Captain Scraggs Part 15

"'I'll fight you for her,' says Bull very pleasantly.

"'No,' says I, 'I'm opposed t' fightin' a shipmate under such circ.u.mstances, and moreover we're the only two white men aboard, an' if we fight I think I'll kill you, an' then I'd be lonesome.

As a compromise, I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll give Pinky the freedom o' the ship, an' me an' you'll have a cribbage tournament from now until we drop anchor at Santa Maria del Pilar (that's a dog hole on the Guatemala coast). We'll play every chance we get, an' the lad that's ahead when we let go the anchor at Santa Maria del Pilar gets Pinky.'

"'Fair enough,' says Bull, 'an' here's my hand on it.'

"We had a smart pa.s.sage o' fifteen days, and in that time me an'

Bull McGinty plays just one hundred and eighteen games. We had to quit in the middle o' the last, with the score fifty-eight games to fifty-nine in Bull's favour, in order to let go the anchor at Santa Maria del Pilar. While we was up on deck, what do you suppose Pinky goes and does? She slips down to the cabin and fudges my peg three holes ahead. It seems that Bull, who talked the island lingo, has been braggin' to her an' tellin' her what we've been up to. The minute we have the anchor down, me an' Bull returns to the game. It's nip an' tuck to the finish an' I win by one point, Bull dyin' in the last hole, which makes the thing a draw.

"Says I to Bull McGinty: 'Bull, we can't both have her.'

"Says Bull to me: 'I hereby declare this tournament no contest, an' move that we sell the lady with the rest o' the herd, an' no hard feelin's between shipmates.'

"Nothin' could be fairer than that an' I tells Bull I'm willin'.

So we sold Pinky for $200 Mex to Don Luiz Miguel y Orena, an'

sailed away for another flock o' blackbirds.

"We had busy times for the next six months until we found ourselves back at Santa Maria del Pilar with another cargo of savages. But all that time I'd been feelin' a little sneaky on account o' sellin' Pinky, an' as soon as we dropped anchor I had the boys pull me ash.o.r.e, an' I chartered a white mule an' shapes my course for the hacienda of this Don Luiz Miguel y Orena. I was minded to see how Pinky was gettin' on.

"It was comin' on dusk when I rides into Orena's place, an' all th' hands was just in from the fields. The labour shacks was built in a kind of square along with the warehouses, an' in the centre o' this square was a snubbin' post, with bull rings, an'

hangin' to this snubbin' post, with her hands triced up to the bull rings, was Pinky Poui-Slam-Bang with a little Colorado claro man standing off swingin' a rope's end on poor little Pinky's bare back.

"I'm not what you'd call a patient man, McGuffey, an' bein' o'

th' sea and not used to ridin' horses, not to speak o' white mules, I was sore in more ways than one. I luffs up alongside o'

this dry land bo'sum an' punches once. Then I jumps off my white mule, takes the swab by the heels, an' chucks him over the warehouse into a cactus bush. Don Orena was there an' he makes objections to me gettin' fresh with his help so, I tucks Don Orena under my arm, lays him acrosst my knee, and gives him a taste o' th' rope's end. He hollers murder, but I bats him around until he can't let out another peep, after which I grabs a machete that's handy an' chases the entire male population into the jungle. When I gets back, Pinky is hanging to the bull rings, about dead. I cuts her down, swings her on th' mule, an' makes for the coast. We was aboard th' _Dashin' Wave_ next mornin'.

"Bull was settin' up on top o' th' house eatin' an orange when me an' Pinky comes over th' rail.

"'Bull McGinty' says I, 'you're a sea captain. Come down off that house an' marry me to Pinky Poui-Slam-Bang.'

"'With pleasure,' says Bull, an' he done it, announcin' us man an' wife by all th' rules an' regulations o' th' Department o'

Commerce an' Labour, th' _Dashin' Wave_ being registered under th' American flag.

