CHAPTER IX
A FIGHT IN THE DARK
Dazed for a minute by the discovery that Meeker had been lurking in thepassage while I was listening to Captain Riggs and Harris in thestoreroom, I leaned against the companionway and fingered the shellcrucifix, wondering how near Meeker had come to making an end of me. Ofcourse, the finding of the crucifix down there, and the man who ran upthe ladder when surprised by Riggs, meant nothing else but that Meekerhad been below either before or after I followed the ship's officersdown.
The fact that he was between me and the companionway was proof enoughthat he had come after I had taken my position at the keyhole of thestoreroom, but if I was inclined to make theories and draw conclusionsabout Meeker, there were other things going on to distract my attention.
There was much shouting and running on deck, and, before going up, Ilistened in the hopes of learning what was taking place, but the roar ofthe sea, the throb of the engines, and the thumping of my own heartprevented me from making any sense of the tumult above. I had a fear thatRiggs had discovered that I was missing from my room, and that he hadfound Meeker likewise absent from his quarters.
No matter what had come about, I was in peril as long as I remained whereI was, both from Riggs and Harris and from Meeker and his assassins.And no matter which side won above, whether Meeker was taken, or Riggsand Harris killed, I would be regarded as an enemy by the victors.The best thing for me to do was to surrender to Riggs at once, and securemy pistols that I might get into the fight with him against Meeker andhis henchmen.
That seemed to be an easy solution of my troubles until I considered thatRiggs and Harris were certain that I was the most dangerous man on board.Before I could say a word I might be seized and ironed, if not shot onsight. Perhaps the wiser course would be to get to my room and barricademyself until affairs were more settled, or until we had the light of dayand I could know with whom I was dealing.
With one hand on the rail of the ladder and the other clutching thecrucifix, I debated with myself about what I should do, while above me Icould hear Riggs and Harris yelling to one another, although I could notmake out what they were saying. I heard Harris say something about "theparson," and there were shouts from the bridge, and all hands seemed tobe running over the main-deck like madmen.
I started up the ladder, bent upon learning what was happening andwatching my chance to slip back to my room through the darkness. Before Ihad gone three steps I was halted by a terrific noise between decks inthe direction of the storeroom. Several heavy blows were struck in rapidsuccession against a bulkhead, followed by a rending crash andsplintering timbers. An iron bar rang on the deck-plates as it was throwndown, and there was a rattle of chains.
Going down the ladder again, I crouched in a corner, for I was sure thatthe racket below would attract the attention of Riggs and Harris, andthat they would be down to investigate. I would have wagered that someone had broken into the storeroom containing the mysterious cargo.
Whispers reached my ears from the end of the passage, and then I heardPetrak yell in his fretful, whining way:
"Hold it down, Bucky! Hold it down, ye beggar! It's my bleedin' hand yegot, will ye mind?"
"Dry up about the paw," said a voice. "Lucky for ye it's not yer neck ina rope. Can't break the chain, can I, 'thout givin' ye a twist, ye fool!There it is now--right aft and on deck, Red, and follow me close! We'llgit 'em off right enough when ye git above decks. What's matter if yerflippers are clear?"
Something rushed toward me in the dark, and again I heard the musicaltinkle that made me think of chain-armour. I pressed my body against theboarding to be clear of the ladder, and made out the figure of a man,crouched down and feeling his way along the passage. He stumbled up theladder, and then I heard Petrak close behind him, panting and cursing,and the broken chains on his hands rasping along the bulkhead.
"Wait for me, can't ye? Bucky, wait for me! Stop a bit and give me a handup--"
"Oh, come along and stow the gab," called Buckrow from the head of thecompanion, but in suppressed tones. "Keep yer lip shut, the afterguardsare on deck here and I don't know where Thirkle is. Slip along and giveus a hand with a knife or a gun. Looks like we'll settle the businessquick now."
