fellow finally did get up courage to speak, I saw +that the eyes of every man in Falk's boat were on him and that Kipping had +clenched both fists. + +"Stop!" the man from Boston cried. "Stop!" He stepped toward Roger with one +hand raised. + +Roger soberly turned on him. "Be still," he said. + +"But, sir--" + +"Be still!" + +"But, sir, there ain't no--" + +Certainly as far as we could see, the man's feverish persistence was arrant +insubordination. What Roger would have done we had no time to learn, for +Blodgett, bursting with zeal for our common cause, grasped him by the +throat and choked his words into a gurgle. A queer expression of spite and +hatred passed over the man's face, and when he squirmed away from +Blodgett's grip I saw that he was muttering to himself as he rubbed his +bruised neck. But the others were paying him no attention and he presently +folded his arms with an air that continued to trouble me and stood apart +from the rest. + +And Falk and Kipping and all their men now were grinning broadly! + +The water slopped over the edges of the buckets and wet some of the bread +as the cook pushed the boat out toward Falk; but the men in the pinnace +watched it eagerly, and when it floated to the end of the painter, they +clutched for it so hastily that they almost upset the precious buckets. + +When they had got it, they looked at each other and laughed and slapped +their legs and laughed again in an uproarious, almost maudlin mirth that we +could not understand. + +We covered them with our muskets lest they try to seize the boat, which I +firmly believe they had contemplated before they realized how closely we +were watching them, and we smiled to see them cram their mouths with bread +and pass the buckets from hand to hand. When they had finished their +inexplicable laughter, they ate like animals and drew new strength and +courage from their food. Though Falk was still white under his bloody +bandage, his voice was stronger. + +"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace +before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of +sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your +piper." + +He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as +if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances. + +"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see +what we shall see." + +"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see +it, too, won't it, sir?" + +It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so +we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the +long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in +undertones we kept up an exchange of comments. + +After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to +row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that +a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their +air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our +compassion. We watched them suspiciously, but they now assumed a frank +manner, which they evidently hoped would put us off our guard. + +"Now you men listen to me," said Falk. "After all, what's the use of +behaving this way? You're just getting yourselves into trouble with the +law. We can send you to the gallows for this little spree, and what's more +we're going to do it--unless, that is, unless you come round sensible and +call it all off. Now what do you say? Why don't you be reasonable? You take +us on board and we'll use you right and hush all this up as best we can. +What do you say?" + +"What do we say?" said Roger, "We say that bread and water have gone to +your head. You were singing another time a while back." + +"Oh well, we _were_ a little down in the mouth then. But we're feeling a +sight better now. Come, ain't our plan reasonable?" + +All the time they were rowing slowly nearer to the ship. + +"Mistah Falk, O Mistah Falk!" + +"Well?" Falk received the cook's interruption with an ill temper that made +the darkey's eyes roll with joy. + +"Whar you git dat bootiful head-piece?" + + +A flush darkened Falk's pale face under the bandage, and with what dignity +he could muster, he ignored our snickers. + +"What do you say?" he cried to Roger. "Evidently you haven't found the +money yet." + +To us Roger said in an undertone, "Hold your fire." To Falk he +replied clearly, "You black-hearted villain, if you show your face in a +Christian port you'll go to the gallows for abetting the cold-blooded +murder of an able officer and an honorable gentleman, Captain Joseph +Whidden. Quid that over a while and stow your tales of piracy and mutiny. +Back water, you! Keep off!" + +Here was no subtle insinuation. Falk was stopped in his tracks by the flat +statement. He had a dazed, frightened look. But Kipping, who had kept +himself in the background up to this point, now assumed command. + +"Them's bad words," he said mildly, coldly. "Bad words. _But_--" he +slightly raised his voice--"we ain't a-goin' to eat 'em. Not we." All at +once he let out a yell that rang shrilly far over the water. "At 'em, men! +At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull! Out pikes and cutlasses! Take +'em by storm! Slash the netting and go over the side." + +"Hold your fire,"--Roger repeated,--"one minute--till I give the word." + +My heart was pounding at my ribs. I was breathing in fast gulps. With my +thumb on the hammer of the musket, I gave one glance to the priming, and +half raised it to my shoulder. + +From the bottom of the boat Falk's men had snatched up the weapons that +hitherto they had kept out of sight. I had no time then to wonder why they +did not shoot; afterwards we agreed that they probably were so short of +powder and balls that they dared not expend any except in gravest +emergency. Kipping was standing as they rowed, and so fiercely now did they +ply their oars, casting to the winds every pretence of weakness, that the +boat rocked from side to side. + +"At 'em!" Kipping snarled. "We'll show 'em! We'll show'em!" + +"Hold your fire, men," said Roger the third time. "I'll wing that bird." +And aiming deliberately, he shot. + +The report of his musket rang out sharply and was followed by a groan. +Kipping clutched his thigh with both hands and fell. The men stopped rowing +and the boat, gradually losing way, veered in a half circle and lay +broadside toward us. In the midst of the confusion aboard it, I saw Kipping +sitting up and cursing in a way that chilled my blood. "Oh," he moaned, +"I'll get you yet! I'll get you yet!" Then some one in the boat returned a +single shot that buried itself in our bulwark. + +"Yeeeehaha! Got Kipping!" the cook cackled. "He got Kipping!" + +"Now then," cried Roger, "bear off. We've had enough of you. If ever again +you come within gunshot of this ship, we'll shoot so much lead into you +that the weight will sink you. It's only a leg wound, Kipping. I was +careful where I aimed." + +In a disorderly way the men began to pull out of range, but still we could +hear Kipping shrieking a stream of oaths and maledictions, and now Falk +stood up and shook his fist at us and yelled with as much semblance of +dignity as he could muster, "I'll see you yet, all seven of you, I'll see +you a-swinging one after another from the game yard-arm!" Then, to our +amazement, one of them whispered to the others behind his hand, and they +all began to laugh again as if they had played some famous joke on us. + +Instead of going toward the island, they rowed out into the ocean. We could +not understand it. Surely they would not try to cross the China Sea in an +open boat! Were they so afraid of the natives? + +Still we could hear Kipping, faintly now, bawling wrath and blasphemy. We +could see Captain Falk shaking his fist at us, and very clearly we could +hear his faint voice calling, "I'll sack that ship, so help me! We'll see +then what's become of the money." + +Where in heaven's name could they be going? Suddenly the answer came to us. +Beyond them in the farthest offing were the tiny sails of the almost +becalmed junk. They were rowing toward it. Eight mariners from a Christian +land! + +In that broad expanse of land and sea and sky, the only moving object was +the boat bearing Captain Falk and his men, which minute after minute +labored across the gently tossing sea. + +Already the monsoon was weakening. The winds were variable, and for the +time being scarce a breath of air was stirring. + +From the masthead we watched the boat grow smaller and smaller until it +seemed no bigger than the point of a pin. The men were rowing with short, +slow strokes. They may have gone eight or ten miles before darkness closed +in upon them and blotted them out, and they must have got very near to the +junk. + +The moon, rising soon after sunset, flooded the world with a pale light +that made the sea shine like silver and made the island appear like a dark, +low shadow. But of the boat and the junk it revealed nothing. + +The cook and Blodgett and I were talking idly on the fore hatch when +faintly, but so distinctly that we could not mistake it, we heard far off +the report of a gun. + +"Listen!" cried Blodgett. + +It came again and then again. + +The cook laid his hand on my shoulder. "Boy," he gasped out, "don' you heah +dat yeh screechin'?" + +"No," said I. + +"Listen!" + +We sat for a long time silent, and presently we heard one more very distant +gunshot. + +Neither Blodgett nor I had heard anything else, but the cook insisted that +he had heard clearly the sound of some one far off shrieking and wailing in +the night. "Ah heah dat yeh noise, yass, sah. Ah ain't got none of dem +yamalgamations what heahs what ain't." + +He was so big and black and primitive, and his great ears spread so far out +from his head, that he reminded me of some wild beast. Certainly he had a +wild beast's keen ears. + +But now Blodgett raised his hand. "Here's wind," he said. + +And wind it was, a fresh breeze that seemed to gather up the waning +strength of the light airs that had been playing at hide and seek with our +ropes and canvas. + +At daybreak, cutting the cable and abandoning the working bower, we got +under way on the remainder of our voyage to China, bearing in a generally +northwesterly course to avoid the dangerous waters lying directly between +us and the port of our destination. + +As we hauled at halyard and sheet and brace, and sprang quickly about at +Roger's bidding, I found no leisure to watch the dawn, nor did I think of +aught save the duties of the moment, which in some ways was a blessed +relief; but I presently became aware that David Paine, who seemed able to +work without thought, had stopped and was staring intently across the heavy +seas that went rolling past us. Then, suddenly, he cried in his deep voice, +"Sail ho!" + +Hazily, in the silver light that intervened between moonset and sunrise, we +saw a junk with high poop and swinging batten sails bearing across our +course. She took the seas clumsily, her sails banging as she pitched, and +we gathered at the rail to watch her pass. + +"See there, men!" old Blodgett cried. + +He pointed his finger at the strange vessel. We drew closer and stared +incredulously. + +On the poop of the junk, beside the cumbersome rudder windlass, leaning +nonchalantly against the great carved rail, were Captain Nathan Falk and +Chief Mate Kipping. That the slow craft could not cross our bows, they saw +as well as we. Indeed, I question if they cared a farthing whether they +sighted us that day or not. But they and their men, who gathered forward to +stare sullenly as we drew near, shook fists and once more shouted curses. I +could see them distinctly, Falk and Kipping and the carpenter and the +steward and the sail-maker and the rest--angry, familiar faces. + +When we had swept by them, running before the wind, some one called after +us in a small, far-off voice, "We'll see you yet in Sunda Strait." + +There was a commotion on the deck of the junk and Blodgett declared that +Falk had hit a man. + +Were they changing their time for some reason that they did not want us to +suspect? _Did they really wish to cut us off on our return?