BEFORE THE BATTLE
Strenuous activities leaped into being, aboard the stranded clipper
ship.
All the Malays were herded in the deck-house, informed that they were
sons of swine and that the first one who showed a face on deck, till
wanted, would be shot dead. The doctor, with a revolver ready for
business, added weight to this information.
Under the orders of Mr. Wansley, all the white sailors came trooping
aft. Noisily and profanely they came, making a holiday of the impending
slaughter. A hard company they were, many in rags, for Briggs could
never have been called other than conservative regarding credits from
the slop-chest. Rum, however, he now promised them, and whatever loot
they could garner from the Malay fleet; so they cheered him heartily.
They, too, had all become his men.
Bad men they looked, and such as now were needed—three or four
Liverpool guttersnipes, a Portuguese cut-throat from Fayal, a couple
of Cayman wreckers, a French convict escaped from the penal ship at
Marseilles, and the rest low-type American scum. For such was the
reputation of Alpheus Briggs, all up and down the Seven Seas, that few
first-class men ever willingly shipped with him before the mast.
Workers and fighters they were, though, every one. While black smoke
began to emerge from the galley funnel, on the shimmering tropic air,
as the cook stuffed oily rags and oil-soaked wood under all the
coppers that his range would hold, divers lines of preparation swiftly
developed.
Already some were casting loose the lashings of the signal-gun
and rigging tackle to hoist the rust-red old four-inch piece to
the after-deck. Others fell to work with Mr. Crevay, rigging the
kedge-anchor or lowering away the long-boat. Another gang leaped to
the task of getting above-decks all the rifles, cutlasses, powder,
ball-shot and iron junk, the axes and revolvers; of loading everything,
even of laying belaying-pins handy as a last line of hand-to-hand
weapons.
Briggs supervised all details, even to the arming of each man with the
butchering-tool he claimed to be most expert with. The best were given
the rifles; to those of lesser skill was left the cutlass work. A gun
crew of two men was picked to serve the cannon with Mr. Crevay. Three
were detailed to help the cook carry boiling water.
“Mr. Bevans will stand over the natives at the capstan,” directed
Briggs. “And you, doctor, will act in your medical capacity when we get
into action. If hard-driven, you can be useful with the kris, eh? Quite
in your line, sir; quite in your line.”
Briggs smiled expansively. All his evil humors had departed. The
foretaste of battle had shaken him clean out of his black moods. His
genius for organizing, for leading men, seemed to have expanded him to
heroic proportions. In his deep, black eyes, the poise of his head, the
hard, glad expression of his full-blooded, black-bearded face, one saw
eager virility that ran with joy to meet the test of strength, and that
exulted in a day’s work of blood.
A heroic figure he, indeed—thewed like a bull; with sunlight on face
and open, corded neck; deep-chested, coatless now, the sleeves of his
pongee shirt rolled up to herculean elbows. Some vague perception
crossed the doctor’s mind that here, indeed, stood an anomaly, a man
centuries out of time and place, surely a throwback to some distant
pirate strain of the long-vanished past.
Imagination could twist a scarlet kerchief ’round that crisp-curling
hair, knot a sash about the captain’s waist, draw high boots up to
his powerful knees. Imagination could transport him to the coasts
of Mexico long, long ago; imagination could run the Jolly Roger to
the masthead—and there, in Captain Briggs, merchant-ship master
of the year 1868, once more find kith and kin of Blackbeard, Kidd,
Morgan, England, and all others of the company of gentlemen rovers in
roistering days.
Something of this the doctor seemed to understand. Yet, as he turned
his glance a moment to the line of war-craft now more plainly visible
across the shimmering nacre of the strait, he said, raising his voice
a trifle by reason of the various shouts, cries and diverse noises
blending confusedly, and now quite obliterating all sounds from the war
fleet:
“You know what those canoes are coming after, of course.”
“The girl! What of it?”
“And you know, sir, that old Dengan Jouga is bound to be aboard.
There’ll be a medicine man or two, as well.”
“What the devil are you driving at?” demanded Briggs.
“That’s a formidable combination, sir,” continued the doctor. “We’ve
got twenty Malays on board that will face hell-fire itself rather than
see any harm befall a native _pawang_ or a witch-woman. We’ll never
be able to hold them to any work. Each of them believes he can reach
paradise by slaughtering a white man. In addition, he can avenge harm
done to the old woman and the girl. Under those circumstances—”
“By God, sir, if I didn’t need you, sir—”
“Under those circumstances, my original suggestion of holding them all
under hatches, as hostages, has much to recommend it, if we come to a
fight. But need we come to a fight? Need we, sir?”
“How the devil can we sheer off from it?”
“By giving up the girl, sir. Put her in one of the small boats with a
few trade-dollars and trinkets for her dowry—which will effectually
lustrate the girl, according to these people’s ideas—and give her a
pair of oars. She’ll take care of herself all right. The war-fleet will
turn around and go back, which will be very much better, sir, than
slaughter. We’ve already lost two men, and—”
“And you’re white-livered enough to stand there and advise taking no
revenge for them?” interrupted Briggs, his voice gusty with sudden
passion.
Briggs struck the rail with the flat of his palm, a blow that cracked
like a pistol-shot; while the doctor, wholly unhorsed by this tilt from
so unexpected an angle, could only stare.
“By the Judas priest, sir!” cried Briggs furiously. “That’s enough to
make a man want to cut you down where you stand, sir, you hear _me_?
And if that yellow-bellied cowardice wasn’t enough, you ask me to give
up the girl—the girl that’s cost me two men already—the girl that may
yet cost me my ship and my own life! Well, by the Judas priest!”
