Captain Blizzard handed the Bible to Ned Cilley and stood with his hands behind him, nodding his head as if to stress his words.
"Yet," he said, "he is being buried far from home and kith or kin. It is not proper that he should be left without even atoken of respect." He gestured with his plump hand to the Bible. "Do you settle among yourselves who shall do the reading, but pardon me that I am so small a man, that I cannot forgive a villain!"
So saying he turned slowly away, followed by Mr. Finney, who was more than usually sober and solemn. Into the dry clatter of palm fronds rose the rough voice of Ned Cilley laboriously reading.
"I am the Resurrection and the Life—"
But Chris, watching the disappearing backs of the Captain and first mate, was thinking what a curious and fortunate thing it was that the bales had fallen on Zachary just at the right time, and when there was not a ripple on the cove.
Chris watched the fat short man and the tall lean one go, resolution and anger still evident even in the set of their shoulders. The boy was thoughtful, thinking back over what Ned had said of them, that first day on the docks: Faithful! he seemed to hear Ned say, that's true of the two of 'em! Whatever they can do for Mr. Wicker is law for Elisha Finney and Captain Blizzard.
Chris thought them two very remarkable men indeed.
B
arely were the last spadefuls of sand packed down into Zachary Heigh's grave when Amos, who had wandered to the beach facing the sea and long outer shoreline, sang out: "Ship ahoy!"
Remembering their orders the men rushed over from the cove but remained hidden behind trees or shrubs. Chris and Amos climbed a tree from whose branches they had a fine unobstructed view up and down the coast. To the left, far distant, a point of land jutted out into the sea, tropical trees carrying their green out in a long curve. To the right, just appearing from the direction in which they themselves had come a few hours previously, came a majestic ship black from stem to stern. Black was its hull, but black too were its sails. It looked exceedingly ominous on the afternoon blue of the sea, and as it came almost level with the channel to the cove, its sails were lowered and the watchers on shore could hear the splash of the anchor as it was heaved overboard.
Then Ned Cilley, oldest of theMirabelle'ssailors, camepanting up from the cove and Zachary's grave to look out from the leaves at the base of the boys' tree.
"Oh, Lordy, Lordy!" he exclaimed when he caught sight of the black ship, the last of her somber sails being taken in, "what did I tell you, lads?" he cried, addressing anyone and everyone near enough to hear him. "That be theBlack Vulture, the pirate ship. No vessel is safe near theBlack Vulture! What a God's mercy that all of us, and theMirabelle, are out of sight, for the men aboard theVultureknow no pity, lads!"
Growls and murmurs rumbled along the shore from clump to clump of leaves where the men stood hidden. Chris pulled his spyglass from his pocket and looked eagerly at the pirate ship only a little way out from shore.
It looked familiar, although Chris had had time to see so few ships he could not be certain. He shifted the glass, looking at details here and there, and at the name in gold carved letters against the black-painted side.Vulture. The letters stood out neat and clear and then Chris's heart stopped and started again.
"Ned!" he called down softly, for sound carries far and clearly over water, as every sailor knows, "Ned, don't most ships just paint the name on the side?"
"Aye lad, that they do," Ned replied in a puzzled tone, looking up through the leaves at the two boys.
"Then isn't it unusual to have letters carved of wood and gilded, on the side of a ship?" Chris persisted.
"Aye, that it be." Ned's puzzled tone was sharper now and he looked up at Chris and then out to the pirate vessel. "What're ye aimin' at now, me lad, eh?" Ned asked. "What's in your mind?"
"Just tell me what ships you know whose name is not paintedon but set in carved letters, Ned," Chris said, and he lowered his glass and looked down.
Their conversation, in the silence, had had some quality of excitement in it that had been caught by the others, for when Chris glanced down he saw half the ship's company knotted around the base of the tree, and a half-circle of faces turned up to his, along with Ned's.
Ned's face puckered with effort for a few moments, as he muttered: "Let me see, now. There's theSoutherner—no,that's painted on, or thePriscilla Drew—no; that's painted too." He turned, searching the faces of his friends. "Come, boys, what ship has carved letters for her name, not painted ones? Where's a better memory nor mine?"
The Captain and Mr. Finney came to join the crowd, standing back in the shadow of the palm grove. Both men were listening attentively. It was Bowie who finally spoke up slowly, as if unwillingly.
"There's only one ship that ever I did see with carven letters on her side, and that was Chew's ship, theVenture."