_ + + +Speculating about the fate of the yellow mariners who once had manned those +clumsy sails, and about what scenes of bloody cruelty there must have been +when those eight mad desperadoes attacked the ancient Chinese vessel, we +sailed away and left them in their pirated junk. But I imagined, even when +the old junk was hull down beyond the horizon, that I could hear an angry +voice calling after us. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +WE REACH WHAMPOA, BUT NOT THE END OF OUR TROUBLES + + +We were only seven men to work that ship, and after all these years I +marvel at our temerity. Time and again the cry "All hands" would come down +the hatch and summon the three of us from below to make sail, or reef, or +furl, or man the braces. Weary and almost blind with sleep, we would +stagger on deck and pull and haul, or would swarm aloft and strive to cope +with the sails. The cook, and even Roger, served tricks at the wheel, turn +and turn about with the rest of us; and for three terrible weeks we forced +ourselves to the sheets and halyards, day and night, when we scarcely could +hold our eyes open or bend our stiffened fingers. + +A Divine Providence must have watched over us during the voyage and have +preserved us from danger; for though at that season bad storms are by no +means unknown, the weather remained settled and fine. With clear water +under our keel we passed shoal and reef and low-lying island. Now we saw a +Tonquinese trader running before the wind, a curious craft, with one mast +and a single sail bent to a yard at the head and stiffened by bamboo sprits +running from luff to leech; now a dingy nondescript junk; now in the offing +a fleet of proas, which caused us grave concern. But in all our passage +only one event was really worth noting. + +When we were safely beyond London Reefs and the Fiery Cross, we laid our +course north by east to pass west of Macclesfield Bank. All was going as +well as we had dared expect, so willing was every man of our little +company, except possibly the man from Boston, whom I suspected of a +tendency to shirk, when late one evening the cook came aft with a very long +face. + +"Well," said Roger, his eyes a-twinkle. "What's wrong in the galley, +doctor?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah! S'pose, sah, you don't' know dah's almost no mo' +wateh foh to drink, sah." + +"What's that you say?" + +"Yass, sah, yass, sah, we done share up with dat yeh Kipping and dah ain't +no mo' to speak of at all, sah." + +It was true. The casks below decks were empty. In the casks already broken +out there was enough for short rations to last until we made port, so our +predicament as yet was by no means desperate; but we remembered the +laughter of Falk and his men, and we were convinced that they knew the +trick they played when they persuaded us to divide the ship's bread and +water. By what mishap or mismanagement the supply of food had fallen +short--there had been abundant opportunity for either--we were never to +learn; but concerning the water-supply and Falk's duplicity, we were very +soon enlightened. + +"Our friend from Boston," Roger said slowly, when the cook had gone, "seems +to have played us double. We'll have him below, Ben, and give him a chance +to explain." + +I liked the fellow less than ever when he came into the cabin. He had a +certain triumphant air that consorted ill with his trick of evading one's +eyes. He came nervously, I thought; but to my surprise Roger's caustic +accusal seemed rather to put him at ease than to disconcert him further. + +"And so," Roger concluded, after stating the case in no mincing terms, "you +knew us to be short of water, yet you deliberately neglected to warn us." + +"Didn't I try to speak, sir? Didn't you cut me off, sir?" + +Roger looked at him gravely. Although the fellow flinched, he was telling +the truth. In justice we had to admit that Roger had given him no hearing. + +"Ay, and that skinny old money-chaser tried to throttle me," he continued. +"Falk lay off that island only because we needed water. Ay, we all knew we +needed it--Falk and all of us. But them murderin' natives was after our +heart's blood whenever we goes ashore, just because Chips and Kipping +drills a few bullet-holes in some of 'em. I knew what Falk was after when +he asks you for water, sir. The scuttlebutts with water in 'em was on deck +handy, and most of them below was empty where you wa'n't likely to trouble +'em for a while yet. He see how't would work out. Wasn't I going to tell +you, even though he killed me for it, until you cut me off and that 'un +choked me? It helps take the soreness--it--I tried to tell you, sir." + +In petty spite, the fellow had committed himself, along with the rest of +us, to privation at the very least. Yet he had a defense of a kind, +contemptible though it was, and Roger let him go. + +It was a weary voyage; but all things have an end, and in ten days we had +left Helen Shoal astern. Now we saw many junks and small native craft, +which we viewed with uncomfortable suspicion, for though our cannon were +double-charged and though loaded muskets were stacked around the +mizzenmast, we were very, very few to stand off an attack by those yellow +demons who swarmed the Eastern seas in the time of my boyhood and who, for +all I know, swarm them still. + +There came at last a day when we went aloft and saw with red eyes that +ached for sleep hills above the horizon and a ship in the offing with all +sails set. A splendid sight she was, for our own flag flew from the ensign +halyards, and less than three weeks before, any man of us would have given +his right hand to see that ship and that flag within hail; but now it was +the sight of land that thrilled us to the heart. Hungry, thirsty, worn out +with fatigue, we joyously stared at those low, distant hills. + +"Oh, mah golly, oh, mah golly!" the cook cried, in ecstasy, "jest once Ah +gits mah foots on dry land Ah's gwine be de happies' nigger eveh bo'n. Ah +ain' neveh gwine to sea agin, no sah, not neveh." + +"Ay, land's good," Davie Paine muttered, "but the sea holds a man." + +Blodgett said naught. What dreams of wealth were stirring in his head, I +never knew. He was so very pale! He more than any one else, I think, was +exhausted by the hardships of the voyage. + +Roger, gaunt and silent, stood with his arms crossed on the rail. He had +eaten almost nothing; he had slept scarcely at all. With unceasing courage +he had done his duty by day and by night, and I realized as I saw him +standing there, sternly indomitable, that his was the fibre of heroes. I +was proud of him--and when I thought of my sister, I was glad. Then it was +that I remembered my father's words when, as we walked toward Captain +Whidden's house, we heard our gate shut and he knew without looking back +who had entered. + +We came into the Canton River, or the Chu-Kiang as it is called, by the +Bocca-Tigris, and with the help of some sailing directions that Captain +Whidden had left in writing we passed safely through the first part of +the channel between Tiger Island and Towling Flat. Thence, keeping the +watch-tower on Chuen-pee Fort well away from the North Fort of Anung-hoy, +we worked up toward Towling Island in seven or eight fathoms. + +A thousand little boats and sampans clustered round us, and we were annoyed +and a little frightened by the gesticulations of the Chinese who manned +them, until it dawned on us that they wished to serve as pilots. By signs +we drove a bargain--a silver dollar and two fingers; three fingers; five +fingers--and got for seven silver dollars the services of several men in +four sampans, who took their places along the channel just ahead of us and +sounded the depth with bamboo poles, until by their guidance we crossed the +second bar on the flood tide, which providentially came at the very hour +when we most needed it, and proceeded safely on up the river. + +That night, too tired and weak to stand, we let the best bower go by the +run in Whampoa Roads, and threw ourselves on the deck. By and by--hours +later it seemed--we heard the sound of oars. + +"Island Princess ahoy!" came the hearty hail. + +"Ahoy," some one replied. + +"What's wrong? Come, look alive! What does this mean?" + +I now sat up and saw that Roger was standing in the stern just as he had +stood before, his feet spread far apart, his arms folded, his chin +out-thrust. "Do you, sir," he said slowly, "happen to have a bottle of wine +with you?" + +I heard the men talking together, but I could not tell what they were +saying. Next, I saw a head appear above the bulwark and realized that they +were coming aboard. + +"Bless my soul! What's happened? Where's Captain Whidden? Bless my soul! +Who are _you_?" The speaker was big, well dressed, comfortably well fed. He +stared at the six of us sprawled out grotesquely on the deck, where we had +thrown ourselves when the ship swung at her anchor. He looked up at the +loose, half-furled sails. He turned to Roger, who stood gaunt and silent +before him. "Bless my soul! _Who are you?_" + +"I," said Roger, "am Mr. Hamlin, supercargo of this ship." + +"But where--what in heaven's name has taken place? Where's Captain +Whidden?" + +"Captain Whidden," said Roger, "is dead." + +"But when--but what--" + +"_Who are you?_" Roger fired the words at him like a thunderclap. + +"I--I--I am Mr. Johnston, agent for Thomas Webster and Sons," the man +stammered. + +"Sir," cried Roger, "if you are agent for Thomas Webster and Sons, fetch us +food and water and get watchmen to guard this ship while we sleep. Then, +sir, I'll tell you such a story as you'll not often hear." + +The well-fed, comfortable man regarded him with a kind of frown. The +situation was so extraordinary that he simply could not comprehend it. For +a moment he hesitated, then, stepping to the side, he called down some +order, which I did not understand, but which evidently sent the boat +hurrying back to the landing. As he paced the deck, he repeated over and +over in a curiously helpless way, "Bless my soul! Bless my soul!" + +All this time I was aware of Roger still standing defiantly on the +quarter-deck. I know that I fell asleep, and that when I woke he was still +there. Shortly afterwards some one raised my head and gave me something hot +to drink and some one else repeated my name, and I saw that Roger was no +longer in sight. Then, as I was carried below, I vaguely heard some one +repeating over and over, "Bless my soul! It is awful! Why won't that young +man explain things? Bless my soul!" When I opened my eyes sunlight was +creeping through the hatch. + +"Is this not Mr. Lathrop?" a stranger asked, when I stepped out in the open +air--and virtually for the first time, so weary had I been the night +before, saw the pointed hills, the broad river, and the great fleet of +ships lying at anchor. + +"Yes," said I, surprised at the man's respectful manner. Immediately I was +aware that he was no sailor. + +"I thought as much. Mr. Hamlin says, will you go to the cabin. I was just +going to call you. Mr. Johnston has come aboard again and there's some kind +of a conference. Mr. Johnston does get so wrought up! If you'll hurry right +along--" + +As I turned, the strange landsman kept in step with me. "Mr. Johnston is so +wrought up!" he repeated interminably. "So wrought up! I never saw him so +upset before." + +When I entered the cabin, Roger sat in the captain's chair, with Mr. +Johnston on his right and a strange gentleman on his left. Opposite Roger +was a vacant seat, but I did not venture to sit down until the others +indicated that they wished me to do so. + +"This is a strange story I've been hearing, Mr. Lathrop," said Mr. +Johnston. His manner instantly revealed that my family connection carried +weight with him. "I thought it best you should join us. One never knows +when a witness will be needed. It's one of the most disturbing situations +I've met in all my experience." + +The stranger gravely nodded. + +"Certainly it is without precedent in my own experience," said Roger. + +Mr. Johnston tapped the table nervously. "Captain and chief mate killed by +a member of the crew; second mate--later, acting captain--accused of +abetting the murder. You must admit, sir, that you make that charge on +decidedly inadequate evidence. And one hundred thousand dollars in gold +gone, heaven knows where! Bless my soul, what shall I do?" + +"Do?" cried Roger. "Help us to make arrangements to unload the cargo, to +ship a new crew, and to get a return cargo. It seems to me obvious enough +what you 'shall do'!" + +"But, Mr. Hamlin, the situation is extraordinary. There are legal problems +involved. There is no captain--bless my soul! I never heard of such a +thing." + +"I've brought this ship across the China Sea with only six hands. I assure +you that I shall have no difficulty in taking her back to Salem when a +new crew is aboard." