“And there wasn’t nobody handy with ropes to haul us aboard like you hauled me,” said Bill, who had been so much afraid of being run down when he was floating alone in a dinghy that he was almost cheered at the thought of being run down with so many others to keep him company. “Thank you kindly, miss.”
“Look out. It’s pretty hot,” said Peggy.
“You may well be thankful for that,” said Peter Duck. “There’s plenty as would have drowned you, fooling about in a boat trying to make us think you was the Viper.”
“But I didn’t, Mr Duck,” began Bill. “I really didn’t.”
“Sound that foghorn,” said Mr Duck. “We’ll have the truth out of you when we’re ready for it.”
He swung the Wild Cat back on her course again. The sails filled and everything settled down; settled down that is, as far as anything can be said to have settled down when a little ship is sailing in a dense fog across the mouth of the Channel. The big tramp steamer had scared them, towering above them suddenly, out of the fog, and though everybody was bursting to find out what the red-haired boy had been doing alone in a boat, everybody knew now that the most important thing of all was to listen and to keep sailing. The whole crew were on deck, excepting the parrot and the monkey. Peter Duck never left the wheel, and every two minutes, at a word from him, the red-haired boy was sending out three blasts on the foghorn, while Captain Flint kept walking quietly fore and aft, listening for noises, and now and then slipping into the deckhouse to have yet another look at the chart that by now he almost knew by heart.
The Wild Cat was steadily moving faster and faster through the water, and she had left the Wolf Rock far astern, and long out of hearing when, at last, Titty, who had been with Roger in the stern looking at Bill, wondering what he was really like, and watching him pump at the foghorn when Mr Duck nodded to him, saw that the jib no longer seemed to be made of fog, and that John and Susan up in the bows could no longer be mistaken for ghosts.
“Fog’s lifting,” said Peter Duck suddenly. “We could do with a bit longer, barring them screw steamers.”
“We can’t have it both ways,” said Captain Flint. ‘I’d like to let Black Jake go cruising up to Ireland looking for the Wild Cat, and that’s likely enough if the fog holds. But I wouldn’t mind it if we met no more of these blundering tramp steamers, not as near as that one, anyway.”
“Was Black Jake going up to Ireland?” said Bill. “What about me? He’d have had to pick me up first.”
“Likely he would,” said Peter Duck. “Valuable you are. He might have come back for his boat or his foghorn, but I reckon he’d made up his mind to be losing the both of them, and you think he’d be coming back for you. Not likely.”
“Lucky I caught your rope,” said Bill.
“Lucky for you,” said Peter Duck. “What about us?”
“With all them cap’ns aboard,” said Bill, “one of em’s bound and sure to want another boy.”
The fog did indeed begin to lift. It was soon possible to see a hundred yards or so from the deck of the schooner. It was as if she were sailing in the exact middle of a round pond, shut in by a high wall of fog. Only, though the pond was so small, a swell was rolling across it of that tremendous kind that does so often come sweeping out of the Atlantic down into the Bay of Biscay. Beyond that wall they could hear faint, distant sirens. Within it they were alone.
“What do you think about it, Mr Duck?” said Captain Flint at last. “Nobody’s going to run us down now. Titty, run along forward and tell John and Susan they can come aft. And Nancy’s there with them. I want one of them to take the wheel from Mr Duck, while we’re hearing what the passenger has to say for himself .…”
Bill looked suddenly grave.
Titty hurried away forward. She hurried because she did not wish to miss a word of what was coming. How had it happened that the red-haired boy had been drifting alone in the fog? Was he on Black Jake’s side or theirs? Had they rescued him or made him prisoner? What had been going on last night when the Viper had nearly crashed into them in the dark? What had been happening in the fog, while Peter Duck had been pretending the Wild Cat was heading north for Ireland when really she was heading south for Spain?
“Come on, Susan,” she said, almost as if Black Jake were listening out on the bowsprit end. “Come on, John. Come on, Nancy. Captain Flint thinks it’s all right now; the fog’s not so bad. He wants somebody to take the wheel. They’re just going to decide about the red-haired boy ….”
