Part 31

“First thing to do now is to get him aboard the schooner,” said Wilbur. “We'll take him right across in the beach-combers' dory here. By Jove!” he exclaimed on a sudden. “The ambergris--I'd forgotten all about it.” His heart sank. In the hideous confusion of that morning's work, all thought of the loot had been forgotten. Had the battle been for nothing, after all? The moment the beach-combers had been made aware of the meditated attack, it would have been an easy matter for them to have hidden the ambergris--destroyed it even.

In two strides Wilbur had reached the beach-combers' dory and was groping in the forward cuddy. Then he uttered a great shout of satisfaction. The “stuff” was there, all of it, though the mass had been cut into quarters, three parts of it stowed in tea-flails, the fourth still reeved up in the hammock netting.

“We've got it!” he cried to Moran, who had followed him. “We've got it, Moran! Over $100,000. We're rich--rich as boodlers, you and I. Oh, it was worth fighting for, after all, wasn't it? Now we'll get out of here--now we'll cut for home.”

“It's only Charlie I'm thinking about,” answered Moran, hesitating. “If it wasn't for that we'd be all right. I don't know whether we did right, after all, in jumping the camp here. I wouldn't like to feel that I'd got Charlie into our quarrel only to have him killed.”

Wilbur stared at this new Moran in no little amazement. Where was the reckless, untamed girl of the previous night, who had sworn at him and denounced his niggling misgivings as to right and wrong?

“Hoh!” he retorted impatiently, “Charlie's right enough. And, besides, I didn't force him to anything. I--we, that is--took the same chances. If I hadn't done for my man there behind the cabin, he would have done for me. At all events, we carried our point. We got the loot. They took it from us, and we were strong enough to get it back.”

Moran merely nodded, as though satisfied with his decision, and added:

“Well, what next, mate?”

“We'll get back to the 'Bertha' now and put to sea as soon as we can catch the tide. I'll send Jim and two of the other men across in the dory with Charlie. The rest of us will go around by the shore. We've got to have a chin-chin with Hoang, if he don't get loose aboard there and fire the boat before we can get back. I don't propose taking these beach-combers back to 'Frisco with us.”

“What will we do with the two prisoners?” she asked.

“Let them go; we've got their arms.”

The positions of the two were reversed. It was Wilbur who assumed control and direction of what went forward, Moran taking his advice and relying upon his judgment.

In accordance with Wilbur's orders, Charlie was carried aboard the dory; which, with two Chinamen at the oars, and the ambergris stowed again into the cuddy, at once set off for the schooner. Wilbur himself cut the ropes on the two prisoners, and bade them shift for themselves. The rest of the party returned to the “Bertha Millner” around the wide sweep of the beach.

It was only by high noon, under the flogging of a merciless sun, that the entire crew of the little schooner once more reassembled under the shadow of her stranded hulk. They were quite worn out; and as soon as Charlie was lifted aboard, and the ambergris--or, as they spoke of it now, the “loot”--was safely stowed in the cabin, Wilbur allowed the Chinamen three or four hours' rest. They had had neither breakfast nor dinner; but their exhaustion was greater than their hunger, and in a few moments the entire half-dozen were stretched out asleep on the forward deck in the shadow of the foresail raised for the purpose of sheltering them. However, Wilbur and Moran sought out Hoang, whom they found as they had left him--bound upon the floor of the cabin.

“Now we have a talk--savvy?” Wilbur told him as he loosed the ropes about his wrists and ankles. “We got our loot back from you, old man, and we got one of your men into the bargain. You woke up the wrong crowd, Hoang, when you went up against this outfit. You're in a bad way, my friend. Your junk is wrecked; all your oil and blubber from the whale is lost; four of your men have run away, one is killed, another one we caught and let go, another one has been hamstrung; and you yourself are our prisoner, with your teeth filed down to your gums. Now,” continued Wilbur, with the profoundest gravity, “I hope this will be a lesson to you. Don't try and get too much the next time. Just be content with what is yours by right, or what you are strong enough to keep, and don't try to fight with white people. Other coolies, I don't say. But when you try to get the better of white people you are out of your class.”

The little beach-comber (he was scarcely above five feet) rubbed his chafed wrists, and fixed Wilbur with his tiny, twinkling eyes.

“What you do now?”

“We go home. I'm going to maroon you and your people here on this beach. You deserve that I should let you eat your fists by way of table-board; but I'm no such dirt as you. When our men left the schooner they brought off with them a good share of our provisions. I'll leave them here for you--and there's plenty of turtle and abalone to be had for the catching. Some of the American men-of-war, I believe, come down to this bay for target-practice twice a year, and if we speak any on the way up we'll ask them to call here for castaways. That's what I'll do for you, and that's all! If you don't like it, you can set out to march up the coast till you hit a town; but I wouldn't advise you to try it. Now what have you got to say?”

Hoang was silent. His queue had become unbound for half its length, and he plaited it anew, winking his eyes thoughtfully.

“Well, what do you say?” said Moran.

“I lose face,” answered Hoang at length, calmly.

“You lose face? What do you mean?”

“I lose face,” he insisted; then added: “I heap 'shamed. You fightee my China boy, you catchee me. My boy no mo' hab me fo' boss--savvy? I go back, him no likee me. Mebbe all same killee me. I lose face--no mo' boss.”

“What a herd of wild cattle!” muttered Wilbur.

“There's something in what he says, don't you think, mate?” observed Moran, bringing a braid over each shoulder and stroking it according to her habit.

“We'll ask Jim about it,” decided Wilbur.

But Jim at once confirmed Hoang's statement. “Oh, Kai-gingh killum no-good boss, fo' sure,” he declared.

“Don't you think, mate,” said Moran, “we'd better take him up to 'Frisco with us? We've had enough fighting and killing.”