BOARDED BY PIRATES
Louise could not go back to sleep. She drew the ruffles of the
negligee about her throat and removed the sliding screen the better to
see into the outer world.
There was a movement in the fog, for the rising breeze ruffled, it.
Full daybreak would bring its entire dissipation. Already the mist
held a luster heralding the sun. The "hush-hush" of the surf along The
Beaches was more insistent now than at any time since Louise had come
to Cap'n Abe's store, while the moan of the breakers on the outer reefs
was like the deep notes of a distant organ.
A cock crew, and at his signal outdoor life seemed to awaken. Other
chanticleers sounded their alarms; a colt whistled in a paddock and his
mother neighed softly from her stall; a cow lowed; then, sweet and
clear as a mountain stream, broke forth the whistle of a wild bird in
the marsh. This matin of the feathered songster rose higher and higher
till he reached the very top note of his scale and then fell again, by
cadences, until it mingled with the less compelling calls of other
birds.
There was a warm pinkness spreading through the fog in one direction,
and Louise knew it must be the reflection of the light upon the eastern
horizon. The sun would soon begin a new day's journey.
The fog was fast thinning, for across the road she could see a spiral
of blue smoke, mounting through it from the chimney of a neighbor. The
kitchen fire there had just been lighted.
Below, and from the living-rooms behind the store, the girl heard some
faint noises as though the early morning tasks of getting in wood and
filling the coal scuttle were under way. Uncle Amazon must be "takin'
holt" just as Cap'n Abe said he would.
Louise was curious to see the returned mariner; but it was too early to
go down yet. She might really have another nap before she dressed, she
thought, yawning behind a pink palm.
There was a step in the store. Her room overlooked by two windows the
roof of the front porch and she could hear what went on below plainly.
The step was lighter than Cap'n Abe's. The bolts of the two-leaved
door rattled and it was set wide; she heard the iron wedges kicked
under each to hold it open. Then a smell of pipe smoke was wafted to
her nostrils.
A footstep on the Shell Road announced the approach of somebody from
The Beaches. Louise yawned again and was on the point of creeping into
bed once more when she descried the figure coming through the fog. She
saw only the boots and legs of the person at first; but the fog was
fast separating into wreaths which the rising breeze hurried away, and
the girl at the window soon saw the full figure of the approaching
man--and recognized him.
At almost the same moment Lawford Tapp raised his eyes and saw her; and
his heart immediately beat the call to arms. Louise Grayling's morning
face, framed by the sash and sill of her bedroom window, was quite the
sweetest picture he had ever seen.
It was only for a moment he saw her, her bare and rounded forearm on
the sill, the frilly negligee so loosened that he could see the column
of her throat. Her gray eyes looked straight into his--then she was
gone.
"Actress, or not," muttered the son of the Salt Water Taffy King,
"there's nothing artificial about her. And she's Cap'n Abe's niece.
Well!"
He saw the figure on the porch, smoking, and hailed it:
"Hey, Cap'n Abe! Those fishhooks you sold me last evening aren't what
I wanted--and there's the _Merry Andrew_ waiting out there for me now.
I want----"
The figure in the armchair turned its head. It was not Cap'n Abe at
all!
"Mornin', young feller," said the stranger cordially. "You'll have to
explain a leetle about them hooks. I ain't had a chance to overhaul
much of Abe's cargo yet. I don't even know where he stows his small
tackle. Do you?"
Fully a minute did Lawford Tapp keep him waiting for an answer while he
stared at the stranger. He was not a big man, but he somehow gave the
impression of muscular power. He was dressed in shabby
clothing--shirt, dungaree trousers, and canvas shoes such as sailors
work and go aloft in. The pipe he smoked was Cap'n Abe's--Lawford
recognized it.
There was not, however, another thing about this man to remind one of
the old storekeeper. This stranger was burned to a rich mahogany hue.
Not alone his shaven face, but his bared forearms and his chest where
the shirt was left unbuttoned seemed stained by the tropical sun.
