Fire Mountain Part 19

"I saw you, in the hall," broke in Martin.

"I didn't see you," replied Ruth. "Indeed, I hardly recall pa.s.sing through a hall. I came to my senses when they brought me into a big, lighted room, where Carew sat behind a table. I was--" the girl paused uncertainly, and Martin saw her face was white and strained--"I was frightened. There is no use my disguising the fact--that man terrifies me. He is--he is----"

"He is a scoundrel!" exploded Captain Dabney.

"Yes, but a courageous and resourceful scoundrel," commented Little Billy. He turned to Martin and continued: "Bob Carew is not a new acquaintance of ours. We have had trouble with him before. He is, er----"

"He is possessed of the idea that he loves me," Ruth quietly continued Little Billy's stammering words. "And he is a man who acts upon his ideas. He has made my life miserable for four years. Oh, I am afraid of that man! He is so determined and ruthless. And I would rather be dead than mated with that heartless wretch!"

"Aye, and I would rather see you dead," commented Captain Dabney.

"Carew's life smells to heaven. He is more odorous than those yellow men who own him."

"If you knew the Pacific, you would know Carew," explained Little Billy to Martin. "He is the best and least favorably known blackleg between the two poles. He is an Englishman--the cast-off son of some n.o.ble house, I believe. And he is a cruel, treacherous, brave, and cunning beast! No other words fit him. Add to that a really beautiful body, a brazen gall, and a well-bred and suave carriage, and you have Wild Bob.

He has an apt nickname--'Wild Bob.'

"The man has come through more wild, disreputable escapades than any other three men afloat. He has robbed right and left all over the Pacific. Half the island capitals are closed to him. He robbed the captain, here, when the captain first knew and trusted him. Two years ago, his schooner the _Aileen_ was confiscated by the United States government for opium-running into California. Since that time he has been employed on shares by the same syndicate of j.a.ps who have bought the captain's furs. They gave him the _Yezo_, which he renamed the _Dawn_, the fastest little schooner in the north and south Pacific, and he has been poaching seal for them, up north."

"Aye, and next year he would have ruined my trade, had not their spy cleared out with your secret," rumbled the captain.

"Yes, I have no doubt those gentlemen in Hakodate placed Ichi aboard to spy out our trading secrets," a.s.sented Little Billy. "And Ichi's learning of the million in ambergris awaiting an owner up there in Bering Sea upset their little plan. Ichi fled to Frisco, instead of to j.a.pan, as we thought. He knew Carew and the schooner were in Frisco, and I suppose he turned to Smatt for a.s.sistance in deciphering the code, and also in preparing the _Dawn_ for sea. Carew could not have attended to that personally. He has to keep under cover in United States' territory. I hazard the guess, Blake, that you are not acquainted with all the activities of Mr. Smatt?"

"No," admitted Martin. "Smatt is a very secretive man. All I know of his affairs I learned from handling his court papers; but I know he has many interests I am entirely ignorant of. For instance, I did not know what brought Dr. Ichi to the office, though he and Smatt were very chummy. I thought it was business connected with the Nippon Trading Company. Smatt is American counsel for a j.a.panese firm of that name.

I never heard of the _Dawn_, nor of Carew, before yesterday."

"I guess we are better posted concerning your former employer than you, yourself," informed Little Billy. "Smatt's name is a byword with the Pacific traders--the shrewd old spider! 'Nippon Trading Company' is the same syndicate we have done business with; and those yellow financiers of Hakodate and Tokyo have many irons in the fire besides the fur iron. Opium and coolie smuggling into California--both very profitable. And old Smatt looks after their American interests, fixes officials, keeps them clear of the law. It was Smatt who rescued Carew two years ago.

"I have no doubt that immediately on receipt of Ichi's intelligence, Smatt set about outfitting Carew for a trip to Fire Mountain. But I don't know whether the attempted shanghaiing of Ruth was premeditated or not. Of course, they knew of our presence in the port, and they may have been waiting for a chance to pick up Ruth--aside from Carew's mad infatuation, they may have expected to force from Ruth the lat.i.tude and longitude of Fire Mountain. I would not put a planned kidnaping beyond them. But it doesn't seem probable in the light of our undisturbed efforts to filch the code from you."

