In the course of the afternoon, having chewed the bitter cud of reflection and reviewed his situation from every possible angle, Mike Murphy came to the conclusion that, for all Terence Reardon's religious backsliding, he might be fairly honest in money matters and possessed of a sense of loyalty where his owners' interests were concerned. Also, having found Herr von Staden bluffing in one instance it occurred to the captain he might be discovered bluffing in another—so he resolved to investigate. Accordingly at an hour when he knew Terence should be in the engine room he took up the speaking-tube at the head of his bed and blew into it. But no shrill whistle signalled his desire in the engine room, and though Michael blew until he was red in the face and his lips hurt him cruelly, reluctantly he came to the conclusion that Herr August Carl von Staden had the situation very well in hand and Terence Reardon in the latter's state-room under lock and key.
He was right in one particular: von Staden had the situation very well in hand, but he did not have Terence Reardon under lock and key. Murphy had been balked in making connections with the unsuspecting Terence for the reason that a little ball of cotton waste had very carefully been tucked into the engine-room howler a few inches at the back of the whistle at the chief's end of the tube. Hence, in the event that one sought to whistle up the other, he merely wasted his breath. Having learned, on the very excellent authority of both men in the case, that they despised each other and were not on speaking terms, von Staden decided that the chance of Terence Reardon's listening to Michael J. Murphy's tale of piracy and mutiny was so vague as to be almost negligible. However, he was painstaking and careful in all things and never ran any unnecessary risks; consequently, just to be on the safe side, he had instructed the first assistant to plug the speaking-tube leading to the skipper's room. And in order to discourage the captain from, seeking an interview with the chief, von Staden had told the former that the chief was a prisoner.
Mr. Reardon was too important a personage to be deprived of his liberty when nothing was to be gained by such action. If he could be kept in ignorance of the state of affairs aboard theNarcissus, he would continue to attend to business; if the worst came to the worst his friendship would be a better asset than his hatred. If he grew suspicious and demanded a showdown, Herr von Staden would give it to him without reservation and stuff his mouth with gold; then, if the chief declined to listen to reason, it would be time enough to lock him up. While the supercargo would not hesitate to sacrifice his life, his liberty, or his honor for his country, he was nevertheless desirous of being a gentleman if accorded the opportuniby. And it must be admitted he had found Mr. Reardon amusing and vastly entertaining, for the very first night aboard, after Mr. Schultz had introduced him to the chief and he had presented the latter with a good cigar, Mr. Reardon, under the spell of the witchery cast by the sea and the night, had sat on deck and told the German wonderful tales of the fairies in Ireland—this while the skipper was ashore. In particular he told von Staden the tale of the fairy queen with the iron hand.
“Her hand,” said Terence, “was as beautiful as ye'd find in a day's thravel, an' 'twas herself that'd dhrive men crazy afther wan look at her. An' she was good to the poor, but divii a bit av love did she have for a redcoat. Whin she'd take human form an' a bowld buck av a British dragoon would come making love to her, 'tis herself would say to him: 'Captain, alannah, would ye oblige me wit' a dhrink av wather?' An' whin he turrned to dhraw the wather, she'd breathe on her hand—like that—an' immejiately 'twould turn to iron an' wit' wan blow she'd knock his brains out. Sure they found the bodies all over Ireland, but divil a man, woman, or child could they ever convict av the murrder. For why? Why, sure, the minute she'd killed a redcoat she'd breathe on her hand ag'in, an' immejiately 'twas flesh an' blood ag'in!”
No, decidedly it would not do to imprison this excellent fellow. Von Staden had read fairy tales as a boy, but never had he met a man who could tell them like Terence Reardon. A hard-headed, highly intelligent chief engineer of a big tramp steamer telling tales of the fairies! Von Staden couldn't understand it. It was so childish—and yet there was nothing childish about Terence Reardon. The German wondered if Terence Reardon believed in the fairies and finally he asked him point-blank if he did; whereupon Terence turned a solemn eye upon him and replied:
“Why, av course I do not. Do you think I'm a blubber-jack av a bhoy? But isn't it pleasant to talk about thim whilst wan has nothing betther to do? Sure, whin I'm lonely at night I think up new fairy tales to tell to the childhren whin I come home from a v'yage.”
So that was the Irish of it! Strangely enough it did not occur to the practical German that an individual with an imagination like that, on such an expedition as the present, was the most dangerous person imaginable to be given the freedom of the ship.
So passed twelve days and nights. Mr. Schultz kept in his pocket the key to the captain's state-room, and consequently was always present when the little cockney steward brought the prisoner his meals, tidied up the state-room and made up the captain's bed. The captain spent most of his time lying on his uninjured side and remained very quiet, for the fractured rib, which had received no attention, was causing him a great deal of suffering. Neither did the bullet wound in his shoulder heal cleanly, for the reason, unknown to the captain, that the bullet had carried with it into the muscle a fragment of Michael J.'s undershirt.
