Latitude 19 degree Part 40

He stopped short and surveyed the Minion contemptuously, "Forgot it was you."

"Dinghy," said the Minion.

The Captain arose lazily. "Don't talk with that fool, Bo's'n. I'm tired as three men. I'll go to bed." Bed! Poor Skipper! The soft side of a rock was his bed. I followed the Skipper shortly, and found him in close conversation with Cynthia.

"How can you be sure he's gone?" asked the Skipper.

"Why, one proof is that my blanket and pillow are gone, too."

"The ungrateful wretch!" said the Skipper.

"I don't believe he's ungrateful," said Cynthia. "He never seemed ungrateful. Perhaps the pirates came back and took him off. I wonder"--with a look in my direction--"if that handsome pirate was with them?"

"No," said I. "You may quiet your mind on that point; he's gone where all good pirates go."

"Where?" asked Cynthia.

"To the nethermost h.e.l.l," answered the Skipper. "And I helped put him there."

"Of course, I don't believe you, Uncle," said Cynthia, "but----"

"The Minion seemed to know something," said the Bo's'n. "Suppose we ask him again."

"Torture wouldn't get more than two words out of him at a time," said I.

"I can," said Cynthia, with a triumphant glance at me. Accordingly, Cynthia proceeded again to the sh.o.r.e with her Uncle to interrogate the Minion. She gathered, after an hour's hard prodding and digging, interspersed with sudden roars mixed with a few judicious oaths from the Skipper to give her inquiries point, that the Minion awoke and found that he was quite alone. He raised up on his elbow and discovered our boat far out at sea. He supposed that it was our boat, as he saw several persons get out and on to the wreck. He laid down again, too dizzy to keep his eyes open any longer. He was aroused by a rustling in the gra.s.s, and turned over to see a man carrying the young Englishman in his arms. The Minion, afraid of nothing in heaven or h.e.l.l, said "Hi!" when the man turned his head, and the Minion discovered that the intruder was no other than the Smith, who had riveted the cages upon the lad and myself. The Minion, with his limited vocabulary, managed to call the Smith a thief, and asked him why he was stealing the boy; whereupon the Smith asked him if his grandmother knew that he was in Hati. This enraged the Minion to such an extent that he raised up on his elbow and threw stones at the Smith. He was especially angry when he saw Cynthia's pillow and blanket carried down and placed in the boat. The young man seemed to protest, but the Smith told him that it was the rule in the British navy to obey first and protest afterward, and the lad seemed too weak to make much opposition. The Smith helped himself to our biscuit and some of our water, taking one of our few utensils to carry it in. He also took a cup and got in and rowed away.

"Which way did he go?" asked Cynthia.

The Minion pointed eastward. He furthermore informed Cynthia that he saw a name upon the bow of the boat, and again when she started toward the east he saw the same name, and that he spelled it over to himself, and that he was sure that it was "Yankee Blade, No. 3."

"That's mighty curious," said the Skipper, scratching his head.

"And he tells me, Uncle, that the man he calls the Smith left a letter for you. He says it's in a place where you will find it first thing."

"Must be the rum bottle," said the Skipper, with peculiar insight. And so it was, for he found the scrawl sticking in the cleft made in the cork.

"Paddon the lib.u.t.ty I takes," wrote the Smith. "I opened a sawtch.e.l.l and got this paper and penzill wen I found the lad wa.s.sent yere in the bigg cavern i sarched i had a fite with a big brown feller but but wen i tell im ime goan fer young trevelin he lets me in i see the brown feller goan in or i nevver shuld have find the place we had a fite outside meanin a s.h.i.+pes fite it was dawk i see the dingee floatin i slips overbord and swimms fer her i tears up one of the planks and paddels i lies by all day wen you go i come the is a british vessel down the coast ime a rowin fer her if i git her ill come fer you i take my recompens before hand in s.h.i.+pes biskits and RUM the lady must excuse my takin her pillar my boys bad and needs em so wis.h.i.+n you luck and ill come if i git a chance no more at presens from yours till deth james taler penock."

