"Excuse me one moment, Captain Dobbs. I wish to speak with my mate,"
said the captain, whose face had begun to shine and his eyes to sparkle.

"Please yourself," replied the pilot. "You couldn't think of offering
a man a nip, could you? just to brace him up. This kind of thing looks
damned inhospitable, and gives a schooner a bad name."

"I'll talk about that after the anchor's down," returned Wicks, and he
drew Carthew forward. "I say," he whispered, "here's a fortune."

"How much do you call that?" asked Carthew.

"I can't put a figure on it yet--I daren't!" said the captain. "We might
cruise twenty years and not find the match of it. And suppose another
ship came in to-night? Everything's possible! And the difficulty is
this Dobbs. He's as drunk as a marine. How can we trust him? We ain't
insured--worse luck!"

"Suppose you took him aloft and got him to point out the channel?"
suggested Carthew. "If he tallied at all with the chart, and didn't fall
out of the rigging, perhaps we might risk it."

"Well, all's risk here," returned the captain. "Take the wheel yourself,
and stand by. Mind, if there's two orders, follow mine, not his. Set the
cook for'ard with the heads'ls, and the two others at the main sheet,
and see they don't sit on it." With that he called the pilot; they
swarmed aloft in the fore rigging, and presently after there was bawled
down the welcome order to ease sheets and fill away.

At a quarter before nine o'clock on Christmas morning the anchor was let
go.

The first cruise of the Currency Lass had thus ended in a stroke of
fortune almost beyond hope. She had brought two thousand pounds' worth
of trade, straight as a homing pigeon, to the place where it was most
required. And Captain Wicks (or, rather, Captain Kirkup) showed himself
the man to make the best of his advantage. For hard upon two days he
walked a verandah with Topelius, for hard upon two days his partners
watched from the neighbouring public house the field of battle; and the
lamps were not yet lighted on the evening of the second before the enemy
surrendered. Wicks came across to the Sans Souci, as the saloon was
called, his face nigh black, his eyes almost closed and all bloodshot,
and yet bright as lighted matches.

"Come out here, boys," he said; and when they were some way off
among the palms, "I hold twenty-four," he added in a voice scarcely
recognizable, and doubtless referring to the venerable game of cribbage.

"What do you mean?" asked Tommy.

"I've sold the trade," answered Wicks; "or, rather, I've sold only
some of it, for I've kept back all the mess beef and half the flour and
biscuit; and, by God, we're still provisioned for four months! By God,
it's as good as stolen!"

"My word!" cried Hemstead.

"But what have you sold it for?" gasped Carthew, the captain's almost
insane excitement shaking his nerve.

"Let me tell it my own way," cried Wicks, loosening his neck. "Let me
get at it gradual, or I'll explode. I've not only sold it, boys, I've
wrung out a charter on my own terms to 'Frisco and back; on my own
terms. I made a point of it. I fooled him first by making believe I
wanted copra, which of course I knew he wouldn't hear of--couldn't, in
fact; and whenever he showed fight, I trotted out the copra, and that
man dived! I would take nothing but copra, you see; and so I've got the
blooming lot in specie--all but two short bills on 'Frisco. And the sum?
Well, this whole adventure, including two thousand pounds of credit,
cost us two thousand seven hundred and some odd. That's all paid back;
in thirty days' cruise we've paid for the schooner and the trade. Heard
ever any man the match of that? And it's not all! For besides that,"
said the captain, hammering his words, "we've got Thirteen Blooming
Hundred Pounds of profit to divide. I bled him in four Thou.!" he cried,
in a voice that broke like a schoolboy's.

For a moment the partners looked upon their chief with stupefaction,
incredulous surprise their only feeling. Tommy was the first to grasp
the consequences.

"Here," he said, in a hard, business tone. "Come back to that saloon.
I've got to get drunk."

"You must please excuse me, boys," said the captain, earnestly. "I
daren't taste nothing. If I was to drink one glass of beer, it's my
belief I'd have the apoplexy. The last scrimmage, and the blooming
triumph, pretty nigh hand done me."

"Well, then, three cheers for the captain," proposed Tommy.

But Wicks held up a shaking hand. "Not that either, boys," he pleaded.
"Think of the other buffer, and let him down easy. If I'm like this,
just fancy what Topelius is! If he heard us singing out, he'd have the
staggers."

As a matter of fact, Topelius accepted his defeat with a good grace;
but the crew of the wrecked Leslie, who were in the same employment and
loyal to their firm, took the thing more bitterly. Rough words and ugly
looks were common. Once even they hooted Captain Wicks from the saloon
verandah; the Currency Lasses drew out on the other side; for some
minutes there had like to have been a battle in Butaritari; and though
the occasion passed off without blows, it left on either side an
increase of ill-feeling.

No such small matter could affect the happiness of the successful
traders. Five days more the ship lay in the lagoon, with little
employment for any one but Tommy and the captain, for Topelius's natives
discharged cargo and brought ballast; the time passed like a pleasant
dream; the adventurers sat up half the night debating and praising their
good fortune, or strayed by day in the narrow isle, gaping like Cockney
tourists; and on the first of the new year, the Currency Lass weighed
anchor for the second time and set sail for 'Frisco, attended by the
same fine weather and good luck. She crossed the doldrums with but
small delay; on a wind and in ballast of broken coral, she outdid
expectations; and, what added to the happiness of the ship's company,
the small amount of work that fell on them to do, was now lessened by
the presence of another hand. This was the boatswain of the Leslie; he
had been on bad terms with his own captain, had already spent his wages
in the saloons of Butaritari, had wearied of the place, and while all
his shipmates coldly refused to set foot on board the Currency Lass, he
had offered to work his passage to the coast. He was a north of Ireland
man, between Scotch and Irish, rough, loud, humorous, and emotional, not
without sterling qualities, and an expert and careful sailor. His frame
of mind was different indeed from that of his new shipmates; instead of
making an unexpected fortune, he had lost a berth; and he was besides
disgusted with the rations, and really appalled at the condition of the
schooner. A stateroom door had stuck, the first day at sea, and Mac (as
they called him) laid his strength to it and plucked it from the hinges.