However, his physical sufferings were as nothing compared with those he experienced mentally. He had hoped to be in fair fighting condition within a week at the latest. Wrapped in paper and tucked away in the back of the ship's safe he had a silver-hilted stiletto he had taken away from a cutthroat who had tried to rob him once in Valparaiso—and with this weapon he had planned to cut away the lock on the state-room door. And once outside—
What Michael J. Murphy did not know was that when one has dislocated one's shoulder one will do very little wood-carving during the three subsequent weeks. It almost broke the skipper's heart to think he had made a threat in good faith, and was balked from making it good.
During this entire period Mr. Reardon was going about his duties as usual, in absolute ignorance of the state of affairs about the ship, for he was an innocent, trustful sort of fellow, and to a born romanticist like Terence the fairy tale which Mr. Schultz had spun at breakfast the morning after leaving Pernambuco was not at all difficult of assimilation. It appeared—according to Mr. Schultz—that the skipper had gone ashore for a night of roystering, and upon returning to the ship about midnight, in a wild state of intoxication, had become involved in an altercation with the launchman over the fare. In the resultant battle the skipper, in his helpless condition, was being terribly beaten by the vicious Pernambucan; hence one could scarcely blame him for drawing a pistol and shooting the launchman—fatally, according to Mr. Schultz. Of course, after that, to have lingered longer inside the three-mile limit would have been sheer insanity, so Mr. Schultz, taking matters into his own hands, had uphooked and skipped with doused lights from the jurisdiction of the Pernambuco police.
“And how did the skipper come out of all this?” Mr. Reardon had inquired anxiously.
“He iss in rodden shape,” Mr. Schultz had declared. “Von of hiss angles vos brogen, und he vos cut mid a knive—preddy deeb, but noddings to worry aboud. Der only drouble iss der dooty of navigading der shib falls double on der segond mate und me.”
“Make him pay ye over-time out av his own wages, the wurthless vagabone!” Mr. Reardon had urged. “May he walk wit' a limp for the rest av his days—bad cess to him! I've a notion, Misther Schultz, that lad'll never comb his hair grey.”
Mr. Schultz nodded lugubriously; then he glanced up and caught the little cockney steward staring at him so balefully, that he realized he must have speech in private with the steward. Consequently he lingered at table until Mr. Reardon finished his breakfast and went below; whereupon Mr. Schultz intimated to the steward, in his direct blunt fashion, that for the remainder of the voyage, Riggins—for that was the steward's name—was to consider himself deaf, dumb and blind; the penalty for reconsideration within the hearing of Mr. Reardon being a swift and immediate excursion, personally conducted by Mr. Schultz, to Davy Jones's locker! Following this earnest exhortation, Riggins, never a robust person mentally or physically, came abruptly to the conclusion that this was one of those occasions where silence, if not exactly golden, was at least to be preferred to great riches.
IT may appear strange that during the days and nights Michael J. Murphy lay on his bed of pain Terence Reardon did not once pass the little open window of the skipper's state-room. Not, however, that the latter watched for him, for he did not. He believed that Reardon, like himself, was a prisoner; although, had the chief passed the window and had the captain observed his passing, the complacence of Herr von Staden and his patriotic company would have received a jar much earlier in the voyage.
Unfortunately, however, for Murphy's plans, the chief's stateroom was located in the after part of the house and on the side opposite the skipper's, and following their brief spat through the speaking-tube, Terence Reardon had confined himself exclusively to his engine-room and that portion of the ship along which he must of necessity pass when going to and from his state-room. He told himself it was the part of wisdom for one of his ferocious temper to avoid the occasions of sin. Certainly it would be hard to pass the skipper's state-room without looking in, particularly since in these warm latitudes the door would probably be open; for should the skipper be within at the time, they would peradventure scowl at each other, and he is a fool indeed who cannot foretell the future when a thousand generations of natural enemies exchange “the black look.” Terence remembered his boy Johnny, a youth who, according to Mrs. Reardon, should never be a marine engineer, but the finest lawyer that ever pouched a fat fee. And there was Mary Agnes and Catherine Bertram. Next year they would begin taking piano lessons, and in the fullness of time, no matter how hard the pull, both should go to the state university and acquire the education made to fit their father's head, but by force of circumstances denied him. And at the thought Terence looked at his hard black hands and set himself resolutely to face a life sentence of rattling ash hoists, roaring furnaces and the soft sucking sounds of the pistons. Two hundred dollars a month—and the union scale was a hundred and fifty! Ah, no, he dared not trifle with that job. He must, at all hazard, avoid friction with the skipper, for what would Mrs. Reardon say if Cappy Ricks forced him to roll the bones with Mike Murphy—one flop and high man out? Mr. Reardon could close his eyes and see Mike Murphy roll out a “stiff,” while with trembling hand the Reardon rolled five sixes!
