The Argus Pheasant Part 37

Another whistle of a pa.s.sing sh.e.l.l and the thunder of an explosion. The two were almost simultaneous, the sh.e.l.l could not have fallen far from the launch's bow, both knew.

"They may sink us!" Paddy cried in a half-breath.

"Better drowning than torture." The curt reply was cut short by another sh.e.l.l. The explosion was more distant.

"They're losing the range." Paddy exclaimed in a low voice. In a flash it came to him why Peter Gross had said: "I hope Enckel doesn't know we're here."

Peter Gross stared, white, and silent into the blackness, waiting for the next sh.e.l.l. It was long in coming, and fell astern. A derisive shout rose from the pirates.

"The _Prins_ is falling behind," Paddy cried despairingly.

"Ay, the proa is too fast for her," the resident a.s.sented in a scarcely audible voice. Tears were coursing down his cheeks, tears for the lad that he had brought here to suffer unnameable tortures, for Peter Gross did not underestimate the fiendish ingenuity of Ah Sing and his crew. He felt grateful for the wall of darkness between them.

"Well, there's more than one way to crawl out of a rain-barrel," Paddy observed with unimpaired cheerfulness.

Peter Gross felt that he should speak and tell Rouse what they had to expect, but the words choked in his throat. Blissful ignorance and a natural buoyant optimism sustained the lad, it would be cruel to take them away, the resident thought. He groaned again.

"Cheer up," Paddy cried, "we'll get another chance."

The grotesqueness of the situation--his youthful protege striving to raise his flagging spirits--came home to Peter Gross even in that moment of suffering and brought a rueful smile to his lips.

"I'm afraid, my lad, that the _Prins_ was our last hope," he said. There was an almost fatherly sympathy in his voice, responsibility seemed to have added a decade to the slight disparity of years between them.

"Rats!" Paddy grunted. "We're not going to turn in our checks just yet, governor. This bird's got to go ash.o.r.e somewhere, and it'll be deuced funny if Cap Carver and the little lady don't figure out some way between 'em to get us out of this."

CHAPTER XXII

IN THE TEMPLE

The hatch above them opened. A b.e.s.t.i.a.l Chinese face, grinning cruelly, appeared in it.

"You b'g-um fellow gettee outtee here plenty d.a.m.n' quick!" the Chinaman barked. He thrust a piece of bamboo into the hole and prodded the helpless captives below with a savage energy. The third thrust of the cane found Peter Gross's ribs. With a hoa.r.s.e cry of anger Paddy sprang to his feet and shot his fist into the Chinaman's face before the resident could cry a warning.

The blow caught the pirate between the eyes and hurled him back on the deck. He gazed at Paddy a dazed moment and then sprang to his feet.

Lifting the cane in both his hands above his head, he uttered a shriek of fury and would have driven the weapon through Rouse's body had not a giant Bugi, standing near by, jumped forward and caught his arm.

Wrestling with the maddened Chinaman, the Bugi shouted some words wholly unintelligible to Paddy in the pirate's ear. Peter Gross scrambled to his feet.

"Jump on deck, my lad," he shouted. "Quick, let them see you. It may save us."

Paddy obeyed. The morning sun, about four hours high, played through his rumpled hair, the auburn gleaming like flame. Malays, Dyaks, and Bugis, attracted by the noise of the struggle, crowded round and pointed at him, muttering superst.i.tiously.

"Act like a madman," Peter Gross whispered hoa.r.s.ely to his aide.

Paddy broke into a shriek of foolish laughter. He shook as though overcome with mirth, and folded his arms over his stomach as he rocked back and forth. Suddenly straightening, he yelled a shrill "Whoopee!"

The next moment he executed a handspring into the midst of the natives, almost upsetting one of them. The circle widened. A Chinese mate tried to interfere, but the indignant islanders thrust him violently aside. He shouted to the _juragan_, who ran forward, waving a pistol.

Every one of the crew was similarly armed, and every one wore a kris.

They formed in a crescent between their officer and the captives. In a twinkling Peter Gross and Rouse found themselves encircled by a wall of steel.

The _juragan's_ automatic dropped to a dead level with the eyes of the Bugi who had saved Paddy. He bellowed an angry command, but the Bugi closed his eyes and lowered his head resignedly, nodding in negation.

The other islanders stood firm. The Chinese of the crew ranged themselves behind their captain and a b.l.o.o.d.y fight seemed imminent.

A Dyak left the ranks and began talking volubly to the _juragan_, gesticulating wildly and pointing at Paddy Rouse and then at the sun. A crooning murmur of a.s.sent arose from the native portion of the crew. The _juragan_ retorted sharply. The Dyak broke into another volley of protestations. Paddy looked on with a glaringly stupid smile. The _juragan_ watched him suspiciously while the Dyak talked, but gradually his scowl faded. At last he gave a peremptory command and stalked away.

