"Quick, lad! Now we must catch theMirabelle, and you and I must part."
"Oh, sir!" Chris cried, holding his oar above the water and turning his head toward the man beside him. Mr. Wicker clapped Chris on the shoulder and a glint of moonlight showed him to be smiling.
"I shall miss you too, my lad," he said. "Now, let us send this boat over the river as fast as she can go. And bear in mind—keep your own shape at all times unless you can change it out of sight of prying eyes." They pulled at the oars. "Oh yes, I nearly forgot. Among the effects placed in your sea chest you will find a conch shell. Hold it to your ear, Christopher, as children do to hear the sea. You will be able to hear my voice, if ever you should need to."
"Oh—like a walkie-talkie?" Chris asked, pulling at his oar.
"Somewhat." And Chris knew his master smiled at him.
"What about getting you to shore, sir?" Chris enquired, pulling in rhythm so that the rope boat flew down the black and silver river.
"Have you forgotten who I am, my boy?" he was asked in return.
"No sir," said Chris, feeling a little small.
"Then undo the dinghy and clamber up the side, for here we are," said Mr. Wicker, and the towering hull of theMirabellerose above them.
Chris grasped a rope ladder that hung down beside them to the water's edge and turned for a last word.
"I'll do my best, sir, but I hope you'll stay with me!" he cried.
"All that I can, Christopher," came the distant voice. "Godspeed!"
And looking about, Chris made out, coasting on the air, a sea gull, balancing upon its black-tipped wings. Swallowing a lump in his throat that proved bothersome, Chris jerked at one oar and deftly coiled the magic rope over his arm, holding to the ship's ladder with the other.
A signal flashed, a lantern swung in an arc, and dim figures waiting in their places hauled on the lines. As Chris stepped to the deck over the side, the great white sails rose, spread, and bellied out from the three masts. Chris looked in wonder as theMirabelle, proud as a woman, lifted up her head.
Soon on the silent river only a dwindling sight of lonely sails was to be seen, heading toward Chesapeake Bay and then to sea. But anyone with eyesight good enough might have seen a solitary sea gull, following.
T
he long days passed on board theMirabelle. The hours rolled majestically past as did the waves through which theMirabellecut her way.
Amos and Christopher were kept out of sight until Mr. Wicker's ship was several days out to sea, for the crew, not knowing that the success of their voyage depended on Chris, would have been surly at the presence of two such young boys on board, useless cargo, in their opinion, who knew nothing of seafaring. But when Chris and Amos appeared under the banner of "stowaways," the sailors considered them full of spunk, and welcomed them warmly.
Both Chris and Amos found life on a sailing vessel strange and fascinating but difficult to get used to. Ned Cilley as their best friend on board was the one to whom they turned whenever his duties gave him free time. However, to Chris's surprise, it was the first mate, sad-looking Mr. Finney, who would patiently instruct them in sea terms and answer their endless questions.
As the days passed and theMirabellepursued her long course through tropical water, Chris, with many free hours to occupy, at last understood how the model of theMirabellehad been so painstakingly arranged inside a bottle. For the time seemed long between glimpses of shore and shore, or until they sailed for a time along some wild and beautiful tropic coast. Then Chris would lean on the side of the ship looking at the mountainous or jungled shore. A scent such as comes from the opened door of a hothouse would drift out to sea to the sailors, who looked yearningly toward the land and the greenness. A warm breath of flowers, damp moss, and leaves in the sun would mingle with the rough salt smell of the sea. Chris and Amos imagined to themselves what the forest or the mountainsides would be like if they could only land and investigate them.
Now and again small flocks of birds, migrating perhaps orblown out to sea, would land on theMirabelle, and Ned Cilley made a large cage for some of the sweet-singing gaily feathered creatures for Chris and Amos. And on one occasion when theMirabellewas sailing past Brazil, a flock of butterflies was carried out on a breeze from shore and hung on the rigging until the boys imagined themselves in a blossoming wood.
Chris had found, his first day at sea, the conch shell Mr. Wicker had mentioned, and he alone of all theMirabelle'screw knew how theVenturehad fared.
That first evening, in the little cabin Captain Blizzard had given Chris and Amos, Chris had waited impatiently for Amos to sleep. The two boys each had a hammock swung across the cabin by night which they rolled up and put away to give more room by day. But that first night poor Chris had begun to despair that he would ever hear Mr. Wicker's voice from the shell, for Amos was excited and had no wish to go to sleep. Heswung back and forth, happy as a dark bird in his hammock, his round eyes looking toward the porthole where there was a faint gleam of night sea.
"Chris," Amos said, "we're sure going on a mighty far trip! That Mister Finney, he showed me on a map, but I never heard of any of the places we pass by. The Bahamas, he say to me, then the West Indies, Cuba, Barbadoes"—he was ticking them off on his fingers as he named them—"an' on to South America. Away down at the tippy end around—what's the name of that loud-named place?"