"No, I am sure my capture was not the result of forethought," stated Ruth. "I think they just noticed me standing steadfastly in the same position, just across the street from their rendezvous, and naturally they concluded I was a spy of some sort. Indeed, Carew's exclamation, when they brought me before him, is convincing proof that he did not know whom his men had bagged. 'My word, it is my spitfire, Ruth!' he cried. I acted the spitfire, too, and I am afraid I said some very unladylike things to him. But he only laughed in high glee. I was horribly frightened, though I took care he didn't suspect it. I know he meant to take me to sea with him.

"I only faced him for a few moments. There was an interruption from the hall, a banging and a knocking----"

"I did that, kicking a door," said Martin.

"I thought it was Little Billy, also captured," went on Ruth. "I was desperate. And Carew had me thrust into that other room, and the door secured upon me. I heard a commotion and quarreling without, and somebody was thrown into the room next to me. I thought it was Billy, and I tried to communicate by raps. You know, Billy and I have become quite expert in the use of that code; we practised on the pa.s.sage up from the islands. You could not answer me, so I knew it was not Little Billy who had been imprisoned in the next room. I waited patiently and fearfully, until Billy burst open the window."

"Yes, we didn't lose any time starting our rescue," added Little Billy.

"When I saw them haul Ruth into the house, I rushed back to the boat and told the bosun. We reconnoitered. We saw a taxi drive up in front of the saloon, and Carew storm out, and drive off."

"I guess he was bound to see Smatt about the blank sheets of paper in the envelope," said Martin. "I swore up and down that they had been placed there by Smatt."

"Yes, we guessed as much," responded Little Billy. "Well, we encircled the building, discovered that back shed, and decided to try and force entrance from the rear. I hustled back to where we had left our automobile, and got a small steel bar from the tool-box. When I rejoined the bosun, we mounted to the roof of the shed and tackled the windows.

"Luck was with us. You separate prisoners were in the rear of the house. We had a narrow squeak of it, though. Wild Bob returned before we had freed Ruth--that was that engine noise that startled us, Martin--and Wild Bob lived up to his reputation by that vicious pursuit he gave us.

"We won aboard safely, yanked up the hook and slipped out with the tide, without waiting for pilot or clearance. And so--well, now you know all. Remains nothing but for us to extend you a formal welcome to the bosom of the happy family."

Martin became suddenly aware that the recital was ended, and that three unlike, friendly faces were beaming upon him with smiling lips.

Unconsciously, as he had followed the course of the tale with absorbed interest, he had lost sight of the fact of his own intimate connection with the narrated events. He had seemed to be a listener to an interesting fiction. His old habit of identifying himself with the characters in the tales he read had mastered him. Little Billy's recountal, and his own responses and interjections, all seemed part of a melodrama which, played out, would vanish and leave him secure in his accustomed law-abiding world.

Now he suddenly realized that the melodrama was real, that the first act only was ended, and that the last was obscured in the future.

The day had been replete with shocks, but the greatest shock was this, when Martin finally and completely realized that the even course of his life had been rudely and permanently changed, that he had been plucked out of his humdrum niche and cast w.i.l.l.y-nilly into this violent drama by sportive circ.u.mstance. The tumultuous incidents of the previous night arrayed themselves in his mind with something of their true perspective.

He touched his head, and felt the bandage about the forgotten wound.

He became more keenly conscious of his surroundings--the unfamiliar furnishings of the cabin, the careened table, the motion of the ship that had at first disturbed and now soothed him, the measured footfalls of the boatswain, overhead, the sough of the wind aloft.

He looked with fresh eyes upon his companions. They too were actors in the play--the forceful blind man, the lovable cripple, and this blooming, merry-eyed girl whose every glance sent a strange thrill through his being. They were his partners, his shipmates! He was committed with them to this adventure, and he was glad. They, too, seemed glad, for they were smiling a welcome.

