The Courage of Captain Plum.
by James Oliver Curwood.
CHAPTER I
THE TWO OATHS
On an afternoon in the early summer of 1856 Captain Nathaniel Plum, master and owner of the sloop _Typhoon_ was engaged in nothing more important than the smoking of an enormous pipe. Clouds of strongly odored smoke, tinted with the lights of the setting sun, had risen above his head in unremitting volumes for the last half hour. There was infinite contentment in his face, notwithstanding the fact that he had been meditating on a subject that was not altogether pleasant. But Captain Plum was, in a way, a philosopher, though one would not have guessed this fact from his appearance. He was, in the first place, a young man, not more than eight or nine and twenty, and his strong, rather thin face, tanned by exposure to the sea, was just now lighted up by eyes that shone with an unbounded good humor which any instant might take the form of laughter.
At the present time Captain Plum"s vision was confined to one direction, which carried his gaze out over Lake Michigan. Earlier in the day he had been able to discern the hazy outline of the Michigan wilderness twenty miles to the eastward. Straight ahead, shooting up rugged and sharp in the red light of the day"s end, were two islands. Between these, three miles away, the sloop _Typhoon_ was strongly silhouetted in the fading glow. Beyond the islands and the sloop there were no other objects for Captain Plum"s eyes to rest upon. So far as he could see there was no other sail. At his back he was shut in by a dense growth of trees and creeping vines, and unless a small boat edged close in around the end of Beaver Island his place of concealment must remain undiscovered. At least this seemed an a.s.sured fact to Captain Plum.
In the security of his position he began to whistle softly as he beat the bowl of his pipe on his boot-heel to empty it of ashes. Then he drew a long-barreled revolver from under a coat that he had thrown aside and examined it carefully to see that the powder and ball were in solid and that none of the caps was missing. From the same place he brought forth a belt, buckled it round his waist, shoved the revolver into its holster, and dragging the coat to him, fished out a letter from an inside pocket. It was a dirty, much worn letter. Perhaps he had read it a score of times. He read it again now, and then, refilling his pipe, settled back against the rock that formed a rest for his shoulders and turned his eyes in the direction of the sloop.
The last rim of the sun had fallen below the Michigan wilderness and in the rapidly increasing gloom the sloop was becoming indistinguishable.
Captain Plum looked at his watch. He must still wait a little longer before setting out upon the adventure that had brought him to this isolated spot. He rested his head against the rock, and thought. He had been thinking for hours. Back in the thicket he heard the prowling of some small animal. There came the sleepy chirp of a bird and the rustling of tired wings settling for the night. A strange stillness hovered about him, and with it there came over him a loneliness that was chilling, a loneliness that made him homesick. It was a new and unpleasant sensation to Captain Plum. He could not remember just when he had experienced it before; that is, if he dated the present from two weeks ago to-night. It was then that the letter had been handed to him in Chicago, and it had been a weight upon his soul and a p.r.i.c.k to his conscience ever since. Once or twice he had made up his mind to destroy it, but each time he had repented at the last moment. In a sudden revulsion at his weakness he pulled himself together, crumpled the dirty missive into a ball, and flung it out upon the white rim of beach.
At this action there came a quick movement in the dense wall of verdure behind him. Noiselessly the tangle of vines separated and a head thrust itself out in time to see the bit of paper fall short of the water"s edge. Then the head shot back as swiftly and as silently as a serpent"s.
Perhaps Captain Plum heard the gloating chuckle that followed the movement. If so he thought it only some night bird in the brush.
"Heigh-ho!" he exclaimed with some return of his old cheer, "it"s about time we were starting!" He jumped to his feet and began brushing the sand from his clothes. When he had done, he walked out upon the rim of beach and stretched himself until his arm-bones cracked.
Again the hidden head shot forth from its concealment. A sudden turn and Captain Plum would certainly have been startled. For it was a weird object, this spying head; its face dead-white against the dense green of the verdure, with shocks of long white hair hanging down on each side, framing between them a pair of eyes that gleamed from cavernous sockets, like black glowing beads. There was unmistakable fear, a tense anxiety in those glittering eyes as Captain Plum walked toward the paper, but when he paused and stretched himself, the sole of his boot carelessly trampling the discarded letter, the head disappeared again and there came another satisfied bird-like chuckle from the gloom of the thicket.
Captain Plum now put on his coat, b.u.t.toned it close to conceal the weapons in his belt, and walked along the narrow water-run that crept like a white ribbon between the lake and the island wilderness. No sooner had he disappeared than the bushes and vines behind the rock were torn asunder and a man wormed his way through them. For an instant he paused, listening for returning footsteps, and then with startling agility darted to the beach and seized the crumpled letter.
The person who for the greater part of the afternoon had been spying upon Captain Plum from the security of the thicket was to all appearances a very small and a very old man, though there was something about him that seemed to belie a first guess at his age. His face was emaciated; his hair was white and hung in straggling ma.s.ses on his shoulders; his hooked nose bore apparently the infallible stamp of extreme age. Yet there was a strange and uncanny strength and quickness in his movements. There was no stoop to his shoulders. His head was set squarely. His eyes were as keen as steel. It would have been impossible to have told whether he was fifty or seventy. Eagerly he smoothed out the abused missive and evidently succeeded even in the failing light, in deciphering much of it, for the glimmer of a smile flashed over his thin features as he thrust the paper into his pocket.
