CHAPTER XXIII
FUNNEL-PAINT MOVES AGAIN
A week had slipped by since the negro's visit, and Austin and Jeffersonwere sitting late in the skipper's room. There had been no change in theweather, and it was then, if possible, hotter than ever. The muggy landbreeze had died away, and a thick woolly mist shut the stranded steamerin. Door and ports were open wide, but the oil lamp that hung beneaththe beams burned unwaveringly, and the ray of light that streamed outfrom the doorway made the blackness outside more apparent. The big pumpwas running behind the deck-house, and its deep vibratory humming rangstartlingly through a stillness so intense that it seemed unnatural, asit hurled the water out of the engine room.
Austin sat huddled in a corner, attired only in duck trousers, and tornsinglet which came no lower than his elbows, and, for want of buttons,fell open at his neck. He had an unusually clean skin, and hissun-scorched lower arms and scarred hands, with the battered knucklesand broken nails, emphasised by contrast the clear whiteness of hishalf-covered chest. That night it was beaded with perspiration, forwhich he was sincerely thankful, since there are times in the tropicswhen the healing moisture fails to find its way through the feveredskin, and its afflicted owner burns in torment.
Jefferson sat on the little table, a blackened pipe in his hand, andthe listless pose of both suggested that the last trace of energy hadbeen sapped out of them. At last Austin laughed, hollowly anddejectedly.
"I don't know why we're sitting here saying nothing when we have tobegin again at five o'clock to-morrow, but I don't feel like sleep," hesaid. "In fact, I scarcely think I've slept for more than a couple ofhours at a time since I came back again. I suppose I ought to be in theforecastle now--four or five of them seemed very sick when I last lookedin--but there's an abominable tension in the air that makes any exertionout of the question."
Jefferson nodded. "You can't do anything for them, and there's nobody wecould spare to send with them down river," he said. "They've got to taketheir chances with the rest of us now, and it seems to me one mightfigure them out as three or four to one if the rains don't come. Still,if you don't want to do anything, why can't you keep still?"
"I don't know," and Austin, who had been rolling a damp cigar in hisfingers, flung it down. "If that pump stopped I should probably make anexhibition of myself. The hum and thump it makes has a soothing effecton me. It's suggestive. Even here man has something to say. I don't knowwhether you understand me."
Jefferson looked at him curiously. "I guess I do. I'd mix myself a goodstrong pick-me-up if I were you. You have had something on your mind thelast day or two."
"I have," said Austin. "I'm afraid of that infernal Funnel-paint, Ithink. I can't help a fancy that we haven't done with him yet; and,though the connection isn't very apparent, the fact that the first thingwe came across after landing when I came out was a dead nigger, insistson obtruding itself on my recollection. Bill told me he was singularlyunpleasant to look at."
Jefferson contrived to laugh. "You take that pick-me-up, and in themeanwhile let up on your reminiscences. Things of that kind aren'tcheerful--and I'm worried by one or two of them myself."
Austin, who stooped and picked up the cigar, settled himself afresh onthe settee after lighting it, and half an hour dragged by. Neither ofthem felt the least sign of drowsiness yet, and the jingle of the oddsand ends in the rack, and tremble of the stout teak house, was, as hehad said, vaguely reassuring. The big pump was pounding on in spite ofthe climate, and neither heat nor fever had any effect on steam. Then helooked up sharply, and Jefferson straightened himself, for a faint soundof footsteps came out of the darkness. They were slow and dragging, asthough somebody was groping his way warily towards the light.
"On deck!" said the American. "What d'you want? Are you there, Wall-eye?Que hay?"
There was no answer, but the shuffling steps drew nearer, slowly andfalteringly, as though whatever made them was but indifferently capableof motion. There was also something unpleasantly suggestive about them,and Austin now sat very straight, while he saw that Jefferson's lipswere pressed together. There was no apparent reason why they shouldshrink from what was coming, but Austin, at least, felt his nervestingling. He was overwrought, and white men are apt to become fancifulwhen they work too hard in the fever swamps. It is a land where onerealises the presence of influences beyond the definition of humanreason, and he afterwards admitted that he was afraid.
