Fire Mountain Part 30

I am a j.a.panese gentleman, sir. I have from my revered ancestors the blood of a Shogun. I am graduated from the University of Tokyo. I have a degree from your own most honorable inst.i.tution of Columbia."

"Ow ---- your ruddy eddication!" broke in the boatswain. "Ye b.l.o.o.d.y murderer! Ye'll 'ang if you've gone to a dozen colleges! Wait till they 'ear about this business at 'ome, or in any port ye call at!

They'll know the brig--and ye'll 'ang, every last scut o' ye!"

The j.a.panese gentleman recovered his composure as suddenly as he had lost it, as the boatswain swore. He was again his suave self. Martin cast a quick glance toward the boatswain, and a certain sly expression that flitted across the giant's fierce features enlightened him. He glimpsed the method in the boatswain's madness.

"Ah, my boatswain, you have a defect in your reflectiveness," Ichi purred smoothly, in response to the boatswain's prophecy. "We do not fear hanging; rather will events shape thusly: If the authorities of your America learn by some unlikely favor of Fate of our barratry, they will say, 'The brigantine _Coha.s.set_, commanded by the notorious filibuster, Captain Dabney, which slipped out of San Francisco without clearance--yes, we know that, my worthy friend--is again in trouble.

The trouble has happened in Russian waters--let the Russians attend to it. We are satisfied if the respected Dabney never again is able to arouse our worriness.' Is it not so the American officials would speak, Mr. Henry?"

The boatswain swore luridly.

"And the Russians, if the affair came to their attention, would move not at all against us," went on Ichi, smug pleasure in his voice.

"Indeed, the chartered company might even reward us for removing one of such dangerousness as Captain Dabney from their trade reserves. And if you suppose my Government would act, I fear you underestimate with greatness the powerfulness of my connections in my country. No, my dear boatswain, it is most unlikely this incident will ever reach unfriendly ears, or ever cross the Pacific. You might meditate upon your chance to carry the tale."

"Ye may silt all our throats," said the boatswain, "but as long as the old brig's above water, there's the evidence that'll 'ang ye."

"Ah--not so," answered Ichi. "There are many closed harbors in my native Yezzo, and the honorable Captain Carew a.s.sures me that rigs may be altered. The honorable captain will have a new schooner, to replace the _Dawn_, for next year's season--and at slight expense to my company. A skilful man in his profession--the honorable Carew!"

"Skilful----!" taunted the boatswain. "'E wasn't skilful enough to save 'is s.h.i.+p!"

"Fate. A night of darkness, and much wind," said Ichi. "Yet Fate relented--for, after a week of starving in the holes on the quaking Island, Fate sends you to our rescue. Fate smiles upon our side, my boatswain--brings us to the Fire Mountain, plays you into the trap, gives to the honorable Carew his wish, and now, only----"

A heavy voice boomed down through the open hatch and interrupted Ichi's smirking revelations. Martin directed his gaze beyond the j.a.p. A man was leaning over the opening, peering into the aret. The heavy voice belonged to Carew, Martin knew.

"I say--what is keeping you down there, Ichi?" called Carew. "Do you need help?"

"All right, captain, directly we come!" answered Ichi.

"Can't you get the young blighter to his feet?" went on Carew. "I will send a couple of hands down, to heave him out."

"I am of the opinion he can walk," replied Ichi. He turned to Martin.

"My dear Mr. Blake, we muchly desire your presence in the cabin. Can you travel there without a.s.sistance?"

Martin received a sharp, meaning glance from the boatswain.

"Yes--I can make it," he told Ichi.

He promptly scrambled to his feet and stumbled toward the ladder.

The boatswain wailed behind him.

"Ow--swiggle me stiff! 'Ere now, Ichi, you ain't goin' to leave me down 'ere alone, all ironed up, and with these bleedin' rats runnin'

about!" There was positive fear in the cry.

Ichi chuckled.

"Yes, Mr. Henry, I am convinced that solitude will benefit your manners. Ah--I had not thought of the rats. But surely the great bull boatswain of the _Coha.s.set_ can not fear the little rats! Ah, I am glad you mentioned them; yes, they shall be companions of your meditations."

The boatswain, in a forcible sentence, disclosed his opinion of the j.a.panese gentleman's ancestral line. Then, abruptly, his tone became conciliatory.