"Cape Horn?" Chris said. He was scarcely listening.
Amos tried to prop himself up on his elbow and promptly fell out of the hammock in a flurry of arms and legs and a heavy landing thump that brought a shout of laughter from Chris. After an attempt at making his bed again in the hammock, and some little difficulty in clambering safely back in again, Amos composed himself with the least possible movement in his swinging bed and yawned.
"I disremember," he said, "where else we're going. Wise Man islands, or Solemn Islands—"
"You mean, Solomon Islands?" Chris asked him. Amos gave another mighty yawn.
"That's what I said. Miss Becky, she read to me from the Bible about Solemn, how wise he was." There was a pause. "On that way—" Amos's voice was becoming indistinct.
"We go past the West Indian Islands next," Chris murmured, almost to himself. "I remember that."
"And the Cell-Bees Sea," Amos said in a whisper.
"Celebes," Chris corrected softly.
"What I said," came Amos's voice, and then at last there was silence in the cabin.
He almost got as far as the China Sea! Chris thought to himself, and holding to the hammock, eased himself out and on bare feet went quietly to his sea chest.
Its square bulk stood in the shadow of the wall, but fragments of light from the night sky caught the brass nailheads and bands upon it so that it appeared to wink cheerfully at Chris in the gloom.
Slowly, to avoid any creaks that might awake Amos, Chris lifted the lid, thrust in one hand and found the shell. He held it near the small port for a moment, its rosy interior faded of color in the gray light. Then he turned it in his hand and put it to his ear.
At first he heard only the rushing sound of surf on a beach. Then the sea sound became fainter and a voice so familiar that it meant home to him came to Chris's ear as if from a long way off.
"Christopher? Christopher, here I am," came Mr. Wicker's voice. "How are you? All going well I hope. Please do me the favor to tell the Captain not to put ashore at his usual place in Tahiti, but to go by night to a cove he will find twelve leagues farther along the coast. I will tell you what to do nearer that time. He will find ample fresh water near that cove, but theVentureis up to mischief. You must escape it, and all on board theMirabelleshall be witnesses to what Claggett Chew plans to do."
The voice faded out and then returned.
"You would probably like to know how far behind theVentureis. She ran aground—most unfortunately and most surprisingly—and is three full days behind you. But she is a fast ship and will soon lessen the distance. Please to tell the Captain so; he is the only one to know of my gifts and that it is possible for me to communicate with you. Tell him not to stop for water or food until his stores are running low. You must not waste time. Have you heard me? Tap the edge of the shell three times for 'Yes.'"
Chris tapped three times, feeling much happier and all at once not quite so much alone. The voice came back to his ear.
"I am following your progress from this room in the manner you know. Practise your magic alone, or you will lose the knack. And now good night. Oh yes—Becky Boozer has been crying into her apron all day. Partly for Ned Cilley but I fancy—" Chris heard a chuckle from a well-remembered room—"but I fancy, largely for two boys! Good night, Christopher. Sleep well."
A
s the Mirabelle sailed farther into tropical seas, Chris and Amos worked out a pattern for their days. Before sunup, while the air was still cool from the night, the two boys were awakened by Ned Cilley or Abner Cloud. They joined the sailors on deck to do their share of chores—mending rigging, patching sails, scrubbing decks, or polishing brass. When the sun rose the boys breakfasted.
The men of theMirabellethen went on with their various tasks, but Amos went up to the Captain's bridge where he listened to Mr. Finney and Captain Blizzard, and Chris went down to their cabin for an hour or more.
Supposedly, Chris was studying lessons. This was only partially true, for instead of sums, he was practising magic, in which he soon attained a high degree of proficiency.
What he most enjoyed was turning himself into some small commonplace creature to plague his friends on board—a mouse, one day, a flea the next, a fly on the third. Quite naturally, no one suspected his ability to adopt such fantastic disguises. So little did they guess—he had one or two narrow escapes from being swatted or stamped on.
It was Zachary Heigh whom Chris wanted to watch, and as a flea or a fly he often rode about on Zachary's jacket listening and observing. But it was not until theMirabellehad rounded Cape Horn one morning that Chris, in the disguise of a fly, rode unnoticed on Zachary's jacket when that sulky young man, after looking around to make sure the others were all at work, slipped down to the sailor's quarters below decks.
There he dragged out his sea chest, and from under his belongings pulled out a second chest. Fitting a key to the lock, he lifted up the lid. Chris, perched on his shoulder, peered over to see the contents. They were disappointing—merely a gray powder carefully packed in a piece of tarpaulin.
Wonder why it has to be kept so dry? Chris pondered, but Zachary was already refolding the tarpaulin and locking the lid. In the next moment, Zachary had uncovered a length of white coils. Then Chris understood.