"Glory!" said he, "this ship's rotten."

"I believe you, my boy," said Captain Wicks.

The next day the sailor was observed with his nose aloft.

"Don't you get looking at these sticks," the captain said, "or you'll
have a fit and fall overboard."

Mac turned towards the speaker with rather a wild eye. "Why, I see what
looks like a patch of dry rot up yonder, that I bet I could stick my
fist into," said he.

"Looks as if a fellow could stick his head into it, don't it?" returned
Wicks. "But there's no good prying into things that can't be mended."

"I think I was a Currency Ass to come on board of her!" reflected Mac.

"Well, I never said she was seaworthy," replied the captain: "I only
said she could show her blooming heels to anything afloat. And besides,
I don't know that it's dry rot; I kind of sometimes hope it isn't. Here;
turn to and heave the log; that'll cheer you up."

"Well, there's no denying it, you're a holy captain," said Mac.

And from that day on, he made but the one reference to the ship's
condition; and that was whenever Tommy drew upon his cellar. "Here's to
the junk trade!" he would say, as he held out his can of sherry.

"Why do you always say that?" asked Tommy.

"I had an uncle in the business," replied Mac, and launched at once into
a yarn, in which an incredible number of the characters were "laid
out as nice as you would want to see," and the oaths made up about
two-fifths of every conversation.

Only once he gave them a taste of his violence; he talked of it, indeed,
often; "I'm rather a voilent man," he would say, not without pride; but
this was the only specimen. Of a sudden, he turned on Hemstead in the
ship's waist, knocked him against the foresail boom, then knocked him
under it, and had set him up and knocked him down once more, before any
one had drawn a breath.

"Here! Belay that!" roared Wicks, leaping to his feet. "I won't have
none of this."

Mac turned to the captain with ready civility. "I only want to learn him
manners," said he. "He took and called me Irishman."

"Did he?" said Wicks. "O, that's a different story! What made you do it,
you tomfool? You ain't big enough to call any man that."

"I didn't call him it," spluttered Hemstead, through his blood and
tears. "I only mentioned-like he was."

"Well, let's have no more of it," said Wicks.

"But you ARE Irish, ain't you?" Carthew asked of his new shipmate
shortly after.

"I may be," replied Mac, "but I'll allow no Sydney duck to call me so.
No," he added, with a sudden heated countenance, "nor any Britisher that
walks! Why, look here," he went on, "you're a young swell, aren't you?
Suppose I called you that! 'I'll show you,' you would say, and turn to
and take it out of me straight."

On the 28th of January, when in lat. 27 degrees 20' N., long. 177
degrees W., the wind chopped suddenly into the west, not very strong,
but puffy and with flaws of rain. The captain, eager for easting, made
a fair wind of it and guyed the booms out wing and wing. It was Tommy's
trick at the wheel, and as it was within half an hour of the relief
(seven thirty in the morning), the captain judged it not worth while to
change him.

The puffs were heavy but short; there was nothing to be called a squall,
no danger to the ship, and scarce more than usual to the doubtful spars.
All hands were on deck in their oilskins, expecting breakfast; the
galley smoked, the ship smelt of coffee, all were in good humour to be
speeding eastward a full nine; when the rotten foresail tore suddenly
between two cloths and then split to either hand. It was for all the
world as though some archangel with a huge sword had slashed it with the
figure of a cross; all hands ran to secure the slatting canvas; and in
the sudden uproar and alert, Tommy Hadden lost his head. Many of his
days have been passed since then in explaining how the thing happened;
of these explanations it will be sufficient to say that they were all
different and none satisfactory; and the gross fact remains that the
main boom gybed, carried away the tackle, broke the mainmast some three
feet above the deck and whipped it overboard. For near a minute the
suspected foremast gallantly resisted; then followed its companion; and
by the time the wreck was cleared, of the whole beautiful fabric that
enabled them to skim the seas, two ragged stumps remained.

In these vast and solitary waters, to be dismasted is perhaps the worst
calamity. Let the ship turn turtle and go down, and at least the pang is
over. But men chained on a hulk may pass months scanning the empty sea
line and counting the steps of death's invisible approach. There is
no help but in the boats, and what a help is that! There heaved the
Currency Lass, for instance, a wingless lump, and the nearest human
coast (that of Kauai in the Sandwiches) lay about a thousand miles to
south and east of her. Over the way there, to men contemplating that
passage in an open boat, all kinds of misery, and the fear of death and
of madness, brooded.

A serious company sat down to breakfast; but the captain helped his
neighbours with a smile.

"Now, boys," he said, after a pull at the hot coffee, "we're done with
this Currency Lass, and no mistake. One good job: we made her pay while
she lasted, and she paid first rate; and if we were to try our hand
again, we can try in style. Another good job: we have a fine, stiff,
roomy boat, and you know who you have to thank for that. We've got six
lives to save, and a pot of money; and the point is, where are we to
take 'em?"

"It's all two thousand miles to the nearest of the Sandwiches, I fancy,"
observed Mac.

"No, not so bad as that," returned the captain. "But it's bad enough:
rather better'n a thousand."