He was surrounded at once by a low murmur of assent from all sides. "Aye aye!" "That be so!" "'Tis so!" Chris from his higher perch, pointed an accusing finger out to sea.
"Look then, for there's your same ship! TheVentureand theVultureare one and the same! Here—take my glass," he cried handing it down. "See the two second letters—they are just a bit aslant. Weeks ago, at home, I thought it seemed strange that theEand theNlooked loose. But loose they are! Once at sea they're changed—bolted in, maybe, I don't know how—and there's your merchant ship at home and pirate ship at sea!"
The men turned, wonderingly but angrily too, for the remembrance of what Zachary Heigh had tried to do, and so nearly succeeded in, rankled, and they now began to understand many things. Voices began to rise dangerously high in the growing ill-feeling.
"Ah—the dirty dog—"
"Andhis friend with the airs!"
"Have we then been harboring the like of him at home?"
"Aye—to let him go free to scuttle the next fine ship, take all her cargo, and leave her valiant men to drown!"
The Captain came forward, his hands upraised. "How-now, men, be still! We are here to see what may take place, but if your voices should carry, as well they may, over the water, we should have little chance of it. Do you be still and watchful."
A low cry came from Amos, who had not taken his eyes from the sea.
"Look! Around the point! Here comes another ship—looks like that was what the ol' blackbird was a-waiting for!"
Sure enough, as the fine white sails of a good-sized vessel made its way around the point of land, distant shouts and confusion could be heard on theVulture. Looking through his glass, which he lent to Amos every few moments, Chris could make out scurrying figures on the deck of the pirate ship, men springing up the rigging and others walking up the anchor as quickly as they could. On the bridge Chris could see the tall gaunt height of Claggett Chew. The humpbacked figure of Simon Gosler stood rubbing his hands, at one side of his master, while on the other, observing the work of the sailors with a supercilious air, leaned a familiar and ridiculous figure. Dressed as if for a court ball at Versailles and holding his lorgnette a few inches from his nose, Osterbridge Hawsey remained elegantly aloof from anything so degrading as hard work. He looked on with a superior smile as the black sails were unfurled, the anchor was heaved dripping from its bed, and the hard-pressed dirty crew made all speed to go in advance of the oncoming ship. Still others among the pirates could be plainly seen manning the guns that had already been brought out from their hiding places, while still more stood by to furnish their comrades with cannon balls and powder. Amos became so excited he leaned too far forward, and, nothing learned fromhis nightly difficulties with his hammock, fell out of the tree onto the heads and shoulders of the men below, causing astonishment and swallowed laughter before he was hoisted back up again.
"Bless my cap and buttons!" Ned Cilley cried, "there's to be a fight for sartin. I can see the flash of light on the swords and axes!"
Quicker than it would take to tell, theVulture, black sails spread, moved forward to head off the merchantman evidently homeward bound from China.
The pirate ship sailed down the coast, turned, and forced the oncoming vessel to stop. Then, as well as the watchers could guess, a parley ensued, but if the pirates thought the prey would be an easy one they were mistaken, for the merchantman came forward suddenly, all sails set, in an effort to ram theVulture. But the rich cargo vessel was hopelessly at a disadvantage. The pirate guns opened fire, ropes were thrown over to the peaceful ship, and with yells of triumph that carried even above the tumult of the fighting, the pirate crew leapt on board. Tiny figures could be seen falling into the water from the merchantman, and in a bitter hour or so the sound of fighting died out altogether.
The men watching from the shore had been kept there only by the obedience the Captain was able to extract from them, for rage was in the heart of every man at the sight they were forced to see, but were powerless to prevent. Even among such hard-bitten old salts as they all were, more than one could be seen mumbling a prayer for the unfortunate men who had put up such a gallant fight.
"Come, lads," Captain Blizzard said to them at last. "We have seen what we had to see, and many is the witness now against Claggett Chew and all his company!"
"Aye! Aye! That we are! We'll bear witness to such villainy—they should all hang for it!" the voices cried.
"Then let us go back to our own ship, for the dreadedVultureis not yet gone, and unarmed as we too are, what chance have we against cannon balls and armed men?"
The men turned about and trouped back to the dinghies, while Captain Blizzard stayed behind a moment to speak to Chris.
"My boy," he said, his hand on Chris's shoulder, as in front of them in the late afternoon light the men of theMirabellemade their way back to the ship, "'tis my advice you had best return with us now, or you might be missed by one or another of the men, and they have much time to think. You shall do what has been set for you to do—we shall stay here another day to take on water and fresh fruits."