Petrak went up the ladder, his progress over each iron step plain to meby the jingle of the chains dangling from his wrists, and before I hadsettled in my mind what had happened the pair of them were gone. Buckrowhad rescued the little red-headed man from the ship's brig.
I crawled up the ladder, still holding the crucifix, for it was the onlything in the form of a weapon I possessed, and the manner in which Igripped it improvised it into a hilted dagger, although I rememberkeeping it more for evidence against Meeker than for any other purpose.If the sly rascal was still making a fool of Riggs, or denied that he hadbeen below, I felt that his crucifix would be proof against him which hecould not deny.
When I emerged from the hood of the companionway I found a high wind wasdrenching the deck with spray and everything was black and wet andslippery. The vessel was labouring, and, although there was nothing thatcould be called a storm, she was bucking into head-swells that rattledher from stem to stern, and the gusts of wind whipped the tips of thewaves across her fore-deck spitefully and without warning.
There were probably twenty feet of open well-deck between me and the footof the ladder leading to the saloon-deck, and, then, I had the darkpassageway to traverse for another thirty or forty feet aft before Icould gain my room.
I braced myself between the hood of the companion and a thrummingventilator and listened for some hostile sound. I was conscious of dimforms all about me, although I could not see them, and I felt as if I hadblundered into a desperate game of hide-and-seek.
Thrusting my hands before me into the darkness, I stumbled toward theladder. As I was about to grasp it I encountered a wet jacket, and thenext instant I found myself gripped in a pair of arms. The fingers of myenemy shut on the light fabric of my pajama-jacket. I struck at him withthe point of the crucifix and landed a glancing blow in his face, for theknuckles of my hand brushed his jaw.
The sharp edge must have cut him, for he uttered a stifled groan, and ashe recoiled from me, partly from my blow and partly as the result of adeep roll of the vessel, I wriggled out of my jacket and ran forward. Inmy flight I bumped into ventilators, stumbled over a hatch-coaming andpulled myself along the swaying rail-chains toward the bow of the vessel.In the scuffle I had lost the crucifix, but I had also escaped from theman who had grabbed me, and, while I was in a panic and did not knowwhere I was going, I hoped to be able to regain the ladder on the portside and get back to my room once I had thrown my assailant off my track.
I reached the break of the forecastle head, but did not go into the bows,because I knew I could not hope to escape from them if I did not keepopen some means of retreat. I halted at the closed scuttle of theforecastle, for from there I could have my choice of getting aft againalong either rail. I clung to the wooden hood, naked to the waist, andswept continually by the spindrift from the seas which met the vessel.
As my eyes grew more accustomed to the darkness I could distinguish theoutlines of the machinery on deck, the foremast and the companionwayforward of the superstructure. I could make out the bridge and the funnelwell enough to see a figure moving over the rim of the storm-apron. Thevessel rolled and the side-lights threw red and green glares over the seaon either side.
As I stood there waiting for some sound which might tell me the positionof the mysterious man who had attacked me, eight bells was struck on thebridge, and I knew it was midnight. I expected that there would be someanswer from the bows, as there should be a man on lookout there, and thefaint double notes of the bell in the wheel-house should have beenrepeated from the ship's bell near to where I stood.
I had about decided to make another sortie toward the ladder, when Iheard a commotion on the bridge, and then a yell as a man might give whohad been stricken suddenly with death. It chilled my bloo
d, for I knewthat another blow had been struck which took another life on board the_Kut Sang_, and I realized that the striking of the bells had been a sortof signal for the assassin.
After a minute I heard Harris bawl: "The Dutchman has been killed! Ho,cap'n--the Dutchman has been knifed on the bridge!"
"The devil and all ye say!" shouted Captain Riggs from the fore-deck, andI heard him clamber up the ladder and knew it must have been he whograbbed me as I was about to gain the upper deck.
"Who was it, Mr. Harris? What in God's name is this, Mr. Harris? Mutiny?Is this mutiny aboard me?" He was mounting to the bridge.
"They got the Dutchman," repeated Harris. "They done for him--he's deadas a red mackerel!"