"I know a man who once did twelve hundred in a boat," said Mac, "and he
had all he wanted. He fetched ashore in the Marquesas, and never set a
foot on anything floating from that day to this. He said he would rather
put a pistol to his head and knock his brains out."

"Ay, ay!" said Wicks. "Well I remember a boat's crew that made this very
island of Kauai, and from just about where we lie, or a bit further.
When they got up with the land, they were clean crazy. There was an
iron-bound coast and an Old Bob Ridley of a surf on. The natives hailed
'em from fishing-boats, and sung out it couldn't be done at the money.
Much they cared! there was the land, that was all they knew; and they
turned to and drove the boat slap ashore in the thick of it, and was
all drowned but one. No; boat trips are my eye," concluded the captain,
gloomily.

The tone was surprising in a man of his indomitable temper. "Come,
Captain," said Carthew, "you have something else up your sleeve; out
with it!"

"It's a fact," admitted Wicks. "You see there's a raft of little bally
reefs about here, kind of chicken-pox on the chart. Well, I looked 'em
all up, and there's one--Midway or Brooks they call it, not forty mile
from our assigned position--that I got news of. It turns out it's a
coaling station of the Pacific Mail," he said, simply.

"Well, and I know it ain't no such a thing," said Mac. "I been
quartermaster in that line myself."

"All right," returned Wicks. "There's the book. Read what Hoyt
says--read it aloud and let the others hear."

Hoyt's falsehood (as readers know) was explicit; incredulity was
impossible, and the news itself delightful beyond hope. Each saw in his
mind's eye the boat draw in to a trim island with a wharf, coal-sheds,
gardens, the Stars and Stripes and the white cottage of the keeper;
saw themselves idle a few weeks in tolerable quarters, and then step on
board the China mail, romantic waifs, and yet with pocketsful of money,
calling for champagne, and waited on by troops of stewards. Breakfast,
that had begun so dully, ended amid sober jubilation, and all hands
turned immediately to prepare the boat.

Now that all spars were gone, it was no easy job to get her launched.
Some of the necessary cargo was first stowed on board; the specie, in
particular, being packed in a strong chest and secured with lashings to
the afterthwart in case of a capsize. Then a piece of the bulwark was
razed to the level of the deck, and the boat swung thwart-ship, made
fast with a slack line to either stump, and successfully run out. For a
voyage of forty miles to hospitable quarters, not much food or water
was required; but they took both in superfluity. Amalu and Mac, both
ingrained sailor-men, had chests which were the headquarters of their
lives; two more chests with handbags, oilskins, and blankets supplied
the others; Hadden, amid general applause, added the last case of the
brown sherry; the captain brought the log, instruments, and chronometer;
nor did Hemstead forget the banjo or a pinned handkerchief of Butaritari
shells.

It was about three P.M. when they pushed off, and (the wind being still
westerly) fell to the oars. "Well, we've got the guts out of YOU!" was
the captain's nodded farewell to the hulk of the Currency Lass, which
presently shrank and faded in the sea. A little after a calm succeeded,
with much rain; and the first meal was eaten, and the watch below lay
down to their uneasy slumber on the bilge under a roaring shower-bath.
The twenty-ninth dawned overhead from out of ragged clouds; there is
no moment when a boat at sea appears so trenchantly black and so
conspicuously little; and the crew looked about them at the sky and
water with a thrill of loneliness and fear. With sunrise the trade set
in, lusty and true to the point; sail was made; the boat flew; and by
about four in the afternoon, they were well up with the closed part of
the reef, and the captain standing on the thwart, and holding by the
mast, was studying the island through the binoculars.

"Well, and where's your station?" cried Mac.

"I don't someway pick it up," replied the captain.

"No, nor never will!" retorted Mac, with a clang of despair and triumph
in his tones.

The truth was soon plain to all. No buoys, no beacons, no lights, no
coal, no station; the castaways pulled through a lagoon and landed on
an isle, where was no mark of man but wreckwood, and no sound but of the
sea. For the seafowl that harboured and lived there at the epoch of my
visit were then scattered into the uttermost parts of the ocean, and
had left no traces of their sojourn besides dropped feathers and addled
eggs. It was to this they had been sent, for this they had stooped all
night over the dripping oars, hourly moving further from relief. The
boat, for as small as it was, was yet eloquent of the hands of men, a
thing alone indeed upon the sea but yet in itself all human; and the
isle, for which they had exchanged it, was ingloriously savage, a place
of distress, solitude, and hunger unrelieved. There was a strong glare
and shadow of the evening over all; in which they sat or lay, not
speaking, careless even to eat, men swindled out of life and riches by
a lying book. In the great good nature of the whole party, no word of
reproach had been addressed to Hadden, the author of these disasters.
But the new blow was less magnanimously borne, and many angry glances
rested on the captain.

Yet it was himself who roused them from their lethargy. Grudgingly they
obeyed, drew the boat beyond tidemark, and followed him to the top of
the miserable islet, whence a view was commanded of the whole wheel of
the horizon, then part darkened under the coming night, part dyed with
the hues of the sunset and populous with the sunset clouds. Here the
camp was pitched and a tent run up with the oars, sails, and mast. And
here Amalu, at no man's bidding, from the mere instinct of habitual
service, built a fire and cooked a meal. Night was come, and the stars
and the silver sickle of new moon beamed overhead, before the meal
was ready. The cold sea shone about them, and the fire glowed in their
faces, as they ate. Tommy had opened his case, and the brown sherry went
the round; but it was long before they came to conversation.

"Well, is it to be Kauai after all?" asked Mac suddenly.