TheNarcissushad been out of Pernambuco harbor four days before Mr. Reardon, upon comparing the sun—which all are agreed rises in the east—with the direction in which the ship was headed, and then extracting the cube root of the resultant product, and subtracting it from the longtitude and latitude of the Cape of Good Hope, decided that there must be something wrong with Mr. Schultz's navigation. So he spoke to Mr. Schultz about it, and was laughingly informed that they were traveling on a great circle. Thereupon Mr. Reardon remembered that at sea a ship traveling on the arc of a great circle, for some mysterious reason repudiates the old geometrical theorem that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points. He recalled that vessels plying between San Francisco and Yokohama describe a great circle which brings them well up toward the Aleutian Islands, So he was satisfied with the explanation, this being his first voyage into the South Atlantic anyhow; but he continued to observe the sun each morning, and still the vessel's head held far to the south. A suspicion that all was not as it should be slowly settled in Mr. Reardon's head, and though he said nothing, he used his ejes and ears. A dozen times a day, as the ship rolled steadily south, he was tempted to take down the speaking tube and confide his suspicions to the master, confined in his state-room by reason of deep—but not serious-knife wounds. Each time he was on the point of yielding, however, he remembered that Mike Murphy had called him a renegade—so he refrained.
The installation of the wireless plant and the presence aboard the ship of Herr von Staden had failed to arouse his suspicions the first day out. True, the wireless could not have been connected with the electric light plant below without Mr. Reardon's knowledge and consent, but when he asked Mr. Schultz about it the latter replied that Cappy Ricks must have changed his mind about installing wireless on theNarcissus, for he had cabled to the agents of the charterers in Pernambuco to have a wireless plant and a competent operator waiting for the vessel upon arrival. It was Mr. Schultz's opinion that the owners had evidently arrived at the conclusion that it was wise to have a wireless aboard during war times. Personally, Mr. Schultz approved of the innovation.
So did Terence Reardon, for that matter. He found the new wireless operator a charming fellow, possessed of talents far superior to those of the young men who ordinarily pound the brass at sea. Indeed, after the second day out, Mr. Reardon would have been heartbroken had anything happened to that wireless. For Herr August Carl von Staden sat at the key almost continuously, eavesdropping on the war news, and Mr. Reardon never came to the wireless room that the operator did not have some news of an overwhelming British defeat!
As the voyage proceeded, however, and Mr. Reardon's mind grew a trifle uneasy, reluctantly he began to view Herr von Staden and the wireless with apprehension. He asked the affable operator how much the Marconi company charged theNarcissusfor his services and the rental of the wireless plant, and von Staden, momentarily stumped, replied that the tariff was two hundred dollars a month; whereupon Reardon knew he lied, for the charge is one hundred and forty. The German, realizing instantly that he was not on the target, added: “That is, for a first-grade operator and a plant like this. Of course we furnish cheaper operators and less powerful plants, Mr. Reardon.”
“Oh! So that's the way av it?” the chief replied, and immediately went to his state-room for the purpose of thinking it over. Eventually he came to the conclusion that all was not as it should be, but that, nevertheless, it was no affair of his. He was paid to obey signals given him from the bridge.
“'Tis no business av mine, afther all,” he soliloquized. “For why should I be puttin' dogs in windows? He's paid to navigate the ship, an' didn't Cappy Ricks tell me to mind me own business? And yet, there's something wrong in this ship. I feel it in me bones.”
He felt it with a force that was almost violent when Mr. Schultz called down through the speaking-tube late one afternoon and told him to put her under a dead-slow bell. That meant they were practically heaving to, and steamers only heave to at sea in fine weather when they have reached a certain longitude and latitude and plan to keep an appointment. On the instant there was a strong odor of rat in Terence Reardon's engine room, but his “Very well, sir,” contained no hint of his surprise and suspicion. He gave his orders to the firemen to bank the fires, and when this had been done he informed his engine-room crew that they might all go on deck for five minutes and get a breath of fresh air. Nothing loath, they scrambled up the steel stairway—and the instant the last man was out of earshot Terence Reardon sprang to the speaking-tube to whistle up the skipper in his room.