He looked smilingly down at Chris but his eyes were concerned. "It will not be a moment too soon for me until I see you safe and sound on board again, my lad," he said, "for I like you well and would have no smallest harm come to you."
Together they went down to the beach and the waiting dinghy. Chris dared not look at the sky above them for he knew night was darkening it, and with the night he must leave.
A
s soon as the night was dark enough, Chris loudly complained of not feeling well—of being hot and dizzy, and in no time Captain Blizzard had, as loudly, told him he was to go to bed on a cot in the Captain's cabin. Captain Blizzard closed the door behind him, and in Amos's and Ned Cilley's hearing, told Mr. Finney that he was much afraid that Chris had a touch of the sun and was coming down with a tropical fever.
Chris remained alone in the cabin from that time. Soon, in the cool of the night, the sailors of theMirabelleset out in dinghies to a cascade of fresh water that emptied itself into the cove at its farther end, taking with them casks and barrels to replenish the ship's water supply. Their deep voices swept back over the water to where Chris stood by the open port of the Captain's cabin. He was forcing himself toward the moment when he must board theVulture. His resolve was held back by his mounting anxiety as to how best to carry out what would be necessary, and a strong natural reluctance to leave theMirabelle.
Leave it he must. He stood pondering on what shape to assume, and when he heard the cry of a belated night bird, and saw it coast by on silent wings to vanish in the night, he decided to take that shape. It took all his courage and determination, but this was the first step toward what he had trained for so long to do, and he knew he must do it, and at once. The boy looked a last time around the cabin, then spoke the magic formula in his mind, and, with a sudden enjoyment in the sense of flight, he soared away from the ship out over the cove.
The bird swept twice around theMirabelle, rising higher as it went. Below, the few lights of the ship had been carefully hooded away from the sea, and the bird, spiraling lightly on air currents, drifted out from land.
The black bulk of theVulturewas easy to find in the clearnessof the night. She was riding at anchor close inshore farther down the coast, and final boatfuls of men were returning from the merchantman carrying the last of the spoils. Sweeping by toward the beach Chris saw that most of the bandit crew were already drunk, shouting and carousing around fires where they roasted wild creatures they had earlier killed. He noticed that a few Tahitians stood apart at the joining of the palm forests and the sand, watching the coarse faces of the drunken men. The Tahitians, fitting so well into the beauty of their island, gold of skin and crowned with flowers, carrying themselves with dignity, were as far removed as could be imagined from the idea of pagan men. They contrasted sharply at that moment with those from "civilization," who in filthy rags of clothes and wild disorder of gestures and voices staggered aboutaimlessly gorging food and drinking. The watching pagans glanced from the brawling pirates back a short distance down the beach where already a few bodies had been washed ashore from the fight. Their distaste and bewilderment were plain.
Chris soared high above the din and the smoke of the fires, and then seeing Osterbridge Hawsey being rowed back to theVulture, followed after.
Osterbridge Hawsey had two baskets at his feet. One was filled with carefully chosen fruits, and the other with the exotic flowers of the island. Hastily changing himself into a green parakeet, Chris alighted on the rail of theVulturejust as Osterbridge Hawsey reached the top of the ladder. Determined to make a good impression and perhaps catch Osterbridge's fancy, Chris, in his bright parakeet plumage, bobbed his head and sidled up and down the ship's rail, eyeing Osterbridge Hawsey with his head on one side as he had seen parakeets do.
The maneuver succeeded, for Osterbridge, with a little cry of pleasure, declared himself enchanted.
"I must have that little bird!" he exclaimed, and carefully taking off his fashionable hat—even more out of place in the tropics than it had been on the Georgetown docks—he slapped it quickly over the parakeet which allowed itself to be captured.
This, Osterbridge Hawsey's own prize, made him crow with delight. Clambering as gracefully as possible over the battle-scarred side of theVulture, he took the parakeet gently out from under his tricorne.
"A parakeet—as Ilive!" he shrilled, sounding very like a parakeet himself. "My soul—what a prize!" he rattled on,entirely to himself as it turned out, for the sailors were not at all interested in a pet. Exhausted from the battle or drunk from captured wine, and all despising the fastidious ways of Osterbridge Hawsey, they paid not the slightest attention. They obeyed occasional orders from him, for they knew they would be whipped by Claggett Chew if they did not, and so hauled up the baskets of fruits and flowers, dumped them unceremoniously in the Captain's cabin, and left as quickly as they could to rejoin their shipmates on shore.