"This is bad enough for me," said Tommy. "Let's stick it out where we
are."

"Well, I can tell ye one thing," said Mac, "if ye care to hear it. When
I was in the China mail, we once made this island. It's in the course
from Honolulu."

"Deuce it is!" cried Carthew. "That settles it, then. Let's stay. We
must keep good fires going; and there's plenty wreck."

"Lashings of wreck!" said the Irishman. "There's nothing here but wreck
and coffin boards."

"But we'll have to make a proper blyze," objected Hemstead. "You can't
see a fire like this, not any wye awye, I mean."

"Can't you?" said Carthew. "Look round."

They did, and saw the hollow of the night, the bare, bright face of the
sea, and the stars regarding them; and the voices died in their bosoms
at the spectacle. In that huge isolation, it seemed they must be visible
from China on the one hand and California on the other.

"My God, it's dreary!" whispered Hemstead.

"Dreary?" cried Mac, and fell suddenly silent.

"It's better than a boat, anyway," said Hadden. "I've had my bellyful of
boat."

"What kills me is that specie!" the captain broke out. "Think of all
that riches,--four thousand in gold, bad silver, and short bills--all
found money, too!--and no more use than that much dung!"

"I'll tell you one thing," said Tommy. "I don't like it being in the
boat--I don't care to have it so far away."

"Why, who's to take it?" cried Mac, with a guffaw of evil laughter.

But this was not at all the feeling of the partners, who rose, clambered
down the isle, brought back the inestimable treasure-chest slung upon
two oars, and set it conspicuous in the shining of the fire.

"There's my beauty!" cried Wicks, viewing it with a cocked head. "That's
better than a bonfire. What! we have a chest here, and bills for close
upon two thousand pounds; there's no show to that,--it would go in
your vest-pocket,--but the rest! upwards of forty pounds avoirdupois of
coined gold, and close on two hundredweight of Chile silver! What! ain't
that good enough to fetch a fleet? Do you mean to say that won't affect
a ship's compass? Do you mean to tell me that the lookout won't turn to
and SMELL it?" he cried.

Mac, who had no part nor lot in the bills, the forty pounds of gold, or
the two hundredweight of silver, heard this with impatience, and fell
into a bitter, choking laughter. "You'll see!" he said harshly. "You'll
be glad to feed them bills into the fire before you're through with ut!"
And he turned, passed by himself out of the ring of the firelight, and
stood gazing seaward.

His speech and his departure extinguished instantly those sparks of
better humour kindled by the dinner and the chest. The group fell again
to an ill-favoured silence, and Hemstead began to touch the banjo, as
was his habit of an evening. His repertory was small: the chords of
_Home, Sweet Home_ fell under his fingers; and when he had played the
symphony, he instinctively raised up his voice. "Be it never so 'umble,
there's no plyce like 'ome," he sang. The last word was still upon his
lips, when the instrument was snatched from him and dashed into the
fire; and he turned with a cry to look into the furious countenance of
Mac.

"I'll be damned if I stand this!" cried the captain, leaping up
belligerent.

"I told ye I was a voilent man," said Mac, with a movement of
deprecation very surprising in one of his character. "Why don't he give
me a chance then? Haven't we enough to bear the way we are?" And to the
wonder and dismay of all, the man choked upon a sob. "It's ashamed of
meself I am," he said presently, his Irish accent twenty-fold increased.
"I ask all your pardons for me voilence; and especially the little
man's, who is a harmless crayture, and here's me hand to'm, if he'll
condescind to take me by 't."

So this scene of barbarity and sentimentalism passed off, leaving behind
strange and incongruous impressions. True, every one was perhaps glad
when silence succeeded that all too appropriate music; true, Mac's
apology and subsequent behaviour rather raised him in the opinion of
his fellow-castaways. But the discordant note had been struck, and its
harmonics tingled in the brain. In that savage, houseless isle, the
passions of man had sounded, if only for the moment, and all men
trembled at the possibilities of horror.

It was determined to stand watch and watch in case of passing vessels;
and Tommy, on fire with an idea, volunteered to stand the first. The
rest crawled under the tent, and were soon enjoying that comfortable
gift of sleep, which comes everywhere and to all men, quenching
anxieties and speeding time. And no sooner were all settled, no sooner
had the drone of many snorers begun to mingle with and overcome the
surf, than Tommy stole from his post with the case of sherry, and
dropped it in a quiet cove in a fathom of water. But the stormy
inconstancy of Mac's behaviour had no connection with a gill or two of
wine; his passions, angry and otherwise, were on a different sail plan
from his neighbours'; and there were possibilities of good and evil in
that hybrid Celt beyond their prophecy.

About two in the morning, the starry sky--or so it seemed, for the
drowsy watchman had not observed the approach of any cloud--brimmed over
in a deluge; and for three days it rained without remission. The islet
was a sponge, the castaways sops; the view all gone, even the reef
concealed behind the curtain of the falling water. The fire was soon
drowned out; after a couple of boxes of matches had been scratched in
vain, it was decided to wait for better weather; and the party lived in
wretchedness on raw tins and a ration of hard bread.