Now, undoubtedly the cool and calculating Herr August Carl von Staden had been carefully trained to take into consideration, when planning his strategy, every conceivable contingency that might possibly arise. It is probable that the German secret service never turned out a more finished graduate than Herr von Staden; but the fact remains, nevertheless, that there are certain contingencies over which no human being has control. One of these is Newton's law of gravitation; another, an equally immutable law to the effect that water will seek its own level; a third, the vindictiveness of an outraged Irishman; and a fourth, the very natural tendency of any man, not excepting Mr. Terence Reardon, to be profoundly surprised and intensely curious when certain phenomena, which we shall now proceed to explain, take place in the engine room where he is chief.
Michael J. Murphy, having only the day before again essayed the task of whistling up the engine room, and having, by reason of the ball of cotton waste with which the tube had been plugged by the first assistant engineer, again failed to receive the courtesy of a reply from any one, had, to put it mildly, been annoyed.
“Very well, my bullies,” he soliloquized as he hung up the tube, “you wouldn't speak to me when I wanted to speak to you; so now the first time one of you wants to speak to me I'll hand you a surprise, and I'll hand it to you right in the mouth.” And forthwith Michael J. had carefully poured down the speaking tube the contents of the basin in which he had just made his morning ablutions! He longed to do something nasty, and he succeeded admirably.
As we have already remarked, water seeks its own level. It ran down the speaking-tube until it encountered the cotton waste plug; whereupon, due to the hydrostatic pressure, the plug gave way and was forced down to the tightly closed mouth of the tube, and the suds backed up behind it. It was pretty warm in the engine room, and most of the water had evaporated by the time Terence Reardon took down the looped tube and opened it for the purpose of putting his lips to the mouthpiece and blowing heartily through it. However, there was about a gill of water left in the tube.
Now, as everybody knows, water running down a slope of seventy-five or eighty degrees comes rather fast. Consequently Mr. Reardon had no time to dodge.
Why be squeamish? He got a mouthful and was very nauseated for half a minute. Also he cursed, we regret to record, and was very, very angry. Carefully he drained the devilish tube, wiped it clean with some fresh waste, and racked his brain for the right thing to say to Michael J. Murphy. Finally he hit upon something he concluded would about fill the bill, so he put his lips to the mouthpiece once more and whistled up the skipper. To his surprise, however, his breath didn't seem to get anywhere: in fact, it was directed back in his face rather forcefully; so he investigated and discovered the mouthpiece was only half open. Upon endeavoring to open it fully he sensed an obstruction in the back of it, so he unscrewed the mouthpiece and drew forth a ball of dirty, sour-smelling cotton waste.
He gazed a moment in speechless wonder. Then: “I'll whistle that dirrty Tomfool, until he answers me in self-defense,” he announced'to the main motor, and forthwith blew a mighty blast. Almost instantly Michael J. Murphy yelled: “Hullo!”
“Murphy,” Terence Reardon announced calmly and very distinctly, “you're a contimptible dhrunken ape!”
“Holy Moses! Reardon, is that you?” the astounded Murphy demanded.
“It is-as you'll discover whin you're able to come on deck an' give me the satisfaction I'll demand for the dirrty dab av wather an' cotton waste you put in the tube, knowin' that the firrst time I took it down to spheak to you, ye blackguard, in the line av djooty—which is the only reason I would spheak to you—I'd get it full in the mouth. Ye dirrty, lyin', schamin', dhrunken murrderer!”
He paused to let that stream of adjectival opprobrium sink in. Silence. Then:
“I poured the contents of my washbasin in the tube, I'll admit, but I did not plug it with cotton waste. One of your assistants did that, chief, and as for the water, as God is my judge, I didn't intend it for you—”
“Who else would ye be afther insultin' if it wasn't me? Are ye not friendly wit' me assistants?”
“Forgive me, Reardon, and listen to what I'm going to tell you.”
And then the tale was told. When it was done Terence Reardon grunted.
“I knew it!” he said. “I knew it! I felt in me bones there was something wrong aboard this ship. An' so ye were not dhrunk an' disordherly at Pernambuco?”
“The liars! Did they tell you that? Reardon, it's only the mercy of heaven they didn't murder me. I'm lying here, helpless and crippled in my state-room, with the key turned in the lock. They've stolen my ship from me, and I can tell by the roll of her she's practically hove to under a dead-slow bell this minute. We've reached the rendezvous—we're waiting for the German fleet to deliver the coal; and oh, man, man, if we're caught by a British cruiser we'll lose the ship! They'll confiscate her, chief. Wirra! Wirra!” he cried, breaking into the forgotten wail of his childhood. “How can I ever face Matt Peasley and Cappy Ricks after this? Reardon, man, they'll think we stood in with the Germans and let them do it. We're both Irish—they know we're both pro-German—”
“What's that you said?” Terence demanded sharply. “Me pro-German. Me? Iwaspro-German—yis—wanst!”
