CHAPTER SEVEN
They went down to the seashore and all got into the boat. Barty sat atone end and the Good Wolf sat at his feet. Saturday took a seat onBarty's knee and Blue Crest sat on his shoulder. The boat was a prettywhite one and the pirates rowed so well that it went up and down overthe waves in a most agreeable manner, rather like a rocking-horse.
When they reached the ship the rest of the pirates crowded to the sideto see who had been brought to the tea party.
"How they are all scowling," said Barty to the Captain.
"You must remember what I told you," the Captain said. "Those aresmiles. They are really grinning from ear to ear with pleasure becausethey see you come without being chained and padlocked."
"Ah! I must remember," said Barty, "that when they look cross theyare only trying to look perfectly delighted."
Two of the sailors let down a rope ladder. Blue Crest flew up it andSaturday ran up it in a minute. The pirates in the boat held it steadyand the pirate Captain carried Barty up on his back. The Good Wolflooked serious for a second or so and then began to walk up as calmlyas if he had used rope ladders all his life.
When Barty was once on board every pirate on the ship began to wavehis hat and cheer. A few of them took out their swords and began toflourish them and then seemed suddenly to remember that sword wavingmight not seem polite, and very quickly put them back into theirscabbards.
Barty looked all around him. The deck was very big and clean and thecannons were polished until the brass they were made of shone likegold. At one end there was a gay blue and white awning spread, andunder it was a table which looked as if it were piled with the kind ofgood things you have at a tea party.
"Where is Baboo Bajorum?" asked Barty, because he was really verycurious.
"If you will have the extreme goodness to please be so kind as to dome the honor to step this way I will show you," said the pirateCaptain. So they went in a procession, the pirate Captain leading theway with his hat in his hand, Barty following, the Good Wolf followingBarty, Saturday following the Good Wolf, Blue Crest hopping afterSaturday, and the six pirates in a line behind them. The pirates madebows all the time and Barty took off his hat for politeness.
When they reached the awning a very big black person, who looked asif he were Saturday who had suddenly grown immense, rose from a chairand made a low bow. He was covered with shaggy hair and had stronglong arms and strong long hands. "He is a Gorilla," said the Good Wolfin a low voice to Barty, "but I know him quite well, and though youwould not think it, he has a delightful disposition."
At all events he knew how to manage pirates and make them give abeautiful tea party. Barty and the Good Wolf and Saturday and BlueCrest were all given comfortable seats under the blue and whiteawning, and the Captain and six pirates handed them things faster thanthey could eat. Blue Crest had a muffin with strawberry jam on it, andshe perched on the end of her plate and pecked away in perfectdelight. Saturday had sugared walnuts which he had never tasted beforeand which filled him with glee. Barty and the Good Wolf had everythingyou could imagine, only the Good Wolf did not care for tea.
Baboo Bajorum did not talk except to make a remark now and then toSaturday, who understood his language. The pirates seemed tounderstand him without any words. He just sat and watched them andthey watched him to see if he were pleased with what they were doing.Once a pirate who was greedy stole a piece of cake before he handedthe plate to Barty, and Baboo Bajorum stretched out his enormouslylong hairy arm and seized him by the seat of his trousers and threwhim over the rail into the sea. The pirate could swim very well and ina few minutes came clambering over the side of the ship again, but helooked very wet and ashamed and sneaked down into the hold as if heknew better than to come back to the party.
"That is the way he teaches us," said the Captain to Barty, eagerlyhanding him a currant bun with one of his best bows. "It is a way thatmakes you improve very quickly. He never argues. If he hits you orthrows you overboard you know you have made some mistake and you makehaste to find out what it is."
"I dare say that does teach people quickly," answered Barty, "but Ishould not like it."
He glanced rather anxiously at Baboo Bajorum, but Baboo was lookingat him with quite a nice expression. Barty thought it must be aGorilla smile, and as he of course wished to be polite he got up andmade a low bow. Then Baboo Bajorum got up and made a low bow also, andall the pirates made bows and the Good Wolf made a bow and Saturdaymade one and Blue Crest bobbled her head up and down most gracefully.
