THE CASTAWAYS
"This ship," growled Carter, the second officer, to Dr. Trendon, as theystood watching the growing smoke-column, "is a worse hot-bed of rumoursthan a down-east village. That's the third sea-gull we've had officiallyreported since breakfast."
As he said, three distinct times the Wolverine had thrilled to animminent discovery, which, upon nearer investigation, had dwindled tonothing more than a floating fowl. Upon the heels of Carter's complaintcame another hail.
"Boat ahoy. Three points on the starboard bow."
"If that's another gull," muttered Carter, "I'll have something to say toyou, my festive lookout."
The news ran electrically through the cruiser, and all eyes were strainedfor a glimpse of the boat. The ship swung away to starboard.
"Let me know as soon as you can make her out," ordered Carter.
"Aye, aye, sir."
"There's certainly something there," said Forsythe, presently. "I canmake out a speck rising on the waves."
"Bit o' wreckage from Barnett's derelict," muttered Trendon, scowlingthrough his glasses.
"Rides too high for a spar or anything of that sort," said the juniorlieutenant.
"She's a small boat," came in the clear tones of the lookout, "driftin'down."
"Anyone in her?" asked Carter.
"Can't make out yet, sir. No one's in charge though, sir."
Captain Parkinson appeared and Carter pointed out the speck to him.
"Yes. Give her full speed," said the captain, replying to a question fromthe officer of the deck.
Forward leapt the swift cruiser, all too slow for the anxious hearts ofthose aboard. For there was not one of the Wolverines who did notexpect from this aimless traveller of desert seas at the least a leadingclue to the riddle that oppressed them.
"Aloft there!"
"Aye, aye, sir."
"Can you make out her build?"
"Rides high, like a dory, sir."
"Wasn't there a dory on the Laughing Lass?" cried Forsythe.
"On her stern davits," answered Trendon.
"It is hardly probable that unattached small boats should be driftingabout these seas," said Captain Parkinson, thoughtfully. "If she's adory, she's the Laughing Lass's boat."
"That's what she is," said Barnett. "You can see her build plain enoughnow."
"Mr. Barnett, will you go aloft and keep me posted?" said the captain.
The executive officer climbed to join the lookout. As he ascended, thosebelow saw the little craft rise high and slow on a broad swell.
"Same dory," said Trendon. "I'd swear to her in Constantinople."
"What else could she be?" muttered Forsythe.
"Somethin' that looks like a man in the bottom of her," sang out thecrow's-nest. "Two of 'em, I think."
For five minutes there was stillness aboard, broken only by an occasionallow-voiced conjecture. Then from aloft:
"Two men rolling in the bottom."
"Are they alive?"
"No, sir; not that I can see."
The wind, which had been extremely variable since dawn, now whippedaround a couple of points, swinging the boat's stern to them. Barnet,putting aside his glass for a moment, called down:
"That's the one, sir. I can make out the name."
"Good," said the captain quietly. "We should have news, at least."
"Ives or McGuire," suggested Forsythe, in low tones.
"Or Billy Edwards," amended Carter.
"Not Edwards," said Trendon.
"How do you know?" demanded Forsythe.
"Dory was aboard when we found her the second time, after Edwards hadleft."
"Can you make out which of the men are in her?" hailed the captain.
"Don't think it's any of our people," came the astonishing reply fromBarnett.
"Are you sure?"
"I can see only one man's face, sir. It isn't Ives or McGuire. He's astranger to me."
"It must be one of the crew, then."
"No, sir, beg your parding," called the lookout. "Nothin' like that inour crew, sir."
The boat came down upon them swiftly. Soon the quarter-deck was lookinginto her. She was of a type common enough on the high seas, except that astep for a mast showed that she had presumably been used for skimmingabout open shores. Of her passengers, one lay forward, prone and quiet. Alength of sail cloth spread over him made it impossible to see his garb.At his breast an ugly protuberance, outlined vaguely, hinted a deformity.
The other sprawled aft, and at a nearer sight of him some of the menbroke out into nervous titters. There was some excuse, for surely such ascarecrow had never before been the sport of wind and wave. A thing ofshreds he was, elaborately ragged, a face overrun with a scrub of beard,and preternaturally drawn, surmounted by a stiff-dried, dirty, clothsemi-turban, with a wide, forbidding stain along the side, worked out thelikeness to a make-up.
