The Skipper and the Skipped Part 45

"This suits me!" said Cap'n Sproul, stubbornly.

The next moment he and his Portuguese were yanked over the side of the boat into the life-craft--a dozen st.u.r.dy chaps a.s.sisting the transfer.

"Let the peapod go afloat," directed the gruff officer. "It's off the _Polyhymnia_--name on the stern-sheets--evidence enough--notice, men!"

"I'm not off the _Polyhymnia_," protested Cap'n Sproul, indignantly.

"I was goin' along 'tendin' to my own business, and you can't--"

"Business?" sneered the man of the faded blue cap. "I thought you were out for a pleasure sail! You shut up!" he snapped, checking further complaints from the Cap'n. "If you've got a story that will fit in with your crazy-man actions, then you can wait and tell it to the court. As for me, I believe you're a gang of mutineers!" And after that bit of insolence the Cap'n was indignantly silent.

The cutter jingled her full-speed bell while the tackle was still lifting the sponson boat.

"They're ugly, and are hiding something," called the man of the faded cap, swinging up the bridge-ladder. "No good to pump more lies out of them. We'll go where they came from, and we'll get there before we can ask questions and get straight replies."

Cap'n Sproul, left alone on the cutter's deck, took out his big wallet, abstracted that fifteen-thousand-dollar check signed by Gideon Ward, and seemed about to fling it into the sea.

"Talk about your hoodoos!" he gritted. "Talk about your banana skins of Tophet! Twice I've slipped up on it and struck that infernal island.

Even his name written on a piece of paper is a cuss to the man that lugs it!"

But after hale second thought he put the check back into his wallet and the wallet into his breast pocket and b.u.t.toned his coat securely.

And the set of his jaws and the wrinkling of his forehead showed that the duel between him and Colonel Ward was not yet over.

As the steamer with the dun smoke-stack approached Cod Lead he noted sourly the frantic signallings of the marooned. He leaned on the rail and watched the departure of the officer of the faded blue cap with his crew of the sponson boat. He observed the details of the animated meeting of the rescuers and the rescued. Without great astonishment he saw that Hiram, of all the others, remained on sh.o.r.e, leaning disconsolately against the protecting bulk of Imogene.

"It's most a wonder he didn't try to load that infernal elephant onto that life-boat," he muttered. "If I couldn't travel through life without bein' tagged by an old gob of meat of that size, I'd hire a museum and settle down in it."

Cap'n Sproul, still leaning on the rail, paid no attention to the snort that Colonel Ward emitted as he pa.s.sed on his way to the security of the steamer's deck. He resolutely avoided the reproachful starings of the members of the Smyrna fire department as they struggled on board. Mr. b.u.t.ts came last and attempted to say something, but retreated promptly before the Cap'n's fiendish snarl and clicking teeth.

"That man there, with the elephant, says he can't leave her,"

reported Faded Cap to the wondering group on the bridge.

"A United States cutter isn't sent out to collect menageries accompanied by dry-nurses," stated the commander. "What is this job lot, anyway--a circus in distress?"

"Says the elephant can swim out if we'll rig a tackle and hoist her on board. Says elephant is used to it."

Something in the loneliness of the deserted two on Cod Lead must have appealed to the commander. He was profane about it, and talked about elephants and men who owned them in a way that struck an answering chord in the Cap'n's breast. But he finally gave orders for the embarkation of Imogene, and after much more profanity and more slurs which Hiram was obliged to listen to meekly, the task was accomplished, and the cutter proceeded on her way along coast on further errands of mercy.

And then the Cap'n turned and gazed on Hiram, and the showman gazed on the Cap'n. The latter spoke first.

"Hiram," he said, "it ain't best for you and me to talk this thing over, just as it stands now--not till we get back to Smyrna and set down on my front piazzy. P'r'aps things won't look so skeow-wowed then to us as they do now. We won't talk till then."

But the captain of the cutter was not as liberal-minded. In the process of preparing his report he attempted to interview both the Cap'n and Colonel Ward at the same time in his cabin, and at the height of the riot of recriminations that ensued was obliged to call in some deck-hands and have both ejected. Then he listened to them separately with increasing interest.

"When you brought this family fight down here to sprinkle salt water on it," he said at last, having the two of them before him again, with a deck-hand restraining each, "you didn't get it preserved well enough to keep it from smelling. I don't reckon I'll stir it. It doesn't seem to be a marine disaster. The United States Government has got other things to attend to just now besides settling it.

Listen!"

He held up a forefinger.

"Smyrna isn't so far away from the seash.o.r.e but what I've had plenty of chances to hear of Colonel Gideon Ward and his general dealings with his neighbors. For myself, I'd rather have less money and a reputation that didn't spread quite so far over the edges. As for you, Cap'n Sproul, as a seaman I can sympathize with you about getting cheated by land-pirates in that timber-land deal and in other things.

But as a representative of the Government I'm not going to help you make good to the extent of fifteen thousand dollars on a hole and a Cap Kidd treasure fake. Hands off for me, seeing that it's a matter strictly in the family! This cutter is due to round to in Portland harbor to-morrow morning a little after nine o'clock. I'll send the two of you in my gig to Commercial Wharf, see that both are landed at the same time, and then--well"--the commander turned quizzical gaze from one to the other with full appreciation of the situation--"it then depends on what you do, each of you, and how quick you do it."

