by Max Brand
“Kate, dear,” said Harrigan hastily, “I see the boat come tossin’ there over the water. Speak out like a brave girl. Neither of us will leave the other in peace as long as we have a hope of you. Choose between us before we put a foot in that boat, and if you choose McTee, I’ll give you God’s blessin’ an’ say no more nor ever raise my hand against ye. McTee, will ye do the like?”
“For the sake of the day of the fight and the wreck I will. If she chooses you now, I’ll raise no hand against you.”
A shout came faintly across the rush and ripple of the breakers.
“Speak out,” said Harrigan.
“Hallo!” she screamed in answer to the hail from the boat, and then turning to them: “I choose neither of you!”
“McTee,” growled Harrigan, “I’m thinkin’ we’ve both been fools.”
“Think what you will, I’ll have her; and if you cross me again, I’ll finish you, Harrigan.”
“McTee, ten of your like couldn’t finish me. But look! There’s the girl wadin’ out to the boat. Let’s steady her through the waves.”
They ran out and, catching her beneath the shoulders, bore her safe and high through the small rollers. When they were waist-deep, the boat swung near. A lantern was raised by the man in the bows, and under that light they saw the four men at the oars, now backing water to keep their boat from washing to the beach. The sailors cheered as the two men swung Kate over the gunwale and then clambered in after her. The man at the bows all this time had kept his lantern high above his head with a rigid arm, and now he bellowed: “Black McTee!”
“Right!” said McTee. “And you?”
“Salvain—put back for the ship, lads—Pietro Salvain. D’you mean to say you’ve forgotten me?”
“Shanghai!” said McTee, as light broke on his memory. “What a night that was.”
“But you—”
“The Mary Rogers took a header for Davy Jones’s locker; first mate drunk and ran her on a reef; all hands went under except the three of us; we drifted to this island.”
“Black McTee shipwrecked! By God, if we get to port with our old tramp, I’ll get a farm and stick to dry land.”
“Your ship?”
“The Heron, four thousand tons, White Henshaw, skipper.”
“White Henshaw?” cried McTee in almost reverent tones.
“The same. Old White still sticks to his wheel. He’s as hard a man as you, McTee, in his own way.”
They were pulling close to the freighter by this time, and Salvain gave quick orders to lay the boat alongside. In another moment they stood on the deck, where a tall man in white clothes advanced to meet them.
“Good fishing, sir,” said Salvain. “We’ve picked up three shipwrecked people, with Angus McTee among them.”
“Black McTee!” cried the other, and even in the dim light he picked out the towering form of the Scotchman.
“It took a wreck to bring us together, Captain Henshaw,” said McTee, “but here we are, I’ve combed the South Seas for ten years for the sake of meeting you.”
“H-m!” grunted Henshaw. “We’ll drink on the strength of that. Come into the cabin.”
They trooped after him, Salvain and the three rescued, and stood in the roomy cabin, the captain and the first mate dapper and cool in their white uniforms, the other three marvelously ragged. Barefooted, their hair falling in jags across their foreheads, their muscles bulging through the rents in their shirts, McTee and Harrigan looked battered but triumphant. Kate Malone might have been the prize which they had safely carried away. She was even more ragged than her companions, and now she withdrew into a shadowy corner of the cabin and shook the long, loose masses of her hair about her shoulders.
CHAPTER 16
The dark eye of Pietro Salvain was quick to note her condition. He was a rather small, lean-faced man with the skin drawn so tightly across his high cheekbones that it glistened. He was emaciated; his energy consumed him as hunger consumes other men.
“There is a berth for me below,” he said to Kate. “You must take my room. And I have a cap, some silk shirts, a loose coat which you might wear—so?”
“This is Miss Malone, Salvain,” said McTee before she could answer.
“You are very kind, Mr. Salvain,” she said.
He smiled and bowed very low, and then opened the door for her; but all the while his glance was upon McTee, who stared at him so significantly that before following Kate through the door, Salvain shrugged his shoulders and made a gesture of resignation.