They all hurried aft together, in time to hear Captain Flint say: “We’ll do better for him than that, if we think he’s worth keeping at all.”
“But you can’t throw him back,” said Titty.
“Why not?” said Captain Flint.
“I’ve got a spare toothbrush he could have,” said Susan. “I brought two for each of us.”
The red-haired boy looked doubtfully, first at Peter Duck then at Captain Flint, then at the children of whom this schooner seemed so full.
“Sou’-sou’-west, half-west,” said Peter Duck, giving up the wheel.
“Sou’-sou’-west half-west it is,” said John, taking it over. Peter Duck turned sharply on the red-haired boy.
“And now, young Bill,” he said, “let’s hear what you was doing in a dinghy letting on with a foghorn as you was a sailing vessel on the starboard tack. What have you got to say about that? Don’t let’s hear nothing but the truth.”
“It wasn’t my fault I shipped along of he,” said Bill.
“Never mind that,” said Captain Flint. “Let’s hear what you were doing with that foghorn.”
“Black Jake he send me down into the dinghy with the horn, and then he tell me to sound it, once at a time, every so often, so he’d know where I was and pick me up when he come back.”
“Back?” said Captain Flint. “Where from?”
“He was going to lay aboard you in the fog and get a hold of Mr Duck.”
“H’m. Was he? And how many did he think would be enough for that?”
“Five of ’em there was. There was Black Jake. Then there was Simeon Boon, that’s just come out after two years’ hard. Then there was Mogandy, the nigger, blacker’n Black Jake. Then there was a brother of Black Jake that was hiding in the fo’c’sle till we’d sailed. Police wanted him for something. Then there was the man that was chucker-out at the ‘Ketch as Ketch Can’…”
“That’s a fishermen’s tavern in Lowestoft, sir,” said Peter Duck. “It’s got another name. You’d not know it.”
“And then there was me.”
Captain Flint threw back his head and laughed.
“There was six of us altogether,” said Bill.
“All right,” said Captain Flint. “So the five who stayed in the Viper were going to board us, were they?”
“Black Jake tell ’em it’d be easy. There’d be no more’n two of you on deck, and if one of ’em was Mr Duck, why that was all he wanted. If Mr Duck wasn’t on deck, Black Jake he reckoned to hold down the hatches and offer to blow you up with dropping something down if you didn’t send Mr Duck up quick.”
“Pleasant,” said Captain Flint. “But if that was what he was thinking, why didn’t he try that game last night, when he ran up alongside us with all lights out in the dark?”
“Half of ’em was drunk last night,” said the red-haired boy, “and some of ’em was frightened. And Black Jake was letting fly at ’em all night for the chance they’d missed, and then, when the fog come on this morning, he fair drove ’em to it. ‘Cap’ns and mates and all,’ he says, ‘I’ve that here as’ll send ’em squealing. Give up Peter Duck,’ he says, ‘they’ll throw him overboard to us and be thankful.’”
“And so you were to sound the foghorn while they were to creep up to us in the fog?” said Captain Flint.
“I didn’t have nothing to say neither way,” said Bill. ‘They’d all had a go at me about one thing and another ever since we was clear of Lowestoft pier heads. I’m all one b
ruise, I am. What could I do when Black Jake drop me over into the dinghy. ‘Pass up them oars,’ he says. ‘You won’t want ’em. And now,’ he says, ‘if you don’t sound that horn regular you’ll be run down and sunk.’ ‘And what if he is?’ says Mogandy. ‘There’s no name on the boat,’ says Black Jake. And he throw down the painter into the boat and let her drop astern, and the next I knowed they were gone into the fog, and what could I do without oars? Swim ashore? What could I do but sound that horn?”
“Well, there’s something in that,” said Captain Flint.
“And then you come right down on top of me and throw me a rope and I come aboard. I’ll work my passage, sir,” he added eagerly, “if you’ll let me stay with you back to Lowestoft.”
“What if we aren’t going there?” said Captain Flint. John and Nancy looked anxiously at Susan.