"Mil diablos!" said Jefferson. "Ven aca! What are you after, outsidethere?"
There was still no answer, though a clatter of booted feet now rose fromthe iron deck. It drowned the other footfalls, and Austin found thatclang of nailed shoes curiously reassuring. Then a figure that swayedfrom side to side emerged from the blackness and stood mowing in thestream of light.
"Good Lord!" said Jefferson, with horror in his voice. "Slam that doorto. Keep it out!"
Austin rose with a sense of sudden sickness, but the figure had movedagain, and now stood with one foot inside the room and a horrible handon the door-jamb, leering at them. It had the shape of a man, but theresemblance ended there, for there was no sign of human intelligence inthe awful face. The thing had no eyebrows, the hair had almost gone, andnose and cheeks were formless with corruption, while naked chest andarms were smeared with festering scars. Austin stood still, shivering,with one hand clenched hard on the table, until Jefferson snatched aglinting object from his bunk.
"Good Lord!" he said again. "It's coming in!"
The figure seemed to brace itself for another move forwards, and Austinsaw Jefferson straighten himself slowly with a big pistol in his hand.He did not remember what his comrade said, but the negro seemed torecoil instinctively before his fierce ejaculation, and, lurchingbackwards, faded into a formless shadow in the gloom again. ThenJefferson's hand fell upon Austin's shoulder.
"Shake yourself! There's something to be done," he said. "They have alight forward, and we can't have--that thing--groping among them in theforecastle."
They went out, and as they did so a sudden glare of light sprang up.Tom, the donkey-man, had lighted the air-blast lamp he used whenanything had to be done to pump or boiler at night, and its smokyradiance showed that Jefferson's shouts had roused the Spaniards. Theywere clustered, half dressed, about the head of the ladder which led tothe bridge deck, with consternation in their shadowy faces, glancing atone another as though afraid to move a step further. Tom leaned againstthe rail, holding up the lamp, and the thing that had the shape of a mansat gibbering on a coil of hawser in the midst of the bridge deck. Theeyes of all who stood there were fixed upon it, but nobody seemedanxious to come any nearer.
Jefferson, standing very straight, opened the breech of his pistol, rana finger across the back of the chamber, and then closed it with alittle snap which, though the pump was humming, sounded startlinglydistinct. His lips were tightly set, and his face was very grim. Theloathsome figure on the rope mowed and grinned at him.
"I suppose the thing was human--once," he said. "Still, we can't have ithere. These complaints are contagious, one understands, but I wish ithadn't happened. He's too like a man."
He dropped the pistol to his side, as though his nerve had momentarilyfailed him, and Austin, who suddenly grasped his purpose, sprang forwardas he raised it again.
"Hold on!" he said. "Do you realise what it is you propose to do?"
Jefferson turned to him slowly, and there was a curious stillness amongthose who watched them. Austin was glad of the hum of the big pump andthe pounding of the engine, for he felt that silence would have made thetension unendurable. Then Jefferson smiled, a little wry smile.
"I know," he said, a trifle hoarsely, "it isn't nice to think of, butit's no more than happens to a superfluous kitten--and it's necessary.Heaven knows what the poor devil suffered before he came to this, and wedon't want to. He's animate carrion without reason or sensibility now.It was only the light brought him here when Funnel-paint somehow senthim within sight of us."
Aust
in saw that this was true. There was no glimmer of humanintelligence in the creature's wandering gaze, but he still bore theshape of a man, and that counted for a good deal, after all.
"Jefferson," he said, "it can't be done!"