"Six weeks later I sets Pinky down on the beach at Nonuti, an' we both go up to her old man's shack for the parental blessin'. I expected Poui-Slam-Bang would slaughter th' roasted hog upon th'

prodigal's return, but come t' find out, the old boy's been took in a sc.r.a.p with one o' the hill tribes, an' speculation's rife as to his final disposition. Pinky allows that pa's been et up, an'

she havin' no brothers is by all the rules o' the game queen o'

Aranuka. Of course, me bein' her husband, I'm king. You can't get around my rights to the job nohow. For all that Pinky stands in with me, however, a big wild-eyed beggar makes up his mind that he'll make a better king than Adelbert P. Gibney, an' he comes at me with a four-foot war club, with two spikes drove crosswise through the business end o' it. As he swings, I soaks him between the eyes with a ripe breadfruit, with the result that his aim's spoiled an' he misses. So I took his club away an' hugged him until I broke three ribs, an' he was always good after that. I wanted t' be king, but I didn't believe in sheddin' no blood for the mere sake of office.

"Well, McGuffey, I was king of Aranuka for nearly six months. I was a popular king, too, an' there was never no belly-achin' at my decisions. I had a double-barrelled muzzle-loadin' shotgun, a present from Bull McGinty. Bull was all broke up at me desertin'

the _Dashin' Wave_, but I promised to save all the Aranuka trade for him an' for n.o.body else, an' he stood off for Suva to get himself another mate.

"At first it was great business bein' king, an' I enjoyed it. I learned Pinky to speak a little English an' she learned me her lingo, an' we got along mighty fine. Pinky would lay awake nights, snoopin' around listenin' to what the rest o' the gang had to say about me, and twice she put me wise to uprisin's that threatened my throne. I used to get the ring leaders in my arms an' hug 'em, an' after one hug from Adelbert P. Gibney in them days----

"Well, as I was sayin', it was nice enough until the novelty wore off, an' there was nothin' to do that I hadn't done twenty times before. I thought some o' goin' to war with the wild n.i.g.g.e.rs in the hills, an' avengin' my father-in-law's death, but I couldn't get my army more than three miles inland, so I had to give that up. Before three months had pa.s.sed I wanted to abdicate the worst way. I wanted to tread a deck again, an' rove around with Bull McGinty. I wanted th' smell o' the open sea an' th' heave o' th'

_Dashin' Wave_ underfoot. I was tired o' breadfruit an' guavas an' cocoanuts an' all th' rest o' th' blasted grub that Pinky was feedin' me, an' most of all I was gettin' tired o' Pinky. She _would_ put cocoanut oil in her hair. Yet (here Mr. Gibney's voice vibrated with emotion as he conjured up these memories of his lurid past) it never occurred to me, at the time, I was that young an' foolish, that she was doin' it for _me_. She was as beautiful as ever, an' Gawd knows n.o.body but a fool would get tired o' such a fine woman, every inch a queen, but I was just that foolish.

"I got so lonesome I wouldn't eat. I wished McGinty would show up an' relieve me of my kingship. An' one night sure enough he came.

It was moonlight--you've been in the tropics, McGuffey, you know what real moonlight is--an' I was lyin' out on th' edge of Hakatuea overlookin' the beach. I'd spotted a sail at sunset an'

somethin' told me it was the _Dashin' Wave_. Pinky was with me, rubbin' my head an' braidin' my whiskers an' cooin' over me like a baby, as happy as any woman could be.

"Along about ten o'clock, I should say, here comes the _Dashin'

Wave_ around the headland. I could see her luff up an' come about with her bow headed straight for the entrance between the reefs, an' th' water purlin' under her forefoot. Everything was as still as the grave, an' only the surf was swishin' up th' beach sobbin'

'Peace! Peace!' and there wasn't no peace for King Gibney. Pretty soon I heard the creak of the blocks an' the smash o' th' mast hoops as th' mains'l came flutterin' down--then th' sound o' the cable rushin' through the hawsepipes as her hook took bottom. In the moonlight I could see Bull McGinty standin' by the port mizzen shrouds with a megaphone up to his face, and his voice comes up to me like the bugle blast of Kingdom Come.

"'O, Gib! Are you there?'

"'Aye, aye, sir.'

"'Have ye et your full o' th' lotus?' says Bull.