"Of course, Martin, we feel rather diffident before you," spoke up Little Billy. "We know it is an outrage, this causing you to lose your comfortable berth ash.o.r.e, and----"

"Say no more about it," interrupted Martin. "You had sufficient provocation for all your actions. And really, believe me, I am very glad I fell in with you. I am glad to be here. I have wanted to go to sea all my life. We are going to Fire Mountain now, aren't we?"

"That's the spirit!" cried the captain heartily. "And you will not lose by your joining us, lad. Even if this venture prove a failure, there is still a mighty good living to be picked up on the Pacific."

"We are a sort of cooperative a.s.sociation," explained Ruth. "We work on shares; something like the whaleman's lay, though more generous. Of course, we pay straight wages to the hands forward. But we of the afterguard work this way: After all expenses of a voyage have been paid, the captain as master and owner takes fifty per cent. of the net profits. The remaining fifty per cent. is divided among the rest of us, not according to rank but pro rata. We want you to join the partnership. You are to share equally with Billy, the bosun, and myself. And if we really find this stuff on Fire Mountain, your share will come to a neat fortune. No, don't start protesting--of course you are ent.i.tled to it."

"And don't commence counting your chickens before they are hatched,"

admonished Little Billy. "It is quite on the cards that we will reach Fire Mountain to discover Carew ahead of us. Or somebody else may have happened upon the stuff during the twenty-five years since Winters died. The last is not probable, but the first is, at least, possible.

It will not do for us to rest in false security. Carew and his backers are sure to have a try for that million on Fire Mountain."

"But he does not know the island's position. I am sure of that!"

objected Ruth.

"But he does know Bering Sea, almost as well as I," spoke up Captain Dabney. "And he knows the particular corner of Bering we are bound for. No--Billy is right. We must not imagine the _Dawn_ isn't on our heels, even now. In any event, he would be setting out for the Kuriles to pick up the seal-herds, about this time; and, knowing Carew as we do, we may prophesy that he will try to find our island. Indeed, the man may have already run across Fire Mountain during his excursions in those waters--he may know its position as well as we do. He'll try to poach on our preserve, no fear.

"That ambergris would represent the profits of a score of seal-raids--and besides, there is you, Ruth, drawing him like a lodestone. His attempt to shanghai you, back there in Frisco, shows the temper of the man. If we meet the _Dawn_ up north, and I have a hunch we shall meet her, we want to keep our eyes open. Meanwhile, we want to make a smart pa.s.sage, and get there first, and away. We want to carry on--by the Lord, crack on to the limit!"

"If it has come to a race, Carew's schooner has the heels of us,"

observed Little Billy.

"Yes, the _Dawn_ is the better sailer," reluctantly admitted the captain. "If the _Coha.s.set_ were ten years younger, I wouldn't admit it, but the old girl isn't quite as limber as she used to be. But the log line isn't everything in an ocean race. I know Bob Carew is a good seaman, but I'll show him a trick or two this pa.s.sage, for all that I'm a blind man!"

"I hope we don't meet him up north. I am afraid," muttered Ruth.

"But haven't you considered that the police may have grabbed Carew, and the rest of that gang, for their part in that street fight?" broke in Martin. "Of course, I didn't see the finish of that affair, but I remember that I saw the police coming just before I fell."

"The police! Lay Carew by the heels!" The captain shook his head.

"No such good luck, I'm afraid. Trust Carew to win clear of the police every time."

"And if they did grab him, you may trust Lawyer Smatt to have procured his release, at least upon bail, ere now. There is the hope, of course, that when you, Martin, shied that gun into his face, he was badly injured," said Little Billy.

"Oh, I hope not!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Martin.

"We hope so," went on Little Billy. "If you had killed him, you would have rendered mankind a service. No such luck, though--the devil never fails to look after his own. He may not have even been stunned. The bosun did not see what happened after you fell--he picked you up and turned tail and ran for it. But I have no doubt Carew's men gathered up their leader and made off ahead of the law's coming. Carew is too much the fox not to have had a getaway prepared; and the clearance we dumped off the Farallones showed that he had the _Dawn_ ready for sea.

I'll wager we didn't beat him out through the Gate by many hours!"