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "Here's your +captain--I'll do. Lathrop, here, will do good work as supercargo, I'm sure. +I'm told there's the crew of a wrecked brig in port. They'll fill up our +forecastle and maybe furnish me with a mate or two. You'll have to give us +papers of a kind." + +"Lathrop as supercargo? He's too young. He's only a lad." + +"We can get no one else off-hand who has so good an education," said Roger. +"He can write a fair-copy, cipher, and keep books. I'll warrant, Mr. +Johnston, that not even you can catch him napping with a problem in tare +and tret. Above all, the Websters know him well and will be glad to see him +climb." + +"Hm! I'm doubtful--well, very well. As you say. But one hundred thousand +dollars in gold--bless my soul! I was told nothing about that; the letters +barely mention it." Mr. Johnston beat a mad tattoo on the arm of his chair. + +"That, sir, is my affair and my responsibility. I will answer to the +owners." + +"Bless my soul! I'm afraid I'll be compounding piracy, murder, and heaven +knows what other crimes; but we shall see--we shall see." Mr. Johnston got +up and paced the cabin nervously. "Well, what's done's done. Nothing to do +but make the best of a bad bargain. Woolens are high now, praise the Lord, +and there's a lively demand for ginseng. Well, I've already had good +offers. I'll show you the figures, Captain Hamlin, if you'll come to the +factory. And you, too, Mr. Lathrop. If you daren't leave the ship, I'll +send ashore for them. I'm confident we can fill out your crew, and I +suppose I'll have to give you some kind of a statement to authorize your +retaining command--What if I am compounding a felony? Bless my soul! And +one hundred thousand dollars!" + +I was glad enough to see Mr. Johnston rowed away from the ship. Roger, +accompanying him, returned late in the evening with half a dozen new men +and a Mr. Cledd, formerly mate of the brig Essay, which had been wrecked a +few weeks before in a typhoon off Hainan. He was a pleasant fellow of about +Roger's age, and had a frank manner that we all liked. The new men, all of +whom had served under him on the Essay, reported him to be a smart officer, +a little severe perhaps, but perfectly fair in his dealings with the crew; +so we were almost as glad to have him in the place of Kipping, as we were +to have Roger in the place of Captain Falk. We had settled down in the +forecastle to talk things over when presently word came that Davie Paine +and I were wanted aft. + +"Ben," said Roger to me, cordially, "you can move your things into the +cabin. You are to be supercargo." He tapped his pencil on the table and +turned to Davie with a kindly smile. "You, Davie, can have your old +berth of second mate, if you wish it. I'll not degrade a faithful man. +You'd better move aft to-day, for the new crew is coming aboard to-morrow." + +Davie scratched his head and shifted his feet uneasily. "Thank you, sir," +he said at last. "It's good of you and I'm sure I appreciate it, but I +ain't no great shakes of a scholar and I--well, if it's all the same to +you, sir, I'll stay for'ard with the men, sir." + +I was surprised to find how hard it was to leave the forecastle. The others +were all so friendly and so glad of my good fortune, that they brought a +lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. It seemed as if I were taking leave +forever, instead of only moving the length of the ship; and, indeed, as I +had long since learned, the distance from forecastle to cabin is not to be +measured by feet and inches. + +"I knew't would come," Neddie Benson remarked. "You was a gentleman's son. +But we've had good times together--ay, and hard times, too." He shook his +head dolefully. + +All who were left of the old crew gathered round me while I closed my +chest, and Blodgett and Davie Paine seized the beckets before I knew what +they were about and carried it to my stateroom. + + +As I passed the galley the cook stopped me. "You ain't gwine far, sah, +praise de Lo'd!" he said. "Dah's a hot time ahead and we gotta stand one by +anotheh. Ah's gwine keep my eye on dat yeh man f'om Boston. Yass, sah! Ah's +gwine keep mah eye on him." + +Now what did the cook mean by that, I wondered. But no answer suggested +itself to me, and when I entered the cabin I heard things that drove the +cook and the man from Boston far out of my mind. + +"Kipping!" Mr. Cledd, the new chief mate was saying. "Not _William_ +Kipping?" + +Roger got down the attested copy of the articles and pointed at the neatly +written name: "William Kipping." + +Mr. Cledd looked very grave indeed. "I've heard of Falk--he's a vicious +scoundrel in some ways, although too weak to be dangerous of his own +devices But I _know_ Kipping." + +"Tell me about him,' said Roger. + +"Kipping is the meanest, doggonedest, low-down wharf-runner that ever +robbed poor Jack of his wages. That's Kipping. Furthermore, he never signed +a ship's articles unless he thought there was considerable money in it +somewhere. I tell you, Captain Hamlin, he's an angry, disappointed man at +this very minute. If you want to know what I think, he's out somewhere on +those seas yonder--_just_--_waiting_. We've not seen the last of Kipping." + +Roger got up, and walking over to the chest of ammunition, thoughtfully +regarded it. + +"No, sir!" Mr. Cledd reiterated, "if Kipping's Kipping, we've not seen the +last of him." + +[Illustration:] + + + + +VII + +OLD SCORES AND NEW AND A DOUBTFUL WELCOME + +[Illustration] + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +A MYSTERY IS SOLVED, AND A THIEF GETS AWAY + + +Innumerable sampans were plying up and down the river, some with masts and +some without, and great junks with carved sterns lay side by side so +closely that their sails formed a patchwork as many-colored as Joseph's +coat. There were West River small craft with arched deck-houses, which had +beaten their way precariously far up and down the coast; tall, narrow sails +from the north, and web-peaked sails on curved yards from the south; Hainan +and Kwangtung trawlers working upstream with staysails set, and a few +storm-tossed craft with great holes gaping between their battens. All were +nameless when I saw them for the first time, and strange; but in the days +that followed I learned them rope and spar. + +Vessels from almost every western nation were there, too--bluff-bowed Dutch +craft with square-headed crews, brigantines from the Levant, and ships from +Spain, England, and America. + +The captains of three other American ships in port came aboard to inquire +about the state of the seas between the Si-Kiang and the Cape of Good Hope +and shook their heads gravely at what we told them. One, an old friend of +Captain Whidden, said that he knew my own father. "It's shameful that such +things should be--simply shameful," he declared, when he had heard the +story of our fight with the Arab ship. "What with Arabs and Malays on the +high seas, Ladronesers in port--ay, and British men-of-war everywhere!" + +He went briskly over the side, settled himself in the stern-sheets of his +boat, and gave us on the quarter-deck a wave of his hand; then his men +rowed him smartly away down-stream. + +"Ay, it is shameful," Roger repeated. He soberly watched the other +disappear among the shipping, then he turned to Mr. Cledd. "I shall go +ashore for the day," he said. "I have business that will take considerable +time, and I think that Mr. Lathrop had better come too, and bring his +books." + +As we left the ship we saw Mr. Cledd observing closely all that went +forward, and Roger gravely nodded when I remarked that our new mate knew +his business. + +At the end of some three weeks of hard work we had cleared the hold, +painted and overhauled the ship inside and out, and were ready to begin +loading at daylight on a Monday morning. However great was Mr. Johnston's +proclivity to get "wrought up," he had proved himself an excellent man of +business by the way he had conducted our affairs ashore when once he put +his hand to them; and we, too, had accomplished much, both in getting out +the cargo and in putting the ship in repair. We had stripped her to her +girt-lines, calked her, decks and all, from her hold up, and painted her +inside and out. She was a sight to be proud of, when, rigged once more, she +swung at her anchorage. + +That evening, as Roger and Mr. Cledd, the new second mate, and I were +sitting in the cabin and talking of our plans and prospects, we heard a +step on the companionway. + +"Who's that?" Mr. Cledd asked in an undertone. "I thought steward had gone +for the night." + +Roger motioned him to remain silent. We all turned. + +To our amazement it was the cook who suddenly appeared before us, rolling +his eyes wildly under his deep frown. + +"'Scuse me, gen'lems! 'Scuse me, Cap'n Hamlin! 'Scuse me, Mistah Cledd! +'Scuse me, ev'ybody! Ah knows Ah done didn't had ought to, but Ah says, +Frank, you ol' nigger, you jest up 'n' go. Don't you let dat feller git +away with all dat yeh money." + +"What's that?" Roger cried sharply. + +"Yass, sah! Yass, sah! Hun f'om Boston! He's got de chisel and de hammer +and de saw." + +We all stared. + +"Come, come, doctor," said Roger. "What's this cock-and-bull story?" + +"Yass, sah, he's got de chisel and de hammer and de saw. Ah was a-watchin', +yass, sah. He don't fool dis yeh ol' nigger. Ah see him sneakin' round when +Chips he ain't looking." + +For a moment Roger frowned, then in a low, calm voice he said, "Mr. Cledd, +you'll take command on deck. Have a few men with you. Better see that your +pistols are well primed. You two, come with me. Now, then, Frank, lead the +way." + +From the deck we could see the lanterns of all the ships lying at anchor, +the hills and the land-lights and a boat or two moving on the river. We +hurried close at the negro's heels to the main hatch. + +"Look dah!" The negro rested the blunt tip of one of his great fingers on +the deck. + +Some sharp tool had dropped beside the hatch and had cut a straight, thin +line where it fell. + +"Chisel done dat." + +We were communicating in whispers now, and with a finger at his lips the +cook gave us a warning glance. He then laid hold of the rope that was made +fast to a shears overhead, swung out, and slid down to the very keelson. +Silently, one at a time, we followed. The only sound was our sibilant +breathing and the very faint shuffle of feet. Now we could see, almost +midway between the hatches, the dim light of a candle and a man at work. +While we watched, the man cautiously struck several blows. Was he scuttling +the ship? Then, as Roger and the cook tiptoed forward, I suddenly tripped +over a piece of plank and sprawled headlong. + +As I fell, I saw Roger and the cook leap ahead, then the man doused the +light. There was a sound of scuffling, a crash, a splutter of angry words. +A moment later I heard the click of flint on steel, a tiny blaze sprang +from the tinder, and the candle again sent up its bright flame. + +"Come, Ben, hold the light," Roger called. He and Frank had the man from +Boston down on the limber board and were holding him fast. The fight, +though fierce while it lasted, already was over. + +The