Captain Scraggs Part 9

"You done me dirt. You quit me cold. Git out. Two can play at a dirty game an' every dog must have his day. This is my day, Gib.

Scat!"

"Pers'nally," McGuffey announced quietly, "I prefer to die aboard the _Maggie_, if I have to. This ain't movin' day with B.

McGuffey, Esquire."

"Them's my sentiments, too, Scraggsy."

"Then defend yourselves. Come on, lads. Bear a hand an' we'll bounce these muckers overboard." The Squarehead hung back having no intention of waging war upon his late comrades, but the engineer and the new navigating officer stepped briskly forward, for they were about to fight for their jobs. Mr. Gibney halted the advance by lifting both great hands in a deprecatory manner.

"For Heaven's sake, Scraggsy, have a heart. Don't force us to murder you. If we're peaceable, what's to prevent you from givin'

us a pa.s.sage back to San Francisco, where we're known an' where we'll have at least a fightin' chance to git somethin' to eat occasionally."

"You know mighty well what's to prevent me, Gib. I ain't got no pa.s.senger license, an' I'll be keel-hauled an' skull-dragged if I fall for your cute little game, my son. I ain't layin' myself liable to a fine from the Inspectors an' maybe have my ticket book took away to boot."

"You could risk your danged old ticket. It ain't no use to you on salt water anyhow," McGuffey jeered insultingly.

"We can work our pa.s.sage an' who's to know the difference, Scraggsy?"

"You for one an' McGuffey for two. You'd have the bulge on me forever after. You could blackmail me until I da.s.sen't call my ship my own."

"Don't worry, you snipe. n.o.body else will ever hanker to own her." Another insult from McGuffey. Having made up his mind that a fight was inevitable, the honest fellow was above pleading for mercy.

"Enough of this gab," Mr. Gibney roared. "My patience is exhausted. I'm dog-tired an' I'm goin' to have peace if I have to fight for it. Me an' Bart stays aboard the steamer _Maggie_ until she gets back to Frisco town or until we're hove overboard in the interim by the weight of numbers. An' if any man, or set o' male bipeds that calls theirselves men, is so foolish as to try to evict us from this packet, then all I got to say is that they're triflin' with death." (Here Mr. Gibney thrust out his superb chest and thumped it with his h.o.r.n.y fists, after the fashion of an enraged gorilla. This was sheer bluff, however, for while there was not a drop of craven blood in the Gibney veins, he realized that his footwork, in the event of battle, would be sadly deficient and he hesitated to wage a losing fight.) "I got my arms left, even if my feet is on the fritz, Scraggs," he continued, "an' if you start anything I'll hug you an' your crew to death. I'm a rip-roarin' grizzly bear once I'm started an'

there's such a thing as drivin' a man to desperation."

The bluff worked! Captain Scraggs turned to his retainers and with a condescending and paternal smile, said: "Boys, let's give the dumb fools their own way. If they insist upon takin' forcible possession o' my ship on the high seas, there's only one name for the crime--an' that's piracy, punishable by hangin' from the yard-arm. We'll just let 'em stay aboard an' turn 'em over to the police when we git back to the city."

He started for his cabin and the crew, vastly relieved, followed him. The pirates once more sat down and permitted their hot feet to loll overboard.

"It's cold down here nights, Gib," McGuffey opined presently.

"Where're we goin' to sleep?"

"In our old berths, of course." The success of his bluff had operated on Gibney like a tonic. "Hop into your shoes, Bart, an'

we'll snake them two scabs out o' their berths in jig time."

"I'm dodgin' fights to-night, Gib. Let's borrow a blanket or two from The Squarehead an' curl up on deck. It'll be warm over the engine-room gratin'."

Mr. Gibney yawned. "I guess you're right, Bart. While you're at it, make Scraggs come through with a blanket an' an overcoat for a pillow. Run up an' threaten him. He'll wilt."

So McGuffey staggered forward. What arguments he used shall not be recorded here. Suffice it, he returned with what he went after.

CHAPTER XI

The pirates were early astir; so early, in fact, that long before Captain Scraggs and his crew appeared on deck, Messrs. Gibney and McGuffey had quietly cooked breakfast in the galley. They ate six eggs each and consumed the only loaf of bread aboard, for which act of vandalism they were rewarded half an hour later by the sight of Captain Scraggs dancing on a new brown derby.

"It's a wonder that bird wouldn't get him a soft hat to do his jumpin' on," McGuffey remarked. "He's ruined enough good hats to have paid for the new boiler. Yes, sir, whenever ol' Scraggsy gets mad he most certainly gets hoppin' mad."

"It'll soak into his head after a while that us two mean business, Mac, an' he'll get sensible an' fire them outsiders.

I'm lookin' for him to make peace before noon."

