Part 26 (1/2)

The second mate pulled his face into seriousness. ”I don't suppose he got into trouble intentionally, sir.”

”Probably not, but that doesn't alter the fact that he has managed it somehow. I don't engage my mates for amus.e.m.e.nts of that kind, Mr. Grain.

I've got them here to work, and help me do my duty by the owners. If they take up low cla.s.s trades like artisting, they must be prepared to stand the consequences. You'll remember the orders I've given you? If I'm wanted, you'll say I'll probably be back by tea.”

Captain Kettle went off then in a sh.o.r.e-boat, past a small fleet of pearling dhows, which rolled at their anchors, and after a long pull--for the sea was shallow, and the anchorage lay five miles out--stepped on to the back of a burly Arab, and was carried the last mile dry-shod. Parallel to him were lines of men carrying out cargo to the lighters which would trans.h.i.+p it to the _Parakeet_, and Kettle looked upon these with a fine complacency.

His tramping for cargo had been phenomenally successful. He was filling his holds at astonis.h.i.+ngly heavy freights. And not only would this bring him credit with his owners, which meant promotion in due course to a larger s.h.i.+p, but in the mean time, as he drew his 2-1/2 per cent, on the profits, it represented a very comfortable matter of solid cash for that much-needing person himself. He hugged himself with pleasure when he thought of this new found prosperity. It represented so many things which he would be able to do for his wife and family, which through so many years narrow circ.u.mstances had made impossible.

The burly Arab on whose hips he rode pick-a-back stepped out of the water at last, and Kettle jumped down from his perch, and picked his way daintily among the litter of the foresh.o.r.e toward the white houses of the town which lay beyond.

It was the first time he had set foot there. So great was his luck at the time, that he had not been forced to go ash.o.r.e in the usual way drumming up cargo. The s.h.i.+ppers had come off begging him to become their carrier, and he had muleted them in heavy freights accordingly. So he stepped into the town with many of the feelings of a conqueror, and demanded to be led to the office of a man with whom he had done profitable business that very morning.

Of course, ”office” in the Western meaning of the term there was none.

The worthy Rad el Moussa transacted affairs on the floor of his general sitting-room, and stored his merchandise in the bed-chambers, or wherever it would be out of reach of pilfering fingers. But he received the little sailor with fine protestations of regard, and (after some giggles and shuffling as the women withdrew) inducted him to the dark interior of his house, and set before him delicious coffee and some doubtful sweetmeats.

Kettle knew enough about Oriental etiquette not to introduce the matter on which he had come at the outset of the conversation. He pa.s.sed and received the necessary compliments first, endured a discussion of local trade prospects, and then by an easy gradation led up to the powers of the local Kady. He did not speak Arabic himself, and Rad el Moussa had no English. But they had both served a life apprentices.h.i.+p to sea trading, and the curse of the Tower of Babel had very little power over them. In the memories of each there were garnered sc.r.a.ps from a score of spoken languages, and when these failed, they could always draw on the unlimited vocabulary of the gestures and the eyes. And for points that were really abstruse, or which required definite understanding, there always remained the charcoal stick and the explanatory drawing on the face of a whitewashed wall.

When the conversation had lasted some half an hour by the clock, and a slave brought in a second relay of sweetmeats and thick coffee, the sailor mentioned, as it were incidentally, that one of his officers had got into trouble in the town. ”It's quite a small thing,” he said lightly, ”but I want him back as soon as possible, because there's work for him to do on the steamer. See what I mean?”

Rad el Moussa nodded gravely. ”Savvy plenty,” said he.

Now Kettle knew that the machinery of the law in these small Arabian coast towns was concentrated in the person of the Kady, who, for practical purposes, must be made to move by that lubricant known as palm oil; and so he produced some coins from his pocket and lifted his eyebrows inquiringly.

Rad el Moussa nodded again, and made careful inspection of the coins, turning them one by one with his long brown fingers, and biting those he fancied most as a test of their quality. Finally, he selected a gold twenty-franc piece and two sovereigns, balanced and c.h.i.n.ked them carefully in his hand, and then slipped them into some private receptacle in his wearing apparel.

”I say,” remarked Kettle, ”that's not for you personally, old tintacks.

That's for the Kady.”

Rad pointed majestically to his own breast. ”El Kady,” he said.

”Oh, you are his Wors.h.i.+p, are you?” said Kettle. ”Why didn't you say so before? I don't think it was quite straight of you, tintacks, but perhaps that's your gentle Arab way. But I say, Whiskers, don't you try being too foxy with me, or you'll get hurt. I'm not the most patient man in the world with inferior nations. Come, now, where's the mate?”

Rad spread his hands helplessly.

”See, here, it's no use your trying that game. You know that I want Murray, my mate.”

”Savvy plenty.”

”Then hand him out, and let me get away back on board.”

”No got,” said Rad el Moussa; ”no can.”

”Now look here, Mister,” said Captain Kettle, ”I've paid you honestly for justice, and if I don't have it, I'll start in pulling down your old town straight away. Give up the mate, Rad, and let me get back peacefully to my steamboat, or, by James! I'll let loose a wild earthquake here. If you want battle, murder, and sudden death, Mr. Rad el Moussa, just you play monkey tricks with me, and you'll get 'em cheap. Kady, are you? Then, by James! you start in without further talk, and give me the justice that I've bought and paid for.”

Though this tirade was in an alien tongue, Rad el Moussa caught the drift from Captain Kettle's accompanying gesticulations, which supplied a running translation as he went on. Rad saw that his visitor meant business, and signed that he would go out and fetch the imprisoned mate forthwith.

”No, you don't,” said Kettle promptly. ”If your Wors.h.i.+p once left here, I might have trouble in finding you again. I know how easy it is to hide in a-warren like this town of yours. Send one of your hands with a message.”

Now, to convey this sentence more clearly, Kettle had put his fingers on the Arab's clothing, when out fell a bag of pearls, which came unfastened. The pearls rolled like peas about the floor, and the Arab, with gritting teeth, whipped out a knife. Promptly Kettle drew also, and covered him with a revolver.