Bunyip Land Part 8

"Thank'ye, doctor," said the captain grimly, c.o.c.king the piece. "I don't want to use it, and I daresay the sight of it will cool our yaller friend; but it's just as well to be prepared. What! are you coming too?

Thought your trade was to mend holes and not make 'em."

"My trade is to save life, captain," said the doctor quietly. "Perhaps I shall be helping to save life by coming down with you."

"P'r'aps you will, doctor. Here, we don't want you two boys."

"We only want to come and see," I said in an ill-used tone; and before the doctor could speak the captain laughingly said, "Come on," and we followed them down below, the men bringing up the rear, armed with bars and hatchets.

The captain did not hesitate for a moment, but went straight down to the cabin door, turned the key, and threw it open, though all the while he knew that there was a man inside fiercer than some savage beast. But had he been a little more cautious it would have saved trouble, for the Malay had evidently been waiting as he heard steps, and as the door was opened he made a spring, dashed the doctor and captain aside, overset me, and, as the men gave way, reached the deck, where he ran right forward and then close up to the foremast, stood with his long knife or kris in his hand, rolling his opal eyeb.a.l.l.s, and evidently prepared to strike at the first who approached.

"The dog! he has been at the spirits," growled the captain fiercely.

"Confound him! I could shoot him where he stands as easy as could be; but I arn't like you, doctor, I don't like killing a man. Never did yet, and don't want to try."

"Don't fire at him," said the doctor excitedly; "a bullet might be fatal. Let us all rush at him and beat him down."

"That's all very fine, doctor," said the captain; "but if we do some one's sure to get an ugly dig or two from that skewer. Two or three of us p'r'aps. You want to get a few surgery jobs, but I'd rather you didn't."

All this while the Malay stood brandis.h.i.+ng his kris and showing his teeth at us in a mocking smile, as if we were a set of the greatest cowards under the sun.

"Look here, Harriet," cried the captain; "you'd better give in; we're six to one, and must win. Give in, and you shall have fair play."

"Cowards! come on, cowards!" shouted the Malay fiercely, and he made a short rush from the mast, and two of the hatchet men retreated; but the Malay only laughed fiercely, and shrank back to get in shelter by the mast.

"We shall have to rush him or shoot him," said the captain, rubbing his nose with pistol barrel. "Now then, you dog; surrender!" he roared; and lowering the pistol he fired at the Malay's feet, the bullet splintering up the deck; but the fellow only laughed mockingly.

"We shall have to rush him," growled the captain; "unless you can give him a dose of stuff, doctor, to keep him quiet."

"Oh, yes; I can give him a dose that will quiet him for a couple of hours or so, but who's to make him take it?"

"When we treed the big old man kangaroo who ripped up Pompey, Caesar, and Cra.s.sus," drawled Jack Penny, who was looking on with his hands in his pockets, "I got up the tree and dropped a rope with a noose in it over his head. Seems to me that's what you ought to do now."

"Look'ye here," cried the captain, "don't you let your father call you fool again, youngster, because it's letting perhaps a respectable old man tell lies. Tell you what, if you'll s.h.i.+n up the shrouds, and drop a bit of a noose over his head while we keep him in play, I won't say another word about your coming on board without leave."

"Oh, all right! I don't mind trying to oblige you, but you must mind he don't cut it if I do."

"You leave that to me," cried the captain. "I'll see to that. There, take that thin coil there, hanging on a belaying-pin."

The tall thin fellow walked straight to the coil of thin rope, shook it out, and made a running noose at the end, and then, with an activity that surprised me, who began to feel jealous that this thin weak-looking fellow should have proved himself more clever and thoughtful than I was, he sprang into the shrouds, the Malay hardly noticing, evidently believing that the boy was going aloft to be safe. He looked up at him once, as Jack Penny settled himself at the masthead, but turned his attention fiercely towards us as the captain arranged his men as if for a rush, forming them into a semicircle.

"When I say ready," cried the captain, "all at him together."

The Malay heard all this, and his eyes flashed and his teeth glistened as he threw himself into an att.i.tude ready to receive his foes, his body bent forward, his right and left arms close to his sides, and his whole frame well balanced on his legs.