Fell a silence.
Now, for the benefit of the uninitiated, be it known that there is a certain curse employed by the Irish and by no other race on earth. Whenever you hear an Irishman employ it, you know instantly—provided, of course, you are Irish yourself—just what kind of Irish that Irishman is. You cannot mistake it. There is no possible chance. It is only brought forth with the dust of the centuries on it, so to speak, to grace a fitting occasion. Terence Reardon felt that such an occasion was now at hand. As naturally, as inevitably, therefore, as the suds ran down the speaking-tube, that curse climbed up it—softly, distinctly, and with a wealth of feeling in the back of it:
“God put the curse av Crummle on thim!”
Mr. Reardon, of course, referred to the late Oliver Cromwell. Any one who has ever read the sorry history of Erin knows what the amiable Oliver did to the Irish. Consequently such an one will have no difficulty in estimating the precise proportions of bad luck Terence Reardon prayed might be the immediate heritage of the crew of the S.S.Narcissus.
Michael J. Murphy blinked rapidly, for all the world as if Mr. Schultz had entered at that moment and struck him a terrific blow on top of the head. A more dazed Irishman than he never threw an ancient egg or a defunct cat at an alleged Celtic comedian with green whiskers. He was absolutely staggered—but not for long. The Irish come back very quickly.
“Shame on you, Terence Reardon!” he declared. “And you with a Masonic ring on your finger.”
“Glory be!” cried the delighted Terence. “Sure are you wan av us?”
“One of you!” Mike Murphy fairly shrieked. “The minute I'm out of this room you'll apologize or fight for thinking I'm a renegade.”
“Naboclish!” laughed Terence Reardon, slipping into the Gaelic and out again. “The divil a Mason am I! Sure that ring ye saw on me finger that day in the office av the owners belonged to me second assistant in theArab. He'd lost it in the engine room, an' a mont' afther he'd left I found it. Not knowin' what ship he was in, 'twas me intintion to take the ring over to the Marine Engineers' Association an' lave it for him wit' the secreth'ry; and to make sure I wouldn't forget it I put it on me finger—”
“Well, you knew, Terence, that with the likes of me round you'd not be liable to forget it,” Mike Murphy laughed.
“As for you, ye divil,” Terence continued, “faith, what wit' yer English tweeds an' the fancy cut av thim, an' yer lack av the brogue an' the broadaav ye, I thought, begorra, ye were a dirrty Far Down! God love ye, Michael, but 'tis the likes av you I'm proud to be ship-mates wit'.”
“But you said you were from Belfast, Terence.”
“So I am. I was borrn there, but me parents—the Lord 'a' merrcy on their sowls—moved back to Kerry.”
“Terence!”
“What is it, Michael, me poor lad?”
“Do you ever drink on duty? I don't mean with your superiors—”
The chief chuckled. He knew what Murphy was alluding to.
“I do,” he replied, “wit' me equals.”
“'Tis a pity, Terence, that man Schultz has the key to my state-room in his pocket. Now if you could manage to tap that Dutchman on the head with something hard and heavy, take the key out of his pocket and throw him overheard, you could let me out of this purgatory I'm in. Then I wouldn't be surprised if the sight of me and the absence of Mr. Schultz would put a bit of heart in that little cockney steward—and maybe he'd bring a drink to hearten you for what's ahead of you this night.”
“An' what might that be, avic?” Terence demanded.
“I want you to steal the ship back from them, Terence.”
“Very well, Michael. 'Tis not a small thing ye ask me to do, but the divil a more willin' man could ye find to ask. Have ye figured out the plan av campaign? Sure what wit' the suddenness av it all I'm all in a shweat wit' excitement.”
“You may be cold enough before morning, Terry, my boy.”
“Bad luck to you, Michael! Dyin' is wan thing I cannot afford to do, although be the same token they tell me ould Ricks has a kind shpot in the heart av him for the widow an' the orphan—particularly av thim that dies in his service! As I say, I cannot afford to get kilt, but in back av that ag'in I cannot afford to lose the best job I ever had. An' afther all, 'tis a poor man that won't fight for a fine, kind gentleman—”
“Damn the fine, kind gentleman! It serves him right for letting us get into this fix. He can afford the loss of the ship, but you and I, Terence Reardon, cannot afford the loss of our honor and self-respect. For the sake of the blood that's in us we can't afford to let a lot of Dutchmen steal our ship and cargo.”
“Whist!” Reardon warned. “Hurry up. Me crew is comin' below ag'in.”
“Make it a point to pass by my state-room window after dark. You'll find a scrap of paper on the sill. Help yourself to it.”