second mate now handed me the candle, and bent over and examined the +hole the man had cut in the ceiling. "Is the scoundrel trying to sink us?" +he asked hotly. + +Roger smiled. "I suspect there's more than that behind this little +project," he replied. + +The man from Boston groaned. "Don't--don't twist my arm," he begged. + +"Heee-ha-ha!" laughed the cook. "Guess Ah knows whar dat money is." + +"Open up the hole, Ben," said Roger. + +I saw now that there was a chalk-line, as true as the needle, from +somewhere above us in the darkness, drawn along the skin of the hold +perpendicular to the keelson, and that the man from Boston had begun to cut +at the bilge where the line crossed it. + +He blinked at me angrily as I sawed through the planks. But when with +chisel and saw I had removed a square yard of planking and revealed only +the bilge-water that had backed up from the pump well, he brightened. Had +the Island Princess not been as tight as you could wish, we should have had +a wetter time of it than we had. Our feet were wet as it was, and the man +from Boston was sadly drabbled. + +"There's nothing there?" said Roger, interrogatively. "Hm! Put your hand in +and feel around." + +I reluctantly obeyed. Finding nothing at first, I thrust my arm deeper, +then higher up beyond the curve. My fingers touched something hard that +slipped away from them. Regardless of the foul water, I thrust my arm in +still farther, and, securing my hold on a cord, drew out a leather bag. It +was black and slimy, and so heavy that I had to use both hands to lift it, +and it clinked when I set it down. + +"I thought so," said Roger. "There'll be more of them in there. Fish them +out, Bennie." + +While Roger and the cook sat on the man from Boston and forced him down +into the evil-smelling bilge-water, the second mate and I felt around under +the skin of the hold and drew out bag after bag, until the candle-light +showed eighteen lying side by side. + +"There ought to be two more," said Roger. + +"I can't find another one, sir," the second mate replied. + +I now hit upon an idea. "Here," said I, "here's what will do the work." I +had picked up a six-foot pole and the others eagerly seized upon my +suggestion. + +I worked the pole into the space between the inner and outer planking while +the man from Boston blinked at me angrily, and fished about with it until I +discovered and pried within reach two more leather bags. + +"Well done!" Roger cried. "Cook, suppose you take this fellow in +tow,--we've a good strong set of irons waiting for him,--and I'll help +carry these bags over under the hatch." + +Calling up to Mr. Cledd, Roger then instructed him to throw down a +tarpaulin, which he did, and this we made fast about the twenty bags. +Having taken several turns of a rope's end round the whole, Roger, carrying +the other end, climbed hand-over-hand the rope by which we had lowered +ourselves, and I followed at his heels; then we rigged a tackle and, with +several men to help us, hauled up the bundle. + +"Cap'n Hamlin, sah," the cook called, "how's we gwine send up dis yeh +scound'l?" + +"Let him come," said Roger. "We'll see to him. Prick his calves with a +knife if he's slow about it." + +We heard the cook say in a lower voice, "G'wan, you ol' scalliwaggle"; +then, "Heah he is, cap'n, heah he come! Watch out foh him. He's +nimble--yass, sah, he's nimble." + +The rope swayed in the darkness below the hatch, then the fellow's head and +shoulders appeared; but, as we reached to seize him, he evaded our +outstretched fingers by a quick wriggle, flung himself safely to the deck +on the far side of the hatch, and leaping to the bulwark, dove into the +river with scarcely a splash. + +Some one fired a musket at the water; the flash illuminated the side of the +ship, and an echo rolled solemnly back from the shore. Three or four men +pointed and called, "There he goes--there--there! See him swimming!" For a +moment I myself saw him, a dark spot at the apex of a V-shaped ripple, then +he disappeared. It was the last we ever knew of the man from Boston. + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +HOMEWARD BOUND + + +We had the gold, though, twenty leather bags of it; and we carried it to +the cabin and packed it into the safe, which it just filled. + +"Now," said Roger, "we _have_ a story to tell Mr. Johnston." + +"So we have!" exclaimed Mr. Cledd, who had heard as yet but a small part of +this eventful history. "Will you tell me, though, how that beggar ever knew +those bags were just there?" + +"Certainly." Roger's eyes twinkled as of old. "He put them there. When the +islanders were everywhere aboard ship, and the rest of us were so much +taken up with them and with the fight we'd just been through that we +didn't know what was on foot,--it was still so dark that he could work +unnoticed,--he sneaked below and opened the safe, which he had the craft to +lock again behind him, and hauled the money forward to the hatch, a few +bags at a time. Eventually he found a chance to crawl over the cargo, start +a plank in the ceiling, drop the bags down inside the jacket one by one, +and mark the place. Then, holding his peace until the cargo was out of the +hold, he drew a chalk line straight down from his mark to the lower deck, +took bearings from the hatch, and continued the line from the beam-clamp to +the bilge, and cut on the curve. There, of course, was where the money had +fallen. He worked hard--and failed." + +Then I remembered the hatch that had been pried off when the natives were +ranging over the boat. + +Early next morning Roger, Mr. Cledd, and I, placing the money between us in +the boat and arming ourselves and our men, each with a brace of pistols, +went ashore. That brief trip seems a mere trifle as I write of it here and +now, so far in distance and in time from the river at Whampoa, but I truly +think it was as perilous a voyage as any I have made; for pirates, or +Ladronesers as they were called, could not be distinguished from ordinary +boatmen, and enough true stories of robbery and murder on that river passed +current among seafaring men in my boyhood to make the everlasting fortune +of one of those fellows who have nothing better to do than sit down and +spin out a yarn of hair-raising adventures. But we showed our cocked +pistols and passed unmolested through the press, and came at last safe to +the landing. + +Laboring under the weight of gold, we went by short stages up to the +factory, where Mr. Johnston in his dressing-gown met us, blessing his soul +and altogether upset. + +"Never in my life," he cried, clasping his hands, "have I seen such men as +you. And now, pray, what brings you here?" + +"We have come with one hundred thousand dollars," said Roger, "to be paid +to the Chinese gentleman of whom you and I have spoken together." + +Mr. Johnston looked at the lumpy bundles wrapped now in canvas and for once +rose to an emergency. "Come in," he said. "I'll dispatch a messenger +immediately. Come in and I'll join you at breakfast." + +We ate our breakfast that morning with a fortune in gold coin under the +table; and when the boat came down the river, bringing a quiet man whom Mr. +Johnston introduced as the very person we were seeking, and who himself in +quaint pidgin English corroborated the statement that he it was who had +sent to Thomas Webster the five teakwood chests, we paid him the money and +received in return his receipt beautifully written with small flourishes of +the brush. + +"That's done," said Roger, when all was over, "in spite of as rascally a +crew as ever sailed a Salem ship. I am, I fear, a pirate, a mutineer, and +various other unsavory things; but I declare, Mr. Cledd, in addition to +them all, I am an honest man." + +The coolies already had begun to pass chests of tea into the hold when we +came aboard; and under the eye of the second mate, who was proving himself +in every respect a competent officer,--in his own place the equal, perhaps, +of Mr. Cledd in his,--all hands were industriously working. The days passed +swiftly. Work aboard ship and business ashore crowded every hour; and so +our stay on the river drew to an end. + +Before that time, however, Blodgett hesitantly sought me out one night. +"Mr. Lathrop," he said with a bit of constraint, "I and Davie and Neddie +and cook was a-thinkin' we'd like to do something for poor Bill Hayden's +little girl. Of course we ain't got no great to give, but we've taken up a +little purse of money, and we wondered wouldn't you, seein' you was a good +friend to old Bill, like to come in with us?" + +That I was glad of the chance, I assured him. "And Captain Hamlin will come +in, too," I added. "Oh, I'm certain he will." + +Blodgett seemed pleased. "Thinks I, he's likely to, but it ain't fit I +should ask the captain." + +Promising to present the plea as if it were my own, I sent Blodgett away +reassured, and eventually we all raised a sum that bought such a royal doll +as probably no merchant in Newburyport ever gave his small daughter, and +enough silk to make the little maid, when she should reach the age for it, +as handsome a gown as ever woman wore. Nor was that the end. The night +before we sailed from China, Blodgett came to me secretly, after a +mysterious absence, and pressed a small package into my hand. + +"Don't tell," he said. "It's little enough. If we'd stopped off on some o' +them islands I might ha' done better. Thinks I last night, I'd like to send +her a bit of a gift all by myself as a kind of a keepsake, you know, sir, +seeing I never had a little lass o' my own. So I slips away from the others +and borrows a boat that was handy to the shore and drops down stream +quiet-like till I comes in sight of one of them temples where there's gongs +ringing and all manner of queer goings-on. Says I,--not aloud, you +understand,--'Here, my lad, 's the very place you're looking for, just +a-waiting for you!' So I sneaks up soft and easy,--it were a rare dark +night,--and looks in, and what do I see by the light o' them there crazy +lanterns? There was one o' them heathen idols! Yes, sir, a heathen idol as +handy as you please. 'Aha!' says I,--not aloud, you understand, sir,--'Aha! +I'll wager you've got a fine pair o' rubies in your old eye-sockets, you +blessed idol.' And with that I takes a squint at the lay o' the land and +sees my chance, and in I walks. The old priest, he gives a squawk, but I +cracks him with a brass pot full of incense, which scatters and nigh chokes +me, and I grabs the ear-rings and runs before they catches me, for all +there's a million of 'em a-yammering at my heels. I never had a chance at +the eyes--worse luck! But I fared well, when all's said and done. It was a +dark night, thank heaven, and the boat was handy. The rings is jade. She'll +like 'em some day." + +I restrained my chuckles until he had gone, and added the stolen treasures +to the rest of the gifts. What else could I do? Certainly it was beyond my +power to restore them to the rightful owners. + +The last chest of tea and the last roll of silk were swung into the hold, +the hatches were battened down, and all was cleared for sailing as soon as +wind and tide should favor us. + +That morning Mr. Johnston came aboard, more brisk and pompous than ever, +and having critically inspected the ship, met us in the cabin for a final +word. My new duties as supercargo had kept me busy and my papers were +scattered over the table; but when I started to gather them up and +withdraw, he motioned me to stay. + +"Never in all my experience has such a problem as this arisen," he +exclaimed, rubbing his chin lugubriously. "Bless my soul! Who ever heard of +such a thing? Captain and chief mate murdered--crew mutinied--bless my +soul! Well, Captain Hamlin--I suppose you've noticed before, that I give +you the title of master?