Holding the parakeet firmly, Osterbridge Hawsey tied a long silk cord to its right leg, fastening the other end to the arm of his chair so that he could closely observe his new pet.
Chris did not disappoint him. As the parakeet, he played the clown for all he was worth. He strutted up and down, and bobbed his head whenever Osterbridge Hawsey spoke, so that it appeared that the brightly feathered bird was in constant agreement with his captor. Or he would cock his head to one side as if weighing one of Osterbridge's remarks, in a truly comical manner.
Looking about meanwhile with his black beady eyes, Chris saw that Claggett Chew was lying in a bunk against one wall, nursing his left leg which had been given a sword thrust in the fight. He was obviously in pain and perhaps feverish, and Osterbridge Hawsey's childish talk irritated and bored him so that he turned his face to the wall. Light from the swinging lamp that Chris remembered from many weeks before threw black hollows into Claggett Chew's eye sockets and deeply lined face. Now and again he could be heard grinding his teeth at the pain of his wound, but Osterbridge Hawsey, throwing his fine coat and plumed hat to one side, lightheartedlyamused himself by trying to tempt his new pet with some fruit.
"Claggett!" he cried, as if Claggett Chew could possibly be interested in a parakeet at that point, "do look at what I captured! This is my very own spoils of war!" he crowed.
Claggett Chew made an impolite noise and said nothing. "Well," Osterbridge Hawsey gave a shrug as answer to the noise, "you know how Idetestfighting. It is vulgar, messy, and noisy. I can imagine no possible good word to say for it. And I see no reason why you could not have made them give up their cargo without a skirmish. Ugh!" he said, at the remembrance.
"Now, a good gentlemanly fight with a rapier isquiteanother thing," he went on. He smirked and made a face at the parakeet who did its best to smirk back. "Thatis a graceful and fine art. Refined, and not at all degrading to one's character."
No sound from Claggett Chew. Osterbridge Hawsey rattled on and Chris, pecking at the fruit proffered him, thought that sometimes Osterbridge Hawsey might quite possibly talk just as gaily to himself as he did to the unresponsive Claggett Chew.
"Claggett—your men!" his voice rose. "Really.They are making anexhibitionof themselves on the beach. Just as well there is no one to see but some aborigines.Quiterevolting.Howcan you bear to associate with suchtypes, when you are so much above them yourself—but there, I must not pique you, must I, poor Claggett? I expect your wound smarts a trifle?"
Claggett Chew turned his face toward Osterbridge Hawsey, his eyes blazing with rage and his mouth working with the fretful annoyance of an ill man, but he only muttered and turned away again.
"Do you know," his more delicate friend pursued, stretching out a long finger for the parakeet to perch on, which to his evident pleasure it instantly did, "Do you know, Claggett, this dear little creature seems fearless and almost human?Quitetouching."
He paused, admiring the vivid colors of the feathers which perhaps awoke a kindred feeling in Osterbridge Hawsey, loving a fine display as he did.
"I shall give you a name, my little feathered captive," he said, and pondered. "I wonder what would be suitable? Something French, undoubtedly." He waved a hand and the lace at his wrist fell forward in a not overly clean frill. "Louis, after the dear king? No—that would be too great an honor for so small a bird, gaudy though you are. I think, 'Monsieur,' after the king's brother. That's it. Little Monsieur." He broke off, dreamily. "To think that I once knew such a royal, such a distinguished man!" He sighed reminiscently.
For the first time words came from Claggett Chew. He bitthem off as if the saying of them cost him very great effort.
"Moreextinguished thandistinguished, I would say."
Osterbridge Hawsey permitted a sad condescending smile to cross his face and he shook his finger at Claggett Chew. "Ah, Claggett—you never knew him, you see. I amsureyou would have liked him—such charm! Sodistingué. Oh dear me yes. A mostunusualroyal personage," Osterbridge Hawsey said, smiling happily at his parakeet. "Most of them are somuchalike—"
He singled out several fresh fruits, peeling some for Claggett Chew. Silence fell over the cabin except for Osterbridge Hawsey's delicately smacking lips as he finished the fruit and licked his fingers one by one, the increasingly heavy breathing of Claggett Chew, who fell asleep, and the distant sound of shouts and clamor from the shore. Osterbridge Hawsey made a pouting face at the sleeping figure of Chew; evidently Osterbridge was bored. He went to the door and clapped his hands, but no one responded. Except for the two men and the parakeet, theVulturewas deserted.
