About Pomp he was not so certain. The steward and cook seemed to be on good terms with the two sailors, and he frequently sat with them as they formed a little group forward, on the bright moonlight nights, when they preferred to sit thus and smoke and spin yarns to going below and catching slumber, when it was their privilege to do so.
“I believe he is in with them,” was the conclusion which Storms, the mate, finally reached, after watching and listening as best he could for several days. “They’re hatching some conspiracy—most likely a mutiny to take possession of the ship. Captain Bergen doesn’t suspect it—he is so absorbed in the pearl business; and I’ll let him alone for the present, though it may be best to give him a hint or two to keep him on his guard.”
It never can be known what the restraining power of little Inez Hawthorne was on board that vessel on her extraordinary voyage to the Paumotu Islands, in the South Seas. She lived over again the same life that was hers during the few days spent on the Polynesia. She ran hither and thither, climbing into dangerous places at times, but with such grace and command of her limbs that she never once fell or even lost her balance. She chatted and laughed with Brazzier and Redvig, but she preferred the others, and showed it so plainly in her manner, that, unfortunately, the two could not avoid noticing it.
“See here,” said Captain Bergen, one evening while sitting in the cabin with the child on his knee, “I want you to try and think hard and answer me all the questions I ask you. Will you?”
“Of course I will, if you don’t ask too hard ones.”
“Well, I will be easy as I can. You have told me all about the big steamer that you were on when we found you, and you said that you lived with your Uncle Con in San Francisco, and that it was he and your Aunt Jemima that put you on board.”
“I didn’t say any such thing!” indignantly protested Inez. “I haven’t got any Aunt Jemima—it was my Aunt Letitia.”
The captain and mate smiled, for a little piece of strategy had succeeded. They had never before got the girl to give the name of her aunt, though she mentioned that of her uncle. But she now spoke it, her memory refreshed by the slight teasing to which she was subjected.
“That’s very good. I’m glad to learn that your uncle and aunt had two such pretty names as Con and Letitia Bumblebee.”
“Ain’t you ashamed of yourself?” demanded Inez, turning upon him with flashing eyes. “I never heard of such a funny name as that.”
“I beg pardon. What, then, is their name?”
The little head was bent and the fair brow wrinkled with thought. She had tried the same thing before, though it must be believed that she could not have tried very hard, or she would not have failed to remember the name of those with whom she lived but a short time before. But she used her brain to its utmost now, and it did not take her long to solve the question. In a few seconds she looked up and laughed.
“Of course I know their name. It was Hermann, though he sometimes called himself George Smith.”
“The other sounds German,” remarked Storms, in a lower voice. “Go ahead and get all you can from her.”
“How long did you live with them?”
“Let me see,” said Inez, as she turned her lustrous blue eyes toward the roof of the cabin, as if she expected to read the answer there. “I guess it was about two—three hundred years.”
She was in earnest, and Storms observed:
“She must be a little off on that; but take another tack.”
The captain did so.
“Do you remember living with any one excepting your Uncle George and Aunt Letitia?”
Inez thought hard again, and replied, after a few seconds:
“I don’t know. Sometimes he was Uncle George and sometimes Uncle Con. We lived in the city a good while, where there were, oh, such lots of houses! but there was a time before that when we come such a long, long way in the cars. We rode and rode, and I guess we must have come from the moon, for we was ten years on the road.”
“Do you remember what sort of looking place the moon was?”
“It was just like San Francisco—that is, it was full of houses.”
The officers looked at each other with a smile, and the mate said:
“It’s plain enough what that means. She has come from New York, over the Union Pacific, and her trip was probably the longest of her life.”
“Do you remember your father and mother?”
“I don’t know,” said Inez, with a look of perplexity on her young face which it was not pleasant to see.“Sometimes I remember or dream of them, before we took such a long ride on the cars. My mother used to hold me on her lap and kiss me, and so did my father, and then there was crying, and something dreadful happened in the house, and then I can’t remember anything more until I was on the cars.”
“It may be all right,” said Captain Bergen to his mate, “for this could occur without anything being amiss.”
“It is possible; but I have a conviction that there is something wrong about the whole business. I believe, in short, that the person who placed her on board the steamer Polynesia had no claim upon her at all.”
“That, in fact, the man stole her?”
“That’s it, exactly; and still further, I don’t believe she has any father or mother in Japan, and that if we had gone thither we should have lost all the time and accomplished nothing.”
“It may be, Abe, that you are right,” said the captain, who held a great admiration for his mate,“but I must say you can build a fraud and conspiracy on the smallest foundation of any man I ever knew. But, Abe, you may be right, I say, and if you are, it’s just as well that we didn’t go on a fool’s errand to Tokio, after all.”
“The truth will soon be known, captain.”
CHAPTER X
The Mutineers
A few degrees south of the equator, the schooner Coral ran into a tempest of such fury that with all the skilful seamanship of her captain and crew, and the admirable qualities of the schooner itself, she narrowly escaped foundering.