By golly! he exclaimed to himself, dynamite! Or gunpowder! And so much! What's it for?
Zachary made no other disclosures of interest that day, but after that Chris spent all the time he could, both day and night, watching the young sailor. He was determined to discover if he could what Zachary intended to do with the gunpowder.
It was hard for Chris not to be able to ask Mr. Wicker's advice and not to have his master's superior knowledge to lean on. Yet had he known it, it was just this lack which was making him quick witted and more resourceful.
One night a short time after Zachary's uncovering of the gunpowder, Chris noticed that Zachary remained on deckafter the others had gone to bed, and continued to sit with his back to a stanchion dreamily gazing at the starry sky. Chris was in a fever for Amos to sleep, which his good friend soon did. Then a gray mouse scuttered along the wainscot of the ship's passageways until it reached a good vantage point from which to see the young sailor on deck. Chris had chosen well; a mouse is used to the dark.
For several hours Zachary remained still and the mouse dozed, woke with a start, twitched its ears, and waited. Then, long after midnight when, alone of the entire ship's company, only the helmsman and night watch were awake, Zachary very slowly slid his way to the ladder leading to the hold. The mouse, scurrying forward, was able to follow by means of a dangling rope and a leap into pitch-blackness at the rope's end. The poor mouse hit something and ricocheted off. It lay stunned for a moment or two a few inches from Zachary's feet as the sailor stood at the foot of the ladder in the black heavy air of the hold. Then Zachary lit a candle end he had brought in his pocket, and lifted it up above his head to give the maximum amount of radiance.
The glow of the candle stub, like a yellow daisy in a cavern, spread petals of light for only a short distance. By its sputtering, the mouse looked up to the towering figure Zachary now made above it, and hearing the sharp squeakings and furtive scratches that signaled rats, the mouse thought it more prudent to adopt the shape of a fly. This Chris did, and on Zachary's shoulder the fly's many-faceted eyes could not only see everything, but see them several times over.
Zachary then put the candle on the corner of a packing case and from under his shirt pulled out the coils of the fuse Chrishad seen a few days before. He took up the candle stub and began a long and patient search, measuring with the length of fuse, and hunting for a secure hiding place for the gunpowder. In the end he found a cramped space, just big enough for him to slide into, made by the shifting of the cargo which had seemingly rewedged itself firmly, forming a curious little cave of barrel sides, crates, and heavy bales of cotton overhead. Dangerous, thought Chris, should anything rock theMirabellein such a way that the cargo shifted back suddenly to its original tight formation. The hold of theMirabellewas large, the packing case cave was surrounded by hundreds of pounds of solid cargo. It gave Chris a trapped feeling that he did not like, and he was relieved when Zachary edged and squeezed himself out again into a freer part of the hold.
Zachary measured with his fuse from the crate cave, where he evidently intended hiding the gunpowder, to the farthest point away from it and nearest the ladder, for the treacherous young man wanted all the time he could get to escape from thedoomedMirabelle. Time to climb the ladder, reach the ship's side, and perhaps row away to a safe distance.
The fuse proved to be rather shorter than Zachary Heigh wished. His candle stub, set on a crate, was burning very low and he had only a few more moments in which—that night at any rate—to decide where he would hide the lighting end of the fuse. Just before the candle went out, Zachary's fuse coil reached a group of molasses barrels, and here the young man decided that the fuse, when the time came, would be hidden and lit. He made a mark in white chalk behind one of the barrels and then hurriedly began coiling up the fuse as he turned toward the ladder.
At that moment the candle end, drowned in a pool of its own melted tallow, guttered, blinked, and went out. The utter blackness of the hold rushed over Zachary and the fly who clutched at the threads of the sailor's coarse shirt. Zachary was only a young boy, scarcely older than Chris himself, and the fly could almost feel the quickening of Zachary's heartbeat at the sudden flood of dark, the sense of the late hour, and therat-infested hold. Zachary moved quickly in the pitch-black, his hands outstretched to feel the ladder, his breath coming and going rapidly through his parted lips. The heat of the airless place, the heavy smells of the cargo itself, oppressed and weighed on both Zachary and his unsuspected companion. TheMirabellewas moving slowly forward in calm tropic seas, scarcely making headway on an almost breathless night. Down in the hold the ladder eluded Zachary's reaching fingers, and the creaking of the ship was all that was to be heard except for the faint sound of Zachary's breathing.
Then all at once, as sometimes happens in a roomful of talking people, there came a moment of total silence. For a second there was a space in the creaking of the ship, the pad of rats, or the slight shift and reshift of boxes. And in that second, just as Zachary's fingers touched the ladder, to Zachary and to Chris on his shoulder, came the distinct sound of another man's breathing.
