CHAPTER XXVII
THE GIANT AWAKES
Allen Drew had not been a party to the conference between Captain Hamilton and Grimshaw after supper. After the strenuous exertions of the day he had felt the need of a bath and a change of linen.
Once more clothed and feeling refreshed, Drew paced the afterdeck with his cigar, hearing the voices of Captain Hamilton and Tyke in the former's cabin, but having no desire just then to join them.
Although his body was rejuvenated, his mind was far from peaceful. He had not lost hope of their finding what they had come so far to search for; he still believed the pirate hoard to be buried on the side of the whale's hump. "Hope deferred maketh the heart sick;" but hope had not been long enough deferred in this case to sicken any of the party of treasure seekers. Yet there was a great sickness at the heart of Allen Drew.
That particular incident of the afternoon that had brought the remembrance of Parmalee so keenly to his mind, had thrown a pall over his thoughts not easily lifted.
It had shown, too, that Parmalee's strange and awful death had strongly affected Ruth. That mystery was likely to erect a barrier between the girl and himself. Indeed, it had done so already. Drew felt it—he knew it!
There was in her father's attitude something intangible, yet certain enough, which spelled the captain's doubt of him. As long as Parmalee's disappearance remained unexplained, as long as Ditty's story could not be disproved, Drew felt that Captain Hamilton would nurse in his mind a doubt of his innocence.
And that doubt, if it remained, whether Drew was ever tried for the crime of Parmalee's murder or not, just as surely put Ruth out of his grasp as though his hands actually dripped of the dead man's blood.
Captain Hamilton would never see his daughter marry a man under such a cloud. Drew appreciated the character of the schooner's commander too thoroughly to base any illusions upon the fact that Hamilton treated him kindly. They were partners in this treasure hunt. The doubloons once secured, the Bertha Hamilton once in port, Drew well knew that Ruth's father would do what he felt to be his duty. He would be Drew's accuser at the bar of public justice. That, undoubtedly, was a foregone conclusion.
Plunged in the depth of these despairing thoughts, Drew was startled by the light fall of a soft hand upon his arm, and he descried the slight figure of Ruth beside him.
"Walking the deck alone, Allen?" she said softly. "I wondered where you were."
"Just doing my usual forty laps after supper," he responded, trying to speak lightly.
"I should think your work to-day in the digging, to say nothing of our experience in the cave, would have been as much exercise as you really needed," she said, laughing. "And all for nothing!"
"We could scarcely expect success so soon," he replied.
"No? Perhaps success is not to be our portion, Allen. What then?"
"Well," and he tried to say it cheerfully, "we've had a run for our money."
"A run for the pirate's money, you mean. Let's see," she added slyly, "that confession did not state just how many doubloons were buried, did it?"
"The amount specified I failed to make out," he told her. "Time had erased it."
"Then we are after an unknown amount—an unknown quantity of doubloons. And perhaps we are fated never to know the amount of the pirate's hoard," and she laughed again. Then, suddenly, she clutched his arm more tightly as they paced the deck together, crying under her breath: "Oh! look yonder Allen."
A strangely flickering light dispelled the pall that hung above the hilltop. The cloud of smoke or steam, rising from the crater and which they had first seen that afternoon, was now illuminated and shot through with rays of light evidently reflected from the bowels of the hill.
"The volcano is surely alive!" cried the young man.
The crew, loafing on the forecastle, saw the phenomenon, and their chattering voices rose in a chorus of excitement. Tyke came up from below and joined Drew and the captain's daughter. The glare of the volcano illuminated the night, and they could see each other's features distinctly.
"Looks like we'd stirred things up over there," chuckled the old man. "There are more'n ghosts of dead and gone pirates guarding that treasure."
"It—it is rather terrifying, isn't it?" Ruth suggested.
"It is to them ignorant swabs for'ard," growled Tyke. "Good thing, though. They'll be too scared to want to roam over the island. We want it to ourselves till we find the loot. Don't we, Allen?"
"That's true. The disturbance over there may not be an unmitigated evil," was the young man's rejoinder.
Captain Hamilton called Ruth through the open window of his cabin, and she bade Grimshaw and Allen Drew good night and went below. Tyke remained only long enough to finish his cigar, then he departed.
