The pirates were early astir; so early, in fact, that long before
Captain Scraggs and his crew appeared on deck, Messrs. Gibney and
McGuffey had quietly cooked breakfast in the galley. They ate six
eggs each and consumed the only loaf of bread aboard, for which
act of vandalism they were rewarded half an hour later by the
sight of Captain Scraggs dancing on a new brown derby.
"It's a wonder that bird wouldn't get him a soft hat to do his
jumpin' on," McGuffey remarked. "He's ruined enough good hats to
have paid for the new boiler. Yes, sir, whenever ol' Scraggsy
gets mad he most certainly gets hoppin' mad."
"It'll soak into his head after a while that us two mean
business, Mac, an' he'll get sensible an' fire them outsiders.
I'm lookin' for him to make peace before noon."
About ten o'clock that morning the little vessel completed taking
on her cargo, the lines were cast off, and the homeward voyage
was begun. As she hauled away from the wharf, Messrs. Gibney and
McGuffey might have been observed seated on the stern bitts
smoking, the picture of contentment. Pirates under the law they
might be, but of this they knew nothing and cared less. With
them, self-preservation was, indeed, the first law of human
nature.
They were still seated on the stern bitts as the _Maggie_ came
abreast the Point Montara fog signal station, when Mr. Gibney
observed a long telescope poking out the side window of the pilot
house. "Hello," he muttered, "Scraggsy's seein' things," and
following the direction in which the telescope was pointing he
made out a large bark standing in dangerously close to the beach.
In fact, the breakers were tumbling in a long white streak over
the reefs less than a quarter of a mile from her. She was lying
stern on to the beach, with one anchor out.
In an instant all was excitement aboard the _Maggie_. "That looks
like an elegant little pick-up. She's plumb deserted," Scraggs
shouted to his navigating officer. "I don't see any distress
signals flyin' an' yet she's got an anchor out while her canvas
is hangin' so-so."
"If she had any hands aboard, you'd think they'd have sense
enough to clew up her courses," the mate answered.
At this juncture, Mr. Gibney and McGuffey, unable to restrain
their curiosity, and forgetful of the fact that they were pirates
with very sore feet, came running over the deckload and invaded
the pilot house. "Gimme that glass, you sock-eyed salmon, you,"
Gibney ordered Scraggs, and tore the telescope from the owner's
hands. "There ain't enough real seamanship in the crew o' this
craft to tax the mental make-up of a Chinaman. Hum--m--m!
American bark _Chesapeake_. Starboard anchor out; yards braced
a-box; royals an' to'-gallan'-s'ls clewed up; courses hangin' in
the buntlines an' clew garnets, Stars-an'-Stripes upside down."
He lowered the glass and roared at Neils Halvorsen, who was at
the wheel, "Starboard your helm, Squarehead. Don't be afraid of
her. We're goin' over there an' hook on to her. I should say she
is a pick-up."
Mr. Gibney had abdicated as a pirate and assumed command of the
S.S. _Maggie_. With the memory of a scant breakfast upon him,
however, Captain Scraggs was still harsh and bitter.
"Git out o' my pilot house an' aft where the police can find you
when they come lookin' for you," he screeched. "Don't you give no
orders to my deckhand."
"Stow it, you ass. Don't fly in the face of your own interests,
Scraggsy, you bandit. Yonder's a prize, but it'll require
imagination to win it; consequently you need Adelbert P. Gibney
in your business, if you're contemplatin' hookin' on to that
bark, snakin' her into San Francisco Bay, an' libelin' her for
ten thousand dollars' salvage. You an' me an' Mac an' The
Squarehead here have sailed this strip o' coast too long together
to quarrel over the first good piece o' salvage we ever run into.
Come, Scraggsy. Be decent, forget the past, an' let's dig in
together."
"If I had a gun," Scraggs cried, "I do believe I'd shoot you. Git
out o' my pilot house, I tell you, or I'll stick a knife in you.
I'll carve your gizzard, you black-guardin' pirate."
Inasmuch as Scraggs really did produce a knife, Mr. Gibney backed
prudently away. "You're mighty quick to let bygones be bygones
when you see me with a fortune in sight with you wantin' to horn
in on the deal, ain't you?" the owner jeered. "You must think I'm
a born fool."
"I don't think it a-tall. I know it. You're worse'n a born fool.
You're sufferin' from acquired idiocy, which is the mental state
folks find themselves in when they refuse to learn by experience
an' profit by example. I've always claimed you ain't got no more
imagination than a chicken, an' I'll prove it to you right now.
Here you are, braggin' about how you're goin' to salvage that
bark but givin' no thought whatever to the means to be employed.
How're you goin' to pull her off? If the _Maggie_ ever had a
towline aboard I never seen it. Perhaps, however, you're
figgerin' on poolin' all the shoestrings aboard."
"Every ship that size has a steel towin' cable, wound up on a
reel, nice an' handy," the new navigating officer reminded Mr.
Gibney. "I can put the skiff out, get the bark's line, haul it
back, an' make it fast on the bitts you two skunks has been
occupyin' instead of a prison cell."