E
xhausted as he was by his long vigil and the effort needed to change his shape, it was another hour or more before Chris could sleep that night. The sound of that heavy but held-back breathing, so close to Zachary and himself in the black hold, frightened Chris almost more, once he was safe in his cabin and hammock, than it had at the time. Zachary had bolted up the ladder like a frightened squirrel, with Chris, as a fly, holding on for dear life. Even so, Zachary moved none too fast to suit Chris, who flew off toward his own cabin in a chattering fright. The lumpy form of Amos, asleep in his hammock, was reassuring, but Chris lay shivering and puzzling for a long time before he finally fell asleep.
The next day, lying on his stomach in the hot sun, he dozed with his cheek on his folded hands, his mind going over and over the details of the night before. Try as he would, Chris could not remember having seen any member of the crew even near the hatch leading to the hold.
Let's see, he began in his mind, a bunch of the men were singing—Bowie was one of 'em. They went down to their quarters first. They were really closest to the hatch. Mr. Finney called Abner up to the bridge, and Abner came back and went down a while later. Guess Mr. Finney went to his quarters—I don't remember seeing him cross the deck or come over that way at all.
Then—let's see—Captain Blizzard took a turn around the deck. It was getting dark. He joked with the cook at the galley door, and probably went on, for I didn't see him come by again. Next, Ned Cilley was relieved at the helm by Elbert Jones, who took over. Ned went on down.
Or did he? Chris wrinkled his brow with concentration. Iguessso, he thought, but I don'tknowso. It looks to me as if it could have been one of several people, and I'll be switched if I know who. I'll keep my eyes open. Maybe whoever it was will give himself away somehow and give me a clue.
TheMirabellewas nearing Tahiti. The air was balmy, and already a different fragrance pervaded it, together with a softer quality which Chris now knew meant land.
At noon one day Captain Blizzard announced to Chris and Amos: "Should the wind keep up as it is now, by nightfall or by dawn at the latest, we should sight Tahiti. We've water and fresh stores to take on there." He beamed over his many chins at the two boys. "'Tis a fair place, is Tahiti, and one you lads will have an interest and a pleasure in seeing."
Chris lost no time, as soon as he could do it without being noticed, in hurrying down to his cabin. Locking the door, he took the conch shell from his sea chest and held it to his ear. The voice of his friend—so far distant now!—came to hisear and Chris smiled with the pleasure this brief link with home gave him.
"Nearly to Tahiti, eh, my lad?" came Mr. Wicker's voice. "Then listen carefully. Ask for a private interview with the Captain, and when you are alone with him, tell him that these are my orders: He is to sail on past his usual anchorage, making all speed. You will know the reason for it at sundown today. Tell Captain Blizzard to go around the point—he will know—and continue for twelve leagues farther on. This must be done by night, for he must not slacken. Then he will see by moonlight a reef. The water is phosphorescent, and when it breaks over the reef it will shine in the night. Then must he heave to, and you will go over the side, and as a fish, find out the channel, for the coral is dangerous and the way into the cove almost impossible to find even by day.
"The land there is like a cup with a chip in its rim; the chip is the entrance to the cove. This entrance, overhung by slanting trees and jungle, is just large enough to allow for the passage of theMirabelle.
"Nevertheless," went on Mr. Wicker's voice in the shell, "the masts and the sides of the ship could be seen from the sea. So with all haste, once anchored in the cove, the men must goashore, bring back palm fronds and leafy branches and camouflage—as you say in your time—theMirabellefrom her topmost mast to the water's edge.
"Let the men rest, but by midafternoon have them hide along the shore facing the sea, for they shall all be witnesses to what is to transpire. Then you must do your part, for you must board Claggett Chew's ship and see to it that his vessel does not gain many days' advantage over theMirabelle. By daylight theMirabellewill find her way safely to sea again, and you will rejoin her with the aid of the rope." The voice paused and then enquired, "Is all this clear?"
Chris tapped three times, his heart thumping with excitement at the prospect of the imminent action.
Going up to the Captain's cabin, he took advantage of a moment when Mr. Finney and Amos were outside to ask Captain Blizzard if he might speak with him alone.
"Certainly my boy," boomed out the Captain, his blue eyes abruptly keen and penetrating. "Mr. Finney will be some time on deck. We cannot be overheard in here."
He motioned to a stool as he let himself fall heavily into a teakwood armchair made especially for his bulk. But Chris was too excited to sit down, and delivered his message standing.
When he described how in the night—that very night, he realized with a jumping pulse—he was to go over the side of theMirabelleand find out the channel, the Captain looked at him piercingly.
"How now, lad," he said in his deep voice, "how are you to find the channel in the dark?"
This was a question Chris was unprepared for, but he tooka long breath which gave him a moment of extra time, and then replied.
"I—I see uncommonly well by night, Captain sir," he said, "and I'm a very strong swimmer."
