Part 29 (1/2)

But the n.i.g.g.e.r only rolled his eyes and shook his head. By and by he arose and disappeared in the dusk and was no more seen.

”Dam' fool,” muttered Handy Solomon. ”Well, here's to crime!”

He drank a deep cup of the raw rum, and staggered back to his seat on the sands.

”'I am not a man-o'-war, nor a privateer,' said he.

_Blow high, blow low! What care we_!

'But I am a jolly pirate and I'm sailing for my fee,'

_Down on the coast of the high Barbare-e-e_.”

he sang. ”We'll land in Valparaiso and we'll go every man his way; and we'll sink the old _Laughing La.s.s_ so deep the mermaids can't find her.”

Thrackles piled on more wood and the fire leaped high.

”Let's get after 'em,' said he.

”To-morrow's jes' 's good,” muttered Pulz. ”Les' hav' 'nother drink.”

”We'll stay here 'n see if our ol' frien' Percy don' show up,” said Handy Solomon. He threw back his head and roared forth a volume of sound toward the dim stars.

”Broadside to broadside the gallant s.h.i.+ps did lay, _Blow high, blow low! What care we_?

'Til the jolly man-o'-war shot the pirate's mast away, _Down on the coast of the high Barbare-e-e_.”

I saw near me a live coal dislodged from the fire when Thrackles had thrown on the armful of wood. An idea came to me. I hitched myself to the spark, and laid across it the rope with which my wrists were tied. This, behind my back, was not easy to accomplish, and twice I burned my wrists before I succeeded.

Fortunately I was at the edge of illumination, and behind the group.

I turned over on my side so that my back was toward the fire. Then rapidly I cast loose my ankle las.h.i.+ngs. Thus I was free, and selecting a moment when universal attention was turned toward the rum barrel, I rolled over a sand dune, got to my hands and knees, and crept away.

Through the coa.r.s.e gra.s.s I crept thus, to the very entrance of the arroyo, then rose to my feet. In the middle distance the fire leaped red. Its glow fell intermittently on the surges rolling in. The men staggered or lay p.r.o.ne, either as gigantic silhouettes or as tatterdemalions painted by the light. The keg stood solid and substantial, the hub about which reeled the orgy. At the edge of the wash I could make out something p.r.o.ne, dim, limp, thrown constantly in new positions of weariness as the water ebbed and flowed beneath it, now an arm thrown out, now cast back, as though Old Scrubs slept feverishly. The drunkards were getting noisy. Handy Solomon still reeled off the verses of, his song. The others joined in, frightfully off the key; or punctuated the performance by wild staccato yells.

”Their coffin was their s.h.i.+p and their grave it was the sea, _Blow high, blow low! What care we_?

And the quarter that we gave them was to sink them in the sea, _Down on the coast of the high Barbare-e-e,_”

bellowed Handy Solomon.

I turned and plunged into the cool darkness of the canon.

XIV

AN ADVENTURE IN THE NIGHT

Ten seconds after entering the arroyo I was stumbling along in an absolute blackness. It almost seemed to me that I could reach out my hands and touch it, as one would touch a wall. Or perhaps not exactly that, for a wall is hard, and this darkness was soft and yielding, in the manner of enveloping hangings. Directly above me was a narrow, jagged, and irregular strip of sky with stars. I splashed in the brook, finding its waters strangely warm, rustled through the gra.s.ses, my head back, chin out, hands extended as one makes his way through a house at night. There were no sounds except the tinkle of the sulphurous stream: successive bends in the canon wall had shut off even the faintest echoes of the baccha.n.a.lia on the beach.

The way seemed much longer than by daylight. Already in my calculation I had traversed many times the distance, when, with a jump at the heart, I made out a glow ahead, and in front of it the upright logs of the stockade.

To my surprise the gate was open. I ascended the gentle slope to the valley's level--and stumbled over a man lying prostrate, s.h.i.+vering violently, and moaning.

I bent over to discover whom it might be. As I did so a brilliant light seemed to fill the valley, throwing an illumination on the man at my feet. I saw it was the n.i.g.g.e.r, and perceived at the same instant that he was almost beside himself with terror. His eyes rolled, his teeth chattered, his frame contracted in a strong convulsion, and the black of his complexion had faded to a washed-out dirty grey, revolting to contemplate. He felt my touch and sprang to his feet, clutching me by the shoulder as a man clutching rescue.