--well, Captain Hamlin, I fear I'm compounding +felony, but after all that's a matter to be settled in the courts. I'm +confident that I cannot be held criminally responsible for not +understanding a nice point in admiralty. Whatever else happens, the ship +must go home to Salem, and you, sir, are the logical man to take her home. +Well, sir, although in a way you represent the owners more directly than I +do, still your authority is vicariously acquired and I've that here +which'll protect you against interruption in the course of the voyage by +any lawful process. I doubt, from all I've heard, if Falk will go to law; +but here's a paper--" he drew it out of his pocket and laid it on the +table--"signed, sealed and witnessed, stating that I, Walter Johnston, +agent in China for Thomas Webster and Sons, do hereby recognize you as +master of the ship Island Princess, and do invest you, as far as my +authority goes, with whatever privileges and responsibilities are attached +to the office. All questions legal and otherwise, ensuing from this +investure, must be settled on your arrival at the United States of America. +That, sir, is the best I can do for you, and I assure you that I hope +sincerely you may not be hanged as a pirate but that I am by no means +certain of it." + +Thus he left-handedly concluded his remarks, and murmuring under his +breath, "Bless my soul," as if in final protest against everything without +precedent, folded his fat hands over his expansive waist-band. + +"I thank you, Mr. Johnston," Roger replied gravely, though he could not +completely hide the amusement in his eyes. "I'm sure it is handsome of you +to do so much for us, and I certainly hope no act of piracy or violence, of +which we may have been guilty, will compromise you in the slightest +degree." + +"Thank _you_, Captain Hamlin. I hope so myself." + +If I had met Roger's glance, I must have laughed outright. The man was so +unconscious of any double edge to Roger's words, and so complacent, that +our meeting was all but farce, when he bethought himself of another subject +of which he had intended to speak. + +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "I well nigh forgot. Shall you--but of +course you will not!--go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +Mr. Cledd, who hitherto had sat with a slight smile on his lean Yankee +face, now looked at Roger with keener interest. + +"Yes," said Roger, "I shall go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"Now surely, Captain Hamlin, that would be folly; there are other courses." + +"But none so direct." + +"A long way round is often the shortest way home. Why, bless my soul, that +would be to back your sails in the face of Providence." + +Roger leaned forward. "Why should I not go home by way of Sunda Strait?" + +"Why, my dear sir, if any one were--er-er--to wish you harm,--and if your +own story is to be believed, there are those who do wish you harm,--Sunda +Strait, of all places in the world, is the easiest to cut you off." + +"Mr. Johnston, that is nonsense," said Roger. "Such things don't happen. I +will go home by way of Sunda Strait." + +"But, Captain Hamlin,--" the good man rubbed his hands more nervously than +ever,--"but, Captain Hamlin, bless my soul, I consider it highly +inadvisable." + +Roger smiled. "Sir, I will not back down. By Sunda Strait we came. By Sunda +Strait we'll return. If any man wishes to see us there--" He finished the +sentence with another smile. + +Mr. Cledd spoke up sharply. "Ay, and if a certain man we all know of should +appear, I'm thinking he'd be unpleasantly surprised to find me aboard." + +Mr. Johnston rubbed his hands and tapped the table and rubbed his hands +again. So comfortable did he appear, and so well-fed, that he seemed quite +out of place in that severely plain cabin, beside Roger and Mr. Cledd. That +he had a certain mercantile shrewdness I was ready to admit; but the others +were men fearless and quick to act. + +"Bless my soul!" he said at last, beating a tattoo on the table with his +soft fingers. "Bless my soul!" + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THROUGH SUNDA STRAIT + + +Laden deep with tea and silk, we dropped down the Chu-Kiang, past Macao and +the Ladrone Islands, and out through the Great West Channel. Since the +northeast monsoon now had set in and the winds were constant, we soon +passed the tide-rips of St. Esprit, and sighting only a few small islands +covered with brush and mangroves, where the seas broke in long lines of +silver under an occasional cocoanut palm, we left astern in due time the +treacherous water of the Paracel Reefs. + +Each day was much like every other until we had put the China Sea behind +us. We touched at the mouth of the Saigon, but found no promise of trade, +and weighed anchor again with the intention of visiting Singapore. Among +other curious things, we saw a number of pink porpoises and some that were +mottled pink and white and brown. Porpoises not infrequently are spotted by +disease; but those that we saw appeared to be in excellent health, and +although we remarked on their odd appearance, we believed their strange +colors to be entirely natural. A fleet of galleys, too, which we saw in the +offing, helped break the monotony of our life. There must have been fifty +of them, with flags a-flutter and arms bristling. Although we did not +approach them near enough to learn more about them, it seemed probable that +they were conveying some great mandarin or chief on affairs of state. + +"That man Blodgett is telling stories of one kind or another," Mr. Cledd +remarked one afternoon, after watching a little group that had gathered by +the forecastle-hatch during the first dog-watch. "The fortuneteller fellow, +too, Benson, is stirring up the men." + +As I looked across the water at the small island of palms where the waves +were rolling with a sullen roar, which carried far on the evening air, I +saw a native boat lying off the land, and dimly through the mists I saw the +sail of an old junk. I watched the junk uneasily. Small wonder that the men +were apprehensive, I thought. + +After leaving Singapore, we passed the familiar shores of eastern Sumatra, +Banka Island and Banka Strait, and the mouths of the Palambang, but in an +inverted order, which made them seem as strange as if we never before had +sighted them. Then one night, heading west against the tide, we anchored in +a rolling swell, with Kodang Island to the northeast and Sindo Island to +the north. On the one hand were the Zutphen Islands; on the other was Hog +Point; and almost abeam of us the Sumatran coast rose to the steep bluff +that across some miles of sea faces the Java shore. We lay in Sunda Strait. + +I came on deck after a while and saw the men stirring about. + +"They're uneasy," said Mr. Cledd. + +"I'm not surprised," I replied. + +The trees on the high summit of the island off which we lay were +silhouetted clearly against the sky. What spying eyes might not look down +upon us from those wooded heights? What lawless craft might not lurk beyond +its abrupt headlands? + +"No, I don't wonder, either," said Mr. Cledd, thoughtfully. + +At daybreak we again weighed anchor and set sail. Three or four times a +far-away vessel set my heart leaping, but each in turn passed and we saw it +no more. A score of native proas manoeuvring at a distance singly or by +twos caused Roger to call up the watch and prepare for any eventuality; but +they vanished as silently as they had appeared. At nightfall we once more +hove to, having made but little progress, and lay at anchor until dawn. + +In the darkness that night the cook came up to me in the waist whither I +had wandered, unable to sleep. "Mistah Lathrop," he muttered, "Ah don't +like dis yeh nosing and prying roun' islands whar a ship's got to lay up +all night jes' like an ol' hen with a mess of chickens." + +We watched phosphorescent waves play around the anchor cable. The spell of +uneasiness weighed heavily on us both. + +The next evening, still beating our way against adverse winds, we rounded +Java Head, which seemed so low by moonlight that I scarcely could believe +it was the famous promontory beyond which lay the open sea. I went to my +stateroom, expecting once again to sleep soundly all night long. Certainly +it seemed now that all our troubles must be over. Yet I could not compose +myself. After a time I came on deck, and found topsails and royals set and +Mr. Cledd in command. + +"All goes well, Mr. Lathrop," he said with a smile, "but that darky cook +seems not to believe it. He's prowling about like an old owl." + +"Which is he?" I asked; for several of the men were pacing the deck and at +the moment I could not distinguish between them. + +"They do seem to be astir. That nearest man walks like Blodgett. Has the +negro scared them all?" + +When, just after Mr. Cledd had spoken, Blodgett came aft, we were +surprised; but he approached us with an air of suppressed excitement, which +averted any reprimand Mr. Cledd may have had in mind. + +"If you please, sir," he said, "there's a sail to windward." + +"To windward? You're mistaken. You ought to call out if you see a sail, but +it's just as well you didn't this time." + +Mr. Cledd turned his back on Blodgett after looking hard up the wind. + +"If you please, sir, I've got good eyes." Blodgett's manner was such that +no one could be seriously offended by his persistence. + +"My eyes are good, too," Mr. Cledd replied rather sharply. "I see no +sail." + +Nor did I. + +Blodgett leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness like a cat. "If +you please, sir," he said, "I beg your pardon, but I _can_ see a sail." + +Now, for the first time I thought that I myself saw something moving. "I +see a bank of fog blowing westward," I remarked, "but I don't think it's a +sail." + +After a moment, Mr. Cledd spoke up frankly. "I'll take back what I've just +said. I see it too. It's only a junk, but I suppose we'd better call the +captain." + +"Only a junk!" Blodgett repeated sharply. "When last we saw 'em, a junk was +all they had." + +"What's that?" Mr. Cledd demanded. + +"Ay, ay, sir, they was sailing away in a junk, sir." + +Mr. Cledd stepped to the companionway. "Captain Hamlin," he called. + +The junk was running free when we first sighted her, but just as she was +passing astern of us, she began to come slowly about. I could see a great +number of men swaying in unison against the helm that controlled the +gigantic rudder. Others were bracing the curious old sails. + +"I wish she were near enough for us to watch them handle the sails on the +after masts," I said. + +She had a pair of mizzen-masts, one on the larboard side, one on the +starboard, and I was puzzled to know how they were used. + +"She'll pass close aboard on this next tack," Mr. Cledd replied. "I think +we'll be able to see." He had paused to watch her manoeuvres. + +"Here's the doctor," Blodgett murmured. + +Black Frank was coming aft with a quick humpy walk. "'Scuse me, sah, 'scuse +me!" he said. "But I's skeered that we--" + +Mr. Cledd now had gone to the companion. "Captain Hamlin," he called again, +"there's a junk passing close aboard." + +I heard Roger's step on the companion-way. It later transpired that he had +not heard the first summons. + +"Mah golly! Look dah!" the cook exclaimed. + +The junk was looming up dangerously. + +Mr. Cledd caught my arm. "Run forward quick--quick--call up all hands," he +cried. Then raising the trumpet, "Half a dozen of you men loose the +cannon." + +Leaping to the spar deck, I ran to do his bidding, for the junk now was +bearing swiftly down upon us. On my way to the forecastle-hatch I noted the +stacked pikes and loaded muskets by the mainmast, and picked out the most +likely cover from which to fire on possible boarders. That my voice was +shaking with excitement, I did not realize until I had sent my summons +trembling down into the darkness. + +I heard the men leaping from their bunks; I heard Roger giving sharp +commands from the quarter-deck; I heard voices on the junk. By accident or +by malice, she inevitably was going to collide with the Island Princess. As +we came up into the wind with sails a-shiver, I scurried back to the stack +of muskets. + +Neddie Benson was puffing away just behind me. "I didn't ought to 'ave +come," he