"It's mutiny, Mr. Harris," said the captain.
"Ye know cussed well what it is," shouted Harris, as loudly as thoughCaptain Riggs were still below. "I come up to take the watch and find theDutchman hangin' over the port ladder bleedin' like a dead goose! Morework of yer fine passengers, that's what it is, and ye know why."
A lantern flickered above the storm-apron and then swung in the break ofthe bridge-rail at the ladder-head, and I saw Harris moving somethingwhich hung limply as he dragged it behind the canvas.
There was a wrathful conference as the two of them inspected the body ofthe second mate, and as I watched I saw a lancelike tongue of fire,outside the halo of light cast up from the lantern, followed by thereport of a pistol shot, which reached my ears after I had seen theflash, for the wind checked the sound.
On top of this came a ripping, rending noise and the figure of a manswung to the lower deck, carrying with him a portion of the storm-apron,which volleyed in the wind for a minute and then was swept away as he letgo of it.
"There they go!" bellowed Harris. "Come on, cap'n, we'll git the houndsnow," and he led the captain down the bridge-ladder, Riggs still carryingthe lantern, which swung crazily as he dropped three steps at a time.
"W'ere the bloody 'ell be ye, Bucky?" called a voice which I knew to bethat of Long Jim. "W'ere be ye, I s'y! Ye missed 'im, ye fool. Missed 'imdead. Jolly nice mess ye made of it! Were be ye, Bucky?"
"Shut yer bloomin' face," growled Buckrow. "What if I did miss him? Itwas you that spoiled my aim, falling against the lashings as ye did, sothe blasted thing carried away with me and like to mashed my head. What,with a fall like that. Dropped my gun, too, and it's broke or jammed."
"Likewise I couldn't 'elp it," said Long Jim. "Caught my blasted foot ina lashin'--rotten sailcloth, that, Bucky. Make a stand of it 'ere as theycome on an' we'll git the two of 'em, Bucky."
"My gun is jammed, I say," said Buckrow. "Come on below for now and findThirkle and Red. We'll get another gun."
They were coming toward me all the time, and behind them were CaptainRiggs, still with his lantern, and Harris, uttering terrible threats ofvengeance.
"Throw that cussed light away," said Harris. "Throw it away, cap'n, orthey'll wing us sure. Cuss it all, cap'n, they'll blow yer head off if yepack that 'round with ye. Throw it, can't ye?"
"I can't see!" wailed Riggs, who seemed to be confused. "I can't see,Harris."
"'Course ye can't see with it shinin' in yer eyes! Throw it away, willye? Here--now keep after me."
Harris wrenched the lantern from Riggs's hand and hurled it into the sea,and, as the briny spume closed over it, it went out with a spiteful,protesting hiss.
"'Ere's w'ere we bloody well get the two of 'em," said Long Jim, who waswithin a dozen paces of me. "Give 'em the knives as they come along inthe black, Bucky."
"No knife-play for me with Harris--he's got a gun," said Buckrow. "Comealong below, Jim, and let 'em go for now. Quick, or the mate'll haveye. Thirkle said he'd have the fo'c's'le by now. He run the chinks out,him and Petrak. Scuttled 'em aft. Come below."
"Not till Mr. Mate 'as this in 'is ribs," said Long Jim.
"Ye fool--here they be, on us, and Harris with a couple of guns. Run forit, Jim, I tell ye," and Buckrow rose up out of the dark within reach ofmy hand and thrust back the slide of the forecastle-hood and swung below.
Long Jim came after him, chuckling with the joy of battle. I wanted to dosomething, to have some hand in the fight, to capture one of themurderers, and so prove to Riggs that I was not in league with them. Thisimpulse to aid the captain's side of the fight came to me swiftly, and Iput it into action at once by jumping directly in Long Jim's path at thehead of the forecastle ladder. I planned to grab his arms and hurl himback, yelling at the same time to Harris not to shoot, that it was I,Trenholm, and that I was holding Long Jim.