Under jet-black brows the eyes that gazed upon Lawford Tapp seemed dark.
His sweeping mustache was black; and such hair as was visible showed
none of the iron gray of advancing age in it. He wore gold rings in
his ears and to cap his piratical-looking figure was a red bandana worn
turbanwise upon his head.
"What's the matter with you, young feller? Cat got your tongue?"
demanded the stranger.
"Well, of all things!" finally gasped Lawford. "I thought you were
Cap'n Abe. But you're not. You must be Cap'n Amazon Silt."
"That's who I be," agreed the other.
"His brother!"
"Ain't much like Abe, eh?" and Cap'n Amazon smiled widely.
"Only your voice. That is a little like Cap'n Abe's. Well, I
declare!" repeated Lawford, coming deliberately up the steps.
Cap'n Amazon rose briskly and led the way into the store. The fog was
clearing with swiftness and a ray of sunlight slanted through a dusty
window with sufficient strength to illumine the shelves behind the
counter.
"Those boxes yonder are where Cap'n Abe keeps his fishhooks. But isn't
he here?"
"He's off," Cap'n Amazon replied. "Up anchor'd and sailed 'bout soon's
I come. Been ready to go quite a spell, I shouldn't wonder. Had his
chest all packed and sent it to the depot by a wagon. Walked over
himself airly to ketch the train. These the hooks, son?"
"But where's he _gone_?"
"On a v'y'ge," replied Cap'n Amazon. "Why shouldn't he? Seems he's
been lashed here, tight and fast, for c'nsider'ble of a spell. He and
this store of hisn was nigh 'bout spliced. I don't see how he _has_
weathered it so long."
"Gone away!" murmured Lawford.
Cap'n Amazon eyed him with a tilt to his head and possibly a twinkle of
amusement in his eye. "Young man, what's your name?" he asked bluntly.
Lawford told him. "Wal, it strikes me," Cap'n Amazon said, "that your
tops'ls air slattin' a good deal. You ain't on the wind."
"I am upset, I declare!"
"Sure you got the right hooks this time?"
"Yes. I believe so."
"Then if your _Merry Andrew_--what is she, cat-rigged or----"
"Sloop."
"Then if your _Merry Andrew_ sloop's a-waiting for you, _that's_ the
way out," said Cap'n Amazon coolly, pointing with his pipestem to the
door. "Come again--when you want to buy anything in Abe's stock. Good
day!"
Lawford halted a moment at the door to look back at the bizarre figure
behind the counter, leaning on the scarred brown plank just as Cap'n
Abe so often did. The amazing difference between the storekeeper's
well remembered appearance and that of his substitute grew more
startling.
As Cap'n Amazon stood there half stooping, leaning on his hairy fists,
the picture rose in Lawford Tapp's mind of a pirate, cutlass in teeth
and his sash full of pistols, swarming over the rail of a doomed ship.
The young man had it in his mind to ask a question about that
wonderfully pretty girl above. But, somehow, Cap'n Amazon did not
appear to be the sort of person to whom one could put even a mildly
impudent question.
The young man walked slowly down the road toward the shore where his
boat was beached. He had no idea that a pair of gray eyes watched him
from that window where he had glimpsed the vision of girlish beauty
only a few minutes before.
The neighborhood was stirring now and Louise had not gone back to bed.
Instead, she dressed as simply as she could until it would be possible
to get at her trunks.
While thus engaged she observed the neighborhood as well as she could
see it from the windows of her chamber. Down the Shell Road, in the
direction of the sea, there were but two or three houses--small
dwellings in wind-swept yards where beach grass was about all the
verdure that would grow.
Across the road from the store, however, and as far as she could see
toward Cardhaven, were better homes, some standing in the midst of
tilled fields and orchards. Sandy lanes led to these homesteads from
the highway. She could see the blunt spire of the Mariner's Chapel.
