Captain Scraggs Part 23

"I'd have to spend about two thousand dollars on her to put her in condition for the voyage," Scraggs replied.

"Can do," Scab Johnny answered him briefly, and Senor Lopez nodded acquiescence. "You discharge on a lighter at Descanso Bay about twenty miles below Ensenada. What'll it cost us?"

"Ten thousand dollars, in addition to fixin' up the _Maggie_.

Half down and half on delivery. I'm riskin' my hide an' my ticket an' I got to be well paid for it."

Again Senor Lopez nodded. What did he care? It wasn't his money.

"I'll furnish you with our own crew just before you sail," Scab Johnny continued. "Get busy."

"Gimme a thousand for preliminary expenses," Scraggs demanded.

"After that Speed is my middle name."

The charming Senor Lopez produced the money in crisp new bills and, perfect gentleman that he was, demanded no receipt. As a matter of fact, Scraggs would not have given him one.

The two weeks that followed were busy ones for Captain Scraggs.

The day after his interview with Scab Johnny and Don Manuel he engaged an engineer and a deck hand and went up the Sacramento to bring the _Maggie_ down to San Francisco. Upon her arrival she was hauled out on the marine ways at Oakland creek, cleaned, caulked, and some new copper sheathing put on her bottom. She was also given a dash of black paint, had her engines and boilers thoroughly overhauled and repaired, and shipped a new propeller that would add at least a knot to her speed. Also, she had her stern rebuilt. And when everything was ready, she slipped down to the Black Diamond coal bunkers and took on enough fuel to carry her to San Pedro; after which she steamed across the bay to San Francisco and tied up at Fremont Street wharf.

The cargo came down in boxes, variously labelled. There were "agricultural implements," a "cream separator," a "windmill," and half a dozen "sewing-machines," in addition to a considerable number of kegs alleged to contain nails. Most of it came down after five o'clock in the afternoon after the wharfinger had left the dock, and as nothing but a disordered brain would have suspected the steamer _Maggie_ of an attempt to break the neutrality laws, the entire cargo was gotten aboard safely and without a jot of suspicion attaching to the vessel.

When all was in readiness, Captain Scraggs incontinently "fired" his deckhand and engineer and inducted aboard a new crew, carefully selected for their filibuster virtues by Scab Johnny himself. Then while the new engineer got up steam, Captain Scraggs went up to Scab Johnny's office for his final instructions and the balance of the first instalment due him.

Briefly, his instructions were as follows: Upon arrival off Point Dume on the southern California coast, he was to stand in close to Dume Cove under cover of darkness and show two green lights on the masthead. A man would come alongside presently in a small boat, and climb aboard. This man would be the supercargo and the confidential envoy of the insurrecto junta in Los Angeles.

Captain Scraggs was to look to this man for orders and to obey him implicitly, as upon this depended the success of the expedition. This agent of the insurrecto forces would pay him the balance of five thousand dollars due him immediately upon discharge of the cargo at Descanso Bay. There was a body of insurrecto troops encamped at Megano rancho, a mile from the beach, and they would have a barge and small boats in readiness to lighter the cargo. Scab Johnny explained that he had promised the crew double wages and a bonus of a hundred dollars each for the trip. Don Manuel Garcia Lopez paid over the requisite amount of cash, and half an hour later the _Maggie_ was steaming down the bay on her perilous mission.

The sun was setting as they pa.s.sed out the Golden Gate and swung down the south channel, and with the wind on her beam, the aged _Maggie_ did nine knots. Late in the afternoon of the following day she was off the Santa Barbara channel, and about midnight she ran in under the lee of Point Dume and lay to. The mate hung out the green signal lights, and in about an hour Captain Scraggs heard the sound of oars grating in rowlocks. A few minutes later a stentorian voice hailed them out of the darkness. Captain Scraggs had a Jacob's ladder slung over the side and the mate and two deckhands hung over the rail with lanterns, lighting up the surrounding sea feebly for the benefit of the lone adventurer who sat m.u.f.fled in a great coat in the stern of a small boat rowed by two men. There was a very slight sea running, and presently the men in the small boat, watching their opportunity by the ghostly light of the lanterns, ran their frail craft in under the lee of the _Maggie_. The figure in the stern sheets leaped on the instant, caught the Jacob's ladder, climbed nimbly over the side, and swore heartily in very good English as his feet struck the deck.

"What's the name of this floating coffin?" he demanded in a chain-locker voice. It was quite evident that even in the darkness, where her many defects were mercifully hidden, the _Maggie_ did not suit the special envoy of the Mexican insurrectos.