"Ready?" cried the captain.

"All ready!" was the reply; and I was so intent upon the fierce lithe savage that I forgot all about Jack Penny till I heard the men answer.

There was the whizzing noise of a rope thrown swiftly, and in an instant a ring had pa.s.sed over the Malay's body, which was s.n.a.t.c.hed tight, pinioning his arms to his side, and Jack Penny came down with a rush on the other side of the fore-yard, drawing the savage a few feet from the deck, where he swung helplessly, and before he could recover himself he had been seized, disarmed, and was lying bound upon the deck.

"I didn't mean to come down so fast as that," drawled Jack, rubbing his back. "I've hurt myself a bit."

"Then we'll rub you," cried the captain joyously. "By George, my boy, you're a regular two yards of trump."

The excitement of the encounter with the Malay being over, there was time to see to poor Jimmy, who was found to be suffering from a very severe cut on the head, one of so serious a nature that for some time the poor fellow lay insensible; but the effect of bathing and bandaging his wound was to make him open his eyes at last, and stare round for some moments before he seemed to understand where he was. Then recollection came back, and he grinned at me and the doctor.

The next moment a grim look of rage came over his countenance, and springing up he rushed to where the Malay was lying upon the deck under the bulwarks, and gave him a furious kick.

"Bad brown fellow!" he shouted. "Good for nothing! Hi--wup--wup--wup!"

Every utterance of the word _wup_ was accompanied by a kick, and the result was that the Malay sprang up, s.n.a.t.c.hed his kris from where it had been thrown on the head of a cask, and striking right and left made his way aft, master of the deck once more.

"Well, that's nice," growled the captain.

"I thought them knots wouldn't hold," drawled Jack Penny. "He's been wriggling and twisting his arms and legs about ever since he lay there.

I thought he'd get away."

"Then why didn't you say so, you great, long-jointed two-foot rule?"

roared the captain. "Here, now then, all together. I'm skipper here.

Rush him, my lads; never mind his skewer."

The captain's words seemed to electrify his little crew, and, I venture to say, his pa.s.sengers as well. Every one seized some weapon, and, headed by the skipper, we charged down upon the savage as he stood brandis.h.i.+ng his weapon.

He stood fast, watchful as a tiger, for some moments, and then made a dash at our extreme left, where Jack Penny and I were standing; and I have no doubt that he would have cut his way through to our cost, but for a quick motion of the captain, who struck out with his left hand, hitting the Malay full in the cheek.

The man made a convulsive spring, and fell back on the edge of the bulwarks, where he seemed to give a writhe, and then, before a hand could reach him, there was a loud splash, and he had disappeared in the sea.

We all rushed to the side, but the water was thick from the effects of the storm, and we could not for a few moments make out anything. Then all at once the swarthy, convulsed face of the man appeared above the wave, and he began to swim towards the side, yelling for help.

"Ah!" said the skipper, smiling, "that's about put him out. Nothing like cold water for squenching fire."

"Hi--wup! hi--wup!" shouted Jimmy, who forgot his wound, and danced up and down, holding on by the bulwarks, his s.h.i.+ning black face looking exceedingly comic with a broad bandage of white linen across his brow.

"Hi--wup! hi--wup!" he shouted; "bunyip debble shark coming--bite um legs."

"Help!" shrieked the Malay in piteous tones, as he swam on, clutching at the slippery sides of the schooner.

"Help!" growled the captain; "what for? Here, you, let me have that there kris. Hitch it on that cord."

As he spoke the captain threw down the thin line with which the Malay had been bound, the poor wretch s.n.a.t.c.hing at it frantically; but as he did so it was pulled away from his despairing clutch.

"I could noose him," drawled Jack Penny coolly. "I've often caught father's rams like that."

"Yes, but your father's rams hadn't got knives," said the captain grimly.

"No, but they'd got horns," said Jack quietly. "Ain't going to drown him, are you?"

"Not I, boy; he'll drown himself if we leave him alone."

"I don't like to see fellows drown," said Jack; and he left the bulwarks and sat down on the hatchway edge. "Tell a fellow when it's all over, Joe Carstairs."