About ten o'clock that morning the little vessel completed taking on her cargo, the lines were cast off, and the homeward voyage was begun. As she hauled away from the wharf, Messrs. Gibney and McGuffey might have been observed seated on the stern bitts smoking, the picture of contentment. Pirates under the law they might be, but of this they knew nothing and cared less. With them, self-preservation was, indeed, the first law of human nature.

They were still seated on the stern bitts as the _Maggie_ came abreast the Point Montara fog signal station, when Mr. Gibney observed a long telescope poking out the side window of the pilot house. "h.e.l.lo," he muttered, "Scraggsy's seein' things," and following the direction in which the telescope was pointing he made out a large bark standing in dangerously close to the beach.

In fact, the breakers were tumbling in a long white streak over the reefs less than a quarter of a mile from her. She was lying stern on to the beach, with one anchor out.

In an instant all was excitement aboard the _Maggie_. "That looks like an elegant little pick-up. She's plumb deserted," Scraggs shouted to his navigating officer. "I don't see any distress signals flyin' an' yet she's got an anchor out while her canvas is hangin' so-so."

"If she had any hands aboard, you'd think they'd have sense enough to clew up her courses," the mate answered.

At this juncture, Mr. Gibney and McGuffey, unable to restrain their curiosity, and forgetful of the fact that they were pirates with very sore feet, came running over the deckload and invaded the pilot house. "Gimme that gla.s.s, you sock-eyed salmon, you,"

Gibney ordered Scraggs, and tore the telescope from the owner's hands. "There ain't enough real seamanship in the crew o' this craft to tax the mental make-up of a Chinaman. Hum--m--m!

American bark _Chesapeake_. Starboard anchor out; yards braced a-box; royals an' to'-gallan'-s'ls clewed up; courses hangin' in the buntlines an' clew garnets, Stars-an'-Stripes upside down."

He lowered the gla.s.s and roared at Neils Halvorsen, who was at the wheel, "Starboard your helm, Squarehead. Don't be afraid of her. We're goin' over there an' hook on to her. I should say she is a pick-up."

Mr. Gibney had abdicated as a pirate and a.s.sumed command of the S.S. _Maggie_. With the memory of a scant breakfast upon him, however, Captain Scraggs was still harsh and bitter.

"Git out o' my pilot house an' aft where the police can find you when they come lookin' for you," he screeched. "Don't you give no orders to my deckhand."

"Stow it, you a.s.s. Don't fly in the face of your own interests, Scraggsy, you bandit. Yonder's a prize, but it'll require imagination to win it; consequently you need Adelbert P. Gibney in your business, if you're contemplatin' hookin' on to that bark, snakin' her into San Francis...o...b..y, an' libelin' her for ten thousand dollars' salvage. You an' me an' Mac an' The Squarehead here have sailed this strip o' coast too long together to quarrel over the first good piece o' salvage we ever run into.

Come, Scraggsy. Be decent, forget the past, an' let's dig in together."

"If I had a gun," Scraggs cried, "I do believe I'd shoot you. Git out o' my pilot house, I tell you, or I'll stick a knife in you.

I'll carve your gizzard, you black-guardin' pirate."

Inasmuch as Scraggs really did produce a knife, Mr. Gibney backed prudently away. "You're mighty quick to let bygones be bygones when you see me with a fortune in sight with you wantin' to horn in on the deal, ain't you?" the owner jeered. "You must think I'm a born fool."

"I don't think it a-tall. I know it. You're worse'n a born fool.

You're sufferin' from acquired idiocy, which is the mental state folks find themselves in when they refuse to learn by experience an' profit by example. I've always claimed you ain't got no more imagination than a chicken, an' I'll prove it to you right now.

Here you are, braggin' about how you're goin' to salvage that bark but givin' no thought whatever to the means to be employed.

How're you goin' to pull her off? If the _Maggie_ ever had a towline aboard I never seen it. Perhaps, however, you're figgerin' on poolin' all the shoestrings aboard."

"Every ship that size has a steel towin' cable, wound up on a reel, nice an' handy," the new navigating officer reminded Mr.

Gibney. "I can put the skiff out, get the bark's line, haul it back, an' make it fast on the bitts you two skunks has been occupyin' instead of a prison cell."

"h.e.l.lo! There's another county gone Democratic. Your old man must ha' been to sea once an' told you about it. Them bitts won't hold."

"I'll make the towline fast to the mainmast."

"That'll hold, I admit. But has the _Maggie_ got power enough, what with the load she's totin' now, to tow that big bark in to San Francis...o...b..y?"

"Oh, we'll take it easy an' get there some time," Scraggs chipped in.

"You bet you'll take it easy--easier'n you think. Before you start towin' that bark, you'll have to clew up her canvas a whole lot to make the towin' easier, an' who's goin' to do that? An'

you got to have a man at her wheel."