"American steamer _Maggie_," said the skipper frigidly. "Scraggs is my name, sir. And if you don't like my vessel----"

"Scraggsy!" roared the special envoy. "Scraggsy, for a thousand!

And the old _Maggie_ of all boats! Scraggsy, old tarpot, your fin! Duke me, you doggoned old salamander!"

"Gib, my _dear_ boy!" shrieked Captain Scraggs and cast himself into Mr. Gibney's arms in a transport of joy. Mr. Gibney, for it was indeed he, pounded Captain Scraggs on the back with one great hand while with the other he crushed the skipper's fingers to a pulp, the while he called on all the powers of darkness to witness that never in all his life had he received such a pleasant surprise.

It was indeed a happy moment. All the old animosities and differences were swallowed up in the glad hand-clasp with which Mr. Gibney greeted his old shipmate of the green-pea trade.

Scraggs took him below at once and they pledged each other's health in a steaming kettle of grog, while the _Maggie_, once more on her course, rolled south toward Descanso Bay.

"Well, I'll be keel-hauled and skull-dragged!" said Captain Scraggs, producing a box of two-for-a-quarter cigars and handing it to Mr. Gibney. "Gib, my _dear_ boy, wherever have you been these last three years?"

"Everywhere," replied Mr. Gibney. "I have been all over, mostly in Panama and the Gold Coast. For two years I've been navigatin'

officer on the Colombian gunboat _Bogota_. When I was a young feller I did a hitch in the navy and become a first-cla.s.s gunner, and then I went to sea in the merchant marine, and got my mate's license, and when I flashed my credentials on the president of the United States of Colombia he give me a job at "dos cienti pesos oro" per. That's Spanish for two hundred bucks gold a month. I've been through two wars and I got a medal for sinkin' a fishin' smack. I talk Spanish just like a native, I don't drink no more to speak of, and I've been savin' my money. Some day when I get the price together I'm goin' back to San Francisco, buy me a nice little schooner, and go tradin' in the South Seas. How they been comin' with you, Scraggsy, old kiddo?"

"Lovely," replied Scraggs. "Just simply grand. I'll pull ten thousand out of this job."

Mr. Gibney whistled shrilly through his teeth.

"That's the ticket for soup," he said admiringly. "I tell you, Scraggs, this soldier of fortune business may be all right, but it don't amount to much compared to being a sailor of fortune, eh, Scraggsy? Just as soon as I heard there was a revolution in Mexico I quit my job in the Colombian navy and come north for the pickin's.... No, I ain't been in their rotten little army....

D'ye think I want to go around killin' people?... There ain't no pleasure gettin' killed in the mere shank of a bright and prosperous life ... a dead hero don't gather no moss, Scraggsy.

Reads all right in books, but it don't appeal none to me. I'm for peace every time, so right away as soon as I heard of the trouble, says I to myself: 'Things has been pretty quiet in Mexico for twenty years, and they're due to shift things around pretty much. What them peons need is a man with an imagination to help 'em out, and if they've got the money, Adelbert P. Gibney can supply the brains.' So I comes north to Los Angeles, shows the insurrecto junta my medal and my honourable discharges from every ship I'd ever been in, includin' the gunboat _Bogota_, and I talked big and swelled around and told 'em to run in some arms and get busy. I framed it all up for this filibuster trip you're on, Scraggsy, only I never did hear that they'd picked on you. I told that coffee-coloured rat of a Lopez man to hunt up Scab Johnny and he'd set him right, but if anybody had told me you had the nerve to run the _Maggie_ in on this deal, Scraggsy, I'd a-called him a liar. Scraggs, you're _mucho-bueno_--that is, you're all right. I'm so used to talkin' Spanish that I forget myself. Still, there's one end of this little deal that I ain't exactly explained to all hands. If I'd a-known they was charterin' the _Maggie_, I'd have blocked the game."

"Why?" demanded Captain Scraggs, instantly on the defensive.

"Not that I'm holdin' any grudge agin you, Scraggsy," said Mr.

Gibney affably, "but I wouldn't a-had you no more now than I would when we was runnin' in the green-pea trade. It's because you ain't got no imagination, and the _Maggie_ ain't big enough for my purpose. Havin' the _Maggie_ sort of puts a crimp in my plans."

"Rot," snapped Captain Scraggs. "I've had the _Maggie_ overhauled and shipped a new wheel, and she's a mighty smart little boat, I'll tell you. I'll land them arms in Descanso Bay all right."

