Part 31 (2/2)
Thus appealed to, the doughty commodore permitted his two unmatched optics to rest mournfully upon his s.h.i.+pmates. For nearly a minute he gazed at them, the while he struggled to stifle the awful fear within him. In the Gibney veins there flowed not a drop of craven blood, but the hideous prospect before him was almost more than the brave commodore could bear.
Death, quick and b.l.o.o.d.y, had no terrors for him, but a finish like this--a slow finish--thirst, starvation, heat----
He gulped and thoughtfully rubbed the knuckles of his right hand where the skin was barked off. He thought of the silly joke he and McGuffey had thought to perpetrate on Captain Scraggs by leading him up against a beating at the hands of a cannibal king, and with the thought came a grim, hard chuckle, though there was the look of a thousand devils in his eyes.
”Well, boys,” he said huskily, ”who's looney now?”
”What's to be done?” asked McGuffey.
”Well, Mac, old sporty boy, I guess there ain't much to do except to make up our minds to die like gentlemen. If I was ever fooled by a man in my life, I was fooled by that doggone mate. I thought he'd tote square with the syndicate. I sure did.”
For a long time McGuffey gazed seaward. He was slower than his s.h.i.+pmates in making up his mind that the mate had really deserted them and sailed away with the fortunes of the syndicate. Of the three, however, the stoical engineer accepted the situation with the best grace. He spurned the white sand with his foot and faced Mr. Gibney and Captain Scraggs with just the suspicion of a grin on his homely face.
”I make a motion,” he said, ”that the syndicate pa.s.s a resolution condemnin' the action of the mate.”
It was a forlorn hope, and the jest went over the heads of the deck department. Said Mr. Gibney sadly:
”There ain't no more _Maggie II_ Syndicate.”
”Well, let's form a Robinson Crusoe Syndicate,” suggested McGuffey. ”We've got the island, and there's a quorum present for all meetin's.”
Mr. Gibney smiled feebly. ”We can appoint Tabu-Tabu the man Friday.”
”Sure,” responded McGuffey, ”and the king can be the goat.
Robinson Crusoe had a billy goat, didn't he, Gib?”
But Captain Scraggs refused to be heartened by this airy persiflage. ”I'm all het up after my fight with the king,” he quavered presently. ”I wonder if there's any water on this island.”
”There is,” announced Mr. Gibney pleasantly; ”there is, Scraggsy.
There's water in just one spot, but it's there in abundance.”
”Where's that spot?” inquired Scraggs eagerly.
Mr. Gibney removed his old Panama hat, and with his index finger pointed downward to where the hair was beginning to disappear, leaving a small bald spot on the crown of his ingenious head.
”There,” he said, ”right there, Scraggsy, old top. The only water on this island is on the brain of Adelbert P. Gibney.”
CHAPTER XXVI
Neils Halvorsen often wondered what had become of the _Maggie_ and Captain Scraggs. Mr. Gibney and Bartholomew McGuffey he knew had turned their sun-tanned faces toward deep water some years before Captain Scraggs and the _Maggie_ disappeared from the environs of San Francis...o...b..y, and Neils Halvorsen was wise enough to waste no time wondering what had become of _them_.
These two worthies might be anywhere, and every conceivable thing under the sun might have happened to them; hence, in his idle moments, Neils Halvorsen did not disturb his gray matter speculating on their whereabouts and their then condition of servitude.
But the continued absence of Captain Scraggs from his old haunts created quite a little gossip along the waterfront, and in the course of time rumours of his demise by sundry and devious routes came to the ears of Neils Halvorsen. Now, Neils had sailed too long with Captain Scraggs not to realize that the erstwhile green-pea trader would be the last man to take a chance in any hazardous enterprise unless forced thereto by the weight of circ.u.mstance; also there was affection enough in his simple Scandinavian heart to cause him to feel just a little worried when two weeks pa.s.sed and Captain Scraggs failed to show up. He had disappeared in some mysterious manner from San Francis...o...b..y and the old _Maggie_ had never been heard from again.
Hence Neils Halvorsen was puzzled. In fact, to such an extent was Neils puzzled, that one perfectly calm, clear night while beating down San Pablo Bay in his bay scow, the _Willie and Annie_, he so far forgot himself and his own affairs as to concentrate all his attention on the problem of the ultimate finish of Captain Scraggs. So engrossed was Neils in this vain speculation that he neglected to observe toward the rules of the ocean highways that nicety of attention which is highly requisite, even in the skipper of a bay scow, if the fulsome t.i.tle of captain is to be retained for any definite period. As a result, Neils became confused regarding the exact number of blasts from the siren of a river steamer desiring to pa.s.s him to port. Consequently the _Willie and Annie_ received such a severe b.u.t.ting from the river steamer in question as to cause her to careen and fill. Being, unfortunately, loaded with gravel on this particular trip, she subsided incontinently to the bottom of San Pablo Bay, while Neils and his crew of two men sought refuge on a plank.
Without attempting to go further into the details of the misfortunes of Neils Halvorsen, be it known that the destruction of the _Willie and Annie_ proved to be such a severe shock to Neils' reputation as a safe and sane bay scow skipper that he was ultimately forced to seek other and more virgin fields. With the fragments of his meagre fortune, the ambitious Swede purchased a course in a local nautical school from which he duly managed to emerge with sufficient courage to appear before the United States Local Inspectors of Hulls and Boilers and take his examination for a second mate's certificate. To his unutterable surprise the license was granted; whereupon he s.h.i.+pped as quartermaster on the steamer _Alameda_, running to Honolulu, and what with the lesson taught him in the loss of the _Willie and Annie_ and the exacting duties of his office aboard the liner, he forgot that he had ever known Captain Scraggs.
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