The stifling heat of the room seemed to get more oppressive. The mystery of the thing beat against Kettle"s brain.
Of course he could not read the deposed operator"s thoughts, though he could see easily that the man was reading the messages which White was so glibly sending off. But it was clear that the man"s agitation was growing; growing, too, out of all proportion to the coolness he had shown when his room was first invaded. At last an exclamation was forced from him, almost, as it seemed, involuntarily. "Oh, you ghastly scoundrel," he murmured, and on that Kettle spoke. He could not stand the mystery any longer.
"Tell me," he said, "exactly what message that man"s sending."
"But I forbid you to do any such thing," said White, and reached for his revolver. But before his fingers touched it, he looked up and saw Kettle"s weapon covering him.
"You put that down," came the crisp order, and White obeyed it nervously enough.
"And now go and stand in the middle of the room till I give you leave to shift."
White did this also. He grasped the fact that Captain Kettle was not in a mood to be trifled with.
"Now, Mr. Telegraph Clerk, as you understand this tack-hammer language, and as I could see you"ve been following all the messages that"s been sent, just tell me the whole lot of it, please, as near as you can remember."
"He called up London first, and gave what sounded like a registered address, and sent the word "corruscate." That"s probably code; anyway I don"t know what it meant. Then he called the Cape, and sent a message to the Governor. He hadn"t got to the end, and there was no signature, but it was evidently intended to make them believe that it was sent from the Colonial Office at home."
"Well," said Kettle, "what was the message?"
"Good Lord, man, he"s directing the Governor to declare war on the Transvaal. You know there"s been trouble with them lately, and they"ll believe that it comes from the right place. If this is some stock-jobbing plant--"
"It is."
"Then, by heavens, it"ll be carried through unless you let me stop it at once. The thing"s plausible enough--"
But here White recovered from his temporary scare, and cut in with a fine show of authority. "S"help me, Kettle, you"re making a pretty mess of things. You make me knock off in the middle of a message, and they"ll not know what"s up at the other end if I don"t go on. Look at that mirror."
"I see the spot of light winking about."
"That"s the operator at the next station calling me."
"But is it true what this gentleman"s been telling me?"
"I suppose it is, more or less. But what of that? What did you lose your temper for like this? You knew quite well what we came here for."
"I knew you came to steal money from stockbrokers. I knew nothing about going to try and run my country in for a war."
"Poof, that"s nothing. The war would not hurt you and me. Besides, it must go on now. I"ve cabled my partner in London to be a bear in Kaffirs for all he"s worth. We must smash all the instruments here so they can"t contradict the news, and then be off."
"Your partner can be a bear or any other kind of beast, in any sort of n.i.g.g.e.rs he chooses, but I"m not going to let you run England into war at any price."
"Pah, my good man, what does that matter to you? What"s England ever done for you?"
"I live there," said Kettle, "when I"m at home, and as I"ve lived everywhere else in the world, I"m naturally a bit more fond of the old shop than if I"d never gone away from her beach. No, Mr. White, England"s never done anything special for me that I could, so to speak, put my finger on, but--ah would you!"
White, in desperation, had made a grab at the revolver lying on the instrument table, but with a quick rush Kettle possessed himself of it, and Mr. White found himself again looking down the muzzle of Captain Kettle"s weapon.
But a moment later the aim was changed. Sheriff, hearing the whispered talk, had come in through the doorway to see what it was about, and promptly found himself favored in his turn.
"Shift your pistol to muzzle end, and bring it here."
Sheriff obeyed the order promptly. He had seen enough of Captain Kettle"s usefulness as a marksman not to dispute his wishes.
"Did you know that we came here to stir up a war between our folks at home and the Transvaal?"
"I suppose so."
"And smash up the telegraph instruments afterward, so that it could not be contradicted till it was well under way?"
"That would have been necessary."
"And you remember what you told me on that steamboat? Oh! you liar!"
said Kettle, and Sheriff winced.
"I"m so beastly hard up," he said.
Captain Kettle might have commented on his own poverty, but he did not do this. Instead, he said: "Now we"ll go back to the ship, and of course you"ll have to scuttle her just as if you"d brought off your game here successfully. Run England in for a b.l.o.o.d.y war, would you, just for some filthy money? By James! no. Come, march. And you, Mr. Telegraph Clerk, get under weigh with that deaf and dumb alphabet of yours, and ring up the Cape, and tell them what"s been sent is all a joke, and there"s to be no war at all."
"I"ll do that, you may lay your heart on it," said the operator. "But Mr. I-don"t-know-what-your-name-is, look here. Hadn"t you better stay?
I"ll see things are put all right. But if you go off with those two sharks, it might be dangerous."
"Thank you, kindly, sir," said Kettle; "but I"m a man that"s been accustomed to look after myself all the world over, and I"m not likely to get hurt now. Those two may be sharks, as you say, but I"m not altogether a simple little lamb myself."
"I shall be a bit uneasy for you. You"re a good soul whoever you may be, and I"d like to do something for you if I could."
"Then, sir," said Kettle, "just keep quiet, here, and get on with your work contradicting that wire, and don"t send for any of those little Portuguese soldiers with guns to see us off. It"s a bad beach, and we mayn"t get off first try, and if they started to annoy us whilst we were at work, I might have to shoot some of them, which would be a trouble."
"I"ll see to that," said the operator. "We"ll just shake hands if you don"t mind, before you go. There"s more man to the cubic inch about you than in any other fellow I"ve come across for a long time. I"ve no club at home now, or I"d ask you to look me up. But I dare say we shall meet again some time. So long."
"Good-by, sir," said Kettle, and shook the operator by the hand. Then he turned, and drove the other two raiders before him out of the house, and down to the beach, and, with the Krooboys, applied himself to launching the surf-boat through the breakers.
"Run the old shop into a war, would you?" he soliloquized to two very limp, unconscious figures, as the Krooboys got the surf-boat afloat after the third upset. "It"s queer what some men will do for money." And then, a minute later, he muttered to himself: "By James! look at that dawn coming up behind the island there; yellow as a lemon. Now, that is fine. I can make a bit of poetry out of that."
CHAPTER VII
THE DERELICT
"Her cargo"ll have shifted," said the third mate, "and when she got that list her people will have felt frightened and left her."
"She"s a scary look to her, with her yard-arms spiking every other sea,"
said Captain Image, "and her decks like the side of a house. I shouldn"t care to navigate a craft that preferred to lie down on her beam ends myself."
"Take this gla.s.s, sir, and you"ll see the lee quarter-boat davit-tackles are overhauled. That means they got at least one boat in the water. To my mind she"s derelict."
"Yard-arm tackles rigged and overhauled, too," said Captain Image.