It was a foolish enough thing to do, for in the excitement of the minuteHarris would have undoubtedly shot me and Long Jim, too, and with goodreason, for he would have suspected a trap if I had asked him to hold hisfire and approach us in the dark.
As it happened, Long Jim was throwing himself forward in a sort of divebeneath the hood of the scuttle, just as I thrust my body against theopening. His shoulder caught me in the stomach, and my head and feet flewout and we grabbed each other and went tumbling down the old woodencompanion together and rolled into the black forecastle.
"Blime me, I thought ye was down afore me, Bucky," gasped Long Jim,recovering himself and stumbling over me. I rolled to one side and foundmyself under a bunk.
"I was down," said Buckrow. "What ye trying to do--make a Punch and Judyshow of yerself? Ye come down like a lubberly farmer, and then blame iton me. What made ye tumble like that?"
"I thought ye was down."
"I was down--well clear of ye and waiting for ye."
"Then how come ye under my bleedin' feet. Mind yer eye now, or the two of'em'll be down on us. That mate is a bad un, I tell ye, Bucky--bad as thenigger in the _Southern Cross_. No end of trouble with him, if yeremember as I do."
"Aw, stow the gab," whispered Buckrow, "We're working now. Mind what yerabout. I've got another gun from Thirkle."
"Thirkle here?" asked Long Jim. "W'ere be ye, Thirkle?"
"Standing by," was the whispered reply. "Shoot if they come down, butkeep still a minute. Fire up before they have a chance to drop on you,and stand clear, with the gun around the bulkhead at that side, while Ilet go at them from this side."
"Below thar!" called Harris down the scuttle. "All hands on deck and looklively, or I'll make a tailor's dummy of the last up."
"Don't say a word, but let him have it when he gets well down," whisperedthe man who had been addressed as Thirkle, which mystified me.
"Below thar! I want the man as killed the Dutchman! All hands up and oneat a time, or I'll let daylight through ye all. Hear me below?"
"Don't say a word," cautioned Thirkle.
Riggs and Harris were talking together, but we could not make out whatthey were saying. I lay under the bunk at the very feet of Buckrow, dazedand bruised from my fall, yet keenly aware of the situation and strangelycool, thrilled and fascinated with the drama being played about me.
I knew that I had small chance of escaping with my life if my presenceshould be discovered by the men who lay in wait for Harris and thecaptain; but it was not fear which kept me an auditor when I might wellhave been an actor to good purpose. I desired to see what would be theend of the act, and, far from being terrorized as I should have been, Ienjoyed the invisible scene. It was not that I was unmindful of thedanger, but that I was surprised at myself for feeling no fear.
"I'll give all hands a minute to get up, and if they ain't, I'll bedown," thundered Harris. "I know yer down thar, Buckrow, along with Jimand the red chap, and I know yer game. If I have to go down I'll kill acouple of ye, lay to that; so ye can come up and save yer necks, or takeyer chances if I go below."
"Pass him some insolence," said Thirkle. "We've got to get out of here.Give him lip, Buckrow, so he'll come down, or he'll batten down on usuntil morning, and ye know what that means."
"What ye want of me?" called Buckrow.
"Ye stabbed the Dutchman, ye murderin' hound," said Harris. "Ye know whatI want ye for well enough, and
if ye don't come up I'll see that Jim andPetrak swing with ye."
"I didn't kill nobody," said Buckrow. "Ye want to blame it on me, don'tye, ye big monkey."
"It was you that stabbed him and then took a shot at me. I know ye,Buckrow, and I'll have the life of ye if ye don't come up."
"Petrak was the one what killed the mate," said Buckrow. "It was Petrakdone for the Dutchman, sir. I ain't no murderer, sir, Mr. Harris, but asailorman what does his duty as he sees it, sir."
"Come on deck then and we'll see about that," said Harris, who seemed tothink that Buckrow's play of fear of him was genuine.