His face froze with nervousness that this might not do as an answer, and he stood stiff and still before Captain Blizzard. The Captain sat forward in his chair looking at him for a long moment, considering. Then he said: "Well, I do not care for it, I cannot say I do. This ship is more to me than wife or mother or family. She's all I have, young man, and you can understand that to trust her to so young a lad, clever though you may be, to go safely past jagged coral reefs into a cove I never even guessed at, well"—he threw out a hand and then rubbed his chin with it—"You can understand I do not fancy it. However," and he leaned back in his chair again, "I take orders from Mr. Wicker, the owner of theMirabelle, and since he says so, this is how it must be."
He paused, fingering his lower lip and looking sideways in a reflective fashion at Chris standing before him.
"He told me you would have information from him for me, from time to time. We shall say no more, but I trust you understand the responsibility you have? This ship, its cargo, and its men will be in your hands."
Chris felt cold for a moment, chilled as he had never been before, but he spoke up firmly. "Yes sir. I think I can do it safely, or I should not try, sir."
Captain Blizzard's round pink face creased in his winning smile. "Aye, aye. No doubt. Just bear it in mind at the time, eh lad?"
"I shall sir," Chris replied.
He then went on to describe what else was to follow—the covering of the ship with leaves to make it blend with its surroundings. Camouflage was not a word the Captain, or anyone else of his time, yet understood.
"After we see—whatever we are to see," Chris ended, "I'll be absent for a while. What can be said during that time, sir?" Chris thought to ask. Captain Blizzard pondered for some minutes, and Chris was grateful that he asked no questions. At last he answered.
"I shall say you have a tropical fever, Christopher," he said. "I am somewhat skilled in medicaments—I have to be, as captain of a ship, and the crew know it. I shall say that you are in my own cabin so that I can care for you. I shall allow no one to enter it but myself. It will be a most contagious fever for a time," he added with his eyes twinkling. "I shall bring you food with my own hands. Nothing much—broth and gruel,and I daresay I can eat it myself if I cannot throw it out the porthole!" He winked at Chris. "Have no fear on that score, Christopher." He looked steadily at the boy in front of him. "You have your part to carry out, I have mine."
Not since he had left Mr. Wicker had Chris felt such confidence as he did in the words and actions of Captain Blizzard. He knew now that his absence, for as long as he had to be away, would be covered up and satisfactorily accounted for.
Their conversation had taken some little while. As they went over for the last time all the details of what lay ahead of them in the next few hours, Chris, glancing out the windows of the Captain's cabin, saw the splendors of a tropical sunset streaking the sky.
"Oh sir!" he cried, "Mr. Wicker said we'd know the reason why we must take shelter tomorrow at sundown today. And now itissundown!"
With quite surprising silence and agility for so large a man, Captain Blizzard was out of his chair and half-way to the door of his cabin before Chris had much more than finished speaking. Over his shoulder, continuing with rapid quiet steps to the bridge of theMirabelle, he said: "Run down to your cabin and fetch up that good spyglass of yours, my boy. We shall have a good look, for as you know, night falls in a few moments after sundown in these waters."
Racing to his cabin and back, even in those few seconds Chris could see a change in the sky. The brilliance of the colors, their extravagant and awe-inspiring cloud effects, had taken on an intensity of light which meant they were at their peak.
Standing beside Captain Blizzard on the bridge, Mr. Finneyand Amos just beyond, Chris and the Captain looked through Chris's powerful spyglass at the wide stretch of the horizon.
All around lay only the sea and the dazzling sky. Not even a porpoise or flying fish broke the surface of the water which was placid save for the long swells over which theMirabelledipped her white sails. The color ebbed from the sky as if drained from some celestial bowl, and in the place of the scarlets and turquoise, the clear yellows and the plums, came a deep blue that was the forerunner of a fine clear night.
Chris turned slowly, his glass to his eyes, searching the edge of what was now their world, and especially the line where the sea and sky meet.
All at once, as if a white dagger had stabbed the rim of the ocean, white sails grew upward against the encroaching night, and Chris found what he had been looking for.
"There sir!" he cried, pointing to the distance, and the Captain and Mr. Finney swung their glasses to where his finger led, far astern of theMirabelle.
Captain Blizzard's round cheerful face hardened as he looked, and Mr. Finney's lugubrious countenance seemed positively despairing, while Amos hopped on one foot crying: "Leave me look through your glass, Chris! What do you see? What is it you-all see?"
It was Captain Blizzard who answered him.
"We see theVenture, Amos, Claggett Chew's ship, coming up fast astern. Let us all pray that the wind holds."
T
he captain, turning quickly, bellowed for all hands to come on deck. When they were assembled below him he spoke. "Men, you have followed me for many a voyage and I have always brought you safely home. Is it not so?"
A good-humored and enthusiastic roar of assent came from the sailors. Captain Blizzard began again.
"What lies ahead of us in the next few hours will not make good sense to many of you. Nevertheless I ask for your instant help, and you shall see what lies at the end of my orders when we reach that time. Are you with me?"
