The Island Treasure Part 24

"Wer ye ez frit ez I wer jest now?" asked Hiram quizzingly. "Mind, quite ez much ez I wer?"

"Ay, bo," replied Tom, "I dessay I were, if the truth be told."

This pleased Hiram immensely.

"Then, I guess I don't see whaar yer crow comes in, my joker!" he exclaimed, giving Tom a similar thump on the back to that which he had a short time before bestowed on Sam--a slight token of affection by no means to be sneezed at. "Why, ye wer cacklin' like a durned old hen with one egg, 'bout Cholly an' I bein' frit jest now, thinkin' we seed Sam's ghostess, when hyar, ye sez now, ye wer frit yerself the same at the fust sight ye seed of him!"

"Ay, bo; but I wern't going to tell you that, nor 'bout another fright I next had, when the darkey and I were a-smoking down in the forepeak and nearly set the ship a-fire," said Tom knowingly, with a shrewd, expressive wink to each of us respectively in turn, before he resumed his story. "But, to go on properly with my yarn from the beginning, when I found Sam's head wasn't a mop, but belonged to his real darkey self, and that he wasn't drownded after all, why, I made him as snug as I could down below, thinking it were best for him to keep hid, for if the skipper saw him on dock and knew he were alive he would soon be shooting him again, or else ill-treating him in the way he had already done. Sam agreed to act by my advice on my promising to take him down grub and all he might want into the forepeak; but, bless you, the contrary darkey wouldn't act up to this arrangement arter a day or two."

"Dat was 'cause yer hab forget to bring de grub," interposed Sam, to explain this apparent breach of contract on his part. "I'se cook, an'

not used fo' ter go widout my vittles fo' n.o.body!"

"How could I get below to you when we had bad weather and the hatches were battened down?" retorted Tom Bullover, in his turn. "Howsomdever, to stop arguefying, Master Sammy, finding himself hungry and knowing something of the stowage below from having been in the ship on a previous voyage, he manages to work a pa.s.sage through the hold to the after part right under the cuddy; and from there my gentleman, if you please, makes his way on deck again through the hatchway in the captain's cabin, not forgetting to rummage the steward's pantry for provisions when he goes by!"

"An' mighty little grub was dere, suah," put in the negro cook, with great dignity. "I'se feel mean as a pore white if yer was ebbah come to my galley an' fin' sich a scrubby lot tings! Dere was nuffin' fit fo' a decent culler'd pusson ter eat--dat feller Morris Jones one big skunk!"

"I guess ye air 'bout right," agreed Hiram; while Tom and I signified our a.s.sent likewise by nodding our heads with great unction. "He's the biggest skunk I ever wer shipmets with afore!"

"Let him slide, for he don't consarn us now," said Tom, continuing the narrative of Sam's story. "Well, you must know, our darkey friend here, having taken first to prowling about the ship for grub, keeps it up arterwards for pleesure and devarshun, thinking it a jolly lark to make the hands believe the old barquey was haunted. Then, one day he gets hold of his banjo from out of Hiram's chest in the fo'c's'le, where old Chicopee really did stow it away arter he bought it at the auction o'

Sam's traps, as he thought he did, although I persuaded him and you Charley, too, if you remember, that the banjo had been left hanging up still in the galley in the place where Sam used to keep it. Once, indeed, when Sam forgot to put it back arter playing on it in the hold, where he had taken it, I brought it up and hung it on its old peg in the galley right afore your very eyes, Hiram!"

"I recollect, Tom," said I; "and so, Sam used to play on it in the hold below, then, when we heard the mysterious music coming from we knew not where?"

"Yes, that's so," replied he. "At first, Sam touched the strings only now and then, 'specially when the wind was blowing high, and he thought that n.o.body would hear the sound from the rattling of the ship's timbers and all; but, when I noticed how you above on deck could distinguish, not only the notes of the banjo, but also the very air that Sam played, and how the skipper was terrified and almost frightened out of his boots when he recognised the tune, which he had heard Sam chaunt often and often in the galley of an evening, why, then, I puts up the darkey to keep on the rig, so as to punish our brute of a skipper for his cold-blooded attempt at murdering poor Sam--which, but for the interposition of Providence, would have succeeded!"

Before Tom could proceed any further, however, consternation fell upon us all, as if a bombsh.e.l.l had burst in our midst; for, Sam, who was looking the opposite way to us and could see over our heads, suddenly sprang upon his feet, his mouth open from ear to ear and his teeth chattering with fear, while his short, woolly hair seemed literally to crinkle up and stand on end.

"O Lor'! O Lor'!" he exclaimed. "Look dere! Look dere!"

And there, right before us, stood the skipper himself, snorting and sniffing and foaming with rage, his keen, ferrety eyes piercing us through and through--so close, that his long nose almost touched me, and his billy-goat beard seemed to bristle right into my face, I being the nearest to him.