"'Hard tack an' salt horse for King Gibney,' I yells back. 'I ain't no vegetarian no more, Bull. Do you need a smart mate?'

"I could hear Bull McGinty chucklin' to himself.

"'You young whelp,' says Bull. 'I knew you'd outgrow it. They all do, when they're as young as you. I'll send the whaleboat ash.o.r.e.

Kiss Pinky good-bye for me, too,' he adds.

"Two minutes later I heard the boat splash over the stern davits an' the black boys raisin' a song as they lay to their work. I turns to Pinky, takes her in my arms an' kisses her for the first time in three weeks, an' she knows that th' jig is up. She might 'a' slipped a dirk in me, but she wasn't that kind. Women is women, McGuffey, the world over. Pinky just kissed me half a hundred times an' cries a little, holdin' on to me all th' time, for naturally she don't like to see me go. Finally I have to make her break loose, an' I climbs down over the bluff an' wades out to my waist to meet the boat. I was aboard th' _Dashin' Wave_ in two twos, shakin' hands with Bull McGinty, an' ten minutes later we had th' anchor up an' th' sails shook out, an' standin' off for the open sea. An' the last I ever saw of Mrs. Pinky Gibney was a shadowy figger in th' moonlight standin' out on th' edge o'

Hakatuea Head. The last I hear of her was a sob."

Mr. Gibney's voice was a trifle husky as he concluded his tale.

He opened and closed his clasp knife and was silent for several minutes. Presently he sighed.

"When a feller's young, he never stops to think o' th' hurt he does," continued the erstwhile king of Aranuka. "Sometimes I lay awake at nights an' wonder whatever became o' Pinky. I can see her yet, standin' in th' moonlight, as fine a figger o' a woman as ever lived. Savage or no savage, she was true an' beautiful, an' I was a mighty dirty dawg." Mr. Gibney wiped away a suspicious moisture in his eyes and blew his nose unnecessarily hard.

"You was," coincided McGuffey. "You was all o' that. What became o' Bull McGinty?"

"He married a sugar plantation in Maui. He's all right for the rest o' his life. An' as for me as gave him his start, look at me. Ain't I a sight? Here I am, forty-two years old an' only a thousand dollars in my pocket. Instead of bein' master of a clipper ship, I'm mate on a dirty little b.u.mboat. I fall asleep on deck an' dream an' somethin' drops on my face an' wakes me up.

Is it a breadfruit, Mac? It is not. It's a head of cabbage. I grab something to throw at Scraggs's cat. Is it a ripe mango? No, it's a artichoke. In fancy I go to split open a milk cocoanut.

What happens? I slash my thumb on a can o' condensed cream.

Instead o' th' Island trade, I'm runnin' in th' green-pea trade, twenty miles of coast, freightin' garden truck! My Gawd!"

Mr. Gibney stood up and dusted the seat of his new suit. He was dry after his long recital and Captain Scraggs was too long putting in an appearance, so he decided not to wait for him.

"Let's go an' stow away a gla.s.s of beer," he suggested to McGuffey. "I'm thirstier'n a camel."

McGuffey was willing so they left the bulkhead for the more convivial shelter of the Bowhead saloon.

CHAPTER XV

Had either Gibney or McGuffey glanced back as they headed for their haven of forgetfulness they might have seen Captain Scraggs poking his fox face up over the edge of a tier of potato boxes piled on the bulkhead not six feet from where Gibney and McGuffey had been sitting. Upon his return to the _Maggie_, about the time Mr. Gibney commenced spinning his yarn, he had almost walked into the worthy pair, and, wishing to avoid the jeers and jibes he felt impending, he had merely stepped aside and hidden behind the potato boxes in order to eavesdrop on their plans, if possible.

Had Mr. Gibney been less interested in his past or Mr. McGuffey less interested in the recital of that past they would have seen Scraggs.

The owner of the _Maggie_ shook his fist in impotent rage at their retreating backs. "You think you've suffered before," he snarled. "But I'll make you suffer some more, you big brute. I'll hurt you worse than if I caved in your head with a belayin' pin.

I'll break your heart, that's what I'll do to you. You wait."