His comrade looked at him with half-closed eyes. "Would you wish to liveif you looked like that, or do you want the rest of us to find out whathe went through? I'm responsible for those men yonder--and it's onlyantedating the thing a month or two. The life is almost rotted out ofhim. Stand clear! We must get it over!"
It was evident that the Spaniards understood what he meant to do, and amurmur of concurrence rose from them, for they knew a little about themore loathsome forms of skin diseases. Men who might have escaped fromthe sepulchre walk abroad in the hot Southern countries, where restraintis unknown and salt fish is a staple food, but, though they have oftenthemselves to blame, the innocent also suffer in Western Africa, andnone of those who stood by, tense and strung up, had ever seen a man wholooked quite as this one did.
Then, as Jefferson raised his pistol, Austin seized him by the shoulderand shook him in a sudden outbreak of fury.
"You're right," he said, "but you shall not do it! You hear me? Put the---- thing down!"
Then there was a sudden clamour, and as the Canarios ran forwardJefferson struggled vainly. Austin never knew where his strength camefrom, but in another moment the pistol slipped from his comrade's hand,and, reeling backwards, he struck the deck-house. Austin stood in frontof him, with hands clenched, and the veins swollen high on his forehead,panting hard.
"It has come to this," he said. "If you move a step, I'll heave youover the rail! I've strength enough to break your back to-night!"
Jefferson straightened himself slowly, and waved back the others whowere clustering round. Then he smiled, and made a little gesture ofresignation.
"I believe you have, but that's not quite the point," he said. "It's theonly thing you have ever asked me, and, if nothing else will satisfyyou, you shall have him. You don't suppose it isn't a relief to me? Thequestion is, what you're going to do with him? You see, he can't stayhere."
That, at least, was evident, and for a moment or two Austin gazed abouthim stupidly as he grappled with the difficulty. The stricken man stillsquatted, unconcerned, upon the hawser, mowing and grimacing, while heclawed at the hemp in a fashion that suggested the antics of a pleasedanimal, with swollen hands. The rest stood still, well apart from him,with expectancy overcoming the repulsion they felt. Then Tom, thedonkey-man, who was nearest the rail, held up his flaring lamp.
"There's the canoe he come in still alongside aft," he said.
Austin gasped with relief. "Heave down a bunch of the red bananas we gotup the creek," he said. "He'll know they are good to eat."
It was done, and Jefferson smiled again grimly.
"That," he said, "is easy. Still, have you figured how he is to begotten into the canoe? You are hardly going to make him understand whathe is to do."
"There's only one way. He must be put into it. Under the circumstances,it's only fitting that I should undertake the thing."
"No!" and Jefferson's voice rang sharply. "Not you! Offer any of therest of them fifty dollars!"
Austin smiled. "To take a risk I'm responsible for? I think not. I wentsufficiently far when I brought some of them here. Besides, it'scomforting to remember you mayn't be right about the thing beingcontagious, after all."
Jefferson looked at him hard a moment, with the fingers of one handclosed, and then made a little sign.
"Well," he said, "if you feel it that way, there's probably nothing tobe gained by protesting. There are disadvantages in being leader."
Austin turned and touched the negro with his foot, while he pointed tothe ladder.
"Get up! You lib for canoe one time!" he said.
The negro mowed and gibbered meaninglessly, and Austin, stooping,grasped his shoulder, which was clean. With an effort he dragged him tohis feet, and, while the rest fell back from them, drove the man towardsthe head of the ladder. Then one of them slipped, and there was a cry ofhorror from the rest as the negro clutched the white man, and theyrolled down the ladder into the darkness below together. Tom ran towardsthe rail with his lamp, and as Jefferson leaned out from them he sawAustin shake off the negro's engirdling grasp.
"Get up!" he said hoarsely, and stirred him with his foot again.
The man rose half upright, stumbled, and, straightening himself, movedtowards the open gangway with a lurch. Then he vanished suddenly andthere was a crash below. Austin leaned out through the opening, and hisvoice rose harsh and strained:
"Come down, one of you, and cut this warp! The devil's hanging on!" hesaid.