“What if we aren’t going there?” said Captain Flint again. “What do you think about it now, Mr Duck? Eavesdropping wasn’t enough for him. Kidnapping he was up to. Piracy. The fellow’d stick at nothing. Why not spike his guns for good by lifting that treasure of yours, Mr Duck, and bringing it home? Once he knows it’s gone, you’ll have a quiet life.”
“I’ve never said yet there was a treasure in that place,” said Mr Duck, “and I’ve always said I’d never go there. But after what’s happened since yesterday I’m with you, sir. I’ll show you the place as near as I can. If it’s anything you fancy, well and good. Even if them crabs have scoffed the bag and all that’s in it, it’ll be a grand bit of sailing down the Nor’-east Trades.”
But it was Susan who, in the end, gave the deciding vote.
“Whatever it is,” she said, “Black Jake ought not to have it. And Peggy and I were counting things all yesterday, because of what you said at Cowes. We’ve got enough for a very long time.”
“Six months’ stores,” said Captain Flint. “And if there’s anything short we could fill up in Madeira.”
“I think we ought to go,” said Susan. “Black Jake’s almost a murderer. He oughtn’t to be allowed to get it after this.”
“Susan,” said Captain Flint, “shake hands. You’re fifteen kinds of trump.”
“Well done, Susan,” said Nancy. “I thought you’d agree in the end.”
“What about you, John?” said Captain Flint.
“Susan’s quite right. We ought to go,” said John.
“Swallows and Amazons for ever!” cried Nancy.
“Don’t shout, Nancy,” said John, and Peter Duck looked northwards over his shoulder.
“What’s going to happen?” said Roger. “What’s it all about? What? What?”
“We’re going to Crab Island to get that treasure,” said Titty, who had been listening open-mouthed.
“Then we’ll really see those crabs,” said Roger.
Bill stared first at one and then at another.
Captain Flint walked hurriedly forward, right up to the bows and back again. He came aft chuckling in his excitement. “We’ll bring it off,” he was saying. “Nothing’s going to stop us. Black Jake did a bad day’s work for himself when he set his ship’s boy afloat in a dinghy. As for you, you young pirate,” he added, turning to Bill, “where did you sleep aboard the Viper?”
“Sail locker,” said Bill.
“We’ll do a bit better for you than that, if you’re to sign articles with us.”
“I’ll do whatever Mr Duck says,” said Bill.
“We’ll fix you up a bunk in the hospital cabin,” said Captain Flint. “There’s nothing in there but tinned food. Take him below, you others, and introduce him to Gibber and the parrot. Matter of fact,” he added, turning to Peter Duck, “I’ve been feeling a bit uneasy about that boy, ever since we sent him back to the Viper, that day when John and Nancy fished him out of the harbour.”
Bill, hearing this, bobbed up again into the highest spirits.
“Come on, Bill,” said Nancy.
“Come along,” said Roger, “Gibber’ll be pleased to meet you.”
“Where’s all them cap’ns and mates of yours?” said Bill. There was a general laugh.
Bill looked from face to face with surprise.
“Come on,” said Roger again, and Bill, nerving himself to meet a whole saloon full of officers, followed him down the companion.
*
“You’d better go down with the others to fix him up,” said Captain Flint to John. “I’ll take the wheel. Ask Susan and Peggy if they can’t give us something to eat.”
“Sou’-sou’-west, half-west,” said John.
“Sou’-sou’-west, half-west.”
“Blue water sailing after all,” said Peter Duck, looking round at the thinning fog.
And Captain Flint watched the compass card, smiling happily, as he kept the Wild Cat on her course for Finisterre, and thought of Madeira and the distant Caribbees.
CHAPTER XIV
QUIT OF THE VIPER
THE MESSAGE ABOUT food was given and at once forgotten. What with Bill and the decision just taken, not even Roger at that moment could think about such things as dinner.
“Well,” said Nancy cheerfully, as they crowded into the saloon and Bill looked round in surprise to see no officers about. “We’re in for it now. I knew he’d never be content just hanging about near home. Three cheers for Christopher Columbus.”
“It’s a good thing we’ve been careful with the water from the very beginning,” said Susan.
“This is going to be a real voyage,” said Titty.