By the 2nd February, in the dark hours of the morning watch, the clouds
were all blown by; the sun rose glorious; and once more the castaways
sat by a quick fire, and drank hot coffee with the greed of brutes and
sufferers. Thenceforward their affairs moved in a routine. A fire was
constantly maintained; and this occupied one hand continuously, and the
others for an hour or so in the day. Twice a day, all hands bathed in
the lagoon, their chief, almost their only pleasure. Often they fished
in the lagoon with good success. And the rest was passed in lolling,
strolling, yarns, and disputation. The time of the China steamers
was calculated to a nicety; which done, the thought was rejected and
ignored. It was one that would not bear consideration. The boat voyage
having been tacitly set aside, the desperate part chosen to wait there
for the coming of help or of starvation, no man had courage left to look
his bargain in the face, far less to discuss it with his neighbours. But
the unuttered terror haunted them; in every hour of idleness, at every
moment of silence, it returned, and breathed a chill about the circle,
and carried men's eyes to the horizon. Then, in a panic of self-defence,
they would rally to some other subject. And, in that lone spot, what
else was to be found to speak of but the treasure?

That was indeed the chief singularity, the one thing conspicuous in
their island life; the presence of that chest of bills and specie
dominated the mind like a cathedral; and there were besides connected
with it, certain irking problems well fitted to occupy the idle. Two
thousand pounds were due to the Sydney firm: two thousand pounds were
clear profit, and fell to be divided in varying proportions among
six. It had been agreed how the partners were to range; every pound of
capital subscribed, every pound that fell due in wages, was to count for
one "lay." Of these, Tommy could claim five hundred and ten, Carthew one
hundred and seventy, Wicks one hundred and forty, and Hemstead and Amalu
ten apiece: eight hundred and forty "lays" in all. What was the value of
a lay? This was at first debated in the air and chiefly by the strength
of Tommy's lungs. Then followed a series of incorrect calculations; from
which they issued, arithmetically foiled, but agreed from weariness upon
an approximate value of 2 pounds, 7 shillings 7 1/4 pence. The figures
were admittedly incorrect; the sum of the shares came not to 2000
pounds, but to 1996 pounds, 6 shillings: 3 pounds, 14 shillings being
thus left unclaimed. But it was the nearest they had yet found, and the
highest as well, so that the partners were made the less critical by the
contemplation of their splendid dividends. Wicks put in 100 pounds and
stood to draw captain's wages for two months; his taking was 333 pounds
3 shillings 6 1/2 pence. Carthew had put in 150 pounds: he was to take
out 401 pounds, 18 shillings 6 1/2 pence. Tommy's 500 pounds had grown
to be 1213 pounds 12 shillings 9 3/4 pence; and Amalu and Hemstead,
ranking for wages only, had 22 pounds, 16 shillings 1/2 pence, each.

From talking and brooding on these figures, it was but a step to
opening the chest; and once the chest open, the glamour of the cash was
irresistible. Each felt that he must see his treasure separate with the
eye of flesh, handle it in the hard coin, mark it for his own, and
stand forth to himself the approved owner. And here an insurmountable
difficulty barred the way. There were some seventeen shillings in
English silver: the rest was Chile; and the Chile dollar, which had been
taken at the rate of six to the pound sterling, was practically their
smallest coin. It was decided, therefore, to divide the pounds only,
and to throw the shillings, pence, and fractions in a common fund. This,
with the three pound fourteen already in the heel, made a total of seven
pounds one shilling.

"I'll tell you," said Wicks. "Let Carthew and Tommy and me take one
pound apiece, and Hemstead and Amalu split the other four, and toss up
for the odd bob."

"O, rot!" said Carthew. "Tommy and I are bursting already. We can take
half a sov' each, and let the other three have forty shillings."

"I'll tell you now--it's not worth splitting," broke in Mac. "I've cards
in my chest. Why don't you play for the slump sum?"

In that idle place, the proposal was accepted with delight. Mac, as the
owner of the cards, was given a stake; the sum was played for in five
games of cribbage; and when Amalu, the last survivor in the tournament,
was beaten by Mac, it was found the dinner hour was past. After a hasty
meal, they fell again immediately to cards, this time (on Carthew's
proposal) to Van John. It was then probably two P.M. of the 9th
February; and they played with varying chances for twelve hours, slept
heavily, and rose late on the morrow to resume the game. All day of the
10th, with grudging intervals for food, and with one long absence on the
part of Tommy from which he returned dripping with the case of sherry,
they continued to deal and stake. Night fell: they drew the closer to
the fire. It was maybe two in the morning, and Tommy was selling his
deal by auction, as usual with that timid player; when Carthew, who
didn't intend to bid, had a moment of leisure and looked round him. He
beheld the moonlight on the sea, the money piled and scattered in that
incongruous place, the perturbed faces of the players; he felt in his
own breast the familiar tumult; and it seemed as if there rose in his
ears a sound of music, and the moon seemed still to shine upon a sea,
but the sea was changed, and the Casino towered from among lamplit
gardens, and the money clinked on the green board. "Good God!" he
thought, "am I gambling again?" He looked the more curiously about the
sandy table. He and Mac had played and won like gamblers; the mingled
gold and silver lay by their places in the heap. Amalu and Hemstead had
each more than held their own, but Tommy was cruel far to leeward, and
the captain was reduced to perhaps fifty pounds.

"I say, let's knock off," said Carthew.

"Give that man a glass of Buckle," said some one, and a fresh bottle was
opened, and the game went inexorably on.

Carthew was himself too heavy a winner to withdraw or to say more; and
all the rest of the night he must look on at the progress of this folly,
and make gallant attempts to lose with the not uncommon consequence of
winning more. The first dawn of the 11th February found him well-nigh
desperate. It chanced he was then dealer, and still winning. He had just
dealt a round of many tens; every one had staked heavily; the captain
had put up all that remained to him, twelve pounds in gold and a few
dollars; and Carthew, looking privately at his cards before he showed
them, found he held a natural.

"See here, you fellows," he broke out, "this is a sickening business,
and I'm done with it for one." So saying, he showed his cards, tore them
across, and rose from the ground.

