Captain Brassbound's Conversion Part 17

REDBROOK (hastily). Shut up, you fool. (He elbows Drinkwater into the background.)

KEARNEY (surprised and rather suspicious). Well, I hardly understahnd this. However, if you are Captain Bra.s.sbound, you can take your place with the rest. (Bra.s.sbound joins Redbrook and Johnson. Kearney sits down again, after inviting Lady Cicely, with a solemn gesture, to take the vacant chair.) Now let me see. You are a man of experience in these matters, Sir Howard Hallam. If you had to conduct this business, how would you start?

LADY CICELY. He'd call on the counsel for the prosecution, wouldn't you, Howard?

SIR HOWARD. But there is no counsel for the prosecution, Cicely.

LADY CICELY. Oh yes there is. I'm counsel for the prosecution. You mustn't let Sir Howard make a speech, Captain Kearney: his doctors have positively forbidden anything of that sort. Will you begin with me?

KEARNEY. By your leave, Lady Waynfiete, I think I will just begin with myself. Sailor fashion will do as well here as lawyer fashion.

LADY CICELY. Ever so much better, dear Captain Kearney. (Silence.

Kearney composes himself to speak. She breaks out again). You look so nice as a judge!

A general smile. Drinkwater splutters into a half suppressed laugh.

REDBROOK (in a fierce whisper). Shut up, you fool, will you? (Again he pushes him back with a furtive kick.)

SIR HOWARD (remonstrating). Cicely!

KEARNEY (grimly keeping his countenance). Your ladyship's cawmpliments will be in order at a later stage. Captain Bra.s.sbound: the position is this. My ship, the United States cruiser Santiago, was spoken off Mogador latest Thursday by the yacht Redgauntlet. The owner of the aforesaid yacht, who is not present through having sprained his ankle, gave me sertn information. In cawnsequence of that information the Santiago made the twenty knots to Mogador Harbor inside of fifty-seven minutes. Before noon next day a messenger of mine gave the Cadi of the district sertn information. In cawnsequence of that information the Cadi stimulated himself to some ten knots an hour, and lodged you and your men in Mogador jail at my disposal. The Cadi then went back to his mountain fahstnesses; so we shall not have the pleasure of his company here to-day. Do you follow me so far?

BRa.s.sBOUND. Yes. I know what you did and what the Cadi did. The point is, why did you do it?

KEARNEY. With doo patience we shall come to that presently. Mr. Rahnkin: will you kindly take up the parable?

RANKIN. On the very day that Sir Howrrd and Lady Cicely started on their excursion I was applied to for medicine by a follower of the Sheikh Sidi el a.s.sif. He told me I should never see Sir Howrrd again, because his master knew he was a Christian and would take him out of the hands of Captain Bra.s.sbound. I hurried on board the yacht and told the owner to scour the coast for a gunboat or cruiser to come into the harbor and put persuasion on the authorities. (Sir Howard turns and looks at Rankin with a sudden doubt of his integrity as a witness.)

KEARNEY. But I understood from our chahplain that you reported Captain Bra.s.sbound as in league with the Sheikh to deliver Sir Howard up to him.

RANKIN. That was my first hasty conclusion, Captain Kearney. But it appears that the compact between them was that Captain Bra.s.sbound should escort travellers under the Sheikh's protection at a certain payment per head, provided none of them were Christians. As I understand it, he tried to smuggle Sir Howrrd through under this compact, and the Sheikh found him out.

DRINKWATER. Rawt, gavner. Thet's jest ah it wors. The Kepn--

REDBROOK (again suppressing him). Shut up, you fool, I tell you.

SIR HOWARD (to Rankin). May I ask have you had any conversation with Lady Cicely on this subject?

RANKIN (naively). Yes. (Sir Howard qrunts emphatically, as who should say "I thought so." Rankin continues, addressing the court) May I say how sorry I am that there are so few chairs, Captain and gentlemen.

KEARNEY (with genial American courtesy). Oh, THAT's all right, Mr.

Rahnkin. Well, I see no harm so far: it's human fawlly, but not human crime. Now the counsel for the prosecution can proceed to prosecute. The floor is yours, Lady Waynflete.

LADY CICELY (rising). I can only tell you the exact truth--

DRINKWATER (involuntarily). Naow, down't do thet, lidy--

REDBROOK (as before). SHUT up, you fool, will you?

LADY CICELY. We had a most delightful trip in the hills; and Captain Bra.s.sbound's men could not have been nicer--I must say that for them--until we saw a tribe of Arabs--such nice looking men!--and then the poor things were frightened.

KEARNEY. The Arabs?

LADY CICELY. No: Arabs are never frightened. The escort, of course: escorts are always frightened. I wanted to speak to the Arab chief; but Captain Bra.s.sbound cruelly shot his horse; and the chief shot the Count; and then--

KEARNEY. The Count! What Count?

LADY CICELY. Marzo. That's Marzo (pointing to Marzo, who grins and touches his forehead).

KEARNEY (slightly overwhelmed by the unexpected profusion of incident and character in her story). Well, what happened then?

LADY CICELY. Then the escort ran away--all escorts do--and dragged me into the castle, which you really ought to make them clean and whitewash thoroughly, Captain Kearney. Then Captain Bra.s.sbound and Sir Howard turned out to be related to one another (sensation); and then of course, there was a quarrel. The Hallams always quarrel.

SIR HOWARD (rising to protest). Cicely! Captain Kearney: this man told me--

LADY CICELY (swiftly interrupting him). You mustn't say what people told you: it's not evidence. (Sir Howard chokes with indignation.)

KEARNEY (calmly). Allow the lady to proceed, Sir Howard Hallam.

SIR HOWARD (recovering his self-control with a gulp, and resuming his seat). I beg your pardon, Captain Kearney.

LADY CICELY. Then Sidi came.

KEARNEY. Sidney! Who was Sidney?

LADY CICELY. No, Sidi. The Sheikh. Sidi el a.s.sif. A n.o.ble creature, with such a fine face! He fell in love with me at first sight--

SIR HOWARD (remonstrating). Cicely!

LADY CICELY. He did: you know he did. You told me to tell the exact truth.

KEARNEY. I can readily believe it, madam. Proceed.

LADY CICELY. Well, that put the poor fellow into a most cruel dilemma.

You see, he could claim to carry off Sir Howard, because Sir Howard is a Christian. But as I am only a woman, he had no claim to me.

KEARNEY (somewhat sternly, suspecting Lady Cicely of aristocratic atheism). But you are a Christian woman.

LADY CICELY. No: the Arabs don't count women. They don't believe we have any souls.

RANKIN. That is true, Captain: the poor benighted creatures!

LADY CICELY. Well, what was he to do? He wasn't in love with Sir Howard; and he WAS in love with me. So he naturally offered to swop Sir Howard for me. Don't you think that was nice of him, Captain Kearney?

KEARNEY. I should have done the same myself, Lady Waynflete. Proceed.

LADY CICELY. Captain Bra.s.sbound, I must say, was n.o.bleness itself, in spite of the quarrel between himself and Sir Howard. He refused to give up either of us, and was on the point of fighting for us when in came the Cadi with your most amusing and delightful letter, captain, and bundled us all back to Mogador after calling my poor Sidi the most dreadful names, and putting all the blame on Captain Bra.s.sbound. So here we are. Now, Howard, isn't that the exact truth, every word of it?

SIR HOWARD. It is the truth, Cicely, and nothing but the truth. But the English law requires a witness to tell the WHOLE truth.