"He likes you," the Good Wolf said to Barty in a whisper; "he sees youare polite by nature. I saw it myself that first morning when we metat the edge of the deep forest."
Barty's forehead wrinkled itself up in a puzzled way. "The morning wemet on the edge of the deep forest," he said. "Now you have made mebegin to think of that thing I can't remember. What is it, what is it,what is it?"
"Never mind," said the Good Wolf; "you will find out in time. Just nowyou must enjoy your adventures."
"Yes, I must," said Barty. "They are such splendid adventures. Justthink, here I am on a pirate ship, having tea with pirates. What willcome next?"
What came next was very interesting, but it was the thing that camenext but one which was thrilling.
After tea was over Baboo Bajorum made a sign to the pirate Captain andhe got up and bowed more deeply than ever and began to tell his story.
"This," he said, "is the story of how we were made into PolitePirates. When first we were pirates we were a disgrace to the name. Wechased ships and made them prisoners. We robbed them of theirtreasures and burned them and sank them in the sea. We made peoplewalk the plank or chopped their heads off. Nobody would associate withus and we were never invited anywhere. I think I might even say thatwe were disliked. One day we dropped anchor near a small island in theIndian Ocean. We were very hot and tired because the sun was blazingand the sea was like a burning-glass and we had been having a busyday. We had chased a merchant vessel loaded with a rich cargo of goldand splendid stuff and ivory, and when we had caught it we had behavedin our usual rude and inconsiderate way. We had sliced any number ofheads off, and after we had carried the rich cargo to our own ship wehad blown up the merchant ship without a word of apology. We were sohot and tired when we dropped anchor near the little island that weall lay down in our hammocks and fell into a deep sleep.
"Just before I went down to my cabin one of the other pirates asked meto come with him to the side of the ship and look at something he hadbeen noticing on the island.
"'Do you see those big creatures dodging in and out among the trees?'he said. 'Are they savages, or what are they?'
"I took my spy-glass and looked and saw that there really were somebig creatures moving about among the cocoanut palm trees. They seemedto be peeping at us but trying to keep out of our sight and I couldnot see them plainly at all.
"'They look like savages dressed in skins of wild beasts,' I said;'but they cannot do us any harm so long as we are on the sea and theyare on the land. We will go to our cabins and sleep and leave one ofthe little cabin boys to watch.'
"So we went downstairs and left a little pirate whose name was ReginalCyrel Adolphin Seymour to watch. He was a little boy who had run awayfrom school to be a pirate, and very often he had been heard to remarkthat now he really was a pirate he would rather learn themultiplication table. He was as hot and tired as any of us that day,and what _he_ did was to fall asleep the minute the rest of us hadgone to lie down." The pirate Captain stopped and cleared his throatand mopped his forehead with his red handkerchief.
"What happened then?" asked Barty. He saw Baboo Bajorum leaningforward with his big hairy hands on his knees and listeningattentively. The pirate Captain began again:
"The sun got hotter and hotter and we slept and slept and slept. Youknow how heavily one sleeps on a hot day and how hard it is to getawake when you try. We did not try, but suddenly we all wakened atonce. We were wakened by a great roaring which we tho
ught was asudden storm. But it was not a storm. It was a Baboo Bajorum sound,which you have never heard and which I hope you will never hear. It islouder than lions and fiercer than tigers and more piercing thanpanthers and leopards. Baboo Bajorums never make it unless they arevery angry indeed, and when you hear it you had better look out."
"Are there more Baboo Bajorums than one?" Barty asked. "I thought thisgentleman was the only one in the world."
The pirate Captain opened his mouth very wide and drew a long breath.Then he said in a solemn voice:
"When we waked up there were forty-two Baboo Bajorums on our ship andone was sitting by each man's hammock and roaring the angry roar."
"Ah," said Barty, "how frightening!" and he felt quite alarmed.