The company stared and murmured in mere amazement; but Mac stepped
gallantly to his support.

"We've had enough of it, I do believe," said he. "But of course it was
all fun, and here's my counters back. All counters in, boys!" and he
began to pour his winnings into the chest, which stood fortunately near
him.

Carthew stepped across and wrung him by the hand. "I'll never forget
this," he said.

"And what are ye going to do with the Highway boy and the plumber?"
inquired Mac, in a low tone of voice. "They've both wan, ye see."

"That's true!" said Carthew aloud. "Amalu and Hemstead, count your
winnings; Tommy and I pay that."

It was carried without speech: the pair glad enough to receive their
winnings, it mattered not from whence; and Tommy, who had lost about
five hundred pounds, delighted with the compromise.

"And how about Mac?" asked Hemstead. "Is he to lose all?"

"I beg your pardon, plumber. I'm sure ye mean well," returned the
Irishman, "but you'd better shut your face, for I'm not that kind of a
man. If I t'ought I had wan that money fair, there's never a soul here
could get it from me. But I t'ought it was in fun; that was my mistake,
ye see; and there's no man big enough upon this island to give a present
to my mother's son. So there's my opinion to ye, plumber, and you can
put it in your pockut till required."


"Well, I will say, Mac, you're a gentleman," said Carthew, as he helped
him to shovel back his winnings into the treasure chest.

"Divil a fear of it, sir! a drunken sailor-man," said Mac.

The captain had sat somewhile with his face in his hands: now he rose
mechanically, shaking and stumbling like a drunkard after a debauch. But
as he rose, his face was altered, and his voice rang out over the isle,
"Sail, ho!"

All turned at the cry, and there, in the wild light of the morning,
heading straight for Midway Reef, was the brig Flying Scud of Hull.




CHAPTER XXIV. A HARD BARGAIN.


The ship which thus appeared before the castaways had long "tramped" the
ocean, wandering from one port to another as freights offered. She was
two years out from London, by the Cape of Good Hope, India, and the
Archipelago; and was now bound for San Francisco in the hope of working
homeward round the Horn. Her captain was one Jacob Trent. He had retired
some five years before to a suburban cottage, a patch of cabbages, a
gig, and the conduct of what he called a Bank. The name appears to have
been misleading. Borrowers were accustomed to choose works of art and
utility in the front shop; loaves of sugar and bolts of broadcloth were
deposited in pledge; and it was a part of the manager's duty to dash in
his gig on Saturday evenings from one small retailer's to another, and
to annex in each the bulk of the week's takings. His was thus an active
life, and to a man of the type of a rat, filled with recondite joys.
An unexpected loss, a law suit, and the unintelligent commentary of the
judge upon the bench, combined to disgust him of the business. I was so
extraordinarily fortunate as to find, in an old newspaper, a report of
the proceedings in Lyall v. The Cardiff Mutual Accommodation Banking Co.
"I confess I fail entirely to understand the nature of the business,"
the judge had remarked, while Trent was being examined in chief; a
little after, on fuller information--"They call it a bank," he had
opined, "but it seems to me to be an unlicensed pawnshop"; and he wound
up with this appalling allocution: "Mr. Trent, I must put you on your
guard; you must be very careful, or we shall see you here again." In the
inside of a week the captain disposed of the bank, the cottage, and the
gig and horse; and to sea again in the Flying Scud, where he did well
and gave high satisfaction to his owners. But the glory clung to him; he
was a plain sailor-man, he said, but he could never long allow you to
forget that he had been a banker.

His mate, Elias Goddedaal, was a huge viking of a man, six feet three
and of proportionate mass, strong, sober, industrious, musical, and
sentimental. He ran continually over into Swedish melodies, chiefly in
the minor. He had paid nine dollars to hear Patti; to hear Nilsson, he
had deserted a ship and two months' wages; and he was ready at any time
to walk ten miles for a good concert, or seven to a reasonable play.
On board he had three treasures: a canary bird, a concertina, and a
blinding copy of the works of Shakespeare. He had a gift, peculiarly
Scandinavian, of making friends at sight: an elemental innocence
commended him; he was without fear, without reproach, and without money
or the hope of making it.

Holdorsen was second mate, and berthed aft, but messed usually with the
hands.

Of one more of the crew, some image lives. This was a foremast hand out
of the Clyde, of the name of Brown. A small, dark, thickset creature,
with dog's eyes, of a disposition incomparably mild and harmless, he
knocked about seas and cities, the uncomplaining whiptop of one vice.
"The drink is my trouble, ye see," he said to Carthew shyly; "and it's
the more shame to me because I'm come of very good people at Bowling,
down the wa'er." The letter that so much affected Nares, in case the
reader should remember it, was addressed to this man Brown.

Such was the ship that now carried joy into the bosoms of the castaways.
After the fatigue and the bestial emotions of their night of play, the
approach of salvation shook them from all self-control. Their hands
trembled, their eyes shone, they laughed and shouted like children as
they cleared their camp: and some one beginning to whistle _Marching
Through Georgia,_ the remainder of the packing was conducted, amidst a
thousand interruptions, to these martial strains. But the strong head of
Wicks was only partly turned.


"Boys," he said, "easy all! We're going aboard of a ship of which we
don't know nothing; we've got a chest of specie, and seeing the weight,
we can't turn to and deny it. Now, suppose she was fishy; suppose it was
some kind of a Bully Hayes business! It's my opinion we'd better be on
hand with the pistols."