The crew returned to their duties.

"We're to be allowed to stay on deck as long as we behave ourselves until we near sh.o.r.e, or unless some trader pa.s.ses us," Peter Gross said in a low voice to Rouse. Paddy blinked to show that he understood, and burst into shouts of foolish laughter, hopping around on all fours. The natives respectfully made room for him. He kept up these antics at intervals during the day, while Peter Gross, remaining in the shade of the cabin, watched the pirates. After prying into every part of the vessel with a childish curiosity that none of the crew sought to restrain, Paddy returned to his chief and reported in a low whisper:

"The old bird isn't aboard, governor."

"I rather suspected he wasn't," Peter Gross answered. "He must have been put ash.o.r.e at the stop you spoke of."

It was late that day when the proa, after running coastwise all day, turned a quarter circle into one of the numerous bays indenting the coast. Peter Gross recognized the familiar headlands crowning Bulungan Bay. Paddy also recognized them, for he cried:

"They're bringing us back home."

At that moment the tall Bugi who had been their sponsor approached them and made signs to indicate that they must return to the box between decks from which he had rescued them. He tried to show by signs and gestures his profound regret at the necessity of locking them up again, his anxiety to convince the "son of the Gunong Agong" was almost ludicrous. Realizing the futility of objecting, Peter Gross and Paddy permitted themselves to be locked in the place once more.

It was quite dark and the stars were s.h.i.+ning brightly when the hatch was lifted again. As they rose from their cramped positions and tried to make out the circle of faces about them, unceremonious hands yanked them to the deck, thrust foul-smelling cloths into their mouths, blindfolded them, and trussed their hands and feet with stout cords. They were lowered into a boat, and after a brief row were tossed on the beach like so many sacks of wool, placed in boxlike receptacles, and hurried inland. Two hours' steady jogging followed, in which they were thrown about until every inch of skin on their bodies was raw with bruises.

They were then taken out of the boxes and the cloths and cords were removed.

Looking about, Peter Gross and Paddy found themselves in the enclosed court of what was evidently the ruins of an ancient Hindoo temple. The ma.s.sive columns, silvery in the bright moonlight, were covered with inscriptions and outline drawings, crudely made in hieroglyphic art. In the center of one wall was the chipped and weather-scarred pedestal of a Buddha. The idol itself, headless, lay broken in two on the floor beside it. Peter Gross's brow puckered--the very existence of such a temple two hours' journey distant from Bulungan Bay had been unknown to him.

The _juragan_ and his Chinese left after giving sharp instructions to their jailers, two Chinese, to guard them well. Peter Gross and Paddy looked about in vain for a single friendly face or even the face of a brown-skinned man--every member of the party was Chinese. The jailers demonstrated their capacity by promptly thrusting their prisoners into a dark room off the main court. It was built of stone, like the rest of the temple.

"Not much chance for digging out of here," Rouse observed, after examining the huge stones, literally mortised together, and the narrow window aperture with its iron gratings. Peter Gross also made as careful an examination of their prison as the darkness permitted.

"We may as well make ourselves comfortable," was his only observation at the close of his investigation.

They chatted a short time, and at last Paddy, worn out by his exertions, fell asleep. Peter Gross listened for a while to the lad's rhythmic breathing, then tip-toed to the gratings and pulled himself up to them.

A cackle of derisive laughter arose outside. Realizing that the place was carefully watched, he dropped back to the floor and began pacing the chamber, his head lowered in thought. Presently he stopped beside Rouse and gazed into the lad's upturned face, blissfully serene in the innocent confidence of youth. Tears gathered in his eyes.

"I shouldn't have brought him here; I shouldn't have brought him here,"

he muttered brokenly.

The sc.r.a.ping of the ponderous bar that bolted the door interrupted his meditations shortly after daybreak. The door creaked rustily on its hinges, and an ugly, leering Chinese face peered inside. Satisfying himself that his prisoners were not planning mischief, the Chinaman thrust two bowls of soggy rice and a pannikin of water inside and gestured to Peter Gross that he must eat. The indignant protest of the door as it closed awoke Paddy, who sat bolt upright and blinked sleepily until he saw the food.

"What? Time for breakfast?" he exclaimed with an amiable grin. "I must have overslept."

He picked up a bowl of rice, stirred it critically with one of the chopsticks their jailers had provided, and snuffed at the mixture. He put it down with a wry face.

"Whew!" he whistled. "It's stale."

"You had better try to eat something," Peter Gross advised.