Osterbridge Hawsey came back into the cabin holding a bottle of wine which he uncorked and poured into a glass. Chris, foreseeing what would follow, hopped up to the back of his new master's chair where he hoped he would be forgotten, and tucked his head under his wing in case Osterbridge should look at him.
Waiting for the right moment was the hardest thing Chris had to do, but he knew, as Osterbridge Hawsey drank glass after glass and his book fell from his fingers, that the right moment would not be long in coming.
T
he tropic coolness of the night intensified as the hours advanced. An added freshness swept out from the shore carrying its scent of flowers and earth. The feasting pirates had evidently fallen asleep over their food and empty wine mugs, for they did not return.
With a growing sense of uneasiness, Chris cautiously brought his head out from under his jade-green wing. He had had for the past hour the eerie feeling of being stared at, and he pecked at his scarlet and yellow breast feathers while sending a glance about the cabin.
He knew without having to look, where the source of his uneasiness lay. Claggett Chew had turned on his right side and fixed him with a pale, piercing, and unblinking eye. So fixed, it was, that for a heart-thudding moment Chris imagined his enemy to be dead. But after a longer pause than usual, the pale heavy lids finally blinked, though the unwavering eyes did not move from where Chris was perched, as nonchalantly as he knew how to, on the back of Osterbridge Hawsey's chair.
The intelligence behind the stare was infinitely keen and resourceful. Chris, preening himself in a difficult effort to appear what he was not, knew that if Claggett Chew had not already guessed his disguise, he was certainly more than suspicious.
Hastily, and with increasing starts of fear that sent the blood spurting through his veins, Chris cast about in his mind as to how he could distract Claggett Chew. As a parakeet, he was chained by the tough silk cord that bound his bird's foot. He glanced down. Osterbridge Hawsey's now sleeping head lolled like a child's to one side. Chris eyed the length of the coral silk cord, and then hopped lightly from the back of the chair to Osterbridge Hawsey's shoulder. A blink of his parakeet's eyes, from under their gray lids, showed him that Claggett Chew had him fixed in a penetrating and unwavering stare. In his role as parakeet, he moved sideways up Osterbridge Hawsey's shoulder, making for the shelter that the lolling head would afford to hide him from his enemy's eyes.
As he moved step by step, the parakeet made small low, raucous noises—not loud enough to awaken Osterbridge Hawsey, but enough, he hoped, to make him seem a natural creature to the man who watched him so intently. As he neared Osterbridge Hawsey's neck, seeing the ridge of collar on which he intended to perch, Chris took heart and with a last quick effort, climbed the collar to hide behind Osterbridge Hawsey's head, under the thick cluster of curls tied with what was now a ratty black bow. He was, in this precarious shelter, about to change himself into a fly, when a scraping noise froze him with fear. Looking around Osterbridge's neck he saw that Captain Chew was making desperate efforts to get out ofhis berth, and had not taken his eyes from the place where he had last seen the parakeet. Chris knew in that moment with what an astute and formidable enemy he was faced. Paralyzed, he remained in his green and red parakeet feathers watching the motions of the injured pirate.
Claggett Chew might be suspicious but he was also a fevered and badly wounded man. From his insecure hiding place, terrified at every sleeping movement from Osterbridge Hawsey, and even more fearful of what Claggett Chew intended, Chris stared out as purposefully as Claggett Chew had only a few moments before.
The ashen-faced man across the room in the glare of the hanging lamp heaved and pushed at the sides of the bunk, his eyes brilliant with high fever; the sweat of illness and strain glistening over his bare head and colorless face. He ground his teeth at the sudden, almost intolerable flashes of pain that gripped him when he moved his leg. Still he persevered, grasped at a corner of the bunk and pushed himself upright.
If it was possible for his white face to become paler, some last vestige of color seemed to leave it. Claggett Chew threw up an arm to catch on something to steady himself, swayed and closed his sunken eyes. His arm caught the lamp, which, rocking, threw jet shadows as jagged as its light was harsh. Claggett Chew's prominent broken nose, and the deeply grooved lines running down from it to the thin lips under his mustache, changed the cruelty of his face into a brutal mask. To Chris, he scarcely looked human. He was a picture of all that was heartless and evil. But holding to the edge of his bunk, weakened and ill though he was, the power of his will still ruled his body.
