CONCLUSION
“Aye, it was the knee he give you, lad. ’Ow was an innercent babe like
you to know about foul tricks o’ fighting? But ’twas a close shave you
’ad, a blinkin’ close shave, swiggle me stiff, it was! If it ’adn’t
been for the lass grabbin’ up ’is gun and potting the blighter—well,
it’s a lucky lad you are, Martin, with a double treasure won, and but
sore muscles to pay.” The bosun shifted his quid and spat over the rail
into the racing sea. “Aye, the lass,” he mumbled. “A lucky lad, that’s
wot.”
“I know I am,” answered Martin, humbly. “Oh, so lucky. If only poor
Billy had had some of my luck.”
“’E was feyed, Martin,” declared the bosun. “I knew from the moment you
told me wot Sails as ’ow I’d never clasp Little Billy’s ’and again, and
’im alive and cheery. Poor Billy! ’E was my mate, my chum, and I’d give
my share o’ the swag ten times over just to ’ear ’im cuss me out again.”
They took a turn or two on the deck in sorrowful silence, Martin
limping somewhat painfully, and the big man accommodating his stride
to the other’s progress. The brig was running before the wind, over a
sun-sparkled, white capped sea; every rag she owned was spread, and the
breeze snored aloft like an organ. The bosun paused at the poop break,
snorted into his large red handkerchief, and pretended to inspect the
drawing of the mainsail. Then, his emotion conquered, he resumed the
stroll.
“We left foul weather be’ind us in that black Devil’s ’ole,” he
commented. “Now it’s fair winds and bright skies. Ow, well, swiggle
me stiff, wot’s done is done and can’t be undone, as Sails would ’ave
said. ’Tis fine weather for you, eh, lad—and you standin’ the moonlight
watches with the lass by your side? Another day o’ this, and we’ll be
landin’ those five yellow imps we got in the hold on their own bloomin’
coast, and then it’s ’urrah for ’ome and the splicin’ party, eh, lad?”
Martin smiled happily.
“I don’t mind landin’ the four ’foremast ’ands, and lettin’ them off
scott free except for their cuts and bumps,” grumbled the bosun. “They
didn’t ’ave no ’and in the plannin’ of it. But to land that feller,
Ichi—swiggle me stiff, if I ’ad my way, I land that blighter in the
air, below the tops’l yardarm, with a bloomin’ noose around ’is neck!
Why, ’e was the ruddy bird wot started the business!”
“But I promised him his life,” said Martin. “And—my God, Bosun, hasn’t
there been enough death on this ship?”
“Well, anyway, that feller, Ichi, is lucky ’e wasn’t on board when we
’ad the grand fight,” vowed the Bosun. “I was looking for ’im; I ’ad
’im marked for my meat. Swiggle me, ’e’d ’ave gone over the side if I
got my ’ands on ’im that mornin’. Aye, and Yip was layin’ for ’im, too.”
“How Yip hated them,” mused Martin.
“Aye, that ’e did,” agreed the bosun. “But ’e was a slick one, was Yip.
’Oo but ’im would of thought o’ dopin’ their grub? And the ’olesale way
’e did it—mixin’ a pint bottle o’ cockroach killer in with their rice.
A white man wouldn’t ’ave been able to do that. But it give Yip his
chance, when they got the bellyache, to skip for’ard and lay out the
’atch guard with his cleaver. My blinkin’ heye, when I come up after ’e
opened the ’atch, there ’e was with that Jap’s neck across the ’atch
combin’, and ’e was ’ackin’ away and yellin’ like a wild Indian. Aye,
and ’e’d ’ave ’acked some more o’ them, if that shot that was aimed at
me ’adn’t took ’im through the ’ead. Swiggle me, Marty, I wouldn’t ’ave
been able to eat ’is grub after that.”
“Nor I,” agreed Martin. “Well, Bos, I think I’ll take a turn below.”
“Aye, I ’eard the lass’ voice through the skylight, a moment since,”
observed the bosun, slyly. “Swiggle me—get along with ye, lad!” He gave
Martin a gentle nudge with his giant’s elbow that nearly knocked him
down the hatch.
She was in the cabin, when Martin descended the stairs. She welcomed
him with a glance that more than repaid him for the bosun’s thump; aye,
that repaid him (he would have sworn) for all the pain and misery he
had ever suffered.
She was standing by her grandfather’s side, and the latter was seated
at the cabin table, a mess of papers before him.
“Well, my boy, I’ve just been figuring out our fortune,” he hailed
Martin. “It’s plenty; more than plenty. Something not much short
of a million, as prices for ambergris were quoted when we left San
Francisco. Not such a bad little treasure, eh?”
“We have paid a stiff price for it,” answered Martin, soberly.
A shade crossed the captain’s serene old face. “That we have,” he
assented. “Too great a price. Gladly I’d give it all, and more, to get
my men back again. To have—Little Billy—” He heaved a deep sigh, and
smiled again. “Ah, and that is not all,” he said, patting Ruth’s hand,
which lay on his shoulder, “for it seems I must lose my girl, as well.
Even the thought of walking in on that doctor who told me I would never
see again hardly reconciles me to the thought of losing my girl.”
“What nonsense!” exclaimed Ruth. “Why, grand-daddy, you don’t lose me.
You gain—a son.”
Captain Dabney’s bright, clear eyes searched Martin’s face, and when he
replied to Ruth it was in a contented, satisfied voice:
“Yes, I do,” he said. “And a worthy son, girl, tried and tempered, by
Fire Mountain.”
THE END