"AYE!" cried the sailors, their faces close together below their captain, and upturned to see him and catch every word. All but Zachary Heigh, Chris noticed. Zachary remained sullen and apart, his arms folded on his chest, taking no part in the enthusiasm of his companions.
"Well and good," roared Captain Blizzard. "I thank you. Now crowd on all the sail she will take, boys, for theVenturefollows hard upon us!"
Without a word the men sprang to work, darting up the masts and out over the rigging like monkeys. Every bit of sail theMirabellepossessed bellied out on the night breeze, and Chris could feel the ship leap under his feet as the additional canvas caught the wind and the graceful ship surged forward.
Night fell before the men had finished and Chris and the Captain could no longer see the sails of Claggett Chew'sVenture.
The Captain turned to Chris. "It would be my advice, lad, to go below and sleep for a bit. You too, Amos. I shall send Ned to awaken you when land is sighted."
This seemed good reasoning, and the two boys went below where they snatched a few hours' sleep. It seemed only a minute to Chris from the time he lay down in his hammock, knowing he was too excited to sleep, until Ned Cilley was at his side with a lantern, bringing food for Amos and himself.
"Best eat up, lads," Ned told them, "and join the Captain, sez he to me, for land is just ahead and the Captain do be waiting you on the bridge, Chris, me lad."
The food was bolted down in no time and Chris, feeling fresh and alert, ran up to the warm darkness of the bridge.
To his surprise the usual lanterns were not lit; only a small shaded light shed its rays on the compass near the wheel.
At his questioning look Captain Blizzard muttered: "Impossible to tell how close behind theVenturemay be. We have come quickly, but they have the faster ship. I have no wish to give them more clue than necessary as to where we may be." He looked keenly toward the bow, his hands clasped behind his back. "Land is off the starboard quarter, and Abner Cloud is out on the bowsprit looking for the reef. We have passed our anchorage—they expected us, or some other ship, for fires were lit on shore. Sail has been taken in; we are going slowly and will soon be there, by my reckoning."
His eyes grown used to the dark, Chris now saw that it was a remarkably light night. There was no moon, but a myriad of stars gave a clear pallid sheen to the sea. Chris, looking to his left, could make out the blacker mass against the stars that was Tahiti. TheMirabellewas close inshore, and the scent of hot sand from the beaches, of flowers and of plants, made Chris take many deep grateful breaths.
"May I go forward and be with Abner?" he asked the Captain.
"Aye," replied that good man, for by this time Chris was as surefooted as any sailor and for the last month or more had been clambering barefoot in the rigging with the best of them. "Aye lad," the Captain told him, "and hurry. Happen your eyes are sharper than Abner's. Sing out when you spy the reef. We will heave to, and then God be with you, my lad, to find us out the channel to the cove!"
Chris ran forward to the bow of theMirabelle, and out along the bowsprit where, at the tip, he could see the longform of Abner Cloud stretched out at full length. They murmured a greeting and waited, eyes straining ahead.
Then both saw the phosphorus gleam and fade, gleam and fade as the waves broke over the coral. Eerie jade-green and white-gold, the phosphorus shone in the starlight.
"Reef-ho!" sang out Abner, and the sound of his shout was echoed back from the closeness of the shore in faint dangerous mockery. "Reef-ho!"
"Reef-ho!" came a third time from the bridge, and then "Heave-ho!" thundered Captain Blizzard. "Drop anchor, lads!"
Abner left his place to go back and lend a hand, and in his sudden solitude Chris grasped a rope and swung down to the water.
A porpoise slipped away from theMirabelleand moved this way and that to get its bearings. Then the mass of the reef to the left and the hidden shelf of a second but obscured underwater reef to the right made dark patches in the phosphorescence. Far below lay the ghostly spread of sand, and the porpoise nosed its way forward.
The channel to the cove proved to be some five hundred yards long, and it seemed no time before the porpoise passed from the shadow of the trees at the shore into the starlit cup of the cove. Taking a turn about in the enjoyment of flipping its fins and giving a leap or two, the big fish then went back toward where theMirabellehung suspended on the glassy sea.
A boy it was that pulled himself up hand over hand along the anchor rope and stood dripping sea water on the bridge before Captain Blizzard.
"I've found the channel, sir," he said, abruptly conscious ofhis importance from the admiring way in which Amos was staring at him. "There's a dangerous shelf of coral that juts out on the port side—if you let me go first, and the men man the boats and row her in, I think we shall do it safely even in this light."
Captain Blizzard looked at him, his expression both serious and trusting.
"Well lad, we do what we must, and you and I understand one another. Ahoy there!" he roared down to the shadowy decks from which the black spikes of masts rose high to break the sky. "Man the boats! We shall tow theMirabelleto cover, for there's a channel here!"
He turned to Chris as the sound of running feet and of the boats being hoisted overboard came loudly in the stillness of the night.