He doesn't know when he's licked, Chris thought, and not knowing—he isn't!
Then, trying to hoist himself upright, Claggett Chew began beckoning and appealing to Osterbridge Hawsey, and Chris shook at the momentary possibility that some noise or word would awaken his sleeping hiding place.
"Osterbridge! Osterbridge!" Claggett Chew cried hoarsely. "Wake up! Hear me!—Fire take your eyes!" he muttered in his rage, "can you not rouse? Osterbridge! Osterbridge!"
But after a slight shift in position, Osterbridge Hawsey slept on. Claggett Chew, his face livid with pain, blood weaving down his chin where he had bitten his lip in an attempt to stifle his groans, managed to push himself up and totter to a chair against which he leaned weakly, calling out again: "Plague your bones! Osterbridge! You sot! Help me—you sleazy fashionable!"
He started across the few feet of floor separating him from his friend, and, stooped though he was to adjust his height tothe low-ceilinged cabin, nevertheless his bulk was a terrifying sight as he stumbled and staggered forward. His hairless head nearly scraped the ceiling, and his shoulders were as broad across as those of two men. His hands, white but strong and bony, twitched at the finger ends as if they were unused to idleness without hurting, or without the handle of his whip to grasp.
Two steps forward, Chris saw, was all Claggett Chew needed to show him where the parakeet had gone, snatch him up, and snuff out his life as a candleflame is pinched between finger and thumb. Chris was tearing with his beak at the silk cord on his foot, raking at it between every look he sent towards Claggett Chew. Chris knew that if the pirate touched Osterbridge Hawsey, or worse, fell, the touch or the noise would succeed in awakening the heavily sleeping fop and the parakeet, exposed, would be an easy prey for Claggett Chew.
The Captain of theVulture, sweat rolling down his tortured face, his eyes starting from their deep-sunk sockets with the strain of keeping himself on his feet, began roaring at Osterbridge once more.
"Osterbridge! Scummy no-good!Wake!That parrot has a scar on his jaw such as I once gave a boy!Osterbridge!" he roared with a final terrible effort.
Then everything happened at once. Osterbridge Hawsey was aroused at last and sat up abruptly, heavy-headed and bleary, thickly asking: "Claggett! What anoise! Cannot a man be allowed to doze in peace? Whereareyour manners?"
In the same instant, Claggett Chew reached out to pluck the parakeet from behind the sheltering head and neck of "the fashionable." Chris, with a superhuman effort, changed himself to a mouse, tearing his foot from the frayed cord that held it, and leaped into the air. Simultaneously, Claggett Chew, overcome by the approaching blackness he had been fighting, crashed to the floor unconscious.
A
mouse streaked out the door of the Captain's cabin and did not stop until it reached the farther end of theVulture, where it hid quaking behind someone's old shoe. The little creature, quieting down at last and feeling its heart regain a more familiar rhythm, sniffed distastefully at the shoe. It was plain to see, it thought, that theVulturewas an untidy, ill-cared-for ship. Old shoes were never left lying about on theMirabelle.
The thought of theMirabellebrought Chris's mission on the pirate ship into sharper focus. He glanced up at the sky; there was little time left in which to work safely, for Claggett Chew's sharp eyes had noticed the infinitesimal scar on his cheek and his astute brain had put two and two together. Chris wondered, with a new start of horror, if Claggett Chew could read his thoughts, and if this was why he had stared at him with such intensity.
Well, he shrugged, he knew what had to be done and if he worked quickly, and Claggett Chew's swoon lasted longenough, not even he could stop him. Looking about to make sure he was unobserved, he took his own shape again with a sigh of relief. It was almost like holding one's breath for long periods of time, to be in the shape of a bird or a mouse, but to be himself, he knew, held even greater dangers.
For the first time he opened the leather bag at his neck and felt inside. The first thing his fingers closed on he pulled out. He turned the object in his palm toward the starlight to see what it might be.
It was a folding knife in a case of tortoise shell inlaid with strange signs in silver and mother-of-pearl. Chris opened it—the blade was razor-sharp—and put it experimentally point down on the wood of the deck. As if by itself the blade revolved with immense speed, sinking in so fast that only just in time did Chris snatch it out and hold it more tightly. Trying it out he found that the blade would go through anything, sometimes so easily as to scarcely seem to cut, leaving no trace of a mark, it was so keen. At other times when he pressed on it, the blade whirled around, boring a hole as deep as might be necessary.