Yet Cap'n Abe's house and store stood quite alone, for none of the
other dwellings were close to the road.
She set her chamber door ajar and suddenly heard the clash of voices.
The one that seemed nearest to the stair was gruff, but feminine.
"That must be Betty Gallup," thought Louise. "It is nearly six. I'll
go down and interview the lady who Cap'n Abe said ought to sail before
the mast."
The foot of the stairway was in the back entry which itself opened upon
the rear porch. As she came lightly down the stairs Louise saw a
squat, square figure standing in the open doorway. It was topped by a
man's felt hat and was dressed in a loose, shapeless coat and a scant
skirt down to the tops of a pair of men's shoes.
Over the shoulder of this queer looking person--of whose sex it was
hard to be sure--Louise could see an open letter that was evidently
being perused not for the first time.
The hands that held the letter were red and hard and blunt-fingered,
but not large. They did not look feminine, however; not in the least.
The light tap of the girl's heels as she stepped on the bare floor at
the foot of the stairway aroused this person, who turned, revealing a
rather grim, weather-beaten face, lit by little sharp brown eyes that
proceeded to stare at Louise Grayling with frank curiosity.
"Humph!" ejaculated the woman.
Oh, it was a woman, Louise could now see, although Betty Gallup boasted
a pronounced mustache and a voice both deep and hoarse, while she
looked every inch the able seaman she was.
"Humph!" she exclaimed again. "You don't look much like a pirate,
that's one comfort!"
Louise burst into gay laughter--she could not help it.
"I see by this letter Cap'n Abe left for me that you're his niece--his
ha'f sister's child--name, Louise Grayling; and that you've come to
stay a spell."
"Yes," the girl rejoined, still dimpling. "And I know you must be Mrs.
Gallup!"
"Bet Gallup. Yep. Ain't much chance of mistaking me," the woman said,
still staring at Louise. "Humph! you're pretty 'nough not to need
m'lasses to ketch flies. Why didn't Cap'n Abe stay to home when you
come visiting him?"
"Why, he had his plans all laid to go away, if Uncle Amazon came."
"Ya-as. That's so. You are _his_ niece, too, I s'pose."
"Whose niece? Uncle Amazon's? I suppose I am," Louise gayly replied,
"though when I came I had no idea there was a second uncle down here on
the Cape."
"What's that?" demanded Betty Gallup, her speech crackling like a rifle
shot.
"I had not heard before of Cap'n Amazon," the girl explained. "You
see, for several reasons, I have known very little about my mother's
kinfolk. She died when I was a baby. We have traveled a good deal,
father and I."
"I see. I been told you worked for them movin' pictures. Mandy Card
was over to my house last night. Well! what do you think of your
Uncle Am'zon?"
"I can express no opinion until I have met him," Louise returned, again
dimpling.
"Haven't ye seen him?" gasped Betty in astonishment.
"Not yet."
"Ye didn't see him when he came last night?"
"I was in bed."
"Then how--how d'ye know Cap'n Abe's gone? Or that this man is Am'zon
Silt? Nobody ever seen this critter 'round Cardhaven before," Betty
Gallup declared with strong conviction.
"Oh, no; Uncle Amazon has never been here to visit Cap'n Abe before.
Cap'n Abe told me all about it," the girl explained, fearing that
scandal was to take root here and now if she did not discourage it.
"Of course Uncle Abe went away. He came to my door and bade me
good-bye."
Louise was puzzled. She saw an expression in Betty Gallup's face that
she could not interpret.
"Ye heard Cap'n Abe _say_ he was goin'," muttered Betty. "_His_ voice
sounds mighty like Cap'n Abe's. But mebbe Abe Silt didn't go after
all--not rightly."
"What _do_ you mean, Mrs. Gallup?" demanded Louise in bewilderment.
"Well, if you ask me, I should say we'd been boarded by pirates. Go
take a look at that Uncle Am'zon of yourn. He's in the store."