CHAPTER XII
THE LURE OF GOLD
THE LURE OF GOLD
THE LURE OF GOLD
The boys lost no time in hunting up the old Eskimo chief. He remembered them immediately and seemed glad to see them. He made the walrus do tricks for them and talked freely enough of his life and experiences with the circus. But when the boys approached the subject of treasure-hunting he became wary at once, and they could extract little information from him. They were afraid to persist, lest they arouse his suspicions. This was the last thing in the world they wanted to happen, for the idea of sunken treasure had now taken possession of their minds, and if Takyak really knew where any was located, they were full of hope to get a share of it.
The prospects did not appear very bright, however, and more than once Mouser took the opportunity to crow over the other three and remind them that he had “told them so.”
“Such a thing as sunken gold and pieces of eight and all that sort of thing would never happen to me,” he said one day. “If it rained soup, I’d be caught out with nothing but a fork. Besides, what would a treasure ship be doing up around the North Pole? It doesn’t sound plausible.”
“I don’t suppose any treasure ship ever came very far north on purpose,” said Fred, sarcastically. “There’s always a chance that it might have been blown up in a storm, though. Stranger things than that have happened.”
“Yes, but not often,” retorted his gloomy friend. “I’d give my share in the loot to be sitting back on the old porch at home, eating real honest-to-goodness crullers and enjoying life, instead of staggering around the north Atlantic in this forsaken apology for a ship.”
“Oh, you’ll feel mighty different when you get your pockets full of nice, chinking, yellow gold,” grinned Bobby. “You won’t wish then that you hadn’t been let in for this involuntary ocean voyage. Look at the bright side of it, and maybe you’ll feel less doleful. You go around looking as though you’d lost your last friend.”
But Bobby was far from feeling as much confidence as he professed to have. So far they had little to go on save guesswork and the few chance words of the old Eskimo, which might have been little more than a product of his imagination. It might be as Mouser said, that the ship was only going North on a trading cruise, and the old Eskimo, homesick for his own country, had taken passage because it happened to be the first vessel that he could get passage on. But if that were the case, why should the old Eskimo look so suspicious when they mentioned treasure to him, and refuse to say a word on the subject? And what had he and Captain Garish talked about so earnestly that day at the circus?
These and many other questions and surmises sufficed to keep him on the anxious seat. And in addition to this, was the thought of those at home who would have not the slightest knowledge of what had happened to their boys and must have given them up for lost by this time.
They had already learned that the schooner was not equipped with wireless and that they were sailing out of the beaten track of ocean-going vessels. Occasionally a sail was sighted, but so far away that signaling was practically out of the question.
“Guess the captain doesn’t want to signal anyway,” said Fred moodily. “He is short of hands, you know, and we’ll fit in very nicely.”
“And maybe without pay,” added Mouser.
All these things combined to make the boys unhappy, and in spite of many amusing and exciting happenings on board ship, they could not be said to enjoy the cruise much.
The weather was uniformly good, and the boys were on deck most of the time. They struck up an acquaintance with various members of the crew, and many were the yarns they listened to in the off watches while the men sat about on hatch covers and coils of rope, mending or scrubbing their clothes, or perhaps just idly drawing at blackened old pipes. They had a good deal of fun, too, with Mose, the black mess boy, who was always in good spirits and who never grew seasick, no matter how rough the ocean became.
“Ah’s a salty niggah, white boys, an’ dey ain’t no sea ebber rolled dat could make me sick,” he used to boast. “De on’y thing whut it does to me is to give me an appetite. Yessuh, Ah nebber eats quite so heartily as when de old ship is standin’ on her beam ends an’ doin’ her best to dive down to Davy Jones’ locker. Mos’ times Ah kin do justice to mah meals, but it’s den dat Ah really comes out strong an’ packs away de victuals.”
He would come from the galley with a load of dishes on each arm, balancing himself on the heaving deck with all the skill and precision of a tightrope walker, and for a long time the boys never saw him meet with an accident.
But one day there was a heavy cross swell running. The ship rolled and pitched and apparently did everything except actually roll over. By this time the boys had gotten their sea legs, however, and they were seated about the table in the cabin, waiting for breakfast. A steep flight of steps led down to it from the deck, and in due course of time the boys saw the negro’s ungainly flat feet start down the ladder. On one arm he carried a big dish of oatmeal and on the other a pile of plates. This was no more than his usual load, with which he had made the descent many times before without mishap. But this morning luck was against him. He had hardly gotten down three steps, when the ship gave an unusually heavy roll, which suddenly changed to a pitch as the bows slanted steeply downward.
Mose struggled manfully to keep his balance, but it was of no use. He felt himself going, but it was impossible for him to catch hold of anything without dropping the dishes he was carrying. For a few seconds he gyrated wildly, while the boys held their breath. Then down he came flat on the deck, while the big dish of oatmeal went flying through the air and landed against the bulkhead with a crash.
Soft, clinging oatmeal seemed to fill the air for a few seconds, and everything in the cabin, including the boys, was liberally sprinkled. The pile of dishes smashed into a thousand fragments, and the havoc wrought was terrible to see.
At first the boys were afraid that the negro was seriously injured, but before they could get to him he was on his feet, looking very sheepish but apparently none the worse for the accident. When the boys saw that he was not hurt they broke into roars of laughter.
“Wow!” cried Billy, with tears running down his cheeks. “I thought you were so salty that nothing could ever knock you off your feet, Mose. Guess you’d better go easy with that stuff after this.”
“De ole boat sho’ slipped one ober on me dat time. But it cain’t nebber do it no mo,” declared Mose. “Hopes de captain doan come down befo’ Ah has a chance to clean up dis mess. If he ketches me, dis niggah’ll sho’ be out o’ luck.”
He set desperately to work, and in an incredibly short time had scraped the oatmeal off the floor and furniture and had the cabin tidied up. Then he went to get some more food, and this time met with better success.
Such incidents as this lightened the monotony of the voyage but still the days seemed very long to the boys, and more than once they longed for the time when they could get even with Hen Lemming for playing them such a sorry trick.
They often helped the sailors, but were not considered as regular hands. They had a long talk with Captain Garrish and promised to pay him well if he could only put them on some ship bound for home. But so far no such vessel had come their way.
“That captain’s a queer stick,” said Fred to Bobby, one morning. “And he’s got something on his mind, too.”
“Well, maybe we’ll find out what it is some day,” replied Bobby.
And he did find out, and the finding out changed the whole course of Captain Garrish’s conduct toward the Rockledge chums.