moaned. "I had my warning. Oh, it serves me right--I might 'a' +married the lady." + +"Bah, that's no way for a _man_ to talk," cried Davie Paine. + +It all was so unreal that I felt as if I were looking at a picture. It did +not seem as if it could be Ben Lathrop who was standing shoulder to +shoulder with Neddie Benson and old Davie. There was running and calling on +all sides and aloft. Blocks were creaking as the men hauled at braces and +halyards; and when the ship rolled I saw that the men on the yard-arms were +shaking the courses from the gaskets. Although our crew was really too +small to work the ship and fight at the same time, it was evident that +Roger intended so far as possible to do both. + +But meanwhile the junk had worn ship and she still held her position to +windward. Suddenly there came from her deck the flash of a musket and a +loud report. Then another and another. Then Roger's voice sounded sharply +above the sudden clamor and our own long gun replied. + +Flame from its muzzle burst in the faces of the men at the bow of the junk, +and the ball, mainly by chance, I suppose, hit her foremast and brought +down mast and sail. Then the junk came about and bumped into us abreast, +with a terrific crash that stove in the larboard bulwark and showered us +with fragments of carved and gilded wood broken from her towering bow. + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +PIKES, CUTLASSES, AND GUNS + + +As I hastily poured powder into the pan of my musket, a man sprang to our +deck and dashed at Davie Paine, who thrust out a pike and impaled him as if +he were a fowl on a spit, then reached for a musket. Another came and +another; I saw them leap down singly. One of our new men whom we had signed +at Canton raised his cutlass and sliced down the third man to board us; +then they came on in an overwhelming stream. + +Seeing that it would be suicide to attempt to maintain our ground, and that +we already were cut off from the party on the quarter-deck, we retreated +forward, fighting off the enemy as we went, and ten or a dozen of us took +our stand on the forecastle. + +Kipping and Falk and the beach-combers they had gathered together had +conducted their campaign well. Some half of us were forward, half aft, so +that we could not fire on the boarders without danger of hitting our own +men. Davie Paine clubbed his musket and felled a strange white man, and +Neddie Benson went down with a bullet through his thigh; then the pirates +surged forward and almost around us. Before we realized what was happening, +we had been forced back away from Neddie and had retreated to the +knightheads. We saw a beast of a yellow ruffian stab Neddie with a kris, +then one of our own men saw a chance to dart back under the very feet of +our enemies and lay hold of Neddie's collar and drag him groaning up to us. + +They came at us hotly, and we fought them off with pikes and cutlasses; but +we were breathing hard now and our arms ached and our feet slipped. The +circle of steel blades was steadily drawing closer. + +That the end of our voyage had come, I was convinced, but I truly was not +afraid to die. It was no credit to me; simply in the heat of action I found +no time for fear. Parry and slash! Slash and parry! Blood was in my eyes. A +cut burned across my right hand. My musket had fallen underfoot and I +wielded a rusty blade that some one else had dropped. Fortunately the flesh +wound I got from the musket-ball in our other battle had healed cleanly, +and no lameness handicapped me. + +We had no idea what was going on aft, and for my own part I supposed that +Roger and the rest were in straits as sore as our own; but suddenly a +tremendous report almost deafened us, and when our opponents turned to see +what had happened we got an instant's breathing-space. + +"It's the stern-chasers," Davie gasped. "They've faced 'em round!" + +The light of a torch flared up and I saw shadowy shapes darting this way +and that. + +There were two cannon; but only one shot had been fired. + +Suddenly Davie seized me by the shoulder. "See! See there!" he cried +hoarsely in my ear. + +I turned and followed his finger with my eyes. High on the stern of the +junk, black against the starlit sky, I saw the unmistakable figure of +Kipping. He was laughing--mildly. The outline of his body and the posture +and motion of his head and shoulders all showed it. Then he leaped to the +deck and we lost sight of him. Where he had mustered that horde of +slant-eyed pirates, we never stopped to wonder. We had no time for idle +questions. + +I know that I, for one, finding time during the lull in the fighting to +appraise our chances, expected to die there and then. A vastly greater +force was attacking us, and we were divided as well as outnumbered. But if +we were to die, we were determined to die fighting; so with our backs to +the bulwark and with whatever weapons we had been able to snatch up in our +hands, we defended ourselves as best we could and had no more respite to +think of what was going on aft. + +Only one stern gun, you remember, had been fired. Now the second spoke. + +There was a yell of anguish as the ball cut through the midst of the +pirates, a tremendous crash that followed almost instantly the report of +the cannon, a sort of brooding hush, then a thunderous reverberation +compared with which all other noises of the night had been as nothing. + +Tongues of flame sprang skyward and a ghastly light shot far out on the +sea. The junk heaved back, settled, turned slowly over and seemed to spread +out into a great mass of wreckage. Pieces of timber and plank and spar came +tumbling down and a few men scrambled to our decks. We could hear others +crying out in the water, as they swam here and there or grasped at planks +and beams to keep themselves afloat. + + +The cannon ball had penetrated the side of the junk and had exploded a +great store of gunpowder. + +Part of the wreckage of the junk was burning, and the flames threw a red +glare over the strange scene aboard the ship, where the odds had been so +suddenly altered. Our assailants, who but a moment before had had us at +their mercy, now were confounded by the terrific blow they had received; +instead of fighting the more bravely because no retreat was left them, they +were confused and did not know which way to turn. + +Davie Paine, sometimes so slow-witted, seemed now to grasp the situation +with extraordinary quickness. "Come on, lads," he bellowed, "we've got 'em +by the run." + +Again clubbing his musket, he leaped into the gangway so ferociously that +the pirates scrambled over the side, brown men and white, preferring to +take their chances in the sea. As he charged on, I lost sight of him in the +maelstrom of struggling figures. On my left a Lascar was fighting for his +life against one of our new crew. On every side men were splashing and +shouting and cursing. + +Now, high above the uproar, I heard a voice, at once familiar and strange. +For a moment I could not place it; it had a wild note that baffled me. Then +I saw black Frank, cleaver in hand, come bounding out of the darkness. His +arms and legs, like the legs of some huge tarantula, flew out at all angles +as he ran, and in fierce gutturals he was yelling over and over again:-- + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +He peered this way and that. + +"Whar's dat Kipping?" + +Out of the corner of my eye I saw some one stir by the deck-house, and the +negro, seeing him at the same moment, leaped at my own conclusion. + +In doubt whither to flee, too much of a coward at heart either to throw +himself overboard or to face his enemy if there was any chance of escape, +the unhappy Kipping hesitated one second too long. With a mighty lunge the +negro caught him by the throat, and for a moment the two swayed back and +forth in the open space between us and our enemies. + +I thought of the night when they had fought together in the galley door. +Momentarily Kipping seemed actually to hold his own against the mad negro; +but his strength was of despair and almost at once we saw that it was +failing. + +"Stop!" Kipping cried. "I'll yield! Stop--stop! Don't kill me!" + +For a moment the negro hesitated. He seemed bewildered; his very passion +seemed to waver. Then I saw that Kipping, all the while holding the negro's +wrist with his left hand, was fumbling for his sheath-knife with his right. +With basest treachery he was about to knife his assailant at the very +instant when he himself was crying for quarter. My shout of warning was +lost in the general uproar; but the negro, though taken off his guard, had +himself perceived Kipping's intentions. + +By a sudden jerk he shook Kipping's hand off his wrist and raised high his +sharp weapon. + +From the shadow of the deck-house one of Kipping's own adherents sprang to +his rescue, but Davie Paine--blundering old Davie!--knocked him flat. + +For an instant the cook's weapon shone bright in the glare of the torches. +Kipping snatched vainly at the black wrist above him, then jerked his knife +clean out of the sheath--but too late. + +"Ah got you now, you pow'ful fighter, you! Ah got you now, you dirty scut!" +the cook yelled, and with one blow of his cleaver he split Kipping's skull +to the chin. + + + * * * * * + + +When at last we braced the yards and drew away from the shattered fragments +of the junk, which were drifting out to sea, we found that of the lawless +company that so confidently had expected to murder us all, only five living +men, one of whom was Captain Nathan Falk, were left aboard. They were a +glum and angry little band of prisoners. + +Lights and voices ashore indicated that some of our assailants had saved +themselves, and by their cries and confused orders we knew that they in +turn were rescuing others. Of their dead we had no record, but the number +must have been large. + +Of us six who had defied Falk in that time long ago, which we had come to +regard almost as ancient history, only Neddie Benson had fallen. Although +we had laughed time and again at the charming plump lady who had prophesied +such terrible events, it had proved in bitter earnest a sad last voyage for +Neddie. + +From the low and distant land there continued to come what seemed to be +only faint whispers of sound, yet we knew that they really were the cries +of men fighting for their lives where the sea beat against the shore. + +"Ah wonder," said the cook, grimly, "how dem yeh scalliwaggles gwine git +along come Judgment when Gab'el blows his ho'n and Peter rattles his keys +and all de wicked is a-wailin' and a-weepin' and a-gnashin' and can't git +in nohow. Yass, sah. Ah guess dis yeh ol' nigger, he's gwine sit on de +pearly gate and twiddle his toes at 'em." + +He folded his arms and stood in the lantern light, with a dreamy expression +on his grotesque face such as I had seen there once or twice before. When +he glanced at me with that strange affection shining from his great eyes, +he seemed like some big, benign dog. Never had I seen a calmer man. It +seemed impossible that passion ever had contorted those homely black +features. + +But the others were discussing the fate of our prisoners. I heard Roger +say, "Let me look at them, Mr. Cledd. I'll know them--some of them anyway. +Ah, Captain Falk? And the carpenter? Well, well, well! We hadn't dared hope +for the pleasure of your company on the return voyage. In fact, we'd quite +given it up. I may add that we'd reconciled ourselves to the loss of it." + +I now edged toward them, followed by the cook. + +"Ay, Mr. Hamlin, it's all very well for you to talk like that," Falk +replied in a trembling voice from which all arrogance had not yet vanished. +"I'm lawful master of this here vessel, as you very well know. You're +nothing but a mutineer and a pirate. Go ahead and kill me! Why don't you? +You know I can tell a story that will send you to the gallows. What have I +done, but try to get back the owners' property and defend it? To think that +I could have knocked you and that addle-pated Ben Lathrop on the head any +day I wished! And