“Faith, I will,” Mr. Reardon promised fervently, and the tube closed with a click.
TERENCE Reardon's preparations for the night's work began the instant he hung up the speaking-tube. TheNarcissuscarried three assistant engineers, in consequence of which Mr. Reardon was not required to stand a watch unless he so elected; although from force of habit acquired in the days when he had been chief of theArab—a little three-thousand-ton tramp—and perforce had to stand a regular watch, he found it very difficult not to spend at least eight hours in every twenty-four in the engine room. When, eventually, he came to a realization that his job was not to make the engines behave, but to see that they behaved properly, he spent more of his time on deck, and put in only a few hours below during the watch of the third assistant engineer—the third assistant being a young man in whom the chief reposed exactly that degree of confidence a chief engineer should always repose in a third assistant. Mr. Reardon, therefore, was at liberty to leave the engine-room whenever he felt so disposed; and following his illuminating conversation with the captain he felt very much disposed to leave immediately.
He went first to his state-room, where he bathed, changed into new under-clothes and socks, donned a freshly laundered suit of faded dungarees—old, faded, well-washed dungarees, by the way, always appearing neater and cleaner than new ones—and shaved; for if Providence willed it that lie should die to-night. Mr. Reardon was resolved to be in such a highly sanitary condition that “those upon whom should devolve the melancholy duty of laying him out”—which phrase, in the Hibernian sense, means those who should dispose his limbs, close his eyes, tie up his black jowls with a towel and fold his hands—alas, so white in death, at last! across his still breast—might be moved to remark that, notwithstanding the nature of the deceased's vocation, they could not recall ever having seen a cleaner corpse.
Having attended to his pre-dissolution toilet, Mr. Reardon next sat in at his littered desk, swept a space clear of tobacco crumbs, ashes, pipes and some old copies of theCork Eagle, and sat down to write a farewell letter to his wife, hoping that, even though his enemies should slay him, yet would they have sufficient respect for the dead to mail that letter to Mrs. Reardon. And, in order that he might not anger his posthumous benefactors, he mentioned nothing of the state of affairs aboard the ship. He merely stated that she might never see him again, in which event she was to call upon the owners and ask them to invest for her the proceeds of his life insurance policy, since they could and would invest it to better advantage than she. Then he spoke of his grief at the thought of the children being forced to forego their college education and suggested that she ask Cappy Ricks to give Johnny a place in his office; also, should the owners offer anything as compensation for the loss of her husband, she was to accept it, for, as God was his judge, she would be entitled to it! This last sentence Terence underscored for emphasis; that was as close as he came to saying that if he died it would be in defense of his owner's interest. Then he commended her to the comfort of her religion and subscribed himself: “Your loving and devoted husband, Terence P. Reardon, Chief Engineer S.S.Narcissus.”
Having set his small affairs in order against a hasty exit from this vale of hatreds, Mr. Reardon, in unconscious imitation of all the condemned men who had preceded him on the voyage across the Styx, repaired to the dining saloon and partook of a hearty meal. He realized he had undertaken a contract that would require the employment of weapons more formidable than his hard fists, and devoutly he wished that, like the fairy queen, he had but to breathe on them to metamorphose them into pig iron. He pictured the slaughter aboard theNarcissuswhen he should wade into the conflict. Finally he made up his mind that, in lieu of an iron hand or two, he would use his favorite monkey wrench, for he had no firearms whatsoever; although, had somebody presented him with a one-man machine gun with full directions for using, Mr Reardon would have recoiled in horror from it. Firearms were highly dangerous. They killed so many people!
He left the table long before the others had finished. There was no one on deck as he emerged from the dining saloon, so he walked leisurely round past the captain's cabin, whistling the “Cruiskeen Lawn” to let Mike Murphy know who was coming. Evidently Michael assimilated the hint, for there was an envelope on the little window sill as Terence hove abreast of it. He snatched it swiftly away and continued round to his own state-room.
The envelope contained Michael J. Murphy's plan for campaign worked out to the most minute detail, by reason of his absolute knowledge of the customs aboard the ship. Mr. Reardon read the remarkable document and sat lost in admiration; a twinkle leaped to his eyes and a cunning, rather deadly little smile came sneaking round the corners of his broad chin.
“Arrah, but 'tis a beautiful schame,” he soliloquized. “Who but that lad could have t'ought av it? An' here I've been shpendin' the past two hours borrowin' trouble.”
He read and reread the plan of attack, in order to familiarize himself with the details; then he held a match to the document and destroyed it. He considered a moment, and then performed a similar service to his farewell letter to Mrs. Reardon, for the chief engineer of the S.S.Narcissus, of San Francisco, had made up his mind not to die—to-night!