I felt a cold shiver run through me that froze the very marrow of my bones!

Captain Snaggs had, no doubt, overheard all our conversation, listening quietly, hidden behind the bushes that grew up close to the entrance to the cave, until Tom's last words proved too much for his equanimity, when his indignation forced him to come out from his retreat. He was certainly in an awful rage, for he was so angry that he could hardly speak at first, but fairly sputtered with wrath; and, if a look would have annihilated us, we mast all have been killed on the spot.

He was a terrible sight!

"Oh, thet's yer little game, my jokers!" he yelled out convulsively, as soon as he could articulate his words, glaring at us each in turn. "So, thet durned n.i.g.g.e.r ain't dead, arter all, hey? Snakes an' alligators!

Why, it's a reg'ler con-spiracy all round--rank mutiny, by thunder! I guess I'll hev ye all hung at the yard-arm, ev'ry man Jack of ye, fur it, ez sure ez my name's Ephraim O Snaggs!"

His pa.s.sion was so intense that we were spellbound for the moment, not one of us venturing to speak or reply to his threats--he staring at us as if he could 'eat us without salt,' as the saying goes, while we remained stock-still and silent before him.

As for Sam, he wallowed on the ground in terror, for the captain looked and acted like a madman.

Hiram Bangs alone had the pluck to open his mouth and confront the skipper.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN.

MR FLINDERS IN A FIX.

Before relating what next occurred, however, I must break off at this point and make a slight bend in my yarn here, in order to mention something that happened immediately before, and which, although I did not come to hear of it until afterwards, had to do with bringing the skipper so suddenly down upon us. Something, indeed, that tended to infuriate him all the more, with Tom Bullover and Sam; for, from his hearing, by their own confession, that they had planned and kept up the delusion about the cook's ghost on purpose to deceive him, he was led to believe that these two had got the better of him in another matter, even more important still in his estimation.

And so, as I am only a youngster and a poor hand at telling a story, though I find somehow or other I'm getting to the end of my yarn sooner than I expected when I first set to work writing it, I think I had best pat down everything that happened in its proper place and order, 'in regular shipshape Bristol fashion,' so that no hitch may occur by-and-by that might 'bring me up with a round turn,' when, perhaps, I could sail on with a free sheet and a fair wind to what you landfolk and longsh.o.r.emen would call my 'denouement'--a sad one, though, it be, as you'll learn later on, all in good time, as I spin my yarn in my free and easy way!

Well, to go back a bit now, you must know that ever since the thrashing he got from our second-mate, Mr Flinders had kept himself very quiet; not interfering in any way with the work of dismantling and unloading the ship, but leaving the charge of all this in the hands of Jan Steenbock and Tom Bullover--under, of course, the immediate supervision of Captain Snaggs, who, was here, there, and everywhere, pretending to do an awful lot, although really only occupying his time when he wasn't drinking in bullying those of the men, who being tame-spirited, put up with his bad language.

It must be said, though, for the skipper, that he generally left the old hands alone, for they returned his choicest epithets in kind, always giving him quite as good in the rude vernacular as he gave--discipline being rather slack now the vessel was ash.o.r.e, as in the merchant service a wreck is supposed by the crew to dissolve all contracts and annul whatever articles may have been signed. Such, at least, is my experience of the sea.

During this interregnum of duty, the first-mate hardly ever left his bunk on board the ship save to go into the cabin and partake of what meals Morris Jones, the steward, provided him with just when that lazy beggar of a Welshman liked.

Here he remained for over a week, nursing his damaged eyes and general injuries and, no doubt, brooding over the revenge which he contemplated taking at some future period on his late successful antagonist; for, his jealousy had been keenly aroused by the marked partiality Captain Snaggs had shown in favour of Jan Steenbock, although previously he had always chummed with him--and, indeed, even now, in spite of all that had pa.s.sed, the captain still occasionally invited him to a friendly orgy in the cabin, when both, as usual, of course, got royally drunk together as of yore!

But, since the finding of the golden Madonna and the development of the treasure-hunting craze amongst us, Mr Flinders had begun to come out from his temporary obscurity, while not at first actually pushing himself forward, or taking any prominent part in our daily routine.

This modest diffidence was due to the fact that the men used to make audible remarks in reference to his 'lovely black eyes,' but as soon as the tint of these gradually merged from green to yellow and then buck to their normal tone, the first-mate grew b.u.mptious and endeavoured to resume his old position of chief officer in the absence of the skipper, when the latter frequently went off alone, as it was his habit now, in solitary search of the buccaneers' buried h.o.a.rd like all the rest of us--notwithstanding that in public he utterly pooh-poohed its problematical existence and urged on the crew in digging out the dock under the ship, so as to get her afloat again, the only good, as he said, that we could expect from the island being the hope of leaving it behind us as quickly as possible.

