"Then start it," Tommy said. "Run alongside and we"ll climb over!"
"Mr. Thomas," he demurred, "that"s rank piracy, unless we"re the law. I wouldn"t say no, understand, if there warn"t some other way. But if we try it they"ll have every right to shoot us down--which they can easy do, being hid and ready!"
"You forget, Gates, they haven"t a right on earth. They don"t want to face the law with the best justification ever known--they"d be mortally afraid to!"
"Then they wouldn"t be any less particular about shooting us," the old skipper replied.
There was no denying that Tommy had impaled himself upon his own point; not that he cared a hang whether they began shooting or not, but the anxiety of Gates caused him to temporize, and he said:
"Bluff it! Sing across that we"re the U. S. A. ordering "em to stop. Say it strong enough to make us believe it, too, Gates--so we"ll feel self-righteous when the sc.r.a.p comes!"
Gates grinned and, cupping his hands, shouted:
"_Orchid_, ahoy! This yacht"s chartered by the U. S. Secret Service, and you"re ordered to come about! Delay one minute and we blow you out of the water!"
"Accomplished old liar," Tommy chuckled. "See anything?"
Gates, so earnest was he in this role of Uncle Sam, had his watch out, marking off the seconds. When the sixtieth had ticked he called again, in a more ferocious tone:
"Time"s up, but I"ll give you harf a minute longer! This is the larst word!"
"Now," said Tommy, having waited the thirty seconds which brought no response, "let"s see you make good! Will you fire a torpedo, or one of the fifteen-inch guns?"
But Gates was seeing no humor in the situation; neither was I; neither was Tommy, if the truth were known. Our position was in a sense desperate. We had bluffed and the bluff had been called. Five minutes ago we might have turned back, but such a course now would make us laughing-stocks even to ourselves. And there was Sylvia. What sort of a quitter would she think me!
I saw that someone had to board that yacht, even though such a course, almost to a certainty, meant a test of the professor"s surgical skill--a skill we knew he possessed along with his other attainments. But I could not--I simply would not--risk any of our fellows on an undertaking so hazardous. Conscious, however, of Tommy"s utter pig-headedness I saw the futility of merely asking him to stay behind; so my mind became instantly made up and, turning to Gates, I sharply asked:
"Who commands here?"
"Why, I"m the captain, sir," he answered, surprised at my tone.
"But whose orders are absolute?"
"Yours, Mr. Jack, sir."
"Then take this man below and keep him there while you run your rail alongside the _Orchid_. n.o.body follows me until I call, or shoot. Be lively, Captain!"
He looked his horror, but stiffly saluted, saying "Come" to Tommy who had turned white with anger and murderously glared at me.
"Do you mean this dirty trick?" he asked, and I did not meet his eyes when admitting it.
In a few minutes he and Gates were safely in the cabin--Gates having dived nimbly out of our canvas fort; while Tommy, oozing rage, had walked erect, shaking his fist at the _Orchid_ and calling me pretty much every kind of a lizard that crawls the earth.
Perhaps the mad that this aroused was good for me. I had charged into an enemy"s face once or twice under a certain amount of unpleasant fire and most uncomfortable sensations. A fellow"s _savoir faire_ is far from being faultless on such occasions, but if he"s mad--d.a.m.n mad--he gets along rather well, and Tommy"s insulting words turned the trick for me.
We had luffed a bit to let the _Orchid_ draw out ahead, and now all I seemed to see was her slowly nearing rail; twenty feet away, fifteen, ten. My rifle had been laid aside, and I felt to see that my automatic was snugly nested in its holster. Five feet, four, three--we were about to touch! With a bound I cleared my shelter just as the rails were within spanning distance, and vaulted over.
CHAPTER XI
A STRANGE FIND
My feet had no more than touched the new deck when I became electrified with a glorious feeling of possession, of mastery. Immediately I seemed to know just what to do, where to go; and my first move was another headlong rush at the companionway door, bursting it in with a kick and springing quickly aside--ready, listening; being for the time shielded from a fusillade of expected shots. And, because these were not forthcoming, I felt momentarily confused.