“Don’t risk your life and the ship for a native wench!” cut in the
doctor with a rush of indignation. “There are wenches by the score,
by the hundred, all up and down the Straits. You can buy a dozen, for
a handful of coin. Wenches by the thousands—but only one _Silver
Fleece_, sir!”
“Devilish lot you care about the _Fleece_!” snarled Briggs. “Or about
anything but your own cowardly neck!”
“Captain Briggs, don’t forget yourself!”
“Hell’s bells! They shan’t have that girl. Witch-women, medicine men or
all the devils of the Pit shan’t take her back. She’s mine, I tell you,
and before I’ll let her go I’ll throw her to the sharks myself. Sharks
enough, and plenty—there’s one now,” he added, jerking his hand at a
slow-moving, black triangle that was cutting a furrow off to starboard.
“So I want to hear no more from you about the girl, and you can lay to
that!”
He turned on his heel and strode aft, growling in his beard. The
doctor, peering after him with smoldering eyes, felt his finger tighten
on the trigger. One shot might do the business. It would mean death, of
course, for himself. The courts would take their full penalty, all in
due time; but it would save the ship and many white men’s lives.
Nevertheless, the doctor did not raise his weapon. Discipline still
held; the dominance of that black-bearded Hercules still viséed all
opposition into impotence. With no more than a curse, the doctor turned
back to his guard duty.
“Are you man or are you devil?” muttered Filhiol. “Good God, what _are_
you?”
Already the defense of the _Silver Fleece_ was nearly complete; and in
the long-boat the kedge-anchor was being rowed away by four men under
command of Mr. Crevay. The war-fleet had drawn much nearer, in a rough
crescent to northwestward, its sails taut. Flashing water-jewels,
swirled up from paddles, had become visible, under the now unclouded
splendor of the sun. More and more distinctly the chanting and
war-drums drifted in.
The off-shore breeze was urging the armada forward; the dip and swing
of all those scores of paddles gave a sense of unrelenting power.
But Briggs, hard, eager, seemed only welcoming battle as he stood
calculating time and distance, armament and disposal of his forces,
or, with an eye aloft at the clewed-up canvas, figured the tactics
of kedging-off, of making sail if possible, and showing Batu Kawan’s
forces a clean pair of heels.
“Look lively with that anchor!” he shouted out across the sparkling
waters. “Drop her in good holdin’ ground, and lead that line aboard.
The sooner we get our Malays sweatin’ on the capstan, the better!”
“Aye, aye, sir,” drifted back the voice of Crevay. And presently the
splash of the anchor as the boat-crew tugged it over the stern, flung
cascades of foam into the heat-quivering air.
The boat surged back bravely; the line was bent to the capstan, and
Briggs ordered the Malays to the bars. Sullen they came, shuffling,
grumbling strange words—lean, brown and yellow men in ragged cotton
shirts and no shirts at all—as murderous a pack as ever padded in
sandals or bare feet along white decks.
Among them slouched Mahmud Baba, who, like all the rest, shot
a comprehending glance at the on-drawing fleet. Up the forward
companion-ladder they swarmed, and aft to the capstan, with Briggs, the
doctor and Wansley all three on a hair-trigger to let sunlight through
the first who should so much as raise a hand of rebellion. And so they
manned the capstan-bars, and so they fell a-heaving at the kedge-line,
treading with slow, toilsome feet ’round and ’round on the hot planks,
where—young as the morning was—the pitch had already softened.
“Come here, you _surkabutch_!” commanded the captain, summoning Mahmud
Baba. “_Juldi, idherao!_”
The Malay came, gray with anger—for Briggs had, in hearing of all his
fellows, called him “son of a pig,” and a Mohammedan will kill you for
calling him that, if he can. Nevertheless, Mahmud salaamed. Not now
could he kill. Later, surely. He could afford to wait. The Frank must
not call him son of a pig, and still live. Might not Allah even now
be preparing vengeance, in that war-fleet? Mahmud salaamed again, and
waited with half-closed eyes.
At the capstan the _thud-thud-thud_ of twoscore trampling feet was
already mingling with a croon of song, that soon would rise and
strengthen, if not summarily suppressed, and drift out to meet the
war-chant of the warrior blood-kin steadily approaching.
_Click-click-click_! the pawl and ratchet punctuated the rhythm of feet
and song, as the hawser began to rise, dripping, from the sea. Briggs
drew his revolver from his belt, and ground the muzzle fair against
Mahmud’s teeth.
“You tell those other _surkabutchas_,” said he with cold menace, “that
I’ll have no singing. I’ll have no noise to cover up your plotting and
planning together. You’ll all work in silence or you’ll all be dead.
Understand me?”
“Yas, sar.”
“And you’ll hang to the capstan-bars till we’re free, no matter what
happens. The first man that quits, goes to glory on the jump. Savvy?”
“Yas, sar.” Mahmud’s voice was low, submissive; but through the
drooping lids a gleam shone forth that never came from sunlight or from
sea.
“All right,” growled Briggs, giving the revolver an extra shove. “Get
to work! And if those other sons of pigs in the canoes board us, we
white men will shoot down every last one o’ _you_ here. We’ll take
no chances of being knifed in the back. _You’ll_ all have gone to
damnation before one o’ _them_ sets foot on my decks. You lay to that,
my Mud Baby! Now, tell ’em all I’ve told you, and get it straight!
_Jao!_”
Briggs struck Mahmud a head-cracking blow with the revolver just above
the ear and sent him staggering back to the capstan. The song died,
as Mahmud gulped out words that tumbled over each other with staccato
vehemence.
“Get in there at the bars!” shouted Briggs. “Get to work, you, before I
split you!”
Mahmud swung to place, and bent his back to labor, as his thin chest
and skinny hands pushed at the bar beside his fellows.
And steadily the war-fleet drew in toward its prey.