Swept Out to Sea Part 27

"Well, I never heard of such cheek!" I interrupted.

"Now, you do as I say. Father will pay you back. I'll make him," said Paul, as though he thought the whole thing was cut and dried.

"Why, you shipped for the voyage, didn't you?"

"Ye-es. They said something like that. But I didn't mean it," said my cousin.

"You'll find that sea captains expect a man to abide by the ship's papers. I don't know as Captain Rogers loves you much, but maybe he'll want to keep you just the same."

"He ain't trying to hold you," snarled Paul.

"I never signed on," I replied. "I haven't been a real member of the crew at all. But you were very glad for Captain Rogers to take you out of the clutches of that crimp at Buenos Ayres. You won't get away from the Scarboro so easy."

"I ain't going to stay," he declared, bitterly. "I don't like it. I want to go home."

"The voyage will maybe teach you something, Paul," I said, and I must confess I enjoyed his discomfiture.

"You better help me out o' here," he threatened. "You can do it."

"If I could help you, I wouldn't," I declared, with some heat. "Think I've forgotten what you did to me at the consul's office?"

He grinned a little; but he was angry, too. "You better help me to a pa.s.sage home," he growled.

"Not much!"

"You'll wish you had," he declared. "I'll write your mother and tell her just how you've treated me. I've had a hard time----"

And he actually acted and spoke as though he considered himself ill-used! I never in my life saw such a fellow. Always blaming somebody else for the troubles he brought upon himself. I was soon tired of listening to him.

"Come! stow all that!" I advised him. "You're a member of the Scarboro's crew, and you joined of your own free will. The only reason I see for my trying to get you away from here is to have you arrested and punished for getting hold of my money at Buenos Ayres. I could put you in bad for that. You be thankful you are away down here on the Scarboro, instead of at Buenos Ayres."

"So you won't help me get away?" he snarled.

"No, sir!"

"All right. You wait. You'll be sorry."

"Now, don't threaten me any more," I returned. "I hope this voyage will do you some good. I think you'll learn something before the Scarboro reaches New Bedford again. We'll hope so, anyway."

He only snarled at me as I pa.s.sed on. I had just as little to do with him as possible while I remained aboard the bark. We were at Punta Arenas in a few hours, and the very next morning the bark was warped in beside the tramp steamer and the oil in the whaler's tanks was being pumped aboard the steamship. The men were given short sh.o.r.e leave; but Captain Rogers put Paul Downes in the care of Bill Rudd, the carpenter, and made him responsible for him.

"I ain't got my money's worth out o' that greenhorn yet," declared the skipper. "He ain't earned yet what I had to pay for his board bill in Buenos Ayres. Don't you let him get away, Rudd."

I knew that my cousin would come to no harm with Captain Rogers. The cruise might be the means of making some sort of a man of him, at least.

So I put Paul and his affairs right out of my mind.

There was a steamer touching at Buenos Ayres due through the straits in a couple of days, and I prepared to board her. Once in the big Argentine seaport I would take pa.s.sage on a Bayne Liner for Boston. I was eager for the homeward journey now, although I felt that I never should be tired of the salt water. But, as Lawyer Hounsditch advised, I put Duty ahead of Inclination.

I bade my friends aboard the Scarboro good-bye and went ash.o.r.e, spending the night before I was to sail for the north in a decent house near the landing. I knew my mother would be glad to see me and I had no fear but that, once beside her, I should find means of keeping Mr. Chester Downes at a distance. I had no reason to doubt the future, or what it might hold in store for me. That it did not prove wholly uneventful the reader may discover for himself in the second volume of this series, ent.i.tled: "The Frozen Ship; or, Clint Webb Among the Sealers."

I was not thinking of either romance or adventure, however, when I began my homeward voyage. I expected it to be quite uneventful, and was only anxious to walk into Darringford House, surprise my little mother, and take her once again in my arms!