He was an artful hand, was Captain Snaggs!

He thought that if he dissuaded the men from looking for the treasure he might have the greater chance of coming across it himself.

Such being the case, the skipper would sometimes sneak off in the middle of the day when work used to grow rather slack at our excavating task, in consequence of the greater heat at that time; for, the sea-breeze which we used to have with us from the early morning then gradually died away, while the light airs that blew off the land during the afternoon and night-time did not usually spring up until nearly sunset.

Then it was that Mr Flinders saw his opportunity; and, as regularly as the skipper would disappear in the distance over the lava field fronting the beach, saying, as he always did, that he was going up the cliff on our port hand 'to see if he could sight any pa.s.sing vessel'--although the sharpest eyes amongst our lookouts had never yet seen the captain's lean and angular form on top of the said cliff--so, regularly, did the first-mate stealthily descend the side ladder that led from the p.o.o.p of the ship down to the beach.

Once arrived here, his delight was to overlook the men as they lazily dug out the concrete-like sand and shingle at the bottom of the trench, filling baskets with the debris below which their fellows above hoisted up none the more energetically; and the first-mate could not help noticing that while Jan Steenbock purred them on now and then for a brief spell, he let them, as a rule, take things easily; at this heated period of the day, for Jan was wise enough to see that by not overworking them then he got more labour out of his gang when the temperature grew cooler, and the men could dig with greater "go."

For a while, Mr Flinders did not interfere with Jan's method of procedure, seeing, as any sensible man would, that the second-mate's plan answered its purpose of getting the most out of the hands without making them grumble unduly at their unwonted task; but, soon his love of carping at others a.s.serted itself, and this feeling, coupled with the desire to a.s.sert such petty authority as he still had, overcame his sense of prudence, as well as all recollection of the sharp lesson he had received from Jan not so very long before.

The difference between the skipper and Mr Flinders was, that, although the former was essentially cruel and a bully of the first water, he was yet physically brave and a cute, cautious man, who, when sober, knew how far he might venture in his harsh treatment of those under him; while the first-mate, on the contrary, was an utter coward at heart, and of as malicious and spiteful a disposition as he was fond of tyrannising over such as he thought he could ill-treat with impunity.

It never takes long for sailors to 'reckon up' their officers; so, it need hardly be said to which of the two the hands paid the most attention when he gave an order. As to liking either, that was out of the case; but where the men feared Captain Snaggs, the only feeling they had for Mr Flinders was one of contempt--paying back all his snarlings and bullyings in a way that the hands, well knew how to drive home to one of his temperament, as sensitive as it was mean!

Consequently, when, after a bit, he commenced finding fault with this one and that, the men would shove their tongues in their cheek and shrug their shoulders. They did not pay the slightest regard to anything he said; while the more bolder spirits, perhaps, of the stamp of Jim Chowder, winked openly the one to the other, expressing an opinion in a sufficiently loud enough tone for him to hear that 'if he didn't look out,' he would soon become possessed of a pair of eyes "blacker than he'd had afore!"

Then, naturally, there would be a sn.i.g.g.e.r all round, when Mr Flinders had to turn away with a scowl on his unpleasant, cross-grained face. He hated Jan Steenbock all the more, because when the jeering crew displayed their insubordination more strongly than usual, Jan would very properly recall them to their duty--an order which on being given by the second-mate was promptly obeyed, whilst they utterly disregarded even the most trivial command from him, just as they mocked at his reprimands.

This was only noticeable at first, though; for, after a few days'

experience of this 'playing second fiddle,' Mr Flinders, waxing stronger as his injuries improved and the discoloration of his 'lovely black eyes' became less apparent, seemed to resolve on trying a fresh tack. Taking higher ground, instead of idly endeavouring to get the men to treat him with respect, he once more tackled his subordinate superior Jan, who, he thought, from his treating him civilly, was sorry for the 'little misunderstanding' that had occurred between them, and would readily 'knuckle under' now, the moment he a.s.sumed his legitimate role and 'topped the officer' over him.

Mr Flinders never made a greater mistake in his life than in thus attempting to act up to the axiom of the old Latin adage, which teaches us that "necessity makes even cowards brave."

He had far better have remained content with his t.i.tular dignity; for, in seeking to resume the reins of power which he had once let fall, he only received another lesson from Jan Steenbock, teaching him that a placid man was not necessarily one who would quietly put up with insult and rough treatment, and proving that the tables of life are frequently turned in fact as they sometimes are in figure of speech!

This is a long palaver; but I will soon come to the point of it all, and tell what subsequently happened.

You must recollect, though, that I was not on the spot myself, and am only indebted to Jim Chowder for hearing of it--being indeed, at that very time, on my way with Hiram to the cave and the wonderful surprise that awaited us there, an account of which I have just related.