CHAPTER X.
THE MOUTH CLOSES.
When the hatch was closed, and Matt had shut himself into the hull ofthe boat, he found that he was in cramped quarters.
The air was stifling, and the smell of bilge water was extremelyunpleasant. He could not sit up without knocking his head against thedeck beams, and he was entangled in a scattered pile of firewood. Butif he got where he wanted to go he must contrive to move forward.
Taking a match from his pocket, he struck it on his trousers, andlooked about him in the feeble gleam.
The firewood was not all he had to contend with. In addition to that,the hold was half full of boxes and casks.
Making mental note of a course that would take him forward with leasttrouble from the fuel and food supplies, he pinched out the match andcrawled carefully.
He realized, presently, that the voices from the cabin were coming tohis ears in increased volume; in fact, he was hearing them much moredistinctly than when he had been at the window outside the cabin. Theirdistinctness became much more apparent the farther he advanced; notonly that, but they served to help him locate himself. When the voiceswere directly over his head he paused.
The floor boards of the deck had spread slightly, and the cracks werelined with threads of lamplight. This explained the distinctness withwhich the voices reached his ears. Sitting up, he stifled his breathingwhile he listened.
"You fellers might just as well understand this from the startoff--that money stays together, all in a wad, until we get safe out o''Frisco. Then there'll be a divvy, and not before."
Red-whiskers was the speaker. Matt had no difficulty in recognizing hisraucous voice.
"Is that square, John?" demanded one of the others. "Ain't Ross an' meentitled to our share, here an' now, if we want it?"
"You're entitled to your share, Kinky, and you're going to get it, butnot until we're out of the woods. I'd have whacked up to-night, butfor that raw deal we had worked on us at the foot of Clay Street. ThisMotor Matt, it's as plain as a pikestaff, is trying to help Lorry.Lorry himself wouldn't have the nerve to play a game like that. Why, hestole the money himself, see, and he ain't goin' to ask the law to stepin and help him get the stuff back. But this Motor Matt--well, from allI can read about him, he's all nerve and is given to meddling. We'vegot to quit this house boat and sail on that Jap steamer to-morrow.I'll pay our passage to Honolulu out of the funds, and when we get towhere we're going we'll go snucks, share and share alike."
"I want mine now," struck in a third voice.
"That's you, Ross," growled Red-whiskers. "You want to do some gamblin'and drinkin', which is the worst things you could possibly do, not onlyfor yourself, but for Kinky and me. I'll not have it that way. When weget in a safe place, we'll split the loot into three parts, and you cantake what's coming to you and go to ballyhack, if you want to. But youcan't tune up around 'Frisco while I'm in the town."
"What's to be done with the _San Bruno_?" asked a voice which Mattidentified as belonging to Kinky.
"We'll use her to take us to 'Frisco, in the morning, just beforethe steamer leaves. Then we can turn her over to her owner, pay himwhat's coming, and hustle for the dock where we load ourselves for theSandwich Islands. I'm calculating we'll be safe enough there."
"O' course," spoke up the voice of Ross, "all I want's to do the rightthing by everybody an' have the right thing done by me. I ain't puttingup no holler, an' don't think that for a minute; but I'm just aboutstrapped. I haven't got more'n two bits in my jeans."
"Well, you'll have three thousand of your own before you're a weekolder, Ross, and I'd advise you to do the same as I intend todo--invest it in a pineapple plantation in the islands."
"Oh, splash! I'm going to invest my money in a distillery," and Rossfinished with a reckless laugh, only he used a harsher expletive.
"It wouldn't be like you if you didn't," grunted Red-whiskers.
"Speaking along this line," spoke up Kinky, "reminds me that I'mdryer'n the desert of Sahary. Suppose we open a bottle?"
"That hits me," agreed Ross promptly.
"I'll go you--for just one bottle," came from the red-whiskered leaderof the trio.
Ross chuckled.
