"Good day, Aguinili. You have given Ah Sing a fright."
"He gabble gabble all day when captain not well."
"Great Scot! What is wrong? The captain was all right half an hour ago."
"Yes, but we are round the head now, and the monsoon is on. I come speak with you, for to-night I have only one man to steer with me; the rest no good. I come ask will you take helm for time to-night, else we must go back?"
I was certainly surprised at Aguinili"s words, but, grasping their import, I at once signified that I would willingly take a watch, and following him aft, I was made acquainted with the little peculiarities of the schooner in regards to her steering.
"Malay bad man--you no trust him," remarked Aguinili. "No let them know captain not well?"
"Never fear!" I answered; "I have sailed with their kind before. But call me when you want me, for I cannot navigate by the stars as you do, so I must hunt up a chart and get out my own instruments."
At that moment Ah Sing came aft and informed me that the captain desired my presence, so, making my way to his stuffy cabin, I soon stood beside him. He was lying in his bunk reading, but as I entered he cast aside the book and said, "I say, mate, ye needn"t give me away more than ye can help."
"Why, what"s the matter?"
"Nothing, so long as I lie on my back; but this darned motion doesn"t agree with me in any other position."
"Do you mean to say----?"
"That I is no sailor? You struck the bull first shot. I ain"t. I is a gold-miner, and got stranded in Broome after making a pile on the Marble Bar fields, an" losing it down in Roebourne. Lord knows how I got here, but old Wilc.o.x got me this billet with Hobart, "cause I could swear at the nigs better than any man he knowed. I know nothing about navigation except what a bushman knows, and here I is at sea entirely."
"But have you never had any accidents?"
"Oh, there have been some narrow squeaks, but that chap Aguinili is a smart fellow; he manages somehow, and I swears at---- Lor"! but I is bad. Oh!----"
"You"ll be all right soon," I said sympathisingly, as I left him. He was the best example of a bluffer I had ever come across, but he had the true grit of the sons of the Southern Cross, and as he knew nothing of navigation, he got along wonderfully well by leaving everything to fate and Aguinili.
It was a very rough night, but the _Bessie Fraser_ weathered it all right, thanks to the skilful handling of the sarang. Next evening we entered King Sound, and by seven o"clock were safely moored alongside the schooner _Electron_, George Hobart"s headquarters.
This gentleman was a very superior person to those usually met in such lat.i.tudes; he was of a scientific turn of mind, and had designed many strange appliances which were the wonder and admiration of the pearling fraternity.
"You have just arrived in time to witness the trial of my new dress,"
were almost his first words to me; and after dinner, in answer to my inquiry, he proceeded to explain wherein his dress differed from others, and to point out its antic.i.p.ated advantages. "Sixteen fathoms is the greatest depth at which we can work with the old dress, you know,"
he said, "and even at that a diver can only last out three seasons."
"Well, what"s the odds?" interrupted Quin; "they"re cheap, ain"t they?
and there"s any amount where they come from."
"That may be; but this dress is designed to give the diver a longer lease of life, and also to enable him to stand a good two or three fathoms more pressure. I have just got down a new G.B. dress from Singapore, and I intend to try mine alongside it to-morrow."
I did not then know what a G.B. dress was, but not wishing to display my ignorance, I did not inquire, and during the evening"s conversation I gathered that it was the invention of two Glasgow engineers, who had designed it to allow of greater depths being explored.
In the morning all hands began to prepare for the trials, and after breakfast Aguinili, as the most experienced diver, was lowered from the derrick in the G.B. dress, and Jim Mackenzie, the _Electron"s_ chief officer, was also weighted and dropped over in Hobart"s.
"Isn"t there a n.i.g.g.e.r handy to go down in the old dress now?" asked Quin, kicking over a helmet. "I"ll go two to one on it yet."
"The water is too deep here," answered Hobart. "No man could bottom in the old dress."
"I"ll go," said the intrepid Quin, "and chance it."
"No. Hallo! Mackenzie is down. Great heavens! The pumps are not working." Hobart sprang to the pumps, and threw the two Malay operators across the deck, then, a.s.sisted by Quin and myself, began pumping furiously. It was useless. The pumps were not drawing air. The perspiration burst out over my face as I realised the position that poor Mackenzie was in. Quin swore, and then rushed to the winch, where the crew, in answer to Hobart"s signal, were already hauling in. In less time than it takes to tell the diver was above the surface, and in another second his helmet was unscrewed.
