The Great Quest Part 15

"Yes, sir, and he was asleep all morning--at least, sir, he was in his berth, but I heard him groaning, sir."

"Anything else?"

"Yes, sir. They didn't seem to like the way you and Joe Woods acted about their stories of trading n.i.g.g.e.rs, and they said--"

"Ha!" That Arnold rose suddenly, I knew by the creaking of his bunk.

"And they said, sir--" Willie's voice fell as if he were afraid to go on.

"Yes?"

"And they said--"

"Yes, yes! Come, speak out."

"And they said--" again Willie hesitated, then he continued with a rush, but in a mere whisper--"that they was going to get rid of you two."

For a long time there was silence, then Arnold asked in the same low voice, "Have they laid their plans?"

"They was talking of one thing and another, sir, but in such a way that I couldn't hear."

Again a long silence followed, which Willie MacDougald broke by saying, "Please, sir, it was to-day you was to pay me."

"Ah, yes."

I heard a clinking sound as if money were changing hands; then Willie MacDougald said, "Thank you, sir," and turned the latch.

As he left the stateroom I could not forbear from sticking my head out of the blankets to look after him. He was so small, so young, seemingly so innocent! Yet for all his innocence and high voice and respectful phrases, he had revealed a devilish spirit of hard bargaining by the tone and manner, if not the words, with which he demanded his pay; and I was confounded when, as I looked after him, he turned, met my eyes, and instead of being disconcerted, gave me a bold, impudent grimace.

"He is a little devil," Arnold said with a smile.

"Do you believe what he tells you?"

"Yes, he does not dare lie to me."

"But," said I, "what of his story that they intend to get rid of us?"

Arnold smiled again. "I shall put it to good use."

It was evident enough now where Arnold had learned of the quarrel; and as I noted anew his level, fearless gaze, his clear eyes, and his erect, commanding carriage, I again recalled his words,--who could forget them?--"A man does not tell all he knows." More and more I was coming to realize how little we of Topham had known the manner of man that this Frenchman truly was.

It was with a paradoxical sense of security, a new confidence in my old friend, that I accompanied Arnold to breakfast in the great cabin, where two vacant places and three plates still laid showed that Gleazen and Matterson had long since come and gone, and that Seth Upham was still keeping aloof in his own quarters. But little Willie MacDougald, appearing as ever a picture of childish innocence, a.s.siduously waited on us; and before we were through, Matterson came below, flung his great body into a chair and, calling for gin, settled himself for a friendly chat.

"Yes, lads," he said in his oddly light voice, "I've decided to cast my lot with you. I'm going to ship as mate. Not that I feel I ought,--I really scarce can afford the time for a voyage now,--but Neil Gleazen and Seth Upham wouldn't hear to my not going."

He broadly grinned at me, for he knew well that I had heard every word that pa.s.sed between the three the day before.

"Well, lads," he went on, "it's a great country we're going to, and there's great adventures ahead. Yes,--" he spoke now with a sort of humorous significance, as if he were playing boldly with an idea and enjoying it simply because he was confident that we could not detect what lay behind it,--"Yes, there's great adventures ahead. It's queer, but even here in Cuba a young man never knows what's going to overtake him next. I've seen young fellows, with their plans all laid, switched sudden to quite another set of plans that no one, no, sir, not no one ever thought they'd tumble into. It's mysterious.

Yes, sir, mysterious it is."

That there was a double meaning behind all this talk, I had no doubt whatever, and it irritated me that he should tease us as if we were little children; but I could make no particular sense of what he said, except so far as Willie MacDougald's tale served to indicate that it was a threat; and Arnold Lamont, apparently not a whit disturbed, continued his meal with great composure and, whatever he may have thought, gave no sign to enlighten me.

We had so little to say to Matterson in reply, that he soon left us, and for another day we sat idle on deck or amused ourselves as best we could, The crew had numberless duties to perform, such as painting and caulking and working on the rigging. Arnold Lamont and Sim Muzzy got out the chessmen and played for hours, while Matterson watched them with an interest so intent that I suspected him of being himself a chess-player; and Gleazen and Uncle Seth intermittently played at cards. So the day pa.s.sed, until in the early evening a boat hailed us, and a sailor came aboard and said that Captain Jones of the Merry Jack and Eleanor sent his compliments to Mr. Upham and Mr. Gleazen and would be glad to have all the gentlemen come visiting and share a bowl of punch, at making which his steward had an excellent hand.

My uncle seized upon the invitation with alacrity, for it seemed that he had met Captain Jones in Havana two days since. He called to Gleazen and Matterson, saying with something of his old sharp, pompous manner that they certainly must come, too, and that he was going also to bring Arnold, Sim, and me, at which, I perceived, the two exchanged smiles.

Sim came running aft, ready to complain at the slightest provocation, but too pleased with the prospect of an outing to burst forth on no grounds at all; Neil Gleazen and my uncle led the way toward the quarter-boat in which we were to go; and Arnold followed them.