"Now Christopher, my boy, do you go down and go over the side again, and remember what we spoke of a few hours agone!"
The next half-hour was an exhausting one for poor Chris. It was an impossibility for him to keep for long at a time, either his own, or the shape of the porpoise. He had to enter the water under the eyes of the sailors waiting with their oarspoised above the sea, in the shape they knew; Christopher Mason. But once he dived under, in order to seek out the treacherous channel in the half-light, he needed his fish's eyes and senses. He therefore would swim a few yards as a fish, but had to surface again as himself in order to let the men see him, and call: "The length of two boats, keeping to starboard, boys. Then ease her over this way—to port."
So it went, almost foot by foot until theMirabellewas safe inside the cove and turned broadside to the entrance. Then, and only then, with the anchor safely dropped to the white sandy depths of this hidden harbor, did Chris, tired to his very bones, climb up the ladder and over the ship's side. There remained the camouflaging of theMirabelle, for the stars were fading and before long, dawn would banish secrecy.
But Captain Blizzard and Mr. Finney awaited Chris on deck. Captain Blizzard had his hands clasped behind his back in his habitual gesture, and as Chris stood before him swaying with fatigue, there was a look on the Captain's face that Chris had never seen there before. The usually cheerful, joking man was grave, while Mr. Finney, so sober and forlorn as a rule, looked positively jubilant.
"My good lad," the Captain said, "you said you could do it,but truth to tell, I doubted it from the bottom of my heart. Now that you have succeeded where I am sure no other could have done as well, I find I have no words of praise good enough for ye." He looked almost tenderly at the tired boy. "I am proud of you, Christopher. You did a man's task with a boy's body and mind. And it took a man's spirit, too."
Without further words the Captain of theMirabelleheld out his pudgy hand to hold Chris's in a steadying grip, and Mr. Finney swung out his hand, his long face breaking into one of the rare smiles Chris was ever to see on it.
"Now, me boy," thundered the Captain, "do you go to your well-deserved rest. Depend upon it, we shall cover the ship with green until she looks like the proverbial Christmas hall decked with boughs of holly, as the song goes!" he added chuckling. "A little later in the day you shall be called to see what you make of the result. And now, to bed with ye both!" and he clapped Amos on the back.
Never had his hammock seemed more like a cloud to Chris than it did on that night, nor was sleep ever more engulfing.
W
hen Chris awoke he saw that Amos had already stolen out of the cabin, for his hammock was rolled up and put away. By the strength of the sun and the heat that seeped even through the boards of the ship, Chris judged that the morning was well advanced.
Dressing was rapid, for Chris, like the rest of the sailors in the tropic heat, wore only his breeches. His bare chest and shoulders were tanned and healthy and the soles of his bare feet as tough as shoe leather.
Running up to the bridge he was startled at first, at coming on deck, at the sudden green shade everywhere. Then looking up he saw that to their very peaks the masts and rigging of theMirabellehad been hidden with palm fronds. That side of the ship that could be seen from the sea through the narrow channel entrance had been completely covered with green. The work was not yet finished, but most of the crew were sleeping during the hot hours, while a handful had volunteered to complete the job.
The cove by daylight was even lovelier than it had seemed by starlight the night before. The deep water, with a white base of coral sand, flashed in emerald, turquoise, or sapphire blue. Its clarity and sparkling colors put the Jewel Tree into Chris's head and he had a moment's throb of fright when he realized that it was this very night that he must board theVentureto impede her progress toward the Chinese prize.
He put these thoughts from his mind until the time came, and decided to tackle what was most pressing. The most urgent matter that first claimed his attention was breakfast, and when he reached the bridge he was delighted to see fruits from the island piled in shady corners. These and bread and cheese made up his meal, which he ate while watching the final leaves and fronds put in place on the sides of theMirabelle.
Captain Blizzard came up to him, his hands clasped behind his back, and nodded toward the men pulling themselves slowly over the ship's side and falling exhausted into the shade to sleep for a few hours.
"They will be fresh enough in a while," he said, "and then we shall one and all row ashore to see what we shall see."
He paused, and Chris, looking up, saw that the Captain's gaze was fixed on Zachary Heigh. Zachary was obviously not only far from sleeping, but was restless, jumping up to look out to sea and then sitting down again. It would be only a few minutes more before up he would jump once more to pace the deck or lean at the ship's rail.
"It would seem," the Captain said casually, "that Zachary has something on his mind."
Mr. Finney joined Chris and the Captain at that moment, and looking down at Zachary nodded his long sad face in lugubrious agreement. Chris opened his mouth to say something to the Captain of what he had seen Zachary doing. Before the words could leave his mouth, he was interrupted by the appearance of red-faced Ned Cilley. Cheerful as a sand flea at the prospect of going ashore, Ned had come from his rest with a small company of the sailors to ask permission of the Captain if they might leave the ship.
