A Master of Fortune Part 16

"Don't mind if I do. It's been tough work persuading him. He's such a suspicious, conscientious little beggar. Shout for your boy to bring the c.o.c.ktail, and when we're alone, I'll tell you about it."

"I'll fix up your drink myself, old man. Where's the swizzle-stick? Oh, here, behind the Angostura bottle. And there's a fresh lime for you--got a basket of them in this morning. Now you yarn whilst I play barmaid."

Mr. Sheriff tucked his feet on the arms of a long-chair and picked up a fan. He sketched in the account of his emba.s.sage with humorous phrase.

The Hebrew had been liberal with his c.o.c.ktail. He said himself that he made them so beautifully that no one could resist a second; and so, with a sigh of gusto, Sheriff gulped down number two and put the gla.s.s on the floor. "No," he said; "no more. They're heavenly, I'll grant, but no more. We shall want very clear heads for what's in front of us, and I'm not going to fuddle mine for a commencement. I can tell you we have been very nearly wrecked already. It was only by the skin of my teeth I managed to collar Master Kettle. I only got him because I happened to know something about him."

"Did you threaten to get him into trouble over it? What's he done?"

"Oh, nothing of that sort. But the man's got the pride of an emperor, and it came to my knowledge he'd been making a living out of fishing in the lagoon, and I worked on that. Look out of that window; it's a bit glary with the sun full on, but do you see those rows of stakes the nets are made fast on? Well, one of those belongs to Captain Owen Kettle, and he works there after dark like a native, and dressed as one. You know he's been so long living naked up in the bush that his hide's nearly black, and he can speak all the n.i.g.g.e.r dialects. But I guessed he'd never own up that he'd come so low as to compete with n.i.g.g.e.r fishermen, and I fixed things so that he thought he'd have to tell white Lagos what was his trade, or clear out of the colony one-time. It was quite a neat bit of diplomacy."

"You have got a tongue in you," said White.

"When a man's as broke as I am, and as desperate, he does his best in talk to get what he wants. But look here, Mr. White, now we've got Kettle, I want to be off and see the thing over and finished as soon as possible. It's the first time I've been hard enough pushed to meddle with this kind of racket, and I can't say I find it so savory that I'm keen on lingering over it."

The Jew shrugged his shoulders. "We are going for money," he said.

"Money is always hard to get, my boy, but it's nice, very nice, when you have it."

Keen though Sheriff was to get this venture put to the trial, br.i.m.m.i.n.g with energy though he might be, it was quite out of the question that a start could be made at once. A small steamer they had already secured on charter, but she had to be manned, coaled, and provisioned, and all these things are not carried out as quickly in Lagos as they would be in Liverpool, even though there was a Kettle in command to do the driving.

And, moreover, there were cablegrams to be sent, in tedious cypher, to London and elsewhere, to make the arrangements on which the success of the scheme would depend.

The Jew was the prime mover in all this cabling. He had abundance of money in his pocket, and he spent it lavishly, and he practically lived in the neighborhood of the telegraph office. He was as affable as could be; he drank c.o.c.ktails and champagne with the telegraph staff whenever they were offered; but over the nature of his business he was as close as an oyster.

A breath of suspicion against the scheme would wreck it in an instant, and, as there was money to be made by carrying it through, the easy, lively, boisterous Mr. White was probably just then as cautious a man as there was in Africa.

But preparations were finished at last, and one morning, when the tide served, the little steamer cast off from her wharf below the Marina, and steered for the pa.s.s at the further side of the lagoon.

The bar was easy, and let her through with scarcely so much as a bit of spray to moisten the dry deck planks, and Sheriff pointed to the masts of a branch-boat which had struck the sand a week before, and had beaten her bottom out and sunk in ten minutes, and from these he drew good omens about this venture, and at the same time prettily complimented Kettle on his navigation.

But Kettle refused to be drawn into friendliness. He coldly commented that luck and not skill was at the bottom of these matters, and that if the bar had shifted, he himself could have put this steamer on the ground as handily as the other man had piled up the branch-boat. He refused to come below and have a drink, saying that his place was on the bridge till he learned from observation that either of the two mates was a man to be trusted. And, finally, he inquired, with acid formality, as to whether his employers wished the steamer brought to an anchor in the roads, or whether they would condescend to give him a course to steer.

Sheriff bade him curtly enough to "keep her going to the s'uth'ard," and then drew away his partner into the stifling little chart-house. "Now,"

he said, "you see how it is. Our little admiral up there is standing on his temper, and if he doesn't hear the plan of campaign, he's quite equal to making himself nasty."