What a useful gadget! Chris thought.
This is just what I need and now is the time! he said to himself, and sprang up the nearest of theVulture'sthree masts.
What he had to do would take long, and there was little time left that night in which to do it. For he intended slitting the lines of the rigging here and there, not so deeply that they would give way at once and be soon repaired, but so that with the first hard blow the lines would break.
Growing daylight should have warned him long before he was done, for Chris wished also to slit the sails, very slightly,when they had been unfurled and theVulturewas under way. The sound of voices broke his absorption in his task. Looking down from the top of the mainmast where he clung, Chris saw a boatload of returning sailors and realized with a start that it was nearly sunup. In a moment a rat ran down the mast to disappear into the foul-smelling hold of the pirate vessel.
How long must he wait in the hold? Chris wondered. Although he might be in the shape of a rat, it was only his outward form that had changed. He could not eat grain or refuse that was not suitable for a human, and he did not relish having to hold his own in a fight with a true rat, there in the darkness. He contemplated boring a hole in the hull of theVulturebut decided to wait until the ship was under sail. He bitterly regretted not having brought food with him, feeling hungry after his exertions about the ship. There was nothing else for it but to hide as safely as he could in his own shape.
This he did, after a thorough search in his rat form to find what seemed a safe, hidden place high at the top of a pile of the loot stolen from the merchantman. There the exhausted boy, curled closely against any sudden movement of the ship, fell into a sound sleep.
The dip and sway of a sailing ship cutting the seas, and a ravenous appetite, combined to wake Chris. For the first few moments he was confused at where he was. Little or no light seeped into the hold, and he was further troubled by having no idea how long he might have slept.
His first thought was to find food. Climbing down from his sleeping place he felt his way back to the ladder leading up to the deck. The hatch at the top of the ladder was open andthrough it came a long faded shaft of light and a freshening draught of air. By the quality of the light, Chris judged the time to be well along in the afternoon. He was debating with himself whether or not to change his shape and venture up to find something to eat, when on one of the lower treads of the plank ladder he caught sight of a plate of food.
Chris stood staring at it for a moment. His mouth watered, for he had not eaten in many hours and the sight of meat, bread, and fruit was almost more than he could resist. But resist it he did, for he argued in himself: If this has been put here, it must be for me. If it is for me, it may well be poisoned. I shall not be tempted, much as Claggett Chew would like me to be! He therefore left the plate of food where it was, hoping the rats would find it before long and he would have proof, through their actions, whether or not his theory was right. Then, as a shadow fell over the hatch far above his head, Chris hastily became a fly, soaring up to hit Simon Gosler on the nose.
Crawling in a leisurely fashion on the beggar's hump, he lingered long enough to see what the cripple was about. Simon was looking down the steep ladder, shading his rheumy eyes against the brilliance of the setting sun with one filthy, crooked hand. Chris, crawling nearer, could make out what the old man was muttering under his breath.
"The Cap'n, he say go down an' see, is the food et up, sez he. But 'tis a weary hard way for a pore ol' cripple to hop down thet steep ladder. I'll not do it. He's a sick and fevered man. I shall say it was et up—the rats will have got it before I get to his cabin, in any case, an' then who's to be the wiser? Besides, there's no boy on this ship. What a fancy!"he muttered. "He is an ill man, is Claggett Chew. May his bones rot! I need do no more for him than what I have a mind to, knowing as many of his misdeeds as I do. Hah!" He rubbed his hands with anticipation. "Any day, Simon Gosler could be Cap'n of the goodVulture, an he say the word to the right quarter!" His eyes, no longer hidden behind black patches, narrowed with cunning. "And in the meantime, who gets the best share of the spoils?"
The beggar broke off in a cackle of glee, rubbing his dirty gnarled hands with satisfaction, and turned away to go back to the Captain's cabin with his message.
Chris flew away in the direction of the cook's galley, where as a fly he found it easy enough to eat his fill of meat and what few good things theVultureafforded.
Refreshed, he flew hard against the wind in order not to be blown off the ship entirely, up to the safety of a part of therigging from where he could ponder on what he had heard, and see whatever there was to be seen.