The Cap'n walked out of the room, his hand on his breast pocket.

Colonel Ward followed, closing and unclosing his long fingers as if his hands itched to get at that pocket.

At the first peep of dawn Cap'n Aaron Sproul was posted at the cutter's fore windla.s.s, eyes straight ahead on the nick in the low, blue line of coast that marked the harbor's entrance. His air was that of a man whose anxiety could not tolerate any post except the forepeak. And to him there came Hiram Look with tremulous eagerness in his voice and the weight of a secret in his soul.

"I heard him and b.u.t.ts talkin' last night, Cap'n Aaron," he announced.

"It was b.u.t.ts that thought of it first. The telefoam. 'Run into the first place and grab a telefoam,' says b.u.t.ts. 'Telefoam 'em at the bank to stop payment. It will take him ten minutes to run up from the wharf. Let him think you're right behind him. He's got to go to the bank,' says b.u.t.ts. 'He can't telefoam 'em to pay the check.'"

The Cap'n's hand dropped dispiritedly from his clutch at his pocket.

"I knowed something would stop me," he mourned. "The whole plot is a hoodoo. There I was fired back twice onto Cod Lead! Here he is, landin' the same time as I do! And when he stops that check it throws it into law--and I've got the laborin'-oar."

"It ain't throwed into law yet, and you ain't got no laborin'-oar,"

cried Hiram, with a chuckle that astonished the despondent Cap'n.

"He can't telefoam!"

"Can't what?"

"Why, stayin' out in that rain-storm has give him the most jeeroosly cold there's been sence Aunt Jerushy recommended thoroughwort tea!

It's right in his thro't, and he ain't got so much voice left as wind blowing acrost a bottle. Can't make a sound! The bank folks ain't goin' to take any one's say-so for him. Not against a man like you that's got thutty thousand dollars in the same bank, and a man that they know! By the time he got it explained to any one so that they'd mix in, you can be at the bank and have it all done."

"Well, he ain't got cold in his legs, has he?" demanded the Cap'n, failing to warm to Hiram's enthusiasm. "It stands jest where it has been standin'. There ain't no reason why he can't get to that bank as quick as I can. Yes, quicker! I ain't built up like an ostrich, the way he is."

"Well," remarked Hiram, after a time, "a fair show and an even start is more'n most folks get in this life--and you've got that. The boss of this boat is goin' to give you that much. So all you can do is to take what's given you and do the best you can. And all I can do is stay back here and sweat blood and say the only prayer that I know, which is 'Now I lay me down to sleep.'"

And after this bit of consolation he went back amidships to comfort the hungry Imogene, who had been unable to find much in the cuisine of a revenue cutter that would satisfy the appet.i.te of elephants.

At half-past nine in the forenoon the cutter swept past Bug Light and into the inner harbor. Hardly had the steamer swung with the tide at her anchorage before the captain's gig was proceeding briskly toward Commercial Wharf, two men rowing and the man of the faded blue cap at the helm. The antagonists in the strange duello sat back to back, astraddle a seat. At this hateful contact their hair seemed fairly to bristle.

"Now, gents," said Faded Cap, as they approached the wharf, "the skipper said he wanted fair play. No scrougin' to get out onto the ladder first. I'm goin' to land at the double ladder at the end of the wharf, and there's room for both of you. I'll say 'Now!' and then you start."

"You fellers are gettin' a good deal of fun out this thing," sputtered Cap'n Sproul, angrily, "but don't you think I don't know it and resent it. Now, don't you talk to me like you were startin' a foot-race!"

"What is it, if it ain't a foot-race?" inquired Faded Cap, calmly.

"They don't have hacks or trolley-cars on that wharf, and you'll either have to run or fly, and I don't see any signs of wings on you."

Colonel Ward did not join in this remonstrance. He only worked his jaws and uttered a few croaks.

When the gig surged to the foot of the ladder, Colonel Ward attempted a desperate play, and an unfair one. He was on the outside, and leaped up, stepped on Cap'n Sproul, and sprang for the ladder. The Cap'n was quick enough to grab his legs, yank him back into the boat, and mount over him in his turn. The man of the faded cap was nearly stunned by Ward falling on him, and the rowers lost their oars.

When the Colonel had untangled himself from the indignant seamen and had escaped up the ladder, Cap'n Sproul was pelting up the wharf at a most amazing clip, considering his short legs. Before Ward had fairly gathered himself for the chase his fifteen-thousand-dollar check and the man bearing it had disappeared around a corner into the street.

But the squat and stubby old sailor stood little show in a foot-race with his gaunt and sinewy adversary. It was undoubtedly Colonel Ward's knowledge of this that now led him to make the race the test of victory instead of depending on an interpreter over the telephone.

A little more than a block from the wharf's lane he came up with and pa.s.sed his adversary. Men running for trolley-cars and steamboats were common enough on the busy thoroughfare, and people merely made way for the sprinters.

But when Colonel Ward was a few lengths ahead of the Cap'n, the latter made use of an expedient that the voiceless Colonel could not have employed even if he had thought of it.

With all the force of his seaman's lungs he bellowed: "Stop thief!"