Every man of the party but Hemstead had some kind of a revolver; these
were accordingly loaded and disposed about the persons of the castaways,
and the packing was resumed and finished in the same rapturous spirit as
it was begun. The sun was not yet ten degrees above the eastern sea, but
the brig was already close in and hove to, before they had launched the
boat and sped, shouting at the oars, towards the passage.

It was blowing fresh outside, with a strong send of sea. The spray flew
in the oarsmen's faces. They saw the Union Jack blow abroad from the
Flying Scud, the men clustered at the rail, the cook in the galley door,
the captain on the quarter-deck with a pith helmet and binoculars. And
the whole familiar business, the comfort, company, and safety of a ship,
heaving nearer at each stroke, maddened them with joy.

Wicks was the first to catch the line, and swarm on board, helping hands
grabbing him as he came and hauling him across the rail.

"Captain, sir, I suppose?" he said, turning to the hard old man in the
pith helmet.

"Captain Trent, sir," returned the old gentleman.

"Well, I'm Captain Kirkup, and this is the crew of the Sydney schooner
Currency Lass, dismasted at sea January 28th."

"Ay, ay," said Trent. "Well, you're all right now. Lucky for you I saw
your signal. I didn't know I was so near this beastly island, there must
be a drift to the south'ard here; and when I came on deck this morning
at eight bells, I thought it was a ship afire."

It had been agreed that, while Wicks was to board the ship and do the
civil, the rest were to remain in the whaleboat and see the treasure
safe. A tackle was passed down to them; to this they made fast the
invaluable chest, and gave the word to heave. But the unexpected weight
brought the hand at the tackle to a stand; two others ran to tail on and
help him, and the thing caught the eye of Trent.

"'Vast heaving!" he cried sharply; and then to Wicks: "What's that? I
don't ever remember to have seen a chest weigh like that."

"It's money," said Wicks.

"It's what?" cried Trent.

"Specie," said Wicks; "saved from the wreck."

Trent looked at him sharply. "Here, let go that chest again, Mr.
Goddedaal," he commanded, "shove the boat off, and stream her with a
line astern."

"Ay, ay, sir!" from Goddedaal.

"What the devil's wrong?" asked Wicks.

"Nothing, I daresay," returned Trent. "But you'll allow it's a queer
thing when a boat turns up in mid-ocean with half a ton of specie,--and
everybody armed," he added, pointing to Wicks's pocket. "Your boat
will lay comfortably astern, while you come below and make yourself
satisfactory."

"O, if that's all!" said Wicks. "My log and papers are as right as the
mail; nothing fishy about us." And he hailed his friends in the boat,
bidding them have patience, and turned to follow Captain Trent.

"This way, Captain Kirkup," said the latter. "And don't blame a man for
too much caution; no offence intended; and these China rivers shake a
fellow's nerve. All I want is just to see you're what you say you
are; it's only my duty, sir, and what you would do yourself in the
circumstances. I've not always been a ship-captain: I was a banker once,
and I tell you that's the trade to learn caution in. You have to keep
your weather-eye lifting Saturday nights." And with a dry, business-like
cordiality, he produced a bottle of gin.

The captains pledged each other; the papers were overhauled; the tale of
Topelius and the trade was told in appreciative ears and cemented
their acquaintance. Trent's suspicions, thus finally disposed of, were
succeeded by a fit of profound thought, during which he sat lethargic
and stern, looking at and drumming on the table.

"Anything more?" asked Wicks.

"What sort of a place is it inside?" inquired Trent, sudden as though
Wicks had touched a spring.

"It's a good enough lagoon--a few horses' heads, but nothing to
mention," answered Wicks.

"I've a good mind to go in," said Trent. "I was new rigged in China;
it's given very bad, and I'm getting frightened for my sticks. We could
set it up as good as new in a day. For I daresay your lot would turn to
and give us a hand?"

"You see if we don't!" said Wicks.

"So be it, then," concluded Trent. "A stitch in time saves nine."

They returned on deck; Wicks cried the news to the Currency Lasses; the
foretopsail was filled again, and the brig ran into the lagoon lively,
the whaleboat dancing in her wake, and came to single anchor off Middle
Brooks Island before eight. She was boarded by the castaways, breakfast
was served, the baggage slung on board and piled in the waist, and all
hands turned to upon the rigging. All day the work continued, the two
crews rivalling each other in expense of strength. Dinner was served on
deck, the officers messing aft under the slack of the spanker, the men
fraternising forward. Trent appeared in excellent spirits, served out
grog to all hands, opened a bottle of Cape wine for the after-table,
and obliged his guests with many details of the life of a financier
in Cardiff. He had been forty years at sea, had five times suffered
shipwreck, was once nine months the prisoner of a pepper rajah, and had
seen service under fire in Chinese rivers; but the only thing he cared
to talk of, the only thing of which he was vain, or with which he
thought it possible to interest a stranger, was his career as a
money-lender in the slums of a seaport town.

The afternoon spell told cruelly on the Currency Lasses. Already
exhausted as they were with sleeplessness and excitement, they did the
last hours of this violent employment on bare nerves; and when Trent was
at last satisfied with the condition of his rigging, expected eagerly
the word to put to sea. But the captain seemed in no hurry. He went and
walked by himself softly, like a man in thought. Presently he hailed
Wicks.

"You're a kind of company, ain't you, Captain Kirkup?" he inquired.

"Yes, we're all on board on lays," was the reply.

"Well, then, you won't mind if I ask the lot of you down to tea in the
cabin?" asked Trent.