"Come down and get me. Ye don't dare come down, ye big bucko. I know thelikes of ye! Come down and get me, if ye dare."
"Is this mutiny? I'll have the lot of ye hanged! I don't stand for nosuch business aboard me," cried Captain Riggs, and the trio below stifledtheir laughter.
"Naow let me handle this, cap'n," we heard Harris say. "I'll go down andbreak this myself. This ain't no time to argue 'bout mutinies; thisain't."
"Give him a dirty insult, Bucky," whispered Thirkle. "Give it to him hardor the old master will argue him out of coming down."
"Come down, ye swine! Come down ye low-born coward and take me if ye can.That's what I say to ye. It's me, Buckrow, foremast hand that's talkin'to the mate of the _Kut Sang_, who's a dog."
This brought a cry of rage from Harris, and we heard him enter thescuttle, while Captain Riggs begged him not to go down.
"Stay up here, Mr. Harris, and let the murdering dogs stay there. We'llfix 'em fast enough when day comes."
"Leggo me, cap'n! I say I'll break that spawn's neck! Let me down!"
"I can't let you risk your life this way, Mr. Harris. I can't, I say.Where will I have officers if ye get hurt down there? Let 'em stop fornow."
"Leggo my arm!" shrieked Harris. "Cap'n, if ye don't leggo my arm I can'tsay what I'll do. I never let no man talk to me like that!"
"But, Mr. Harris! Ye know what it means! Ye know I can't work the ship!Ye know what's below and what they want! Mr. Harris! Mr. Harris!"
"Now, will ye let go?" demanded Harris, and then he crashed down thewooden ladder. The forecastle was illumined by a flash, and Buckrow'spistol boomed, and then a second flash on the other side of theforecastle showed me the face of the Rev. Luther Meeker at the entranceto the forecastle behind a pistol which had sent a second bullet at themate. And the Rev. Luther Meeker was the man who had been addressed asThirkle, and who seemed to be in command of the others.
Something rolled into the smoke-laden hole and sprawled on the planksnear me, and I could hear it gasping and choking.
"Leggo my coat, cap'n. Leggo my coat!" said the form, and I knew it wasHarris wounded to death. In a minute he was still, and then the scuttleabove rattled peremptorily.
"Mr. Harris! Be ye hurt, Mr. Harris? Oh, Mr. Harris!"
"We got him all right," whispered Buckrow. "That settles Mr. Matey, welland good. Hey, Thirkle?"
"Good, clean job," replied Thirkle. "Good, clean job, Bucky, and smart ascould be the way you drew him down. See what you can do with the skippernow."
"Anything wrong, Mr. Harris?" called the captain from the scuttle. "GoodLord! ain't I to have no officers? What's to become of my ship with sucha crew aboard me? Sally Ann! Sally Ann!"
"Come on down, cap'n," said a voice startlingly like Harris's. It wasMeeker, or Thirkle, as his men called him, imitating the high-pitchednasal twang of the dead mate.
"That you, Harris?" cried Riggs hopefully. "What's the matter, Mr.Harris?"
"I hurt myself, cap'n. Come on down," pleaded Thirkle in a constrainedvoice like a man in pain. "I done for Buckrow, but I hurt my ribs. Whydon't ye come down? I can't navigate this way--I'm hurt."
"Who was my mate in the _Jennie Lee_?" demanded Riggs. "Tell me that, Mr.Harris, and I'll come down, and not before."
"We'll have to go up and get him," whispered Thirkle. "He's too wise anold crab to be caught that way. I'll take the lead, Bucky, and Long Jimlast, and we've got the ship. We can let the fire-room chinks and thenigger go until morning. We'll take the bridge and keep the old tub goinguntil day and then pick out a good place to drop her when we've got whatwe want. Petrak's got the wheel now, and we can do for the chinks, comeday. Blessed if I know what has become of Trenholm, but we'll find him intime and attend to him proper. Remember: make for the bridge once we'vegot the skipper. Quick now!"
The three of them sneaked up the companionway.