“What do you mean?” said Bill.
“Mr Duck’s island,” said John.
“Those crabs,” said Roger.
“I’m jolly glad we ran you down,” said John. “You know, it was just that that settled it, our going, I mean.”
Bill stared.
“Why,” he said, “we knew in Lowestoft you was going there. We was sailing the night you first come aboard, only Black Jake see Mr Duck a-talking to your skipper. And then next day when he see Mr Duck bringing his dunnage aboard, why then he knowed. And then when he pushed me overboard and I telled him what your skipper said about all them cap’ns and mates …” Bill lowered his voice, and looked round at the cabins.
“He did push you overboard that day?” said Titty. “I was sure he did.”
“Course he did,” said Bill. “I ain’t no natural diver. When I come back and tell him what your skipper said, Black Jake he telled the others and I got more’n half a rope’s-ending next morning when he come on deck and find you’d cleared out of harbour and given us the slip. And then when you come in again as we was going to look for you I got it worse from the others. We knowed you was going well enough. And Black Jake telled Mogandy and Boon and the rest they’d nothing to do but to get hold of Mr Duck and they’d be rich men for life. They reckoned to do it, too, this morning.”
The Swallows and Amazons looked at each other. With Bill so sure that from the beginning they had been bound for Crab Island, it began to seem odd, even to Susan, that they had really set sail from Lowestoft without meaning to go treasure-hunting at all. When Captain Flint left the wheel to Mr Duck and came hurrying down after them into the saloon, just for a moment, to spread the big chart of the Atlantic on the saloon table and to show them where they were going (he, too, had already forgotten about the food) they could see that Bill simply did not believe that they were looking at it now for the first time. It may seem a queer thing, but perhaps it was just because Bill took it for granted that they had set out on that tremendous voyage that the others so quickly grew used to the idea of it.
Indeed, they almost forgot to think about the voyage in the interest of fitting Bill out as a member of the crew. Nancy had a white canvas hat for him. John offered him a pair of shorts, but Bill preferred his long trousers, patch and all. His feet turned out to be about the same size as Peggy’s, and luckily she had a pair of sandshoes to spare as well as an old pair of sea-boots. As for oilskins, there were a lot of spare ones. “And, anyway,” said
John, “we’re never all wearing oilskins at once.” Susan and Peggy cleared a lot of tins out of the lower bunk in the hospital cabin for him, and Titty pinned up a picture postcard of Lowestoft harbour on the wall, to make him feel at home. They decided where he was to sit at the saloon table, and remembered, with horror, that Captain Flint had asked for food. Susan and Peggy left the others and bolted up the companion, to get to work in the galley. Roger showed Bill where the engine was stowed. John and Nancy took him into the fo’c’sle. Roger introduced him to Gibber, who let Bill tickle him behind the ear. Titty introduced him to the parrot, who gave him a terrible nip in the finger.
“But where are all them cap’ns and mates?” asked Bill at last, lowering his voice. “Sleeping, are they?”
“There just aren’t any,” said Titty.
“We’re them,” said Nancy.
And they tried to explain to Bill about the adventures they had had in the Swallow and the Amazon, but somehow it didn’t seem much good. Bill just roared with laughter. “And me creeping on my toes,” he said, “for fear of ’em.” Suddenly his face grew solemn. “Lucky for you your skipper telled me what he did. Why, if Black Jake had knowed … If he’d knowed that, why he’d have had Mr Duck out of here before you was halfway down Channel. He wouldn’t have waited for no fog.…”
*
Just then Captain Flint, with a new confident ring in his voice called down through the skylight.
“Come up and have a look round, you people. Fog’s gone. We’ve done it!”
They crowded up on deck. The lurching of the vessel had already told them that there had been a complete change in the weather, just as Peter Duck had guessed there would be. They found the wind blowing hard from the north-west and strengthening every minute. Besides the ocean swell there were waves now, hurrying so fast that their tops tumbled head over heels in a smother of white spray. The wind thrummed in the rigging, and the Wild Cat left a long troubled wake streaming away astern of her. There was no fog. There was no land in sight. And there was no sign of the black schooner.
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