There were two days when she was in such imminent peril that not an eye was closed in slumber, excepting in the case of little Inez Hawthorne, who felt the situation only to the extent that it compelled her to stay close in the cabin, while the vessel pitched and tossed from the crest of one tremendous billow, down, seemingly, into the fathomless depths between, and then laboriously climbed the mountain in front, with the spray and mist whirling about the deck and rigging like millions of fine shot. But the gallant Coral rode it out safely, and the steady breeze caught her and she sped swiftly in the direction of the Pearl Islands.
The little girl had run hither and thither, until, tired out, she had flung herself upon the berth in the cabin, where she was sleeping soundly, while the captain was doing the same; Abe Storms, the mate, being on deck at the wheel. It was yet early in the evening, and Hyde Brazzier and Alfredo Redvignez were sitting close together, forward, smoking their pipes and conversing in low tones. The breeze was almost directly abeam, so that the sails carried the craft along at a rapid rate, the water foaming and curling from the bow, while the rising and sinking of the schooner on the enormous swells were at such long intervals as almost to be imperceptible. As far as the eye could extend in every direction, no glimpse of a sail or light could be perceived, nor had any been observed through the day, which confirmed what Bill Grebbens, the sailor in the Boston hospital, said, to the effect that, despite the location of the Paumotu Islands, the approach to them from the direction of California took one in a section where the sails of commerce were rarely seen.
The captain and mate had been consulting their chart, and had taken their reckoning more frequently and with greater care than ever before. The conclusion at which they arrived was that they were already south of the northernmost island of the Paumotu group, and were close to the Coral Island, along whose shore were to be found the precious pearls which were to make them all, or rather the two, wealthy.
“It’s a
curious business,” reflected Abe Storms, while holding the wheel motionless. “When I consider the matter fairly, I don’t see why the expedition should not succeed. But it is so different from the coasting business, in which the captain and I have been engaged for years, that it is hard to believe we’re going to make anything out of it.”
He listened a minute to the murmur of the voices forward, and then he added, pursuing the same train of thought:
“What an extraordinary thing it is that we should have this little girl for a passenger! Suppose we carry her back to Tokio after this pearl hunt, and fail to find her parents?”
He took but a minute to consider the question, when he answered:
“It can never make any difference to Inez herself, for her sweet face and winning ways will secure her a welcome and a home in a hundred different places.”
While the mate was indulging in these fancies and reveries, Brazzier and Redvignez were holding an important conference forward.
“I’m sure we won’t have much further to sail,” observed the Spaniard, with a slightly broken accent.“We’re in the latitude of the Paumotus.”
“Have you ever been there?” asked his companion.
“No; but I know something about them, and then you had a glimpse of the chart, which they’re continually looking at, and I’m certain from what you said that the particular spot we’re after isn’t far off.”
“I conclude you’re right, more from the way they’re acting than anything else. I wish I could get hold of that chart.”
“What would you do?” asked Redvignez, with a significant side-glance at his companion.
“What would I do? Why, I wouldn’t wait—that’s all.”
“I don’t see as it will make much difference,” said the other, in the most matter-of-fact voice, as he coolly puffed his pipe. “We might as well take them there and make sure of the spot, before we knock them in the head.”
Brazzier gave a contemptuous sniff and a vicious puff of his pipe, and remarked:
“Did you ever see two such fools, Redvig?” He continued, with mock solemnity: “Beware of the temptations of wealth. Behold those two specimens, who have come all the way from Boston to fish for pearls in the Paumotu Islands. Some old sailor had the secret, and told the captain about it, and he has told his friend, and they have formed a partnership and hired us to go with them to dredge up the oysters.”
“What is there so foolish in all that?” asked the Spaniard, with a grin, which showed his white teeth in the moonlight.
“Nothing; for you or I would have done the same had we been placed in their shoes. But we would have shown more sense than they. They believe we do not suspect what their business is; and yet we both understand the whole thing. Here we are within a few hours’ sail of the spot, and what’s to be done?”
The Spaniard indulged in a light laugh, and replied:
“To think that we should consent to take twenty-five dollars a month, while they scooped in their thousands—their millions—it strikes me sometimes as the greatest joke I ever heard. But, Brazzier, the best plan is for us to be good boys, and go on to the island and help take up the pearls; for then we shall be sure of the right spot, and there shall be no mistake; whereas, if we should take possession now, we might miss the place, even with the help of the chart.”
“I don’t know but what you’re right, Redvig, though it galls me to wait. You know a lot of us took charge of the Spitfire, and set the captain and first-mate adrift, off Valparaiso. You were in favor of waiting, and it was well if we had done so, for we came nearer running our necks into the halter that time than we ever did since, and there wasn’t anything aboard the old hulk that was worth the saving.”
“But what about Pomp?” asked Redvig, in a half-whisper, and with an accent which showed that he considered the question of the highest importance.“Is he all right?”
“You needn’t have any fear about him. I had a long talk with him last night, and we shook hands on the question.”