"I don't mind telling him some, but I'm hanged if I'm going to tell him all. There are too many in the secret already, what with you and the two in London; and as I keep on telling you, if one whiff of a suspicion gets abroad, the whole thing's busted, and a trap will be set that you and I will be caught in for a certainty."

"Poof! We're at sea now, and no one can gossip beyond the walls of the ship. Besides Kettle is far too staunch to talk. He's the sort of man who can be as mum as the grave when he chooses. But if you persist in refusing to trust him, well, I tell you that the thought of what he may be up to makes me frightened."

"Now look here, my boy," said White, "you force me to remind you that I'm senior partner here, and to repeat that what I say on this matter's going to be done. I flatly refuse to trust this Kettle with the whole yarn. We've hired him at an exorbitant fee--bought him body and soul, in fact, as I've no doubt he very well understands--and to my mind he's engaged to do exactly as he's told, without asking questions. But as you seem set on it, I'll meet you here; he may be told a bit. Fetch him down."

But as Kettle refused to come below, on the chilly plea of business, the partner went out under the awnings of the upper bridge, where the handsome White, with boisterous, open-hearted friendliness, did his best to hustle the little sailor into quick good humor.

"Don't blame me, Skipper, or Sheriff here either, for the matter of that, for making all this mystery. We're just a couple of paid agents, and the bigger men at the back insisted that we should keep our mouths shut till the right time. There's nothing wrong with this caution, I'm sure you'll be the first to say. You see they couldn't tell from that distance what sort of man we should be able to pick up at Lagos. I guess they never so much as dreamed that we'd have the luck to persuade a chap like you to join."

"You are very polite, sir," said Kettle formally.

"Not a bit of it. I'm not the sort of boy to chuck civility away on an incompetent man. Now look here, Captain. We're on for making a big pile in a very short time, and you can stand in to finger your share if you'll, only take your whack of the work."

"There's no man living more capable of hard work than me, sir, and no man keener to make a competence. I've got a wife that I'd like to see a lot better off than I've ever been able to make her so far."

"I'm sure Mrs. Kettle deserves affluence, and please the pigs she shall have it."

"But it isn't every sovereign that might be put in her way," said the sailor meaningly, "that Mrs. Kettle would care to use."

"I guess I find every sovereign that comes to my fingers contains twenty useful shillings."

"I will take your word for it, sir. Mrs. Kettle prefers to know that the few she handles are cleanly come by."

Mr. White gritted his handsome teeth, shrugged his shoulders, and made as if he intended to go down off the bridge. But Sheriff stopped him.

"We'd better have it out," Sheriff suggested; "as well now as later."

"Put it in your own words, then. I don't seem able to get started. You,"

he added significantly, "know as well as I do what to say."

"Very well. Now, look here, Kettle. This mystery game has gone on long enough, and you've got to be put on the ground floor, like the rest of us. Did you ever dabble in stocks?"

"No, sir."

"But you know what they are?"

"I've heard the minister I sit under ash.o.r.e give his opinion from the pulpit on the Stock Exchange, and those who do business there. The minister of our chapel, sir, is a man I always agree with."

This was sufficiently unpromising, but Sheriff went doggedly on. "I see your way of looking at it: the whole crowd of stock operators are a gang of thieves that no decent man would care to touch?"

"That's much my notion."

"And they are quite unworthy of protection?"

"They can rob one another to their heart's content for all I care."

Sheriff smiled grimly. "That's what I wanted to hear you say, Captain.

This cruise we are on now is not exactly a pleasure trip."

"I guessed that, of course, from the pay that was offered."

"What we are after is this: the Cape to England telegraph cable stops at several places on the road, and we want to get hold of one of the stations and work it for our own purposes for an hour or so. If we can do that, our partners in London will bring off a speculation in South African shares that will set the whole lot of us up for life."

"And who pays the piper? I mean where will the money for your profit come from?"

White was quicker than Sheriff to grasp the situation. "From inside the four walls of the Stock Exchange. S'elp me, Captain, you needn't pity them. There are lots of men there, my friends too, who would have played the game themselves if they had been sharp enough to think of it. We have to be pretty keen in the speculation business if we want to make money out of it."

Captain Kettle b.u.t.toned his coat, and stepped to the further end of the bridge with an elaborate show of disgust. "You are on the Stock Exchange yourself, sir?"

"Er--connected with it, Captain."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "YOU INSOLENT LITTLE BLACKGUARD, YOU DARE TO SPEAK TO ME LIKE THAT!"]

"I can quite understand our minister's opinion of stock gamblers now.

Perhaps some day you may hear it for yourself. He's a great man for visiting jails and carrying comfort to the afflicted."