"John likes his nip jest as well as anybody," said he.
"What of it?" demanded the leader. "If I've got the sense to take nomore than is good for me, what's the odds? The trouble with you, Ross,is that you never stop until you make a fool of yourself. Let me tellyou something: Whisky is the worst enemy a man ever had. It'll give hima little 'Dutch courage' for a piece of crooked work, I grant you, butif a crook hangs onto the drink it will ruin him in the end. That'sright."
This was refreshing doctrine to come from such a man as Red-whiskers.Matt listened to his talk with a half smile.
"Get the stuff, Kinky," said the impatient Ross.
There was a sound of moving feet across the floor. The next moment amatch was lifted directly over Matt's head and a flood of lamplightrevealed him to Kinky. The scoundrel flung back with a wild yell.
Matt waited for no more. With a pounding heart he scrambled over boxesand casks and stove wood on his way toward the other hatch.
A confused babel of voices reached him from the cabin; feet could beheard running over the floor, and some one raised a great clatterdropping into the hold.
"Come out here!" shouted a fierce voice. "Come out, I say, or I'llshoot!"
Matt was willing to run the risk of stopping a bullet, there in thedarkness, and he was in altogether too big a hurry to throw up abarricade between him and the man with the gun.
Rising on his knees, he lifted his hands to the hatch. No shot washeard, and Matt reflected that the scoundrels would not dare fire arevolver for fear of attracting attention from the other house boats inthe cove.
To throw back the hatch took only an instant, but, as the youngmotorist scrambled through the opening, he was seized by the shouldersand hurled roughly to the deck.
He was up again almost as soon as he was down.
"Landers!" bellowed a gruff voice; "where the deuce is Landers? Takehim, Kinky. I guess the two of us are enough without Landers. I'll headhim off on this side."
Matt felt a pair of arms go around him from behind. With a fierceeffort, however, he twisted clear of the clutching hands, whirled andstruck out with his fist.
An exclamation, more forcible than polite, was jolted out of Kinky.
"Hang it!" the scoundrel added, "he's got a fist like a pile driver.Lay for him, Ross! I'm wabbling."
Before Motor Matt could turn and defend himself against Ross,Red-whiskers bolted through the open cabin door.
"Don't make so much noise, you fellows!" he called angrily. "Everyhouse boat in the cove will be----"
Then he saw Matt. The latter had sprung to the edge of the deck withthe plain intention of diving overboard.
Before he could carry out his plan Ross and the leader of the three menhad him by each arm and had jerked him roughly back.
Matt struggled with all his power, but there were three against him,and he was thrown to the deck and dragged into the cabin, one of themen holding a hand over his mouth to prevent outcry.
The cabin was divided into two rooms, and Matt was half dragged andhalf carried through the darkness of the first room into the glaringlamplight of the one beyond.
"Put him in that chair over there," ordered the red-whiskered man. "Youneedn't be afraid he'll yell, Kinky," he added, with savage menace,"so take your hands from his mouth. If he lets out a whoop, or triesto bolt, I'll fire, even if the noise brings a tender from every houseboat in the bay."
One look into the gleaming eyes of Red-whiskers was enough to warn Mattthat discretion demanded passive compliance with the wishes of hiscaptors.
Kinky removed his hands from Matt's lips, and Ross released his arms.Both men stepped to one side, glaring at him curiously and vindictively.
Red-whiskers, a revolver lying on his knees, was sitting on thecushioned bench, directly fa
cing Matt. With a steady hand he waslighting a fresh cigar.
"Pull the window shades, Kinky," said he calmly. "Ross, lock both doorsand put the keys in your pocket. We'll have a little heart-to-hearttalk with Motor Matt, and I don't want Landers to see what we do, orhear what we're talking about."
Motor Matt, blaming himself for what had happened, sat quietly andwondered what was to come.
Motor Matt's Launch; or, A Friend in Need Page 10