Cynthia and Lacelle disappeared during the reading of this finished epistle, and the Skipper, Bo's'n, and I were alone. I forgot to mention the Minion. He counted somewhat now, as he had told us something of real consequence.

Before I lay down to sleep the Bo's'n drew me confidentially aside. "The Minion has been after me," said he in a low tone, "and he says he has found a cave full of jewels, and they're his property, and no one shan't touch 'em. He's goin' to declare it before us all, and call the Skipper and G.o.d to witness his statement, and he says he'll blow on us to the Government as soon as we get home if any of us touches a ring or a pin of it."

"What did you tell him?" said I, rather alarmed, I must confess.

"I told him he had been overcome with liquor in the cave, and that he imagined all those things. He swears it's so, and I swears it ain't, and that's where it is now. I thought of tyin' him up and not lettin' him go in the cave at all."

"I wouldn't watch him," said I. "Just let him go in if he wants to. I suppose you have removed all the traces, Bo's'n?"

"Yes, sir," said the simple Bo's'n. "I suppose you kept your promise to me, and sat with your back against the outer side of the cave?"

"Yes, Bo's'n, I did," said I. "Of course, I couldn't help finding your neckerchief, you know."

"But I can trust you not to mention that, Mr. Jones, sir, to any one?"

"Oh, certainly, Bo's'n, you need have no fear of my telling your--our secret."

The night of my marriage was a very dark and gloomy one. I had been asleep but a short time when I was awakened by the Skipper. The Bo's'n was lying as far from us as he could get. His antipathy to the Skipper had not abated, and at night especially he seemed afraid to come anywhere near him. He was sleeping heavily, poor man! Most of the work came upon the Bo's'n, and I'm afraid we did not appreciate his willingness as much as we should have done.

"I have a favour to ask," whispered the Skipper.

"Ask ahead," said I. "You've done me a service to-day, Captain, which shall be a real one in time, or I'll know the reason why."

"What's that?" asked the Skipper in amazement.

"Well, no matter, if your memory's so short. Now what can I do for you?"

"I've been lyin' awake thinkin'," said the Skipper.

"So have I," I answered.

"Not what I was thinkin' of, I'll be bound," said the Skipper. "Man, as a usual thing, is so regardless of his fellow-man." The Skipper nodded his head several times, as if he were the one considerate creature that G.o.d ever made. "Man is selfish, man is occupied only with his own small affairs."

"Yes, sir," said I. "That is so."

"I was thinkin' as I lay down to-night," continued the old man in a real Wednesday-evening-meeting voice, "that those poor critters need a rest, too."

"You mean the Bo's'n and the Minion?" said I. "Yes, they do, we all do!

You as much as the rest, Captain."

"If noses can speak," returned the Skipper, "the Bo's'n and the Minion are getting all they need just at present. I'm speakin' of those poor soldiers of fortune who have been standin' up for years, perhaps."

"Soldiers of fortune?" I said inquiringly.

"Well, I call 'em so. And of a pretty bad fortune, too. Now what I want of you is to come help me bury 'em."

"Oh, you mean the skeletons?" said I.

"I do," said the Skipper. I saw that the religious mania had got the weather side of him again.

"What! now?" said I. "It's so late, and I want a little sleep, too."

"I can not sleep until they are buried," said he. "Poor things, with no rest for the soles of their feet. I shall sleep easier when they are under the sod."

"We haven't any shovels, you know, Captain," I remonstrated.

"Under the sod figgeratively speakin'," said the Skipper. "We'll give 'em, as we did those two poor s.h.i.+pmates of ours, a burial at sea."

"But I don't see any sense in it, Captain. What is the hurry? Why won't to-morrow do? I'm so tired of funerals and weddings and bones and other horrors of all sorts."