The Mutineers Part 29

Falk threw up his hands in a gesture of despair. "But we ain't got the money. So help me G.o.d, we ain't got a cent of it."

"Hand over the money," Roger repeated, "and we'll give you food and water."

He pointed at the quarter-boat, which swung at the end of a long painter.

"Come no nearer. Put the money in that boat and we'll haul it up."

"We _ain't got the money_, I tell you. I swear on my immortal soul, we ain't got it." Falk seemed to be on the point of weeping. He was so weak and white!

When Roger did not reply, I turned to look at him. There was a thoughtful expression on his face, and following the direction of his eyes, my own gaze rested on the face of the man from Boston. He was smiling. But when he saw us looking at him, he stopped and changed color.

"I believe you," Roger declared suddenly. "You'll have to keep your distance or I'll blow your boat to pieces; but if you obey orders, I'll help you out as far as a few days' supply of food will go. Cook, haul in that boat and put half a hundredweight of s.h.i.+p's bread and four buckets of water in it. That'll keep 'em for a while."

"You ain't gwine to feed dat yeh Kipping, sah, is you?"

"Yes."

The cook turned in silence to do Roger's bidding.

Twice the man from Boston started forward as if to speak. The motion was so slight that it almost escaped me, but the second time I was sure that I really had detected such an impulse, and at the same moment I perceived that Falk, whose fingers were twitching nervously, was shooting an angry glance at him. This byplay to a considerable extent distracted my attention; but when the fellow finally did get up courage to speak, I saw that the eyes of every man in Falk's boat were on him and that Kipping had clenched both fists.

"Stop!" the man from Boston cried. "Stop!" He stepped toward Roger with one hand raised.

Roger soberly turned on him. "Be still," he said.

"But, sir--"

"Be still!"

"But, sir, there ain't no--"

Certainly as far as we could see, the man's feverish persistence was arrant insubordination. What Roger would have done we had no time to learn, for Blodgett, bursting with zeal for our common cause, grasped him by the throat and choked his words into a gurgle. A queer expression of spite and hatred pa.s.sed over the man's face, and when he squirmed away from Blodgett's grip I saw that he was muttering to himself as he rubbed his bruised neck. But the others were paying him no attention and he presently folded his arms with an air that continued to trouble me and stood apart from the rest.

And Falk and Kipping and all their men now were grinning broadly!

The water slopped over the edges of the buckets and wet some of the bread as the cook pushed the boat out toward Falk; but the men in the pinnace watched it eagerly, and when it floated to the end of the painter, they clutched for it so hastily that they almost upset the precious buckets.

When they had got it, they looked at each other and laughed and slapped their legs and laughed again in an uproarious, almost maudlin mirth that we could not understand.

We covered them with our muskets lest they try to seize the boat, which I firmly believe they had contemplated before they realized how closely we were watching them, and we smiled to see them cram their mouths with bread and pa.s.s the buckets from hand to hand. When they had finished their inexplicable laughter, they ate like animals and drew new strength and courage from their food. Though Falk was still white under his b.l.o.o.d.y bandage, his voice was stronger.

"I'll remember this," he said. "Maybe I'll give you a day or two of grace before you swing. Oh, you can laugh at me now, you white-livered sons of sea-cooks, but the day's coming when you'll sing another song to pay your piper."

He looked round and laughed at his own men, and again they all laughed as if he had said something clever, and he and Kipping exchanged glances.

"They ain't found the gold," he caustically remarked to Kipping. "We'll see what we shall see."

"Ay, we'll see," Kipping returned, mildly. "We'll see. It'll be fun to see it, too, won't it, sir?"

It was all very silly, and we, of course, had nothing to say in return; so we watched them, with our muskets peeping over the bulwark and with the long gun and the stern-chasers cleared in case of trouble, and in undertones we kept up an exchange of comments.

After whispering among themselves, the men in the boat once more began to row toward us. Singularly enough they showed no sign of the exhaustion that a little before had seemed so painful. It slowly dawned upon me that their air of misery had been nothing more than a cheap trick to play upon our compa.s.sion. We watched them suspiciously, but they now a.s.sumed a frank manner, which they evidently hoped would put us off our guard.