The captain turned to Harrigan. Henshaw was very old. He was always so erect and carried his chin so high that the loose skin of his throat hung in two sharp ridges. In spite of the tight-lipped mouth, the beaklike nose, and the small, gleaming eyes, there was something about his face which intensified his age. Perhaps it was the yellow skin, dry as the parchment from an Egyptian tomb and criss-crossed by a myriad little wrinkles.
“And you, sir?” he said to the Irishman.
“One of my crew,” broke in McTee carelessly. “He’ll be quite contented in the forecastle. Eh, Harrigan?”
“Quite,” said Harrigan, and his glance acknowledged the state of war.
“Then if you’ll go forward, Harrigan,” said the captain, and his voice was dry and dead as his skin—“if you’ll go forward and report to the bos’n, he’ll see that you have a bunk.”
“Thank you, sir,” murmured Harrigan, and slipped from the room on his bare feet.
“That man,” stated Henshaw, “is as strong as you are, McTee, and yet they call you the huskiest sailor of the South Seas.”
“He is almost as strong,” answered McTee with a certain emphasis.
Something like a smile appeared in the eyes of Henshaw, but did not disturb the fixed lines of his mouth. For a moment Henshaw and McTee measured each other.
The Scotchman spoke first: “Captain, you’re as keen as the stories they tell of you.”
“And you’re as hard, McTee.”
The latter waved the somewhat dubious compliment away.
“I was breaking that fellow, and he held out longer than any man I’ve ever handled. The shipwreck interrupted me, or I would have finished what I started.”
“You’d like to have me finish what you began?”
“You read my mind.”
“Discipline is a great thing.”
“Absolutely necessary at sea.”
Henshaw answered coldly: “There’s no need for us to act the hypocrite, eh?”
McTee hesitated, and then grinned: “Not a bit. I know what you did twenty years ago in the Solomons.”
“And I know the story of you and the pearl divers.”
“That’s enough.”
“Quite.”
“And Harrigan?”
“As a favor to you, McTee, I’ll break him. Maybe you’ll be interested in my methods.”
“Try mine first. I made him scrub down the bridge with suds every morning, and while his hands were puffed and soft, I sent him down to the fireroom to pass coal.”
“He’ll kill you someday.”
“If he can.”
They smiled strangely at each other.
A knock came at the door, and Salvain entered, radiant.
“She is divine!” he cried. “Her hair is old copper with golden lights. McTee, if she is yours, you have found another Venus!”
“If she is not mine,” answered McTee, “at least she belongs to no other man.”
Salvain studied him, first with eagerness, then with doubt, and last of all with despair.
“If any other man said that I would question it—so!—with my life. But McTee? No, I love life too well!”
“Now,” Henshaw said to Salvain, “Captain McTee and I have business to talk.”
“Aye, sir,” said Salvain.
“One minute, Salvain,” broke in McTee. “I haven’t thanked you in the girl’s name for taking care of Miss Malone.”
The first mate paused at the door.
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“I begin to wonder, captain,” he answered, “whether or not you have the right to thank me in her name!”
He disappeared through the door without waiting for an answer.
“Salvain has forgotten me,” muttered McTee, balling his fist, “but I’ll freshen his memory.”
He flushed as he became aware of the cold eye of Henshaw upon him.
“Even Samson fell,” said the old man. “But she hasn’t cut your hair yet, McTee?”
“What the devil do you mean?”
Henshaw silently poured another drink and passed it to the Scotchman. The latter gripped the glass hard and tossed off the drink with a single gesture. At once his eyes came back to Henshaw’s face with the fierce question. He was astonished to note kindliness in the answering gaze.
Old Henshaw said gently: “Tut, tut! You’re a proper man, McTee, and a proper man has always the thought of some woman tucked away in his heart. Look at me! For almost sixty years I’ve been the King of the South Seas!”
At the thought of his glories his face altered, as soldiers change when they receive the order to charge.
“You’re a rare man and a bold man, McTee, but you’ll never be what White Henshaw has been—the Shark of the Sea! Ha! Yet think of it! Ten years ago, after all my harvesting of the sea, I had not a dollar to show for it! Why? Because I was working for no woman. But here I am sailing home from my last voyage—rich! And why? Because for ten years I’ve been working for a woman. For ourselves we make and we spend. But for a woman we make and we save. Aye!”