"Well, why not?" the Captain demanded. "And why not take along the rest too? We were all to go ashore presently,in any case. Those who still want to sleep can do so even more comfortably on the shady sand under the palms."
So in an instant the decks of theMirabellewere crowded with laughing jostling men, duties over for that day, tumbling down the ladders to the dinghies in which they rowed ashore.
Chris and Amos were shoved along with their friends, Chris hiking up his breeches to cover the coil of the magic rope around his waist; the leathern bag hanging in plain sight about his neck. The sailors had often teased him about it, saying that he kept his riches there, but they made no attempt to snatch it from him. There had been no time to warn the Captain, but as the last boatload of sailors leaped into shallow water and scattered under the shade of the trees, Chris searched and searched again for three faces among the crowd that he did not find. Zachary Heigh, the Captain, and Mr. Finney were not to be found.
Aghast, as he understood now what Zachary's plan was—to blow up theMirabellejust as theVentureand its crew came near enough to shoot down the unarmed men—Chris rushed back to the water's edge and stood there hesitating in the powerful sun. How could he change himself to a fish or other shape, unobserved? The sailors from theMirabellewere everywhere—in the thickets for the shade, as well as along the edge of the cove where he now stood, indecisive. To use the rope was just as impossible, for the beach was broad and Chris was acutely aware that he stood out like a single tree in a field, there on the white sand in the broiling sun.
"Better come outen that sun, Chris!" someone called to him. "There's too much of heat in it to be good for unkivered heads!"
Chris knew the voice of the sailor was right, and was on the point of jumping into one of the dinghies, where they lay pulled up on the beach.
Far out on the cove, the decks of theMirabellewere deserted and unlike themselves, so empty of life. Sweat started out on Chris's forehead, as he imagined Zachary in the hold lighting the fuse, and he wondered where the good Captain and Mr. Finney might be. He wondered too if he could row over in time, or if he would be blown up with the ship.
The boy had his hands on the scorching wood of a dinghy, his muscles tensed to thrust it into the waters of the cove, when out over the still harbor, jangling in the heat, came a prolonged and piercing scream. Hot as he was, Chris felt himself go cold at the sound. He knew instantly, although he had never heard it before, that this was the death cry of a man. The scream came a second time, terrified and despairing, and out over the water following it came a low, scattered rumble.
Silence fell for several frozen seconds, and then all at once Chris became aware as he stood rigid with horror by the boat that the sailors of theMirabellehad rushed out from the coolness of the shore to stand stiff and appalled beside him. A babble of voices broke out, and one by one the boats were hastily launched, heading back to the ship, leaving Chris shaking and unnerved on the sand. Over the water as brawny backs bent to the oars the words came floating back:
"Someone's dead for sartin sure—"
"Who was left on board, you say?"
"Leave the lads—no sight for young-uns."
"Pull, you lazy lubbers! The Capt'n and Mr. Finney bean't among us!"
It was a little later that Chris remembered Amos having taken his arm and led him into the shade, and of how sick he was—the heat and the scream, the fear, and a sense of having failed in warning the Captain, combining to churn his insides into a queasy place that violently rejected his pleasant breakfast of so short a time before. Then weak, but somehow feeling better, Chris lay in the cool while Amos found a cold pool of water with which he bathed his friend's face, and then sat fanning him without a word.
Chris must have dozed, for when he came to himself the light had changed, and men were carrying a shapeless bundle wrapped in canvas to a grave dug in the sand. Chris started up and joined the men gathered solemnly about the grave, and as he searched among them, knew a great sense of relief and joy when he saw, standing at the grave head, the Captain and Mr. Finney. As Chris came up to them, Captain Blizzard was speaking, a Bible in his hand.
"Men of theMirabelle, by rights as captain of the vessel I should read the burial service for Zachary Heigh, that met his death by accident, boxes and crates killing him in the hold the way they did. But," and the Captain scanned the tough weather-beaten faces near him slowly, one by one, "you that helped to uncover him know what he meant to do. We harbored a viper, men, who meant to destroy our ship and cargo and leave us to who knows what fate? Had not the bung of that keg of molasses above the lighted fuse most providentially fallen out and the fuse been put out by the sirup, no doubt neither Mr. Finney nor I nor theMirabellewould be here to tell the tale."
He paused again, but there was not a stir from his audience.From under their dirty headkerchiefs or straggly unkempt hair, the men who knew no other life but the sea, no happiness or danger unconnected with it, never took their eyes from their captain.
"So, men," Captain Blizzard resumed, "the gunpowder that was meant to be the end of our fine ship is now safe and out of harm's way, and the traitor who intended this infamous deed has been dealt with by fate and killed in a tomb of his own finding. Therefore, feeling as I do for my ship and my men, I cannot bring myself to read the holy words over this man who had no charity in his heart."