"Hello! There's another county gone Democratic. Your old man must
ha' been to sea once an' told you about it. Them bitts won't
hold."
"I'll make the towline fast to the mainmast."
"That'll hold, I admit. But has the _Maggie_ got power enough,
what with the load she's totin' now, to tow that big bark in to
San Francisco Bay?"
"Oh, we'll take it easy an' get there some time," Scraggs chipped
in.
"You bet you'll take it easy--easier'n you think. Before you
start towin' that bark, you'll have to clew up her canvas a whole
lot to make the towin' easier, an' who's goin' to do that? An'
you got to have a man at her wheel."
"Neils an' my mate."
"If that new mate dares to leave you in command o' the _Maggie_,
alone an' unprotected on the high seas an' you with a fresh water
license, I'll----"
"Then Neils an' I'll do it."
"You don't know how. Besides, you're afraid to go aboard that
bark. You don't know what kind of a frightful disease she may
have aboard. Do you know a plague ship when you see one?"
Captain Scraggs paled a little, but the prospect of the salvage
heartened him. "I don't give a hoot," he declared. "I'll take a
chance."
"All right. Consider it taken. How're you goin' to get aboard
her?"
"In the skiff."
"Where's the skiff?"
Captain Scraggs glanced around wildly, and when McGuffey jeered
him, he cast his hat upon the deck and started to leap upon it.
The devilish Gibney was right. It appeared that owing to a glut
of freight on the landing, Captain Scraggs had decided, in view
of the fine weather prevailing, to take an unusually large cargo
that trip. With this idea in mind, he had piled freight over
every available inch of deck space until the cargo was flush with
the top of the house. On top of the house, the skiff always
rested, bottom up. Captain Scraggs had righted the skiff, piled
it full of loose artichokes from half a dozen crates broken in
the cargo net while loading, and then proceeded to pile more
vegetables on top of it and around it until the _Maggie's_ funnel
barely showed through the piled-up freight, and the little vessel
was so top heavy she was cranky. In order to get at the small
boat, therefore, it would be necessary to shift this load off the
house, and the question that now confronted Scraggs and his crew
was to find a spot that would accommodate the part of the
deckload thus shifted!
When Captain Scraggs had completed his hornpipe on his hat he
threw an appealing glance at his new mate. "We'll jettison what
freight proves an embarrassment," this astute individual advised.
"The farmers that own it will soak you a couple o' hundred
dollars for the loss, but what's that with thousands in sight
waitin' to be picked up?"
"Hear that, Gib? Hear that, you swab?"
"I heard it. Did you hear that?"
"What?"
"A nice, brisk little nor'west trade wind that's only blowin'
about thirty mile an hour. The _Maggie_ ain't got power enough to
tow the bark agin that wind. You'll haul her ahead two feet an',
in spite o' you, she'll slip back twenty-five inches."
"That trade wind dies down after sunset," the devilish new mate
informed him.
"Quite true. But in the meantime you're burning coal loafin'
around here, an' before you get the bark inside you'll be plumb
out o' coal," Mr. McGuffey reminded them. "I know this old coffin
like I know the back o' my own hand. Why, she lives on coal!
Oh-h-h, Scraggsy, Scraggsy, poor old Scraggsy," he keened in a
high falsetto voice and subsided on a crate of celery, the while
he waved his legs in the air and affected to be overcome by his
merriment. Scraggs turned the colour of a ripe old Edam cheese,
while Mr. Gibney folded his hands and looked idiotic.
"Old Phineas P. Scraggs, the salvage expert!" McGuffey's falsetto
would have maddened a sheep. "He cast his bread upon the waters
and lo, it returned to him after many days--and made him sick.
O-h-h-h-h, Scraggsy--poor old Scraggsy! If he went divin' for
pearls in three feet o' water he'd bring up a clam shell. Oh,
dear, I'm goin' to die o' this, Gib."
"Don't, Bart. I'm goin' to have need o' your well-known ability
to help salvage this bark. Scraggs, you old sinner, has it dawned
on you that what this proposition needs to get it over is a dash
o' the Adelbert P. Gibney brand of imagination?"
The new navigating officer drew Captain Scraggs aside and
whispered in his ear: "Make it up with these Smart Alecks,
Scraggs. They got it on us, but if we can send you an' Halvorsen,
McGuffey and Gibney over to the bark, you can get some sail on
her an' what with the wind helpin' us along, the _Maggie_ can tow
her all right."
Mr. Gibney saw by the hopeful, even cunning, look that leaped to
Scraggs's eyes that the problem was about to be solved without
recourse to the Gibney imagination, so he resolved to be alert
and not permit himself to be caught out on the end of a limb.
"Well, Scraggsy?" he demanded.
"I guess I need you in my business, Gib. You're right an' I'm
always wrong. It's a fact. I _ain't_ got no more imagination than
a chicken. Hence, havin' no imagination o' my own I ask you, as
man to man an' appealin' to your generous instincts as an old
friend an' former valued employee, to let bygones be bygones an'
haul us out o' the hole that threatens to make us the laughin'
stock o' the whole Pacific coast."