"Now you men listen to me," said Falk. "After all, what's the use of behaving this way? You're just getting yourselves into trouble with the law. We can send you to the gallows for this little spree, and what's more we're going to do it--unless, that is, unless you come round sensible and call it all off. Now what do you say? Why don't you be reasonable? You take us on board and we'll use you right and hush all this up as best we can.

What do you say?"

"What do we say?" said Roger, "We say that bread and water have gone to your head. You were singing another time a while back."

"Oh well, we _were_ a little down in the mouth then. But we're feeling a sight better now. Come, ain't our plan reasonable?"

All the time they were rowing slowly nearer to the s.h.i.+p.

"Mistah Falk, O Mistah Falk!"

"Well?" Falk received the cook's interruption with an ill temper that made the darkey's eyes roll with joy.

"Whar you git dat bootiful head-piece?"

A flush darkened Falk's pale face under the bandage, and with what dignity he could muster, he ignored our snickers.

"What do you say?" he cried to Roger. "Evidently you haven't found the money yet."

To us Roger said in an undertone, "Hold your fire." To Falk he replied clearly, "You black-hearted villain, if you show your face in a Christian port you'll go to the gallows for abetting the cold-blooded murder of an able officer and an honorable gentleman, Captain Joseph Whidden. Quid that over a while and stow your tales of piracy and mutiny.

Back water, you! Keep off!"

Here was no subtle insinuation. Falk was stopped in his tracks by the flat statement. He had a dazed, frightened look. But Kipping, who had kept himself in the background up to this point, now a.s.sumed command.

"Them's bad words," he said mildly, coldly. "Bad words. _But_--" he slightly raised his voice--"we ain't a-goin' to eat 'em. Not we." All at once he let out a yell that rang shrilly far over the water. "At 'em, men!

At 'em! Pull, you sons of the devil, pull! Out pikes and cutla.s.ses! Take 'em by storm! Slash the netting and go over the side."

"Hold your fire,"--Roger repeated,--"one minute--till I give the word."

My heart was pounding at my ribs. I was breathing in fast gulps. With my thumb on the hammer of the musket, I gave one glance to the priming, and half raised it to my shoulder.

From the bottom of the boat Falk's men had s.n.a.t.c.hed up the weapons that hitherto they had kept out of sight. I had no time then to wonder why they did not shoot; afterwards we agreed that they probably were so short of powder and b.a.l.l.s that they dared not expend any except in gravest emergency. Kipping was standing as they rowed, and so fiercely now did they ply their oars, casting to the winds every pretence of weakness, that the boat rocked from side to side.

"At 'em!" Kipping snarled. "We'll show 'em! We'll show'em!"

"Hold your fire, men," said Roger the third time. "I'll wing that bird."

And aiming deliberately, he shot.

The report of his musket rang out sharply and was followed by a groan.

Kipping clutched his thigh with both hands and fell. The men stopped rowing and the boat, gradually losing way, veered in a half circle and lay broadside toward us. In the midst of the confusion aboard it, I saw Kipping sitting up and cursing in a way that chilled my blood. "Oh," he moaned, "I'll get you yet! I'll get you yet!" Then some one in the boat returned a single shot that buried itself in our bulwark.

"Yeeeehaha! Got Kipping!" the cook cackled. "He got Kipping!"

"Now then," cried Roger, "bear off. We've had enough of you. If ever again you come within gunshot of this s.h.i.+p, we'll shoot so much lead into you that the weight will sink you. It's only a leg wound, Kipping. I was careful where I aimed."

In a disorderly way the men began to pull out of range, but still we could hear Kipping shrieking a stream of oaths and maledictions, and now Falk stood up and shook his fist at us and yelled with as much semblance of dignity as he could muster, "I'll see you yet, all seven of you, I'll see you a-swinging one after another from the game yard-arm!" Then, to our amazement, one of them whispered to the others behind his hand, and they all began to laugh again as if they had played some famous joke on us.