Wall-eye, the Canario, sprang down with his knife, and when Austinclimbed back to the bridge deck the men clustering along the rails sawa canoe with a shadowy object lying in the stern of her slide throughthe blaze of radiance cast by the blast-lamp and vanish into theblackness outside it. Then Tom put out the light, and a hoarse murmur ofrelief rose out of the darkness.
A minute or two later Austin stood, a trifle grey in face, in thedoorway of the skipper's room, and stepped back suddenly when Jeffersonapproached him.
"Keep off!" he said. "Give me the permanganate out of the side drawer. Ileft it there. Miguel, bring me the clothes you washed out of my room inthe poop, and fill me a bucket."
The last was in Castilian, and one of the Canarios went scrambling downthe ladder, while when he came back with an armful of duck clothingJefferson held out a jar to his comrade.
"No!" said Austin sharply. "Put it down!"
Jefferson did as he was bidden, and Austin, who stripped the thingarments from him and flung them over the rail, shook the permanganateinto the bucket, and then, standing stark naked, when it had dissolved,sluiced himself all over with the pink solution. It was ten minuteslater when he stepped into the room, dripping, with a wet rag about hiswaist, and shook his head when Jefferson handed him a towel.
"I think not," he said. "If there's any efficacy in the thing, I may aswell let it dry in. After all, it's consoling to remember that it mayn'tbe necessary."
Jefferson's fingers quivered as he leaned upon the table. "No. Of coursenot!" he said, and added, inconsequently: "I don't think I'm undulysensitive, but a very little thing would turn me deadly sick."
Austin struggled into his duck trousers, and Jefferson, whose face wasalso a little more pallid than usual, glanced at him again.
"You have a beautiful skin," he said. "It's most like a woman's. There'sgood clean blood in you."
"It's one of my few good points," and Austin's smile suggestedcomprehension. "I haven't been particularly indulgent in any direction,considering my opportunities, and I'm rather glad of it now. One couldfancy that the man who seldom let one slip would be unusually apt to getthe promised wages in this country."
He dragged his singlet over his arms, and a little twinkle slowly creptinto Jefferson's eyes.
"Well," he said, "you carry your character with you. How long has therestraining influence been at work on you?"
"You are a little outside the mark," and a faint flush showed inAustin's hollow cheeks. "I am, as you know, not a believer in theunnecessary mortification of the flesh, but there's a trace of theartistic temperament, if that's the right name for it, in me, and it'srather apt to make one finickingly dainty."
Jefferson smiled drily. "That doesn't go quite far enough. I've seen menof your kind wallow harder than the rest. Still, whatever kept you fromit, you can be thankful now."
Austin went on with his dressing, and then took a little medicaltreatise out of a drawer. He spent some time turning over it before helooked up.
"There's nothing that quite fits the thing here, and from what theWest-coast mailboat men told me, craw-craw must be different," he said."In the meanwhile, it wouldn't do any harm to soak myself in blackcoffee."
He was about to go out when Jefferson stopped him. "This is a thing thatis better buried, but there's so
mething to be said. From my point ofview, and it's that of the average sensible man, I was right; but yoursgoes higher, and in one way I am glad of it. I just want to tell you I'msatisfied with my partner!"
Austin smiled at him. "We'll both be guilty of some sentimental nonsensewe may be sorry for afterwards if we continue in that strain, my friend.Still, there's one thing to consider. Although I couldn't help it, whatI did was, of course, absurd, if you look at it practically, and thingsof that kind have their results occasionally."
Jefferson seemed to shiver, and then clenched a hard, scarred fist.
"We won't think of it. Your blood's clean," he said. "But if, after all,trouble comes--I'll get even with that damned Funnel-paint if I spend mylife in Africa trailing him, and have to kill him with my naked hands!"