Yet in times of white hot action it is impulse that succeeds. This door ahead of me was the only way below, except perhaps a hatch, offering greater danger, somewhere forward; it was the only way, therefore, through which Sylvia might be brought up to safety. She was now below, and I would reach her if it were my last journey! Three bounds down the stairs took me into the cabin, my pistol forward, my nerves on hair-trigger, ready for anything that moved.
Silence!--that sickish silence which permeates places of death! No human sound could be detected--no sound of any kind, except an uncanny creaking beneath the floor where the old masts rested in their steps, and a gentle swish of water outside the hull.
There were two doors from the cabin, each opening into a separate, though parallel, pa.s.sageway that doubtless led forward to about the same general arrangements we had on the _Whim_--one past three staterooms, through a galley and into the sailors" quarters; the other, also past a stateroom or two, but opening to the ice-box room and galley. Both of these doors now swung slightly ajar, at a suspicious angle that almost without doubt told me where the men were crouched, and this rendered my position so inexcusably exposed that swift and vigorous action was the only choice. With finger tightening on the trigger I dashed at the nearer of these, giving it a kick that sent it banging against the wall.
The pa.s.sageway was empty, and thus encouraged I rushed the other door.
Here, again, no foe had lain in ambush.
I was crouched now, sheltered by a strip of paneled wall between the two doorways. The staterooms on one side must come next, and after them the galley, with the forecastle beyond, and even beyond this, perhaps, some kind of a cuddy.
Where the men were hiding G.o.d only knew, but hiding they were with c.o.c.ked weapons, firmly gripped knives at some point of vantage that had been carefully chosen--as they expected nothing less than half our crew.
I could almost feel their nearness; so alert were my senses that I fancied I could smell their sweaty clothes.
Again action spelled success and, marking the first stateroom, I bounded into it covering the interior with a quick sweep of my automatic.
Nothing! From this I sprang to the second room, showing myself in the pa.s.sageway only long enough to cover the s.p.a.ce. This, also, was empty.
A third was on this side before the galley should be reached. By my tactics of quick rushes I had doubtless made too fleeting a target to draw their fire, so I dashed at this third door. It was closed but yielded to my shoulder. As I entered, and became instantaneously aware that it contained no foe, my nerves were fired by the sound of rushing feet behind me.
Trapped! At such a time a man will ask an awful price for his life--when he is trapped by merciless villains to whom quarter is an unknown tongue! Springing behind the door, keeping only my pistol hand and eye beyond its thin part.i.tion, I waited with leveled weapon, ready to drop the first man who came in sight. He did not keep me long in suspense. It was Gates, while behind him pressed several anxious faces.
"Thank G.o.d, sir, you"re not killed," he shouted.
I was glad to see him, there"s no denying it!
"Mr. Thomas said he heard you call, so we came a-biling, sir!"
My mind was working rather fast; indeed, it seemed to be thinking at the rate of a thousand miles a minute--clear thinking, too--so even before Gates spoke the second time I had seen through Tommy"s ruse. Bless his old scalp, I was a dog not to have taken him in the first place, now that things were nearer equal. But I said hastily:
"Look sharp, Gates, I haven"t been farther than here! They"re in the galley!--I"m rushing it!"
So I splintered the door and charged through, with the others tripping over my heels. Then my revolver swung across and covered a crouching form.
"Hands up," I commanded.
Although darker here, we could see a huge, partially clothed figure on the floor, reclining very much as The Wounded Gladiator. Leaning above him, with an arm pa.s.sed beneath his shoulders, was another man.
"Hands up, you fool," I called again, ready to fire at the first suspicious move. The man lowered his burden and turned. It was Tommy.
"You"ll forgive me, Jack," he grinned. "We thought I heard you call--and that was to be the signal, you know!"
We thought I heard you call!