I wished it, too, but Kipping he said--" + +Falk stopped suddenly. + +"So Kipping had a finger in the pie, did he?" said Roger. "Well, Mr. Falk, +what did Kipping say?" + +Falk bit his lip sullenly and remained silent. + +There really was something pathetic in the man's plight. He had been +ambitious, and ambition alone, which often is a virtue, had gone far to +contribute to his downfall. In many ways he was so weak! A quality that in +other men might have led to almost anything good, in him had bred +resentment and trickery and at last downright crime. He stood there now, +ruined in his profession, the leader of a defeated band of criminals and +vagabonds. Yet if he had succeeded in capturing the ship and putting the +rest of us to death, he could have sailed her home to Salem, and by +spreading his own version of the mutiny have gained great credit, and +probably promotion, for himself. + +"Well, Chips," said Roger, "I hope you, at least, are pleased with your +prospects." + +The carpenter likewise made no reply. + +"Hm, Mr. Cledd, they haven't a great deal to say, have they?" + +"Aha," the negro murmured just behind me, "dey's got fine prospec's, dey +has. Dey's gwine dance, dey is, yass, sah, on de end of a rope, and after +dey's done dance a while dey's gwine be leetle che'ubs, dey is, and flap +dey wings and sing sweet on a golden harp. Yass, sah." + +The carpenter shot an angry glance at the cook, but no one else paid him +any attention. + +A fire was flaming now on the distant shore. The seas rushed and gurgled +along the side of the ship. Our lights dipped with the rigging as the ship +rolled and tossed, now lifting her dripping sides high out of water, now +plunging them again deep into the trough. + +"Mr. Cledd, I think we can spare those five men a boat," Roger said, after +a time. + +"You're not going to let them go!" Mr. Cledd exclaimed. + +"Yes." + +Mr. Cledd raised his eyebrows, but silently acceded. + +I thought that an expression of relief crossed Falk's face, yet dismay was +mingled with it. Those were dark, inhospitable lands to leeward. The +carpenter opened his mouth as if to speak, closed it without a word, and +vacantly stared at Roger. The rest of us exchanged glances of surprise. + +When we had hove to, they lowered the boat, fumbling at the falls while +they did so, as if they were afraid to leave the ship. The seas caught the +boat and bumped it against the side, but Falk still lingered, even when +Roger indicated by a gesture that he was to go. + +"Ay," he cried, "it's over the side and away. You're sending us to our +death, Mr. Hamlin." + +"To your death?" said Roger. "Sir, do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Falk glared sullenly, but made no reply. + +"Sir," Roger repeated sharply, "do you wish to return with us to Salem?" + +Still there was no response. + +"Ah, I thought not. Stay here, if you wish. I shall have you put in irons; +I should not be justified in any other course. But in Salem we'll lay our +two stories before the owners--ay, and before the law. Then, sir, if you +are in the right and I am in the wrong, your triumph will repay you many +times over for the discomforts of a few months in irons. No? Will you not +come?" + +Still Falk did not reply. + +"Sir," Roger sternly cried, "if I were to take you back a prisoner to +Salem, you'd go to the gallows by way of the courts. Here you can steer +your own course--though in all probability the port will be the same." + +Without another word Falk went over the side, and down by the chains to the +boat that was bumping below. But before we cast off the painter, he looked +up at us in the light of a lantern that some one held over the bulwark and +cried bitterly, "I hope, Mr. Hamlin, you're satisfied now. I'm rightful +master of that vessel in spite of all your high-handed tricks." + +For the first time I noticed the marks of wounds that he had got in the +fight off the island. His face was white and his eyes were at once fierce +and hunted. + +"You're mistaken," Roger replied. "I have papers from the firm's agent that +appoint me as master." Then he laughed softly and added, "But any time you +wish to carry our little dispute to the courts, you'll find me ready and +willing to meet you there. Too ready, Mr. Falk, for your own good. No, Mr. +Falk, it's better for you that you leave us here. Go your own gait. May you +fare better than you deserve!" + +We cast off the painter, and they rowed into the dark toward the shore of +Java. They were men of broken fortunes, whose only hope for life lay in a +land infested with cut-throat desperadoes. I thought of Kipping who lay +dead on our deck. It seemed to me after all that Falk had got the worse +punishment; he had aspired to better things; weak though he was, there had +been the possibility of much good in his future. Now his career was +shattered; never again could he go home to his own country. + +Yet when all was said and done, it was more merciful to set him adrift than +to bring him home to trial. Though he must suffer, he would suffer alone. +The punishment that he so fully deserved would not be made more bitter by +his knowing that all who knew him knew of his ruined life. + +"Poor Falk!" I thought, and was amazed at myself for thinking almost kindly +of him. + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +"SO ENDS" + + +Through the watches that followed I passed as if everything were unreal; +they were like a succession of nightmares, and to this day they are no more +than shadows on my memory. Working in silence, the men laid the dead on +clean canvas and washed down the decks; cut away wreckage, cleared the +running rigging, and replaced with new sails those that had been cut or +burned in battle. Then came the new day with its new duties; and a sad day +it was for those of us who had stood together through so many hardships, +when Neddie Benson went over the side with a prayer to speed him. We were +homeward bound with all sail set, but things that actually had happened +already seemed incredible, and concerning the future we could only +speculate. + +We had gone a long way on our journey toward the Cape of Good Hope before +our new carpenter had repaired the broken bulwark and the various other +damages the ship had suffered, and before the rigging was thoroughly +restored. Weeks passed, their monotony broken only by the sight of an +occasional sail; days piled on end, morning and night, night and morning, +until weeks had become months. In the fullness of time we rounded Good +Hope, and now swiftly with fair winds, now slowly with foul, we worked up +to the equator, then home across the North Atlantic. + +On the afternoon of a bright day in the fall, more than a year after we +first had set sail, we passed Baker Island and stood up Salem Harbor. + +Bleak and bare though they were, the rough, rocky shores were home. To +those of us who hailed from Salem, every roof and tree gave welcome after +an absence of eighteen months. Already, we knew, reports of our approach +would have spread far and wide. Probably a dozen good old captains, +sweeping the sea, each with his glass on his "captain's walk," had sighted +our topsails while we were hull down and had cried out that Joseph Whidden +was home again. Such was the penetration of seafaring men in those good old +days when they recognized a ship and its master while as yet they could spy +nothing more than topgallantsails. + +We could see the people gathering along the shore and lining the wharf and +calling and cheering and waving hands. We thought of our comrades whom we +had left in far seas; we longed and feared to ask a thousand questions +about those at home, of whom we had thought so tenderly and so often. + +Already boats were putting out to greet us; and now, in the foremost of +them, one of the younger Websters stood up. "Mr. Hamlin, ahoy!" he called, +seeing Roger on the quarter-deck. "Where is Captain Whidden?" + +Roger did not answer until the boat had come fairly close under the rail, +and meanwhile young Webster stood looking up at him as if more than half +expecting bad news. + +Only when the boat was so near that each could see the other's expression +and hear every inflection of the other's voice, did Roger reply. + +"He is dead." + +"We heard a story," young Webster cried in great excitement, coming briskly +aboard. "One Captain Craigie, brig Eve late from Bencoolen, brought it. An +appalling tale of murder and mutiny. As he had it, the men mutinied against +Mr. Thomas and against Mr. Falk when he assumed command. They seized the +ship and killed Mr. Thomas and marooned Mr. Falk, who, while Captain +Craigie was thereabouts, hustled a crew of fire-eating Malays and white +adventurers and bought a dozen barrels of powder and set sail with a fleet +of junks to retake the ship. But that, of course, is stuff and nonsense. +Where's Falk?" + +"Falk," said Roger with a wry smile, "decided to spend the rest of his days +at the Straits." + +"Oh!" Young Webster looked hard at Roger and then looked around the deck. +All was ship-shape, but there were many strange faces. + +"Oh," he said again. "And you--" He stopped short. + +"And I?" Roger repeated. + +Again young Webster looked around the ship. He bit his lip. "What is _your_ +story, Mr. Hamlin?" he said sharply. + +"Is your father here, Mr. Webster?" Roger asked. + +"No," the young man replied stiffly, "he is at Newburyport, but I have no +doubt whatsoever that he will return at once when he hears you have +arrived. This seems to be a strange situation, Mr. Hamlin. Who is in +command here?" + +"I am, sir." + +"Oh!" After a time he added, "I heard rumors, but I refused to credit +them." + +"What do you mean by that, sir?" Roger asked. + +"Oh, nothing much, sir. You evaded my question. What is _your_ story?" + +"_My_ story?" Roger looked him squarely in the eye. In Roger's own eyes +there was the glint of his old humorous twinkle, and I knew that the young +man's bustling self-importance amused him. + +"My story?" Roger repeated. "Why, such a story as I have to tell, I'll tell +your father when I report to him." + +Young Webster reddened. "Oh!" he said with a sarcastic turn of his voice. +"Stuff and nonsense! It may be--or it may not." And with that he stationed +himself by the rail and said no more. + +When at last we had come to anchor and young Webster had gone hastily +ashore and we had exchanged greetings at a distance with a number of +acquaintances, Roger and Mr. Cledd and I sat down--perhaps more promptly +than need be--over our accounts in the great cabin. I felt bitterly +disappointed that none of my own people had come to welcome me; but +realizing how silly it was to think that they surely must know of our +arrival, I jumped at Roger's suggestion that we gather up our various +documents and then leave Mr. Cledd in charge--he was not a Salem man--and +hurry home as fast as we could go. + +As we bent to our work, Mr. Cledd remarked with a dry smile, "I'm thinking, +sir, there's going to be more of a sting to this pirate-and-mutiny business +than I'd believed. That smug, sarcastic young man means trouble or I've no +eye for weather." + +"He's the worst of all the Websters," Roger replied thoughtfully. "And I'll +confess that Captain Craigie's story knocks the wind out of _my_ canvas. +Who'd have looked for a garbled story of our misfortunes to outsail us? +However,--" he shook his head and brushed away all such anxieties,--"time +will tell. Now, gentlemen, to our accounts." + +Before we had more than got well started, I heard a voice on deck that +brought me to my feet. + +There was a step on the companionway, and then, "Father!" I cried, and +leaped up with an eagerness that, boy-like, I thought I concealed with +painstaking dignity when I shook his hand. + +"Come, come, come, you young rascals!" my father cried. "What's the meaning +of this? First hour in the home port and you are as busy at your books as +if you were old students like myself. Come, put by your big books and your +ledgers, lads. Roger, much as I hate to have to break bad news, your family +are all in Boston, so--more joy to us!