"It was frightening," replied the pirate Captain, "but we deservedit--for our unpoliteness. We had disturbed the Captain of the merchantship at his dinner when we cut his head off, and we had disturbed thewhole crew when we blew the ship up. Books about politeness alwayssay that you must have quiet and unassuming manners. We deserved allthat happened. We had been loud and assuming."
"What _did_ happen?" inquired Barty, and the Good Wolf leaned forwardto listen, and Saturday leaned forward and Blue Crest nearly tiltedover with eagerness.
"When they stopped roaring they took us all prisoners. They had swumover from the little island and climbed up the ship's side as soon asthey were sure we were asleep. This gentleman," and he made a bow toBaboo Bajorum, "is the Great Baboo of all. He made me get out of myhammock and fastened a chain round my waist so that he could lead meabout. The other Baboos did the same with the other pirates. The firstplace he led me to was to a black corner down in the hold. I had takencaptive a sick old gentleman on the merchant ship and I had loaded himwith chains and put him down in the darkest corner of the bottom ofthe ship. I was going to try and make him sign a paper to give me themoney he had left on land. Baboo Bajorum made me take the chains offhim and take him on deck and wait on him and make bows to him until myback was almost broken."
"He must have been very glad," said Barty, quite relieved.
"He was gladder than I was," said the pirate Captain. "It was throughhim that we found out what the Baboo Bajorum really intended to teachus. We were so frightened that we could not understand their signs,and as they always knocked us down or threw us overboard when we didnot obey at once, we should very soon have been black and blue allover. The sea was very full of sharks near the island and when youwere thrown overboard you never knew whether you would get back ornot."
"That was dangerous enough to make any one polite," said Barty.
"But," said the Captain, "we did not know it was politeness theywanted until we brought the old gentleman out of the hold. He was verypolite himself and made the most beautiful bows to all the Baboos.They had never seen bows before and they were very much pleased andbegan to practice bowing themselves. When the old gentleman wasbowing a book fell out of his pocket. The Great Baboo kicked me untilI picked it up. This is it. I never go anywhere without it." He took abook from his pocket and handed it to Barty, who opened it.
"'A Guide to Perfect Politeness, With Rules for Entertaining RoyalFamilies, the Nobility and Gentry.' That is the name of it," saidBarty. "Are there any adventures in it?"
"Not exactly adventures," said the pirate Captain. "It tells you howto converse brilliantly and how to fill up awkward pauses and how tobegin a letter to a duke when you are writing to one, besides aboutnever eating with your knife and always saying 'please' and 'I thankyou' and 'pray excuse me' and 'I beg your pardon.'"
"Ah, I see!" said Barty. "That's why you said all those things in thecave."
"It was indeed," answered the pirate Captain. "The moment the GreatBaboo saw the book he went and sat by the old gentleman and made signsto him to read aloud. The old gentleman read to him. In half an hourfrom that time I was chained to the mast and all the other pirateswere chained on the deck round me and I was reading to them out of the'Guide to Perfect Politeness.' The Great Baboo had thrown me into thesea in a very sharky place until I understood what he wanted. We allknew all the book by heart before breakfast next morning, and sincethen we have never broken a single rule. That was three years ago. Theother Baboo Bajorums went back to their island in six months, but theGreat Baboo has always sailed with us."
"It is another pirate vessel and it is going to attack us."]
At that moment Barty heard the sound of many feet running on thedeck and the shouting of many voices, as if something new and alarmingwas happening. The pirate sailors were all running about. Some cametumbling up the companion-way and some went screaming up the riggingand some went running to the side to look over the sea.
The pirate Captain stopped and clapped his spy-glass to his eye.
"Hello!" he said. "I beg your pardon, excuse me for disturbing you bymentioning it, but there is a large ship bearing down on us at fullsail. It is another pirate vessel and is going to attack us."
Barty jumped up and threw his cap in the air. "Hooray! Hooray!Hooray!" he said. "There's going to be a pirate battle and I'm certainwe shall win."
CHAPTER EIGHT