"Ow--but say! Ye'll send me some grub? Swiggle me, ye ain't going to b.l.o.o.d.y well starve me, are ye?"

Ichi, retreating to the ladder before Martin's advance, delivered his parting shot at the boatswain.

"Fasting, my dear friend, is an ancient companion of meditation.

Tomorrow, perhaps, when thought has chastened your mood, there is a possibleness you may receive food."

Martin mounted the ladder with mingled feelings; with dismay at leaving the boatswain, with a wild hope of encountering Ruth above, with exhilaration at the success of the boatswain's strategy.

For Martin had fathomed the boatswain's reason for baiting the j.a.panese. The boatswain had known of the alloy of vanity in Ichi's composition, and he had seized upon it to extract needful information.

He had succeeded; Ichi's conceit and vindictiveness had overcome his native caution.

The boatswain knew now something of the enemy's plans. More important, he knew that he was to be left alone, without disturbance, in the lazaret for a whole day. Ichi had already stepped into the cabin with his lantern. Martin called into the gloom behind him:

"Good-by, bos! Good luck!"

He could not see his friend, but he shrewdly suspected the boatswain was already divesting himself of his bonds. The big fellow's hoa.r.s.e growl reached him:

"Good-by, lad. Good luck!"

CHAPTER XVI

THREE GENTLEMEN CONVERSE

Daylight, dazzling to Martin's gloom-accustomed eyes, filled the _Coha.s.set's_ cabin. Martin's upward ranging gaze, as he clambered out of the lazaret, saw, through the open cabin skylights, the blue sky and the suns.h.i.+ne sparkling upon bra.s.s fixtures. So he knew the fog had lifted and the day was clear.

He took a step aside from the lazaret hatch, and then sent his eager gaze about the cabin. But Ruth was not present. He was intensely disappointed.

He stared hard at the closed door to Captain Dabney's room, as if the very intensity of his troubled gaze might penetrate those blank oak panels. The boatswain had said Ruth was nursing the captain in that room. But was the boatswain's opinion correct? Hours had pa.s.sed. Was she still safe in the captain's room?

The slamming shut of the trap-door over the black hole by his side abruptly brought his thoughts back to himself, and his eyes to his surroundings. A man was leaning over, spreading out the rug that ordinarily covered the lazaret opening. Martin recognized the fellow as the same wooden-faced j.a.p who had choked him unconscious a few hours before. Ichi, he discovered standing by his side, regarding him with an ingratiating smile. But it was neither the ju-jitsu man nor Ichi who fastened Martin's attention.

A large man sprawled in Captain Dabney's easy chair at the farther end of the cabin table. The table was littered with the debris of a meal, which Charley Bo Yip was phlegmatically and deftly clearing away, and Martin stared across the board's disarray at Wild Bob Carew's disdainful face. The erstwhile commander of the schooner _Dawn_, his comrades' unscrupulous enemy, his own rival, was the same aloof, superior rogue he remembered from the night in Spulvedo's dive.

As Martin looked, Carew engaged himself with filling and lighting his pipe, and seemed to be totally unconscious of the disheveled young man standing before him, with wrists manacled behind his back.

Martin was again surprised, as he had been that night in San Francisco, with the incongruity of Wild Bob's appearance contrasted with his activities. Was this splendid figure of a man the vicious outlaw of wide and evil repute? The renegade thief? The persecutor of women?

The pitiless butcher of defenseless men? Were those fine, clean-cut features but a mask that covered an abyss of black evil? Did that broad forehead actually conceal the crafty, degenerate brain that planned and executed the b.l.o.o.d.y and treacherous piracy upon their s.h.i.+p?

The haggardness of recent hards.h.i.+p was upon Carew's features, and a week's, or more, stubble of yellow beard covered his cheeks, yet the growth in nowise brutalized the handsome face. There was a long scar on Carew's forehead, which glowed a vivid red as he sucked upon his pipe; there was also a wide cross of court-plaster on a clipped spot on top of the head. Martin suddenly realized that both disfigurements were his handiwork; one was a memento of the fight on the Frisco waterfront, the other the result of his blow the night before.

Carew suddenly lifted his eyes and met Martin's stare, and a cold thrill tingled along Martin's spine. For there was a hot ferocity lighting the man's eyes; there was a hot, yet calculated, hatred in the level look.

Ichi's suave voice broke the uneasy silence.

"Mr. Blake, we have brought you up here for a little chat," said Ichi.