Without a moment"s hesitation he set out on the trail of Captain Plum. A quarter of a mile down the path he overtook the object of his pursuit.
"Ah, how do you do, sir?" he greeted as the younger man turned about upon hearing his approach. "A mighty fast pace you"re setting for an old man, sir!" He broke into a laugh that was not altogether unpleasant, and boldly held out a hand. "We"ve been expecting you, but--not in this way.
I hope there"s nothing wrong?"
Captain Plum had accepted the proffered hand. Its coldness and the singular appearance of the old man who had come like an apparition chilled him. In a moment, however, it occurred to him that he was a victim of mistaken ident.i.ty. As far as he knew there was no one on Beaver Island who was expecting him. To the best of his knowledge he was a fool for being there. His crew aboard the sloop had agreed upon that point with extreme vehemence and, to a man, had attempted to dissuade him from the mad project upon which he was launching himself among the Mormons in their island stronghold. All this came to him while the little old man was looking up into his face, chuckling, and shaking his hand as if he were one of the most important and most greatly to be desired personages in the world.
"Hope there"s nothing wrong, Cap"n?" he repeated.
"Right as a trivet here, Dad," replied the young man, dropping the cold hand that still persisted in clinging to his own. "But I guess you"ve got the wrong party. Who"s expecting me?"
The old man"s face wrinkled itself in a grimace and one gleaming eye opened and closed in an understanding wink.
"Ho, ho, ho!--of course you"re not expected. Anyway, you"re not _expected_ to be expected! Cautious--a born general--mighty clever thing to do. Strang should appreciate it." The old man gave vent to his own approbation in a series of inimitable chuckles. "Is that your sloop out there?" he inquired interestedly.
Something in the strangeness of the situation began to interest Captain Plum. He had planned a little adventure of his own, but here was one that promised to develop into something more exciting. He nodded his head.
"That"s her."
"Splendid cargo," went on the old man. "Splendid cargo, eh?"
"Pretty fair."
"Powder in good shape, eh?"
"Dry as tinder."
"And b.a.l.l.s--lots of b.a.l.l.s, and a few guns, eh?"
"Yes, we _have_ a few guns," said Captain Plum. The old man noted the emphasis, but the darkness that had fast settled about them hid the added meaning that pa.s.sed in a curious look over the other"s face.
"Odd way to come in, though--very odd!" continued the old man, gurgling and shaking as if the thought of it occasioned him great merriment.
"Very cautious. Level business head. Want to know that things are on the square, eh?"
"That"s it!" exclaimed Captain Plum, catching at the proffered straw.
Inwardly he was wondering when his feet would touch bottom. Thus far he had succeeded in getting but a single grip on the situation. Somebody was expected at Beaver Island with powder and b.a.l.l.s and guns. Well, he had a certain quant.i.ty of these materials aboard his sloop, and if he could make an agreeable bargain--
The old man interrupted the plan that was slowly forming itself in Captain Plum"s puzzled brain.
"It"s the price, eh?" He laughed shrewdly. "You want to see the color of the gold before you land the goods. I"ll show it to you. I"ll pay you the whole sum to-night. Then you"ll take the stuff where I tell you to.
Eh? Isn"t that so?" He darted ahead of Captain Plum with a quick alert movement. "Will you please follow me, sir?"
For an instant Captain Plum"s impulse was to hold back. In that instant it suddenly occurred to him that he was lending himself to a rank imposition. At the same time he was filled with a desire to go deeper into the adventure, and his blood thrilled with the thought of what it might hold for him.
"Are you coming, sir?"
The little old man had stopped a dozen paces away and turned expectantly.
"I tell you again that you"ve got the wrong man, Dad!"
"Will you follow me, sir?"
"Well, if you"ll have it so--d.a.m.ned if I won"t!" cried Captain Plum. He felt that he had relieved his conscience, anyway. If things should develop badly for him during the next few hours no one could say that he had lied. So he followed light-heartedly after the old man, his eyes and ears alert, and his right hand, by force of habit, reaching under his coat to the b.u.t.t of his pistol. His guide said not another word until they had traveled for half an hour along a twisting path and stood at last on the bald summit of a knoll from which they could look down upon a number of lights twinkling dimly a quarter of a mile away. One of these lights gleamed above all the others, like a beacon set among fireflies.
"That"s St. James," said the old man. His voice had changed. It was low and soft, as though he feared to speak above a whisper.
"St. James!"
The young man at his side gazed down silently upon the scattered lights, his heart throbbing in a sudden tumult of excitement. He had set out that day with the idea of resting his eyes on St. James. In its silent mystery the town now lay at his feet.
"And that light--" spoke the old man. He pointed a trembling arm toward the glare that shone more powerfully than the others. "That light marks the sacred home of the king!" His voice had again changed. A metallic hardness came into it, his words were vibrant with a strange excitement which he strove hard to conceal. It was still light enough for Captain Plum to see that the old man"s black, beady eyes were startlingly alive with newly aroused emotion.
"You mean--"
"Strang!"
He started rapidly down the knoll and there floated back to Captain Plum the soft notes of his meaningless chuckle. A dozen rods farther on his mysterious guide turned into a by-path which led them to another knoll, capped by a good-sized building made of logs. There sounded the grating of a key in a lock, the shooting of a bolt, and a door opened to admit them.
"You will pardon me if I don"t light up," apologized the old man as he led the way in. "A candle will be sufficient. You know there must be privacy in these matters--always. Eh? Isn"t that so?"