Part 97

In spite of his rather contemptuous opinion of the wit of a girl who would hazard such a silly adventure, he found himself pitying her plight, guessing that she was really sorry. But as to what was going on in the master's cabin he had no way of ascertaining. He wondered whether Captain Downs would marry the couple in such equivocal fashion.

At any rate, pondered Mayo, how did it happen to be any affair of his? He had troubles enough of his own to occupy his sole attention.

Their spanking wind from the sou'west let go just as dusk shut down. A yellowish scud dimmed the stars. Mayo heard one of the mates say that the glass had dropped. He smelled nasty weather himself, having the sailor's keen instinct. The topsails were ordered in, and he climbed aloft and had a long, lone struggle before he got the heavy canvas folded and lashed.

When he reached the deck a mate commanded him to fasten the canvas covers over the skylights of the house. The work brought him within range of the conversation which Captain Downs and Bradish were carrying on, pacing the deck together.

“Of course I don't want to throw down anybody, captain,” Bradish was saying. There was an obsequious note in his voice; it was the tone of a man who was affecting confidential cordiality in order to get on--to win a favor. “But I have a lot of sympathy for you and for the rest of the schooner people. I have been right there in the office, and have had a finger in the pie, and I've seen what has been done in a good many cases. Of course, you understand, this is all between us! I'm not giving away any of the office secrets to be used against the big fellows. But I'm willing to show that I'm a friend of yours. And I know you'll be a friend of mine, and keep mum. All is, you can get wise from what I tell you and can keep your eyes peeled from now on.”

Mayo heard fragmentary explanation of how the combination of steamboat and barge interests had operated to leave only pickings to the schooners. The two men were tramping the deck together, and at the turns were too far away from him to be heard distinctly.

“But they're putting over the biggest job of all just now,” proceeded Bradish. “Confound it, Captain Downs, I'm not to be blamed for running away with a man's daughter after watching him operate as long as I have. His motto is, 'Go after it when you see a thing you want in this world.' I've been trained to that system. I've got just as much right to go after a thing as he. I'm treasurer of the Paramount--that's the trust with which they intend to smash the opposition. My job is to ask no questions and to sign checks when they tell me to, and Heaven only knows what kind of a goat it will make of me if they ever have a show-down in the courts! They worked some kind of a shenanigan to grab off the Vose line; I wired a pot of money to Fletcher Fogg, who was doing the dirty work, and it was paid to a clerk to work proxies at the annual meeting. And then Fogg put up some kind of a job on a greenhorn captain--worked a flip trick on the fellow and made him shove the Montana onto the sands. I suppose they'll have the Vose line at their price before I get back.”

Mayo sat there in the shadow, squatting on legs which trembled.

This babbler--tongue loosened by his new liberty and by the antagonism his small nature was developing, anticipating his employer's enmity--had dropped a word of what Mayo knew must be the truth. It had been a trick--and Fletcher Fogg had worked it! Mayo did not know who Fletcher Fogg's employer might be. From what office this tattler came he did not know; but it was evident that Bradish was cognizant of the trick. As a result of that trick, an honest man had been ruined and blacklisted, deprived of opportunity to work in his profession, was a fugitive, a despised sailor, kicked to the Very bottom of the ladder he had climbed so patiently and honorably.

Furious passion bowled over Mayo's prudence. He leaped down from the top of the house and presented himself in front of the two men.

“I heard it--I couldn't help hearing it!” he stuttered.

“Here's a nigger gone crazy!” yelped Captain Downs. “Ahoy, there, for'ard! Tumble aft with a rope!”

“I'm no nigger, and I'm not crazy!” shouted Mayo.

The swinging lantern in the companionway lighted him dimly. But in the gloom his dusky hue was only the more accentuated. His excitement seemed that of a man whose wits had been touched.

“I knew it was a trick. But what was the trick?” he demanded, starting toward Bradish, his clutching hands outspread.

Captain Downs kicked at this obstreperous sailor, and at the same time fanned a blow at his head with open palm.

Mayo avoided both the foot and the hand. “What does the law say about striking a sailor, captain? Hold on, there! I'm just as good a man as you are. Don't you tell those men to lay hands on me.” He backed away from the sailors who came running aft, with the second mate marshaling them. He stripped up his sleeve and held his arm across the radiance of the binnacle light. “That's a white man's skin, isn't it?” he demanded.

“What kind of play-acting is all this?” asked Old Mull, with astonished indignation.

In that crisis Mayo controlled his tongue after a mighty effort to steady himself. He was prompted to obey his mood and announce his identity with all the fury that was in him. But here stood the man who had served as one of the tools of his enemies, whoever they were. For his weapon against this man Mayo had only a few words of gossip which had been dropped in an unwary moment; he realized his position; he regretted his passionate haste. He was not ready to put himself into the power of his enemies by telling this man who he was; he remembered that he was running away from the law.

Bradish gaped at this intruder without seeming to understand what it all meant.

“Passengers better get below out of the muss,” advised Captain Downs. “Here's a crazy nigger, mate. Grab him and tie him up.”

Mayo backed to the rack at the rail and pulled out two belaying-pins, mighty weapons, one for each hand.

Bradish hurried away into the depths of the house, manifestly glad to get out from underfoot.

“Don't you allow those niggers to lay their hands on me,” repeated the man at bay. “Captain Downs, let me have a word to you in private.” He had desperately decided on making a confidant of one of his kind. He bitterly needed the help a master mariner could give him.

“Get at him!” roared the skipper. “Go in, you niggers!”

“By the gods! you'll be short-handed, sir. I'll kill 'em!”

That threat was more effective than mere bluster. Captain Downs instinctively squinted aloft at the scud which was dimming the stars; he sniffed at the volleying wind.

“One word to you, and you'll understand, sir!” pleaded Mayo. He put the pins back into the rack and walked straight to the captain.