Mr. Schultz, the first assistant, and Mr. von Staden were engaged in coffee and repartee when Terence Reardon thrust his head in at the dining saloon window. He was mildly excited.
“Be the Great Gun av Athlone!” he declared. “I've just been bit be a bedbug—an' I t'ought there wasn't a bedbug in the ship!”
Mr. Schultz looked up, horrified. “Chieve,” he said, “dot is rodden news. Bedbugs!Ach!”
“An' well you may 'Ach,' Misther Schultz. Let a colony av bedbugs move into theNarcissusan' Terence P. Reardon will move out. There's only wan thing to do, Misther Schultz, an' that is to tackle the divils before we're overwhelmed be the weight av numbers. Have ye a bit av sulphur in yer shtore-room, Misther Schultz—the kind that comes in balls an' is used to burrn in shtate-rooms to kill bedbugs?”
When Terence Reardon put that innocent query to the first mate he knew very well Mr. Schultz would reply in the negative—which he did—for the reason that Michael J. Murphy had privately informed Mr. Reardon that the little cockney steward, Riggins, had charge of the bedbug ammunition. Riggins, who had been standing with his back against the wall, eyeing Mr. Schultz sourly, now spoke up and said he had some sulphur.
“More power to ye, Riggins!” Mr. Reardon declared heartily. “Then do ye, like the good lad, give me two or three balls av it. I'll burn them in me shtate-room to-night, wit' the door an' window locked, an' be morrnin' sorra bedbug will be left alive.”
“Very well, sir,” Riggins replied. “Might Hi arsk, Mr. Reardon, where you hintend passin' the night?”
“I'll shleep in me auld aisy-chair abaft the house an' next the funnel, where I'll be snug an' warrm,” Mr. Reardon replied, for he desired an excuse to be on deck all night without arousing the suspicions of Mr. Schultz or von Staden.
The steward, having finished serving those who ate in the dining saloon, stepped out on deck and started for his own room. Mr. Reardon remained by the window a minute, discoursing on the curse of bedbugs aboard a ship, and then with a sigh followed the steward leisurely. Mr. Schultz appeared undecided whether or not to accompany him in the capacity of censor, but finally concluded to remain and finish his coffee, for if Riggins had decided to enlighten the chief as to the real reason for the skipper's indisposition he had had frequent opportunity to do so during the past ten days. It did not seem likely, therefore, that he would run any risks at this late date. To Mr. Schultz, Riggins appeared to be a man who could be depended upon to remember which side his bread was buttered on and who supplied the butter.
Arrived at the steward's state-room, Mr. Reardon helped himself to the entire box of bedbug exterminator and addressed Riggins very briefly:
“Riggins, ye're a child av Johnny Bull, are ye not?”
Riggins, without the slightest trace of embarrassment, admitted his disgrace.
“An' bein' what ye are,” Mr. Reardon continued, “would ye do somethin' av great binifit to England?”
Riggins replied that inasmuch as he had lost two brothers at the Battle of the Marne, that ought to indicate bally well where the Riggins tribe stood on the subject of defense of the realm.
“Good!” Mr. Reardon murmured. “Even if misguided in their pathriotic motives, shtill yer brothers were brave min, an' for that I respect thim. Now, thin, Riggins, ye rabbit, listen to me: In a momint av surpassin' innocince Captain Murphy an' mesilf swallowed a cute suggestion from a lad whose back I'll break in two halves whin theNarcissusgets back to San Francisco. 'Why not save expinse,' says he, 'an' ship the crew av this German liner that's interned over in Richardson's Bay?' Riggins, to make a long shtory short, we have thim this minute, an' the dear God knows that even if shipped at the German scale av wages that gang'll prove a dear crew to the Blue Star Navigation Company if you an' I, Riggins, fail to do our djooty. They've half murdered the captain, shtolen the ship an' cargo from him, an' run her t'ousands av miles off her course to deliver the coal to the German fleet.”
“Oh, my bloody ol' Aunt Maria!” gasped the horrified Riggins.
“What I want to know from you, Riggins, is this: Will ye help me shteal the ship back to-night? We're runnin' almost due south, an' that good-for-nothin' von Staden has been in communication wit' the fleet all day long. I feel it in me bones. If we get the ship back we'll head due west for the coast av South America an' hug the three-mile limit-an' the devil scoort them thin. Riggins, ye gossoon, what for the cause av Merry England? They wouldn't take ye for a gift in the British Arrmy, for I doubt if ye'd weigh ninety pounds soakin' wet an' a rock in yer hand, but for all that, here's an iligant opporchunity for ye to serrve yer counthry, an' should worrd av yer brave action reach the king—bad cess to him—he may call ye Sir Thomas Riggins an' make ye consul-general av the Cannibal Islands.