"Spoken like a man--I do not think. Scraggs, for once in my life
I have you where the hair is short. You find yourself up agin a
proposition that requires brains, you ain't got 'em yourself an'
at last you're forced to admit that Adelbert P. Gibney is the man
that peddles 'em. Now, you been doin' a lot o' hollerin' about me
an' Bart bein' pirates under the law an' liable to hangin' an'
imprisonment, an' that kind o' guff don't go nohow. We're willin'
to admit that mebbe we've been a little mite familiar an'
forward, bankin' on the natural leanin' of friend for friend that
you take it all for the joke it's intended to be, but when you go
to carryin' the joke too far, we got to protect ourselves.
Scraggsy, I'm willin' to dig in an' help out in a pinch, but it's
gettin' so me an' Mac can't trust you no more. We're that leery
of you we won't take your word for nothin', since you fooled him
on the new boiler an' me on the paint; consequently, we're off
you an' this salvage job unless you give us a clearance, in
writin', statin' that we are not an' never was pirates, that
we're good, law-abiding citizens an' aboard the _Maggie_ as your
guests, takin' the trip at our own risk. When you sign such a
paper, with your crew for witnesses, I'll demonstrate how that
bark can be salvaged without makin' you remove so much as a head
o' cabbage to get at your small boat. My imagination's better'n
my reputation, Scraggsy, an' I ain't workin' it for nothin!"
"Gib, my _dear_ boy. You're the most sensitive man I ever sailed
with. Can't you take a little joke?"
"Sure, I can take a little joke. It's the big ones that stick in
my craw an' stifle my friendship. Gimme a fountain pen an' a leaf
out o' the log book an' I'll draw up the affydavit for your
signature."
Scraggs complied precipitately with this request; whereupon Mr.
Gibney spread his great bulk over the chart case and with many a
twist and flip of his tongue on the up and down strokes, produced
this remarkable document:
At Sea, Off Point Montara, aboard
S.S. _Maggie_, of San Francisco.
June 4, 19--.
This is to sertify that A.P. Gibney, Esq., and Bart
McGuffey, Esq. is law-abidin' sitisens of the U.S.A. and
the constitootion thereof, and in no way pirates or
such; and be it further resolved that the said parties
hereto are aboard said American steamer _Maggie_ this
date on the special invite of Phineas P. Scraggs, owner,
as his guests and at their own risk.
Witness my hand and seal:
Captain Scraggs signed without reading and the new mate and Neils
Halvorsen appended their signatures as witnesses. Mr. Gibney
thereupon folded this clearance paper into the tiniest possible
compact ball, wrapped it in a piece of tinfoil torn from a
package of tobacco, to protect it from his saliva, tucked it in
his cheek and with a sign for McGuffey to follow him, started
crawling over the cargo aft. By this time, the _Maggie_ was
within a hundred yards of the distressed bark and was ratching
slowly backward and forward before her.
"In all my born days," quoth Mr. Gibney, speaking a trifle
thickly because of the document in his mouth, "I never got such a
wallop as Scraggs handed me an' you last night. I don't forget
things like that in a hurry. Now that we got a vindication o' the
charge o' piracy agin us, I'm achin' to get shet of the _Maggie_
an' her crew, so if you'll kindly peel off all of your clothes
with the exception, say, of your underdrawers, we'll swim off to
that bark an' give Phineas P. Scraggs an exhibition of real
sailorizin' an' seamanship."
"What's the big idee?" McGuffey demanded cautiously.
"Why, we'll sail her in ourselves--me an' you--an' glom all the
salvage for ourselves. T'ell with Scraggs an' the _Maggie_ an'
that new mate an' engineer. I'm off'n 'em for life."
Pop-eyed with excitement and interest, B. McGuffey, Esquire,
stood up and with a single twist shed his cap and coat. His
shirts followed. Both he and Gibney were already minus their
shoes and socks. To slip out of their faded dungarees was the
work of an instant. Strapping their belts around their waists to
hold up their drawers, the worthy pair stepped to the rail of the
_Maggie_.
"Hey, there? Where you goin', Gib? I give you that clearance
paper on condition that you was to tell me how to salvage that
there bark without havin' to shift my cargo to get at the small
boat."
"I'm just about to tell you, Scraggs. You don't touch a thing
aboard the _Maggie_. You leave her out of it entirely. You just
jump overboard, like me an' Mac will in a jiffy, swim over to the
bark, climb aboard, and sail her in to San Francisco Bay. When
you get there you drop anchor an' call it a day's work." He
grinned broadly. "One o' these bright days, Scraggs, when me an'
Mac is just wallerin' in salvage money, drop around to see us an'
we'll give you a kick in the face. Farewell, you boobs," and he
dove overboard.
"Ta-ta," McGuffey cried in his tantalizing falsetto voice, and
followed his leader into the briny deep. As they came up and
snorted, grampus-like, shaking the water out of their eyes, they
glanced back at the _Maggie_ and observed that Captain Scraggs
was, for the third time that never-to-be-forgotten voyage,
jumping on his hat.
"If I was that far gone in a habit," quoth Mr. McGuffey as he
hauled up alongside Mr. Gibney, "I'll be switched if I wouldn't
go bareheaded an' save expenses."