Latitude 19 degree Part 15

"We ought to sing the doxology," said the Skipper to me in an undertone.

He called to her in a well-simulated tone of regret:

"Oh, no, Cynthy, it can't be possible!"

So there were two cowards of us.

"How can she tell? She can't reach the cage," said I.

"How can you tell he's gone?" called the Skipper, in tones whose joy was but poorly concealed. "You can't reach the cage."

"I'm standing right under the cage, Uncle; I can see right into it. O Solomon, Solomon! my dear, darling, beautiful bird!"

"Never knew she could look through a piece of tin. Guess I'll go and see."

I put my fingers in my ears and ran toward the Bo's'n, who was still waving. The Minion trotted along by my side. The strange thing about the Minion was that, unlike most boys, he seldom spoke; I should have thought that he was dumb had it not been that occasionally, when hard pressed, he did open his childish lips and pour forth words of wisdom.

There is an old saying that actions speak louder than words. The Minion seemed to prefer to communicate his thoughts in this way. He pointed to the beach, where I still saw the Bo's'n making his gestures. I turned and looked back to the camp. I put my hands to my mouth and hallooed to the Skipper, who had emerged from the shadow of the trees.

"It's a flag of truce, I think," said I.

I saw the Skipper shake his head and look despondently on the ground.

What he said was: "O Lord! those wretched sailors again."

I wondered if he was correct in his surmise as I ran along toward where the Bo's'n stood. When he saw that I was really coming, he dropped the flag of truce and put it on, for it was his s.h.i.+rt which he had fastened to a branch to use for this purpose.

"How silly you are, Bo's'n!" I said. "I can't be following you all over the island. You had better come back to the camp and behave like a Christian."

A look of horror overspread his face as I spoke of his return to the camp, but he shook his head and said:

"I should not have called you, sir, Mr. Jones, sir, but I have discovered something. I thought you would like to know it." He turned and walked briskly away.

"Hold on!" I said. "I am tired of this tomfoolery. Do you know what a hot morning it is?"

"Yessir, I know, sir," said the Bo's'n. "Come here, sir."

The Bo's'n's air of mystery overcame my desire to sit down in the shade.

I followed where he led.

"It's the result of the battle, sir," he explained.

"What battle?" I asked, as I walked beside him.

"The fight between the sailors and the Hatiens, sir."

"You don't mean," I said, "that the sailors have come down here to----"

"No, only those are here who were left here." He parted the sh.o.r.eward bushes and revealed to me three men lying there. Two of them were white men. They were our sailors Wilson and Tanby. The other was a Hatien.

He was lying by a partly dug grave. Indeed, so nearly ready was the grave that I had some thought of confiscating it for the body of one of our sailors. There were two other graves; at least, so I took them to be. They were finished, and their occupants were at rest under that wonderful leafy bower which only the tropics can afford. I thought that I heard a rustling in the bushes, and told the Bo's'n my suspicions. The Minion pointed to the thicket, and with a wild yell disappeared. One never knew what the Minion would do. One always knew what he would say, and that was nothing. There seemed to be an air of mystery about this secluded spot. I watched the bushes, expecting the Minion's return, and, as I watched, I felt that a pair of eyes was fixed on me. I pierced the undergrowth right and left with my gaze, but only the mompoja leaves moved languidly in the baby breeze which was now stirring, the precursor of a later wind. I followed the Minion into the thicket, but saw no one.

Even the Minion had vanished. It was a great relief to me to be able to act like a man with courage once more, instead of guarding my words for fear that they would agitate the being the dearest in the world to me.

"Did you see any one as you came along the beach, Bo's'n?" said I.

"No, sir, Mr. Jones, sir; I was not looking or thinking of any one when I stumbled right on them bodies. I was running to get away, sir."

Again the look of horror overspread his features, and he glanced backward over his shoulders toward the camp.

I believe in always going to the root of a matter with the ignorant and superst.i.tious.

"Now, Bo's'n," I said, with an air of logical argument, "what should you see in that simple, plain, iron trinket--" But he stopped me with a gesture which was strangely authoritative from an inferior to a superior, and in hushed, scared tones he said:

"Don't speak of it, Mr. Jones. Don't mention it, sir. Don't think of it.

Make the young lady throw it away."

"_Make!_"

"Yessir, Mr. Jones, make her throw it away, sir."

I laughed to rea.s.sure him, though I must acknowledge that I was impressed by his manner. My laughter had the effect of rea.s.suring myself somewhat also.

"Shall I take the boat and row out and sink this dangerous bauble with its snake's body"--a tremor seemed to seize my listener, and he shook as if with a chill--"and its sheep's head?"

"Do not make fun of it, sir. You will be sor----"

"We will go and get it, Bo's'n, and you shall row me out while I----"

"Do not ask me to touch it, sir. There is doom in that sign." I noticed that he did not call it a ring, as I had done; and then he came close to me and looked into my eyes with impressive and beseeching earnestness, and said in a whisper:

"You may take it out to sea, far, far out to sea, and drop it beneath the waves, but the storms will come, the waves will roll, and the breakers will dash it again on the sh.o.r.e. You may bury it in a pit so deep that you can hardly get yourself out again from its grave, but an earthquake will rumble beneath it and with its cracks will upheave it, and it will be here again. You may take it to the top of yonder mountain and lay it on the topmost peak, but the tempests will come and the hurricane will blow and will toss it again at your feet. She has found it, and it will follow her to the end--to the end."

The mysterious tone of the man, the ghostlike voice in which he spoke, made me feel unpleasantly, although it was broad day and the sun was s.h.i.+ning brightly. He seemed to be lifted out of himself, and to speak in a voice and tone not his own. I tried to laugh. I reasoned with myself thus. How utterly absurd that a man of little education, of the most ordinary ability, and, withal, a man holding that absurd position Bo's'n of a merchant craft, should have an insight into mystical and occult things which none of the rest of us possess! But as he still stood staring at me, and directly into my eyes, as if he would read into the very depths of my mind, I began to have what is commonly called a creepy sensation. Little s.h.i.+vers ran up my backbone, and I longed for other companions.h.i.+p. I cast a glance at the dead men, and felt that if I were to retain the strength to go for aid to bury them, the sooner I went the better for me. With difficulty I withdrew my gaze from the man's eyes.

"Come, come, Bo's'n!" I said, forcing a laugh, "you are overwrought and nervous. Come back with me, and I will give you my word that you shall not see the ring again while you remain with us."

He stood gazing irresolutely out to sea.

"It is no ring!" he muttered. "A circle, a sign, an emblem of horror--of dread--of vengeance!"

"I am hungry, Bo's'n," I said, dropping from the height to which he had raised me and endeavouring to drag him down with me. "You left your post, and Miss Archer is doing your work. I shall return for my breakfast, and then get the Captain to come back here with me and bury our men. That will be only decent."

These matter-of-fact statements brought the Bo's'n down to earth again.

"I see crumbs on your s.h.i.+rt front," said he. He spoke now in his natural voice. His eyes had lost their far-seeing look. I left him and ran back to the camp, calling him to follow. I told the Skipper what he had found, also his strange and unreasonable terror of the ring. Cynthia looked sad and downcast, but entered into this new subject with interest.

"If he's afraid of the ring, I can conceal it," said she, "but don't ask me to throw it away. I wouldn't give it up now for the world."

"For some reason," said I, "the man is half dead with fright. Just hide it, Miss Archer, and I will tell the Bo's'n that you have thrown it away."

_Another!_

People will tell you that it is only wicked women who lead men astray.