The negro was an important factor in this business, for, a giant in stature and strength, whichever side he precipitated himself and his prowess upon was sure to win—judging from the ordinary human standpoint.
Pomp, as we have hinted further back, was not an African with a perfectly clear record. The rumors about his belonging to a gang of river pirates in San Francisco were correct, and he had been engaged in some deeds which were of a character that the law puts the severest ban upon. He was known to be daring, and possessed such prodigious power, united to activity, that, beyond a doubt, if he were placed upon an even footing, he could have conquered the captain, mate and the two sailors, without any special effort upon his own part.
The importance of his declaring himself can therefore be understood. He was a far better man than either of the two Caucasians, who hesitated about approaching him. As it had to be done, however, the matter was skilfully broached, after they had left San Francisco and were sailing southward.
It was agreed by the two mutineers that, if the negro held off, he was to be gotten rid of by some treachery, though it was such a serious matter that they hesitated long as to how it could be safely accomplished. To their surprise and delight, however, Pomp listened eagerly to the project and expressed his willingness to go into it, though he insisted there should be no murdering done, as he was not base enough at heart to wish the death of either of the officers.
Brazzier consented; but in doing so he deceived the negro. A mutiny, such as he contemplated, could never be carried to a successful conclusion without disposing finally and forever of the two officers themselves. If they should be spared, the mutineers would never be safe. But Pomp was misled from the first, because it was believed he could be won over before the time came to strike the blow. Redvignez set himself very skilfully to do so, for Pomp was ignorant and exceedingly greedy for wealth. Redvignez began by telling him of a large number of fictitious mutinies, in which the mutineers had made their fortunes and lived happy and respected afterwards, and the narrator made certain to impress upon the African the fact that the job was rendered a perfect one by following out the proverb that dead men tell no tales. Then he incidentally mentioned others in which the mutineers came to grief, all from the fact that they allowed themselves to be controlled by a foolish sentiment of mercy. The evil seed thus sown did not fail to take root and bring forth its fruit, just as the sower intended.
These little incidents were multiplied, and by-and-by Pomp was told that there was but one way in which to secure the enormous riches that lay in the little bay in the South Seas, awaiting their coming, and that was by making themselves complete masters of the situation. The negro could not mistake the meaning of this, and, after a feeble opposition, he gave his assent, and said he would help carry out the terrible programme, as it had been arranged from the first.
It was certainly very curious how the coming of little Inez Hawthorne upon the ship threatened for awhile to disarrange every plan; but so it was. There was a time when the better nature of the two evil men asserted itself, and they began to consider the question in the light of their awakened consciences; but these divine monitors were only roused into temporary wakefulness and speedily dropped asleep again. The manifest distrust which Inez showed toward them seemed to fill their hearts with the most atrocious feelings, and neither of them would have hesitated to fling her overboard, had the opportunity been given. Incredible as it may seem, it is the fact that they would have preferred to do so, being restrained by the simple question of policy. They saw that Pomp had grown very fond of her, and any such action on their part might alienate him—a catastrophe which they were anxious to avert above everything else.
“You say he shook hands with you upon it?” repeated Redvignez. “What does all that mean?”
“It means that he is with us heart and soul. He sees the necessity of putting the captain and mate out of the way, and he will help do it.”
“But what about the little girl—the vipe
r?”
“It was a bad thing for us, Redvig, when we played that little trick, for I have been ready to despair more than once, but the remedy is so simple that I wonder we have not thought of it before.”
“How is that?”
“We will spare her, for Pomp gave me to understand that on no other conditions would he go into it. She will be a pleasant playmate for him, and will help keep him true to us. She is so young and simple-hearted that we can make her believe that some accident has befallen the other two, by which they came to their death, so there will be no danger from anything she ever can tell. When we have gathered in all the pearls we will set sail for South America. At Valparaiso or some of the ports we will place the girl in some convent or school, with enough money to take care of her, and then we will land at another port, sell the schooner, divide up the proceeds and separate, each taking a different route home, if we choose to go there, and then all we’ll have to do, Redvig, is to enjoy the wealth which shall be ours.”
“How much do you think it will be?” asked the Spaniard, with sparkling eyes.
“There is no telling,” was the reply. “I hardly dare think, but I know it runs into the hundreds of thousands, and it is not at all impossible that it touches the millions.”
Redvignez drew a deep breath and his heart gave a great throb, as would be the case with the most phlegmatic being who contemplated the near possession of such vast wealth. Visions of the wild round of dissipation and excesses in which they would indulge came up before the two evil men, and it was no wonder that they were impatient for the hour to come when they should strike the blow for the prize. Like the officers, they were so full of the scheme that they had no desire to sleep; and while the figure of Mr. Storms was visible at the wheel, and the Coral sped on to the southward over the calm, moonlit sea, these two men talked about and agreed upon the particulars of the frightful crime which had been in their hearts, as may be said, from the moment they hoisted sail and passed out of San Francisco harbor.
The Edward S. Ellis Megapack Page 101