"I know you will," said Mr. Gibney sadly. "That's just what hurts. You see, Scraggsy, I never intended 'em for Descanso Bay in the first place. There's a nice healthy little revolution fomentin' down in the United States of Colombia, with Adelbert P.

Gibney playin' both ends to the middle. And there's a dog-hole down on the Gold Coast where I intended to land this cargo, but now that Scab Johnny's gone to work and sent me a bay scow instead of a sea-goin' steamer, I'm in the nine-hole instead o'

dog-hole. I can never get as far as the Gold Coast with the _Maggie_. She can't carry coal enough to last her."

"But I thought these guns and things was for the Mexicans,"

quavered Captain Scraggs. "Scab Johnny and Lopez told me they was."

Mr. Gibney groaned and hid his face in his hands. "Scraggsy," he said sadly, "it's a cinch you ain't used the past four years to stimulate that imagination of yours. Of course they was purchased for the Mexicans, but what was to prevent me from lettin' the Mexicans pay for them, help out on the charter of the boat, and then have me divert the cargo to the United States of Colombia, where I can sell 'em at a clear profit, the cost bein' nothin' to speak of? Now you got to come b.u.t.tin' in with the _Maggie_, and what happens? Why, I got to be honest, of course. I got to make good on my bluff, and what's in it for me? Nothin' but glory. Can you hock a chunk of glory for ham and eggs, Phineas Scraggs? Not on your life. If it hadn't been for you b.u.t.tin' in with your blasted, rotten hulk of a fresh-water skiff, I'd----"

Mr. Gibney paused ominously and savagely bit the end of his cigar. As for Captain Scraggs, every drop of blood in his body was boiling in defense of the ship he loved.

"You're a pirate," he shrilled.

"And you're just as big a hornet as you ever was," replied Mr.

Gibney. "Always buzzin' around where you ain't wanted. But still, what's the use of bawlin' over spilt milk? We'll drop into San Diego for a couple of hours and take on coal, and about sunset we'll pull out and make the run down to Descanso Bay in the dark.

We might as well forget the past and put this thing through as per program. Only I saw visions of a schooner all my own, Scraggsy, and--well, what's the use? What's the use? Scraggsy, you're a natural-born mar-plot. Always b.u.t.tin' in, b.u.t.tin' in, b.u.t.tin' in, fit for nothin' but the green-pea trade. However, I guess I can turn into my old berth and get some sleep. Put the old girl under a slow bell and save your coal. We'll have to fool away four or five hours in San Diego anyhow and there ain't no sense in crowdin' the old hulk."

"Gib," said Captain Scraggs, "was that really your lay--to steal the cargo, double-cross the insurrecto junta, and sell out to a furrin' country?"

"Of course it was," said Mr. Gibney pettishly. "They all do such things in the banana republics. Why should I be an exception?

There's half a dozen different gangs fightin' each other and the government in Mexico, and if I don't deliver these arms, just see all the lives I'll be savin'. And after I got the cargo into Colombia and sold it, I could have peached on the rebels there, and got a reward for it, and saved a lot more lives, and come away rich and respected."

"By the Lord Harry," said Captain Scraggs, "but you've got an imagination, Gib. I'll swear to that. Gib, I take off my hat to you. You're all tight and shipshape and no loose ends bobbin'

around _you_. Don't tell me th' scheme's got t' fall through, Gib. Great snakes, don't tell me that. Ain't there some way o'

gettin' around it? There _must_ be. Why, Gib, my dear boy, I never heard of such a grand lay in my life. It's a absolute winner. Don't give up, Gib. Oil up your imagination and find a way out. Let's get together, Gib, and make a little money. Dang it all, Gib, I been lonesome ever since I seen you last."

"Well," replied Mr. Gibney, "I'll turn in and try to scheme a way out, but I don't hold out no hope. Not a ray of it. I'm afraid, Scraggsy, we've got to be honest."

Saying which, Mr. Gibney hopped up into his berth, stretched his huge legs, and fell asleep with his clothes on. Captain Scraggs looked him over with the closest approach to affection that had ever lightened his cold gray eye, and sighing heavily, presently went on deck. As he pa.s.sed up the companion-way, the first mate heard him murmur:

"Gib's a fine lad. I'll be dad burned if he ain't."

CHAPTER XIX

At six o'clock next morning the _Maggie_ was rounding Point Loma, heading in for San Diego Bay, and Captain Scraggs went below and awakened Mr. Gibney.