"My God!" cackled Forsythe with an hysterical explosion; and again, "MyGod!"
A long-drawn, irrepressible aspiration of expectancy rose from thewarship's decks as the stranger raised his haggard face, turned eyesunseeingly upon them, and fell back. The forward occupant stirred not,save as the boat rolled.
From between decks someone called out, sharply, an order. In the grimsilence it seemed strangely incongruous that the measured business of aship's life should be going forward as usual. Something within thenewcomer's consciousness stirred to that voice of authority.Mechanically, like some huge, hideous toy, he raised first one arm, thenthe other, and hitched himself halfway up on the stern seat. His mouthopened. His face wrinkled. He seemed groping for the meaning of a joke atwhich he knew he ought to laugh. Suddenly from his lips in surprisingvolume, raucous, rasping, yet with a certain rollicking deviltry fit toset the head a-tilt, burst a chanty:
"Oh, their coffin was their ship, and their grave it was the sea: Blow high, blow low, what care we! And the quarter that we gave them was to sink them in the sea: Down on the coast of the high Barbaree-ee."
Long-drawn, like the mockery of a wail, the minor cadence wavered throughthe stillness, and died away.
"The High Barbaree!" cried Trendon.
"You know it?" asked the captain, expectant of a clue.
"One of those cursed tunes you can't forget," said the surgeon. "Heard ascoundrel of a beach-comber sing it years ago. Down in New Zealand, thatwas. When the fever rose on him he'd pipe up. Used to beat time with asteel hook he wore in place of a hand. The thing haunted me till I wassorry I hadn't let the rascal die. This creature might have learned itfrom him. Howls it out exactly like."
"I don't see that that helps us any," said Forsythe, looking down on thepreparations that were making to receive the unexpected guests.
With a deftness which had made the Wolverine famous in the navyfor the niceties of seamanship, the great cruiser let down her tackle asshe drew skilfully alongside, and made fast, preparatory to lifting thedory gently to her broad deck. But before the order came to hoist away,one of the jackies who had gone down drew the covering back from thestill figure forward, and turned it over. With a half-stifled cry heshrank back. And at that the tension of soul and mind on theWolverine snapped, breaking into outcries and sudden, sharpimprecations. The face revealed was that of Timmins, the bo's'n's mate,who had sailed with the first vanished crew. A life preserver wasfastened under his arms. He was dead.
"I'm out," said the surgeon briefly, and stood with mouth agape. Neverhad the disciplined Wolverines performed a sea duty with so raggeda routine as the getting in of the boat containing the live man and thedead body. The dead seaman was reverently disposed and covered. As to thesurvivor there was some hesitancy on the part of the captain, who wasinclined to send him forward until Dr. Trendon, after a swift scrutiny,suggested that for the present, at least, he be berthed aft. They tookthe stranger to Edwards's vacant room, where Trendon was closeted withhim for half an hour. When he emerged he was beset with questions.
"Can't give any account of himself yet," said the surgeon. "Weak and notrightly conscious."
"What ails him?"
"Enough. Gash in his scalp. Fever. Thirst and exhaustion. Nervous shock,too, I think."
"How came he aboard the Laughing Lass?" "Does he know anything ofBilly?" "Was he a stow-away?" "Did you ask him about Ives and McGuire?""How came he in the small boat?" "Where are the rest?"
"Now, now," said the veteran chidingly. "How can I tell? Would you haveme kill the man with questions?"
He left them to look at the body of the bo's'n's mate. Not a word had heto say when he returned. Only the captain got anything out of him butgrowling and unintelligible expressions, which seemed to be objurgatoryand to express bewildered cogitation.
"How long had poor Timmins been drowned?" the captain had asked him, andTrendon replied:
"Captain Parkinson, the man wasn't drowned. No water in his lungs."
"Not drowned! Then how came he by his death?"
"If I were to diagnose it under any other conditions I should say that hehad inhaled flames."
Then the two men stared at each other in blank impotency. Meantime thescarecrow was showing signs of returning consciousness and a message wasdispatched for the physician. On his way he met Barnett, who asked andreceived permission to accompany him. The stranger was tossing restlesslyin his bunk, opening and shutting his parched mouth in silent, piteousappeal for the water that must still be doled to him parsimoniously.