“For a woman?” repeated McTee, wondering. “Do you mean to say—”
“Tut, man, it’s my granddaughter. Look!”
Perhaps the whisky had loosened the old man’s tongue; perhaps these confidences were merely a tribute to the name and fame of McTee; but whatever was the reason, McTee knew he was hearing things which had never been spoken before. Now Henshaw produced a leather wallet from which he selected two pictures, and handed one to the Scotchman. It showed a little girl of some ten years with her hair braided down her back. McTee looked his question.
“That picture was sent to me by my son ten years ago.”
It showed the effect of time and rough usage. The edges of the cheap portrait were yellow and cracked.
“He was worthless, that son of mine. So I shut him out of my mind until I got a letter saying he was about to die and giving his daughter into my hands. That picture was in the letter. Ah, McTee, how I pored over it! For, you see, I saw the face of my wife in the face of the little girl, Beatrice. She had come back to life in the second generation. I suppose that happens sometimes.
“I made up my mind that night to make a fortune for little Beatrice. First I sold my name and honor to get a half share and captaincy of a small tramp freighter. Then I went to the Solomon Islands. You know what I did there? Yes, the South Seas rang with it. It was brutal, but it brought me money.
“I sent enough of that money to the States to keep the girl in luxury. The rest of it I put back into my trading ventures. I got a larger boat. I did unheard-of things; and everything I touched turned into gold. All into gold!
“From time to time I got letters from Beatrice. First they were careful scrawls which said nothing. Then the handwriting grew more fluent. It alarmed me to notice the growth of her mind; I was afraid that when I finally saw her, she would see in me only a barbarian. So I educated myself in odd hours. I’ve read a book while a hurricane was standing my ship on her beam ends.”
McTee, leaning forward with a frown of almost painful interest, understood. He saw it in the wild light of the old man’s eyes; a species of insanity, this love of the old man for the child he had never seen.
“Notice my language now? Never a taint of the beach lingo in it. I rubbed all that out. Aye, McTee, it took me ten years to educate myself for that girl’s sake. In the meantime, I made money, as I’ve said. Ten years of that!
“Beatrice was in college, and six months ago I got the word that she had graduated. A month later I heard that she was going into a decline. It was nothing very serious, but the doctors feared for the strength of her lungs. It made me glad. Now I knew that she would need me. An old man is like a woman, McTee; he needs to have things dependent on him.
“I turned everything I had into cash. I did it so hurriedly that I must have lost close to twenty per cent on the forced sales. What did I care? I had enough, and I made myself into a grandfather who could meet Beatrice’s educated friends on their own level.
“I kept this old ship, the Heron, out of the list of my boats. I am going back to Beatrice with gold in my hands and gold in my brain! All for her. But is she not worth it? Look!”
He thrust the second portrait into McTee’s hands. It showed a rather thin-faced girl with abnormally large eyes and a rather pathetic smile. It was an appealing face rather than a pretty one.
“Beautiful!” said McTee with forced enthusiasm.
“Yes, beautiful! A little pinched, perhaps, but she’ll fill out as she grows older. And those are her grandmother’s eyes! Aye!”
He took the photograph and touched it lightly.
His voice grew lower, and the roughness was plainly a tremolo now: “The doctors say she’s sick, a little sick, quite sick, in fact. Twice every day I make them send me wireless reports of her condition. One day it’s better—one day it’s worse.”
He began to walk the cabin, his step marvelously elastic and nervous for so aged a man.
“Is it not well, McTee? Let her be at death’s door! I shall come to her bedside with gold in either hand and raise her up to life! She shall owe everything to me! Will that not make her love me? Will it?”
He grasped McTee’s shoulder tightly.
“I’m not a pretty lad to look at, eh, lad?”
McTee poured himself a drink hastily, and drained the glass before he answered.
“A pretty man? Nonsense, Henshaw! A little weather-beaten, but a tight craft at that; she’ll worship the ground you walk! Character, Henshaw, that’s what these new American girls want to see in a man!”