Tahiti seemed to have been left far behind, for theVulturewas well out to sea, and no smallest cloud on the horizon gave any hint of distant land. The sailors had set the sails and a good breeze filled the black canvas of the pirate ship. The pirates themselves, still surly from having eaten and drunk too well after the fight of the day before, were quarrelsome and tired and lay about in sprawling groups on the deck far below. Looking aft, Chris saw Simon Gosler hobbling from the Captain's cabin, and Osterbridge Hawsey's graceful, overdressed figure outlined in the doorway. On an impulse, Chris flew down to hear what they were saving.
"I thank you, Gosler, for your message," Osterbridge was saying, "for Captain Chew seems much relieved to have heard it, and I think will now rest quietly and sleep. Who is it, you say, who has some knowledge of medicine—the ship's carpenter?"
Here Osterbridge Hawsey rolled his eyes upward and shrugged his expressive shoulders.
"Dear me! At least to be a sawbones, he has the saw!" he said disdainfully.
"And knows how to drive a nail into a coffin too, master," whined the beggar.
"Enough!" cried Osterbridge in sudden anger. "Fetch him at once, and tell the cook, as you pass the galley, to bring the Captain some plain hot broth! He is much fevered."
The atmosphere seemed right to Chris for all he had to do. Without Claggett Chew's commanding and forbidding presence, the pirates would be in a turmoil. Chris returned to thehigher rigging to wait until darkness should be more profound.
It was not long before the tropic night fell, deeply blue in the first hours until the stars should give off their high clear light. As theVulturerolled and pitched over the sea far down beneath him, Chris clung to the rigging and took the chance of changing himself into his own shape. Then, with all the haste he could, he moved a hundred feet above the hard decks, up the masts and along the sails, setting the new knife gently here and there to part the fibers of the cloth. As he went the lines were touched occasionally in vital spots.
It took long, for it had to be done with care. Chris scarcely made a move without looking down to see whether the sailors might not have glanced up at the dusky full-bellied sails, but they were weary after two such hard-filled days and soon fell asleep on the planks of the open deck. Only Simon Gosler hobbled in and out, watching a sailor here, stealing from another there, lifting his head slowly above the window of the Captain's cabin to spy on what went on inside. Like a dark malevolent spirit, Simon Gosler, crippled in thought and body, moved restlessly about the pirate ship.
Chris completed his task on the sails and rigging and slipped down to hide behind the third mast as he looked out to see where Simon Gosler might be. He could see him nowhere, and holding his breath, stepped over two sleeping pirates sprawled on their backs on the deck to reach the hatch of the hold. He had one last task to perform before leaving theVulture.
The hatch top was open, laid back as before, and Chris, feeling some danger, changed to a mouse as he crouched on the top rung.
Hesitating, sniffing the fetid air of the hold, he finally randown the ladder edge. There he sensed imminent death at its foot in time to leap as far as he could as he reached the last few rungs of the ladder. For Simon Gosler stood waiting at the bottom armed with a club, which he brought down with a splintering crash on the wooden crossbars as the mouse ran past and leapt out of sight. Curses instantly filled the hot air like so many wasps. Simon Gosler thrashed around with the club laying it about him on the floor, narrowly missing several times, and yelling at the top of his raucous lungs for companions to help him. In no time figures carrying flaming torches clattered down into the hold and Chris, his own shape regained, knew he would have to be quick as he had never been quick before.
With a flick the new knife was open in his hand and theblade pressed with all his strength against the hull of theVulture. He was crowded into a corner as far as possible from the advancing row of torches and shouting men. Frantic rats, terrified by the flames of the torches and the reverberating noise, scampered over Chris's feet or ran up over his bending back and shoulders, but he did not move. The blade whirled in the stout wooden side of theVulture, but it seemed no time before the flicker and wavering red of the nearest torches sent their flares over him from a distance. Chris could make out the silhouette of hunting figures as the first black trickle of sea water pierced through the side of the ship and stained the dry planks. Still the boy pushed the knife on a moment more until the water was a steady spurt, wetting his hand with its coolness. Then, as the torches sent their flames moving into the obscure corner where he had been, a fly soared up and out, over an empty metal plate and four dead rats, over the stooped screaming figure of a humpback, and a scattered line of searching men, out to the freshness of the night and the open sea.
Only Osterbridge Hawsey, curious at the torches and the shouting, looked out the cabin door in time to see a tiny boat scud past, back toward Tahiti. And only in his befuddled dreams did he puzzle over how the small craft could sail against the wind, or wonder how it could sail so well, when it seemed to be made of rope.