"I think I'll try him with a little brandy," said Trendon, and sent forthe liquor.
Barnett raised the patient while the surgeon held the glass to his lips.The man's hand rose, wavered, and clasped the glass.
"All right, my friend. Take it yourself, if you like," said Trendon.
The fingers closed. Tremulously held, the little glass tilted and rattledagainst the teeth. There was one deep, eager spasm of swallowing. Thenthe fevered eyes opened upon the face of the Wolverine's firstofficer.
"Prosit, Barnett," said the man, in a voice like the rasp of rusty metal.
The navy man straightened up as from a blow under the jaw.
"Be careful what you are about," warned Trendon, addressing his superiorofficer sharply, for Barnett had all but let his charge drop. His facewas a puckered mask of amaze and incredulity.
"Did you hear him speak my name--or am I dreaming?" he half whispered.
"Heard him plain enough. Who is he?"
The man's eyes closed, but he smiled a little--a singular, wry-mouthed,winning smile. With that there sprung from behind the brush of beard,filling out the deep lines of emaciation, a memory to the recognition ofBarnett; a keen and gay countenance that whisked him back across sevenyears time to the days of Dewey and the Philippines.
"Ralph Slade, by the Lord!" he exclaimed.
"Of the Laughing Lass?" cried Trendon.
"Of the Laughing Lass."
Such a fury of eagerness burned in the face of Barnett that Trendoncautioned him. "See here, Mr. Barnett, you're not going to fire abroadside of disturbing questions at my patient yet a while. He's in nocondition."
But it was from the other that the questions came. Opening his eyes hewhispered, "The sailor? Where?"
"Dead," said Trendon bluntly. Then, breaking his own rule of repression,he asked:
"Did he come off the schooner with you?"
"Picked him up," was the straining answer. "Drifting."
The survivor looked around him, then into Barnett's face, and his mindtoo, traversed the years.
"North Dakota?" he queried.
"No; I've changed my ship," said Barnett. "This is the Wolverine."
"Where's the Laughing Lass?"
Barnett shook his head.
"Tell me," begged Slade.
"Wait till you're stronger," admonished Trendon.
"Can't wait," said the weak voice. The eyes grew wild.
"Mr. Barnett, tell him the bare outline and make it short," said thesurgeon.
"We sighted the Laughing Lass two days ago. She was in good shape,but deserted. That is, we thought she was deserted."
The man nodded eagerly.
"I suppose you were aboard," said Barnett, and Trendon made a quickgesture of impatience and rebuke.
"No," said Slade. "Left three--four--don't know how many nights ago."
The officers looked at each other. "Go on," said Trendon to hiscompanion.
"We put a crew aboard in command of an ensign," continued Barnett, "andpicked up the schooner the next night, deserted. You must know about it.Where is Billy Edwards?"
"Never heard of him," whispered the other.
"Ives and McGuire, then. They were there after--Great God, man!" hecried, his agitation breaking out, "Pull yourself together! Give ussomething to go on."
"Mr. Barnett!" said the surgeon peremptorily.
But the suggestion was working in the sick man's brain. He turned to theofficers a face of horror.
"Your man, Edwards--the crew--they left her? In the night?"
"What does he mean?" cried Barnett.
"The light! You saw it?"
"Yes; we saw a strange light," answered Trendon soothingly. Slade halfrose. "Lost; all lost!" he cried, and fell back unconscious. Trendonexploded into curses. "See what you've done to my patient," he fumed.Barnett looked at him with contrite eyes.
"Better get out before he comes to," growled the surgeon. "Nice way totreat a man half dead of exhaustion."
It was nearly an hour before Slade came back to the world again. Thedoctor forbade him to attempt speech. But of one thing he would not bedenied. There was a struggle for utterance, then:
"The volcano?" he rasped out.
"Dead ahead," was the reply.
"Stand by!" grasped Slade. He strove to rise, to say something further,but endurance had reached its limit. The man was utterly done.
Dr. Trendon went on deck, his head sunk between his shoulders. For aminute he was in earnest talk with the captain. Presently theWolverine's engines slowed down, and she lay head to the waves,with just enough turn of the screw to hold her against the sea-way.