Henshaw sighed with deep relief.
“Ah-h, McTee, you comfort me more than a drink on a stormy night! For reward, you shall see what I’m bringing back to her. Come!”
He rose and led McTee into his bedroom, for two cabins were retained for the captain’s use. Filling one corner of the room was a huge safe almost as tall as a man.
He squatted before the safe and commenced to work the combination with a swift sureness which told McTee at once that the old buccaneer came here many times a day to gloat over his treasure. At length the door of the safe fell open. Inside was a great mass of little canvas bags. McTee was panting as if he had run a great distance at full speed.
“Take one.”
The Scotchman raised one of the bags and shook it. A musical clinking sounded.
“Forty pounds of gold coin,” said Henshaw, “and about ten thousand dollars in all. There are eighty-five of those bags, and every one holds the same amount. Also—”
He opened a little drawer at the top of the safe and took from it a chamois bag. When he untied it, McTee looked within and saw a quantity of pearls. He took out a small handful. They were chosen jewels, flawless, glowing. His hand seemed to overflow with white fire. He dropped them back in the bag, letting each pearl run over the end of his fingers. Henshaw restored the bag and locked the safe. Then the two men stared at each other. They had been opposite types the moment before, but now their lips parted in the same thirsty eagerness.
“If she were dead,” said McTee almost reverently, “the sight of that would bring her back to life.”
“McTee, you’re a worthy lad. They’ve told me lies about you. Indeed it would bring her back to life! It must be so! And yet—” Sudden melancholy fell on him as they returned to the other room and sat down. “Yet I think night and day of what an old devil of a black magician told me in the Solomon Islands. He said I and my gold should burn toget
her. I laughed at him and told him I could not die on dry land. He said I would not, but that I should burn at sea! Think of that, McTee! Suppose I should be robbed of the sight of my girl and of my gold at the same time!”
McTee started to say something cheerful, but his voice died away to a mutter. Henshaw was staring at the wall with visionary eyes filled with horror and despair.
“Lad, do you think ghosts have power?”
“Henshaw, you’ve drunk a bit too much!”
“If they have no power, I’m safe. I fear no living man!” He added softly: “No man but myself!”
“I’m tired out,” said McTee suddenly. “Where shall I bunk, captain?”
“Here! Here in this room! Take that couch in the corner over there. It has a good set of springs. With gold in my hands. Here are some blankets. With gold in my hands and my brain. Though you don’t need much covering in this latitude. I would raise her from the grave.”
He went about, interspersing his remarks to McTee with half-audible murmurs addressed to his own ears.
“Is this,” thought McTee, “the Shark of the South Seas?”
A knock came and the door opened. A fat sailor in an oilskin hat stood at the entrance.
“The cook ain’t put out no lunch for the night watches, sir,” he whined.
Henshaw had stood with his back turned as the door opened. He turned now slowly toward the open door. McTee could not see his face nor guess at its expression, but the moment the big sailor caught a glimpse of his skipper’s countenance, he blanched and jumped back into the night, slamming the door behind him. That sight recalled something to McTee.
“One thing more, captain,” he said. “What of Harrigan? Do we break him between us?”
“Aye, in your own way!”
“Good! Then start him scrubbing the bridge and send him down to the fireroom afterwards, eh?”
“It’s done. Why do you hate him, McTee? Is it the girl?”
“No; the color of his hair. Good night.”
CHAPTER 17
Long before this, Harrigan had reported to the bos’n, burly Jerry Hovey, and had been assigned to a bunk into which he fairly dived and fell asleep in the posture in which he landed. In the morning he tumbled out with the other men and became the object of a crossfire of questions from the curious sailors who wanted to know all the details of the wreck of the Mary Rogers and the life on the island. He was saved from answering nine-tenths of the chatter by a signal from the bos’n, who beckoned Harrigan to a stool a little apart from the rest of the crew. Jerry Hovey was a cheery fellow of considerable bulk, with an habitual smile. That smile went out, however, when he talked with Harrigan, and the Irishman became conscious of a pair of steady, alert gray eyes.