--there's nothing left but you shall +come straight home with Benny here. Unless, that is--" my father's eyes +twinkled just as Roger's sometimes did--"unless you've more urgent business +elsewhere." + +"I thank you, sir," said Roger, "but I have _no_ more urgent business, and +I shall be--well, delighted doesn't half express it." + +His manner was collected enough, but at my father's smile he reddened and +his own eyes danced. + +"Pack away your books and come along, then. There's some one will be glad +to see you besides Benny's mother. Leave work till morning. I'll wager come +sun-up you'll be glad enough to get to your tasks if you've had a little +home life meanwhile. Come, lads, come." + +Almost before we fully could realize what it meant, we were walking up to +the door of my own home, and there was my mother standing on the threshold, +and my sister, her face as pink now as it had been white on the day long +ago when she had heard that Roger was to sail as supercargo. + +Many times more embarrassed than Roger, whom I never had suspected of such +shamelessness, I promptly turned my back on him and my sister; where upon +my father laughed aloud and drew me into the house. From the hall I saw +the dining-table laid with our grandest silver, and, over all, the +towering candle-sticks that were brought forth only on state occasions. + +"And now, lads," said my father, when we sat before such a meal as only +returning prodigals can know, "what's this tale of mutiny and piracy with +which the town's been buzzing these two weeks past? Trash, of course." + +"Why, sir, I think we've done the right thing," said Roger, "and yet I +can't say that it's trash." + +When my father had heard the story he said so little that he frightened me; +and my mother and sister exchanged anxious glances. + +"Of course," Roger added, "we are convinced absolutely, and if that fellow +hadn't got away at Whampoa, we'd have proof of Kipping's part in it--" + +"But he got away," my father interposed, "and I question if his word is +good for much, in any event. Poor Joseph Whidden! We were boys together." + +He shortly left the table, and a shadow seemed to have fallen over us. We +ate in silence, and after supper Roger and my sister went into the garden +together. What, I wondered, was to become of us now? + +That night I dreamed of courts and judges and goodness knows what penalties +of the law, and woke, and dreamed again, and slept uneasily until the +unaccustomed sound of some one pounding on our street door waked me in the +early morning. + +After a time a servant answered the loudly repeated summons. Low voices +followed, then I heard my father open his own door and go out into the +hall. + +"Is that you, Tom Webster?" he called. + +"It is. I'm told you've two of my men here in hiding. Rout 'em out. What +brand of discipline do you call this? All hands laying a-bed at four in the +morning. I've been up all night. Called by messenger just as I turned in at +that confounded tavern, charged full price for a night's lodging,--curse +that skinflint Hodges!--and took a coach that brought me to Salem as fast +as it could clip over the road. I'm too fat to straddle a horse. Come, +where's Hamlin and that young scamp of yours?" + +I scrambled out of bed and was dressing as fast as I could, when I heard +Roger also in the hall. + +"Aha! Here he is," Mr. Webster cried. "Fine sea-captain you are, you young +mutineer, laying abed at cockcrow! Come, stir a leg there. I've been aboard +ship this morning, after a ride that was like to shake my liver into my +boots. Where's Ben Lathrop? Come, come, you fine-young-gentleman +supercargo." + +Crying, "Here I am," I pulled on my boots and joined the others in the +lower hall, and the three of us, Mr. Webster, Roger, and I, hurried down +the street in time to the old man's testy exclamations, which burst out +fervently and often profanely whenever his lame foot struck the +ground harder than usual. "Pirates--mutineers--young cubs--laying abed-- +cockcrow--" and so on, until we were in a boat and out on the harbor, where +the Island Princess towered above the morning mist. + +"Lathrop'll row us," the old man snapped out. "Good for him--stretch his +muscles." + +Coming aboard the ship, we hailed the watch and went directly to the cabin. + +"Now," the old man cried, "bring out your log-book and your papers." + +He slowly scanned the pages of the log and looked at our accounts with a +searching gaze that noted every figure, dot and comma. After a time he +said, "Tell me everything." + +It was indeed a strange story that Roger told, and I thought that I read +incredulity in the old man's eyes; but he did not interrupt the narrative +from beginning to end. When it was done, he spread his great hands on the +table and shot question after question, first at one of us, then at the +other, indicating by his glance which he wished to answer him. + +"When first did you suspect Falk?--What proof had you?--Did Captain Whidden +know anything from the start?--How do you know that Falk was laying for Mr. +Thomas?--Do you know the penalty for mutiny?--Do you know the penalty for +piracy?--Hand out your receipts for all money paid over at Canton.--Who in +thunder gave you command of my ship?--Do you appreciate the seriousness of +overthrowing the lawful captain?--How in thunder did you force that paper +out of Johnston?" + +His vehemence and anger seemed to grow as he went on, and for twenty +minutes he snapped out his questions till it seemed as if we were facing a +running fire of musketry. His square, smooth-shaven chin was thrust out +between his bushy side-whiskers, and his eyes shot fiercely, first at +Roger, then at me. + +A small swinging lantern lighted the scene. Its rays made the corners seem +dark and remote. They fell on the rough features of the old merchant +mariner who owned the ship and who so largely controlled our fortunes, +making him seem more irascible than ever, and faded out in the early +morning light that came in through the deadlights. + +At last he placed his hands each on the opposite shoulder, planted his +elbows on the table, and fiercely glared at us while he demanded, "Have you +two young men stopped yet to think how it'll seem to be hanged?" + +The lantern swung slowly during the silence that followed. The shadows +swayed haltingly from side to side. + +"No," cried Roger hotly, "we have not, Captain Webster. We've been too busy +looking after _your_ interests." + +The scar where the case-knife had slashed his cheek so long ago stood +starkly out from the dull red of his face. + +At that the old man threw back his head and burst into a great guffaw of +laughter. He laughed until the lantern trembled, until his chair leaned so +far back that I feared he was about to fall,--or hoped he was,--until it +seemed as if the echoes must come booming back from the farthest shore. + +"Lads, lads!" he cried, "you're good lads. You're the delight of an old +man's heart! You've done fine! Roger Hamlin, I've a new ship to be finished +this summer. You shall be master, if you'll be so kind, for an old man that +wishes you well, and"--here he slyly winked at me--"on the day you take a +wife, there'll come to your bride a kiss and a thousand dollars in gold +from Thomas Webster. As for Ben, here, he's done fine as supercargo of the +old Island Princess,--them are good accounts, boy,--and I'll recommend he +sails in the new ship with you." + +He stopped short then and looked away as if through the bulkhead and over +the sea as far, perhaps, as Sunda Strait, and the long line of Sunda +Islands bending like a curved blade to guard the mysteries of the East +against such young adventurers as we. + +After a time he said in a very different voice, "I was warned of one man in +the crew, just after you sailed." His fingers beat a dull tattoo on the +polished table. "It was too late then to help matters, so I said never a +word--not even to my own sons. But--" the old man's voice hardened--"if +Nathan Falk ever again sets foot on American soil he'll hang higher than +ever Haman hung, if I have to build the gallows with my own two hands, Mr. +Hamlin--ay, he or any man of his crew. The law and I'll work together to +that end, Mr. Hamlin." + +So for a long time we sat and talked of one thing and another. + +When at last we went on deck, Mr. Cledd spoke to Roger of something that +had happened early in the watch. I approached them idly, overheard a phrase +or two and joined them. + +"It was the cook," Mr. Cledd was saying. "He was trying to sneak aboard in +the dark. I don't think he had been drinking. I can't understand it. He had +a big bag of dried apples and said that was all he went for. I don't like +to discipline a man so late in the voyage." + +"Let it pass," Roger replied. "Cook's done good work for us." + +I didn't understand then what it meant; but later in the day I heard some +one say softly, "Mistah Lathrop, Ah done got an apple pie, yass, sah. Young +gen'lems dey jest got to have pie. You jest come long with dis yeh ol' +nigger." + +There were tears in my eyes when I saw the great pie that the old African +had baked. I urged him to share it with me, and though for a time he +refused, at last he hesitantly consented. "Ah dunno," he remarked, "Ah +dunno as Ah had ought to. Pies, dey's foh young gen'lems and officers, but +dis yeh is a kind of ambigoo-cous pie--yass, sah, seeing you say so, Ah +will." + +Never did eating bread and salt together pledge a stronger or more enduring +friendship. To this very day I have the tenderest regard for the old man +with whom I had passed so many desperate hours. + +That old Blodgett and Davie Paine should take our gifts to "the tiny wee +girl" at Newburyport we all agreed, when they asked the privilege. "It +ain't but a wee bit to do for a good ship-mate," Blodgett remarked with a +deprecatory wave of his hand. "I'd do more 'n that for the memory of old +Bill Hayden." And just before he left for the journey he cautiously +confided to me, "I've got a few more little tricks I picked up at that 'ere +temple. It don't do to talk about such trinkets,--not that I'm +superstitious,--but she'll never tell if she don't know where they come +from. Ah, Mr. Lathrop, it's sad to lose a fortune, and that's what we done +when we let all them heathen islands go without a good Christian expedition +to destroy the idols and relieve them of their ill-gotten gains." + +The two departed side by side, with their bundles swung over their +shoulders. They and the cook had received double wages to reward their +loyal service, and they carried handsome presents for the little girl of +whom we had heard so much; but it was a sad mission for which they had +offered themselves. No gift on all the green earth could take the place of +poor, faithful old Bill, the father who was never coming home. + +That night, when Roger and I again went together to my own father's house, +eager to tell the news of our good fortune, we found my mother and my +sister in the garden waiting for us. I was not wise enough then to +understand that the tears in my mother's eyes were for a young boy and a +young girl whom she had had but yesterday, but of whom now only memories +remained--memories, and a youth and a woman grown. Nor could I read the +future and see the ships of the firm of Hamlin and Lathrop sailing every +sea. I only thought to myself, as I saw Roger stand straight and tall +beside my sister, with the white scar on his face, that _there_ was a +brother of whom I could be proud. + + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Mutineers, by Charles Boardman Hawes + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MUTINEERS *** + +This file should be named 8mutn10.txt or 8mutn10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, 8mutn11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, 8mutn10a.txt + +Produced by Paul Hollander, Lazar Liveanu +and the PG Distributed Proofreaders + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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