"Poor old Mac," said Quin, as the limp form was removed from its cage; "I always reckoned that he would peg out before me."
"Wrong again, Quin," feebly murmured Mackenzie. "You won"t be mate of the _Electron_ this trip----But I say, there"s sh.e.l.ls down there as big as a table, and they are packed like peas."
"Never mind them at present, Mac," spoke Hobart. "We"re glad to see you all right again; but what happened to the dress----?"
"The dress is all right, but the beggars must have stopped pumping while I was sinking, and when they started again I fancy the check-valve would not work."
"Ah! then we burst the connection on deck when we rushed to the pumps.
That means my dress won"t do for twenty fathoms at any rate. Hallo!
there"s Aguinili"s signal. Haul away. Why, it is sh.e.l.l, and look at the size."
In answer to the diver"s signal the men had hauled up his sh.e.l.l-net, and when it appeared above the waters the size of the sh.e.l.ls had drawn forth an exclamation of surprise from all. Soon after Aguinili himself came up laden with the spoil of the nineteen-fathom ledge, and when he was brought on deck and his helmet removed he told a wonderful story of the wealth of the deep deposits, which hitherto no man had seen.
"Sh.e.l.l plenty. No need move away; fill net all time same place. Good sh.e.l.l for pearl, I know that, for I see sea-snake feed much. I go down again quick."
"No, no, Aguinili," cried Hobart, handing him a gla.s.s of spirits. "We have plenty of time for that. Have the sh.e.l.l been moving much?"
"No. Sh.e.l.ls grow there. No currents; no monsoons; deep, deep coral bottom. No sh.e.l.l on sixteen-fathom bottom here."
"Well, gentlemen," finally said Hobart, "we have seen the result of the G.B. comes out first. I will cable to Singapore to send down some more of them, and I will see that Gentleman James, Captain Biddies, and the others get to know of its good points. Who knows what fortunes we may now obtain from these deep neglected sounds."
Two hours afterwards the _Electron_ was sailing down King Sound towards the Indian Ocean, and on my venturing to ask where we were bound for, Hobart informed me that he had received word from Derby that the bubonic plague had broken out afresh in Fremantle, and it was therefore obvious that the _Australind_ would not now call at the northern port; for if she did so she would a.s.suredly be quarantined at Singapore through not having been sufficient time at sea since leaving Australian waters.
"We are going to put you on board now," he added, "and Mackenzie is going up to Raffles with you to see about the new dresses. Meanwhile the men are opening the sh.e.l.ls from the deep level, and I hope that we will find a memento to give you of your visit to this coast."
Early in the afternoon a long hanging cloud of black smoke became visible away on the southern horizon, and knowing that it must be issuing from the funnels of the _Australind_ or the Adelaide Steamship Co."s trader _Albany_, we steered out to investigate, and, if need be, to intercept. It proved to be the former vessel, and in due course she answered our signal and hove to.
"Well, goodbye then, lad. I hope you will come back to this coast when you are tired of the old country," were Hobart"s parting words as Mackenzie and I clambered up the sides of the _Australind_.
"If you see a lugger cheap at Singapore you might buy it for me," cried Quin, throwing me a miner"s gold-bag; "and, I say, you might send me the second part of the book you gave me to read when we were coming up through the monsoon on the _Bessie_. I am darned curious to know the wind-up."
"And here"s a pair of the deep sh.e.l.ls; take care of them," cried Hobart, fastening a couple into the sling in which my baggage was being hoisted.
Three days after landing at Singapore I bought a small lugger for Quin, and sent back the balance of his money, and a complete copy of the "Pilgrim"s Progress" (which was the book requested) with Mackenzie, who also undertook to see about the lugger going south. Four days later, while tossing in the bay of Bengal on the SS. _Ballarat_, I began to rearrange my belongings so that they might be readily transferred to the connecting P. and O. mail steamer _Himalaya_ at Colombo. In doing so I chanced to open my sh.e.l.ls and found therein two magnificent pearls, and a note which read: "Please accept one of the enclosed from me. The other is from Aguinili, who has asked me to offer it to you in kind remembrance."
The Gresham Press,
UNWIN BROTHERS, LIMITED, WOKING AND LONDON.