“Out wit' it, Riggins. Yer king an' counthry calls ye, an' be the same token so do Michael J. Murphy an' Terence P. Reardon. What'll ye give, Riggins, to preserve the seas to Britain?”
“Me 'eart's blood, that's wot!” Riggins replied quietly.
“I accept the sacrifice in the name av His Majesty, King Jarge! Be on deck at ten o'clock sharp, waitin' close undher the shtarboard companion leadin' to the bridge. Whin I come out on the shtarboard ind av the bridge an' whistle 'O'Donnell Abu,' do ye—”
“S'help me, chief, I never 'eard of the blighter before,” Riggins interrupted.
“God forgive me!” Mr. Reardon murmuredsotto voce. “I'll have to do it. Well, thin, Riggins, whin I come out on the shtarboard ind av the bridge an' whistle 'God Save the King'—troth, I'll gamble that's one blighter ye've hearrd tell av—do ye run up into the pilot-house an' take the wheel. I'll not whistle until we have the deck to ourselves, wit'out fear av intherruption, an' ye must come quick an' take the wheel, else the vessel'll fall off into the trough av the sea an' commince to wallow—which same'll wake up the second mate an' bring him an' von Staden on deck to see what's wrong wit' her. An' until I'm ready to call on those lads I'm not wishful to have them call on me! Remimber, Riggins: Wan jump an' ye're into the pilot-house; then howld her head up to the sea—an' lave the rest to me. Gwan wit' ye now, or that skut, Schultz, will be gettin' suspicious av us.”
When Mr. Schultz came along ten minutes later he found Mr. Reardon very busy calking with oakum the cracks round the door and window of his state-room, through which little wisps of yellow smoke were curling. Mr. Schultz was so completely deceived that he hurried round to his own quarters and pawed over his own mattress and bedding in a vain search for bedbugs.
At eight o'clock Mr. Schultz relieved the second mate on the bridge, and five minutes later Terence Reardon, for the first time invaded that forbidden territory. “Bad cess to me!” he complained plaintively. “I'm the picthur av bad luck. I've a leaky connection below an' divil a bit av red lead. Could ye lind me a dab av red lead from yer shtore-room, Misther Schultz?”
Mr. Schultz marvelled that any man could force his mind to dwell on red lead, leaky pipe connections, sulphur and bedbugs in a ship like theNarcissusat a time like this. He had met a few innocents in his day, but this Irish engineer was most innocent of all.
“Sure, Mike!” he replied, and grinned at his feeble play on words. “Undas I gannot leave der bridge yet, here iss der key to der store-room. Helb yourself, mineFreund, undden gif me der key back.”
“Ye addie-pated son of sin!” Mr. Reardon soliloquized as he took the key and departed. “Faith, a booby birrd has more sinse nor you! D'ye suppose I didn't wait until ye were on djooty before axin' ye, well knowin' ye'd lind me the key an' I'd be alone in yer shtore-room!”
Mr. Reardon was in the store-room less than two minutes. When he emerged he carried a daub of red lead on an old spoon, as Mr. Schultz, looking down on the dimly lighted main deck, observed. What he did not observe, however, was the chief's action in tossing the spoon overboard the instant he passed beyond the range of Mr. Schultz's vision. It is probable, also, that the mate would have been disturbed could he have seen Mr. Reardon in his state-room, with the door locked, removing from beneath his dungaree jumper several fathoms of light, strong, cotton signal halyard, two five-foot lengths of half-inch steel chain, and a strip of canvas. His pockets also gave up two padlocks, with keys to fit. This loot Mr. Reardon very carefully hid in the space under his settee, after which, with due thanks, he returned the key to Mr. Schultz.
The remainder of the evening until nine-thirty Terence spent in the wireless room with Herr von Staden. Then he retired, very low in spirits, to his state-room, to make his preparations for wholesale assault with a deadly weapon—possibly wholesale murder! He cut the signal halyard into short lengths; then he cut the piece of canvas into strips about two inches wide and secreted the halyard and canvas strips here and there about his person. Then he descended to the engine room and selected his monkey wrench from the tool rack on the wall, helped himself to a handful of cotton waste, and returned to his state-room mournfully keening “The Sorrowful Lamentation of Callaghan, Greally and Mullen, killed at the Fair of Turloughmore.”
“Wirra,” he murmured presently, “but 'tis a terrible thing to hit an unsuspectin' man wit' a monkey wrench! An' that divil von Staden, for all his faults, is not a bad lad at all at all. An' I'd give five dollars—yes, seven an' a half—if he were bald an' shiny on any other shpot save an' exceptin' the shpot I have to hit him. Ochone!