Billy Topsail & Company Part 38

"'I _can't_ get her off,' says I.

"'Yes, you can, too, Skipper Bill,' says he. 'I'll lay you can get her off. I don't know how you'll do it,' says he; 'but _I'll lay you can_!'

"'I'll get her off, Archie,' says I, 'if I got t' jump in the sea an'

haul her off with a line in my teeth.'

"'I knowed you would,' says he; 'an' you got the best teeth, Skipper Bill,' says he, 't' be found on this here coast. As for me, skipper,' says he, 'I'm goin' down t' St. John's if I got t' walk on water. I told my father that I'd be in his office on the first o' September--an' I'm goin' t' be there. If I can't be there with the fish I can be there with the promise o' fish; an' I can back that promise up with a motor boat, a sloop yacht an' a pony an' cart. I don't know how I'm goin' t' get t' St. John's,' says he, 'an' I don't want t' walk on a wet sea like this; but I'm goin' t' get there somehow by the first o' September, an' I'm goin' to a.s.soom'--yes, sir, '_a.s.soom_, Skipper Bill,' says Archie--'I'm goin' to a.s.soom that you'll fetch down the _Spot Cash_ an' the tail an' fins of every last tom-cod aboard that there craft.'

"An' I'm goin' t' _do_ it!" Skipper Bill roared in conclusion, with a slap of the counter with his hairy fist that made the depleted stock rattle on the shelves.

"Does you t-t-think you c-c-_can_ haul her off with your teeth?"

Donald North asked with staring eyes.

Bill o' Burnt Bay burst into a shout of laughter.

"We'll have no help from the Jolly Harbour folk," said Billy Topsail, gravely. "They're good-humoured men," he added, "but they means t'

have this here schooner if they can."

"Never mind," said Skipper Bill, with an a.s.sumption of far more hope than was in his honest, willing heart. "We'll get her off afore they comes again."

"Wisht you'd 'urry up," said Bagg.

With the _Spot Cash_ high and dry--with a small crew aboard--with a numerous folk, clever and unfriendly (however good-humoured they were), bent on possessing that which they were fully persuaded it was their right to have--with no help near at hand and small prospect of the appearance of aid--the task which Archie Armstrong had set Bill o'

Burnt Bay was the most difficult one the old sea-dog had ever encountered in a long career of hard work, self-dependence and tight places. The Jolly Harbour folk might laugh and joke, they might even offer sympathy, they might be the most hospitable, tender-hearted, G.o.d-fearing folk in the world; but tradition had taught them that what the sea cast up belonged righteously to the men who could take it, and they would with good consciences and the best humour in the world stand upon that doctrine. And Bill o' Burnt Bay would do no murder to prevent them: it was not the custom of the coast to do murder in such cases; and Archie Armstrong's last injunction had been to take no lives.

Bill o' Burnt Bay declared in growing wrath to the boys that he would come next door to murder.

"I'll pink 'em, anyhow," said he, as he loaded his long gun. "_I'll_ makes holes for earrings, ecod!"

Yes, sir; the skipper would show the Jolly Harbour folk how near a venturesome man could come to letting daylight into a Jolly Harbour hull without making a hopeless leak. Jus' t' keep 'em busy calking, ecod! How much of this was mere loud and saucy words--with how much real meaning the skipper spoke--even the skipper himself did not know.

But, yes, sir; he'd show 'em in the morning. It was night, now, however--though near morning. n.o.body would put out from sh.o.r.e before daybreak. They had been frightened off once. Skipper Bill's wrath could simmer to the boiling point. But a watch must be kept. No chances must be taken with the _Spot Cash_, and--

"Ahoy, Billy!" a pleasant voice called from the water.

The crew of the _Spot Cash_ rushed on deck.

"Oh, ho!" another voice laughed. "Skipper's back, too, eh?"

"_With_ a long--perf.e.c.kly trustworthy--loaded--gun," Skipper Bill solemnly replied.

The men in the punts laughed heartily.

"Sheer off!" Skipper Bill roared.

But in the protecting shadows of the night the punts came closer. And there was another laugh.

It chanced at Hook-and-Line Harbour before night--Skipper Bill had then for hours been gone towards Jolly Harbour--that a Labrador fishing craft put in for water. She was loaded deep; her decks were fairly awash with her load of fish, and at best she was squat and old and rotten--a basket to put to sea in. Here was no fleet craft; but she was south-bound, at any rate, and Archie Armstrong determined to board her. To get to St. John's--to open the door of his father's office on the first of September as he had promised--to explain and to rea.s.sure and even to present in hard cash the value of a sloop yacht and a pony and a motor boat--was the boy's feverish determination. He could not forget his father's grave words: "Your honour is involved."

Perhaps he exaggerated the importance of them. His honour? The boy had no wish to be excused--had no liking for fatherly indulgence. He was wholly intent upon justifying his father's faith and satisfying his own sense of honourable obligation. It must be fish or cash--fish or cash--and as it seemed it could not be fish it must therefore be cash.

It must be hard cash--cash down--paid on the first of September over his father's desk in the little office overlooking the wharves.

"Green Bay bound," the skipper of the Labrador craft replied to Archie's question.

That signified a landing at Ruddy Cove.

"I'll go along," said Archie.

"Ye'll not," the skipper snapped. "Ye'll not go along until ye mend your manners."

Archie started in amazement.

"_You'll_ go along, will ye?" the skipper continued. "Is you the owner o' this here craft? Ye may _ask_ t' go along; but whether ye go or not is for me--for _me_, ye cub!--t' say."

Archie straightened in his father's way. "My name," said he, shortly, "is Archibald Armstrong."

The skipper instantly touched his cap.

"I'm sorry, skipper," Archie went on, with a dignity of which his manner of life had long ago made him unconsciously master, "for having taken too much for granted. I want pa.s.sage with you to Ruddy Cove, skipper, for which I'll pay."

"You're welcome, sir," said the skipper.

The _Wind and Tide_ lay at Hook-and-Line that night in fear of the sea that was running. She rode so deep in the water, and her planks and rigging and sticks were at best so untrustworthy, that her skipper would not take her to sea. Next morning, however--and Archie subsequently recalled it--next morning the wind blew fair for the southern ports. Out put the old craft into a rising breeze and was presently wallowing her way towards Green Bay and Ruddy Cove. But there was no reckless sailing. Nothing that Archie could say with any appearance of propriety moved the skipper to urge her on. She was deep, she was old; she must be humoured along. Again, when night fell, she was taken into harbour for shelter. The wind still blew fair in the morning; she made a better day of it, but was once more safely berthed for the night. Day after day she crept down the coast, lurching along in the light, with unearthly shrieks of pain and complaint, and lying silent in harbour in the dark.

"'Wisht she'd 'urry up,'" thought Archie, with a dubious laugh, remembering Bagg.

It was the twenty-ninth of August and coming on dark when the boy first caught sight of the cottages of Ruddy Cove.

"Mail-boat day," he thought, jubilantly. "The _Wind and Tide_ will make it. I'll be in St. John's the day after to-morrow."

"Journey's end," said the skipper, coming up at that moment.

"I'm wanting to make the mail-boat," said Archie. "She's due at Ruddy Cove soon after dark."

"She'll be on time," said the skipper. "Hark!"

Archie heard the faint blast of a steamer's whistle.

"Is it she?" asked the skipper.

"Ay," Archie exclaimed; "and she's just leaving Fortune Harbour.

She'll be at Ruddy Cove within the hour."

"I'm doubtin' that _we_ will," said the skipper.

"Will you not run up a topsail?" the boy pleaded.

"Not for the queen o' England," the skipper replied, moving forward.