It did not escape me that both Gleazen and Matterson had held their tongues since the sailor delivered his master's invitation, and that, as they pa.s.sed me, they exchanged nudges. I was all but tempted into staying on board the Adventure. As I meditated on Willie MacDougald's story, and Matterson's allusions,--how significant they were, I could not know,--the silence of the two alarmed me more than direct threats would have done. Why should Gleazen and Matterson look at each other and smile when all the rest--all, that is, except myself--were going down by the chains ahead of them? Would they not, unless they had known more than we about this Captain Jones and his ship, the Merry Jack and Eleanor, have asked questions, or perhaps even have declined to go?

Whatever my thoughts, I had no chance to express them; so over the side I went, close after the rest, and down into the boat where the sailors waited at their oars. To none of us did it occur that it was in any way contrary to the usual etiquette to take Sim Muzzy with us. Except that force of circ.u.mstances had placed him in the steerage, his position aboard the Adventure was the same as Arnold's and mine, or even Gleazen's, for that matter.

Poor Sim! For once he forgot to complain and came with us as gayly as the fly that walked into the spider's parlor. And yet I now hold the opinion,--I was a long, long time in coming to it,--that after all fate was very kind to Simeon Muzzy.

He settled himself importantly in the boat and began to talk a blue streak, as the saying is, about one thing and another, until I would almost have tossed him overboard. Uncle Seth, too, frowned at him, and the strange sailors smiled, and Gleazen and Matterson spoke together in Spanish and laughed as if they shared a lively joke. But Arnold Lamont leaned back and half closed his eyes and appeared to hear nothing of what was going on.

All the way to the Merry Jack and Eleanor, which lay about a quarter of a mile from the Adventure, Gleazen and Matterson continued at intervals to exchange remarks in Spanish; and although Uncle Seth and Arnold Lamont completely ignored them, Sim, who by now had got so used to foreign tongues that they no longer astonished and confused him, took it hard that he could make nothing of what they said and went into a lively tantrum about it, at which the strange sailors chuckled as they rowed.

Pa.s.sing under the counter of the vessel, we continued to the gangway; but just as we came about the stern, Arnold touched my hand and by a motion so slight as to pa.s.s almost unnoticed drew my attention to a man-of-war that lay perhaps a cable's length away.

Under cover of the loud exchange of greetings and the bustle that occurred when the others were going aboard, he whispered, "We are safe for the time being. See! Yonder is a frigate. But either you or I must stay on deck, and if there is aught of an outcry below, he must call for help in such a way that there shall be no doubt of its coming."

"What do you mean?" I whispered.

"Hush! They are watching us."

As we followed the others, Arnold stopped by the bulwark and half leaned, half fell, against it.

"Pardon me, gentlemen," he said in that slow, precise voice, "For the moment I am ill. It is a mere attack of dizziness, but I dare not go below. I must stay in the open air. I beg you will pardon me.

I intend no rudeness."

His face did look pale in the half-light, and the others, whatever their suspicions may have been, said nothing to indicate that they doubted him. When Captain Jones of the Merry Jack and Eleanor came toward us a second time and again with oily courtesy asked us all to the cabin, Gleazen and Matterson made excuses for Arnold, and the rest of us went down into the gloomy s.p.a.ce below and left him in the gangway whence he could watch the hills, which were now dark against the evening sky, and the black masts of the frigate, which stood by like sentries guarding our lives and fortunes.

There was a fetid, sickening odor about the ship, such as I had never before experienced, and the cabin reeked of rum and tobacco.

The skipper had the face of a human brute, and the mate's right hand was twisted all out of shape, as if some heavy weapon had once smashed the bones of it. The more I looked about the dark, low cabin, and the more I saw and heard of the skipper and his mate, the more I wished I were on deck with Arnold. But the punch was brewed in a colossal bowl and gave forth a fragrance of spices, and Sim Muzzy drank with the rest, and for a while the five of them were as jolly as the name of the ship would indicate.

CHAPTER XII

CAPTAIN NORTH AGAIN

First there was talk of old times, for it seemed that Matterson and Gleazen and Captain Jones were friends of long standing. Then there was talk of strange wars and battles, particularly of one battle of Insamankow, of which neither Gleazen nor Matterson had had other news than that which Captain Jones now gave them, and in which it seemed that the British had met with great disaster, although it puzzled me to know wherein such a battle even remotely concerned any of us. After that there was talk of various other things--a murderous plague of smallpox that years before had swept the African coast, a war between the Fantis and Ashantis, a cruiser that they, with oaths and laughter, said had struck her flag in battle with a slaver, a year's journey with desert caravans that traded with the Arabs, and last of all, and apparently most important, curious ways of circ.u.mventing the laws of England and America and of bribing Cuban officers of low degree and high.

All this, in a stuffy little place where the mingled smells of rum and spices and tobacco hung heavily on the air as they grew stale, filled me with disgust and almost with nausea. Vile oaths slipped out between each two sentences, if by rare chance they were not woven into the very warp of the sentences themselves; such stories of barbarous and unbelievable cruelty were told and retold as I cannot bear to call to mind, to say nothing of repeating; and always I was aware of that sickening odor, now strong, now weak, which I had detected before we went below.