Wicks was amazed, but he naturally ventured no remark; and a little
after, the six Currency Lasses sat down with Trent and Goddedaal to
a spread of marmalade, butter, toast, sardines, tinned tongue, and
steaming tea. The food was not very good, and I have no doubt Nares
would have reviled it, but it was manna to the castaways. Goddedaal
waited on them with a kindness far before courtesy, a kindness like
that of some old, honest countrywoman in her farm. It was remembered
afterwards that Trent took little share in these attentions, but sat
much absorbed in thought, and seemed to remember and forget the presence
of his guests alternately.

Presently he addressed the Chinaman.

"Clear out!" said he, and watched him till he had disappeared in the
stair. "Now, gentlemen," he went on, "I understand you're a joint-stock
sort of crew, and that's why I've had you all down; for there's a point
I want made clear. You see what sort of a ship this is--a good ship,
though I say it, and you see what the rations are--good enough for
sailor-men."

There was a hurried murmur of approval, but curiosity for what was
coming next prevented an articulate reply.

"Well," continued Trent, making bread pills and looking hard at the
middle of the table, "I'm glad of course to be able to give you a
passage to 'Frisco; one sailor-man should help another, that's my motto.
But when you want a thing in this world, you generally always have
to pay for it." He laughed a brief, joyless laugh. "I have no idea of
losing by my kindness."

"We have no idea you should, captain," said Wicks.

"We are ready to pay anything in reason," added Carthew.


At the words, Goddedaal, who sat next to him, touched him with his
elbow, and the two mates exchanged a significant look. The character of
Captain Trent was given and taken in that silent second.

"In reason?" repeated the captain of the brig. "I was waiting for that.
Reason's between two people, and there's only one here. I'm the judge;
I'm reason. If you want an advance you have to pay for it"--he hastily
corrected himself--"If you want a passage in my ship, you have to pay my
price," he substituted. "That's business, I believe. I don't want you;
you want me."

"Well, sir," said Carthew, "and what IS your price?"

The captain made bread pills. "If I were like you," he said, "when you
got hold of that merchant in the Gilberts, I might surprise you. You
had your chance then; seems to me it's mine now. Turn about's fair play.
What kind of mercy did you have on that Gilbert merchant?" he cried,
with a sudden stridency. "Not that I blame you. All's fair in love and
business," and he laughed again, a little frosty giggle.

"Well, sir?" said Carthew, gravely.

"Well, this ship's mine, I think?" he asked sharply.

"Well, I'm of that way of thinking meself," observed Mac.

"I say it's mine, sir!" reiterated Trent, like a man trying to be angry.
"And I tell you all, if I was a driver like what you are, I would take
the lot. But there's two thousand pounds there that don't belong to you,
and I'm an honest man. Give me the two thousand that's yours, and I'll
give you a passage to the coast, and land every man-jack of you in
'Frisco with fifteen pounds in his pocket, and the captain here with
twenty-five."

Goddedaal laid down his head on the table like a man ashamed.

"You're joking," said Wicks, purple in the face.

"Am I?" said Trent. "Please yourselves. You're under no compulsion. This
ship's mine, but there's that Brooks Island don't belong to me, and you
can lay there till you die for what I care."


"It's more than your blooming brig's worth!" cried Wicks.

"It's my price anyway," returned Trent.

"And do you mean to say you would land us there to starve?" cried Tommy.

Captain Trent laughed the third time. "Starve? I defy you to," said he.
"I'll sell you all the provisions you want at a fair profit."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Mac, "but my case is by itself I'm
working me passage; I got no share in that two thousand pounds nor
nothing in my pockut; and I'll be glad to know what you have to say to
me?"

"I ain't a hard man," said Trent. "That shall make no difference. I'll
take you with the rest, only of course you get no fifteen pound."

The impudence was so extreme and startling, that all breathed deep, and
Goddedaal raised up his face and looked his superior sternly in the eye.

But Mac was more articulate. "And you're what ye call a British sayman,
I suppose? the sorrow in your guts!" he cried.

"One more such word, and I clap you in irons!" said Trent, rising
gleefully at the face of opposition.

"And where would I be the while you were doin' ut?" asked Mac. "After
you and your rigging, too! Ye ould puggy, ye haven't the civility of a
bug, and I'll learn ye some."

His voice did not even rise as he uttered the threat; no man present,
Trent least of all, expected that which followed. The Irishman's hand
rose suddenly from below the table, an open clasp-knife balanced on the
palm; there was a movement swift as conjuring; Trent started half to
his feet, turning a little as he rose so as to escape the table, and the
movement was his bane. The missile struck him in the jugular; he fell
forward, and his blood flowed among the dishes on the cloth.

The suddenness of the attack and the catastrophe, the instant change
from peace to war and from life to death, held all men spellbound. Yet a
moment they sat about the table staring open-mouthed upon the prostrate
captain and the flowing blood. The next, Goddedaal had leaped to his
feet, caught up the stool on which he had been sitting, and swung it
high in air, a man transfigured, roaring (as he stood) so that men's
ears were stunned with it. There was no thought of battle in the
Currency Lasses; none drew his weapon; all huddled helplessly from
before the face of the baresark Scandinavian. His first blow sent Mac to
ground with a broken arm. His second bashed out the brains of Hemstead.
He turned from one to another, menacing and trumpeting like a wounded
elephant, exulting in his rage. But there was no counsel, no light of
reason, in that ecstasy of battle; and he shied from the pursuit of
victory to hail fresh blows upon the supine Hemstead, so that the stool
was shattered and the cabin rang with their violence. The sight of that
post-mortem cruelty recalled Carthew to the life of instinct, and his
revolver was in hand and he had aimed and fired before he knew. The
ear-bursting sound of the report was accompanied by a yell of pain; the
colossus paused, swayed, tottered, and fell headlong on the body of his
victim.