The light over the volcano faded, the rumblings ceased. Drew, in his rubber-soled shoes, paced the deck alone; but he could not be seen ten feet away, for he wore dark clothes.
He knew that Mr. Rogers had long since gone to his room. Most of the crew had either sought their bunks or were stretched out on the forecastle hatch. Yet he heard a low murmur of voices from amidships. When he paced to that end of his walk, the voices reached him quite clearly and he recognized that of the one-eyed mate. The other man he knew to be Bingo, the only English sailor aboard—a shrewd and rat-faced little Cockney.
"Blime me, Bug-eye! but wot Hi sye Hi means. The devil 'imself's near where there's so much brimstone. If that hull bloomin' 'ill blows hup, where'll we be, Hi axes ye?"
"Jest here or hereabouts," growled Ditty.
Drew stepped nearer and frankly listened to the conversation.
"Hi'm as 'ungry for blunt as the next bloke, an' ye sye there's plenty hin it——"
"Slathers of it, Bingo," said the mate earnestly. "Why, man! some of these islands down here are rotten with buried pirate gold. Millions and millions was stole and buried by them old boys."
"Yah! Hi've 'eard hall that before, Hi 'ave. Who hain't?" said Bingo, with considerable shrewdness. "Honly hit halways struck me that if them old buccaneers, as they calls 'em, was proper sailormen, they'd 'ave spent the hull blunt hinstead o' buryin' hof hit."
"Holy heavers, Bingo, they couldn't spend it all!" exclaimed Ditty. "There was too much of it. Millions, mind you!"
"Millions! My heye!" croaked the Cockney. "A million of yer Hamerican dollars or a million sterling?"
"You can lay to it," said Ditty firmly, "that there's more'n one million in English pounds buried in these here islands. And there's a bunch of it somewheres on this island."
"Then, Bug-eye, wye don't we git that map hand dig it hup hourselves on the bloomin' jump? Wye wite? We kin easy 'andle the hafter-guard."
"The boys are balkin', that's why," growled Ditty. "They're like you—afraid of that rotten old volcano."
"Blime me! Hand wye wouldn't they be scare't hof hit?" snarled the Cockney.
"That bein' the general feelin'," Ditty said calmly, "why we'll stick to my plan. Let the old man dig it up hisself and bring it aboard.
"It'll save us the trouble, won't it? And mebbe we can git rid of some of the swabs, one at a time——"
"Huh!" chuckled Bingo. "One's gone halready. Hi see yer bloomin' scheme, Bug-eye."
"Well, then," said the mate, rising from his seat, "keep it to yourself and take your orders from me, like the rest does."
"Hall right, matey, hall right," said Bingo, and likewise stood up.
Drew dared remain no longer. He stole away to the stern and stood for a while, looking over the rail into the black water—no blacker than the rage that filled his heart.
He felt half tempted to attack the treacherous Ditty with his bare hands and strangle the rascal. But he knew that this was no time for a reckless move. There were only himself, the captain, and Tyke to face this promised mutiny. Probably they could trust Rogers, and some few of the men forward might be faithful to the after-guard. The uncertainty of this, however, was appalling.
After a time he went below and rapped lightly on the captain's door. The commander of the Bertha Hamilton opened to him instantly. He was partly undressed.
"Eh? That you, Mr. Drew?"
"Sh! Put out your light, Captain. I'll bring Mr. Grimshaw. I have something to tell you both," whispered the young man.
"All right," said the captain, quick to understand.
His light was out before Drew reached Tyke's door. This was unlocked, but the old man was in his berth. Long years at sea had made Tyke a light sleeper. He often said he slept with one eye open.
"That you, Allen?"
"Yes. Hush! We want you in the captain's room—he and I. Come just as you are."
"Aye, aye!" grunted the old man, instantly out of his berth.
The light was turned low in the saloon. Drew did not know whether Ditty had come down or not; but unmistakable nasal sounds from Mr. Roger's room assured him that the second officer was safe.
Tyke, light-footed as a cat, followed him to Captain Hamilton's door. It was ajar, and they went in. The commander of the schooner sat on the edge of his berth. They could see each other dimly in the faint light that entered through the transom over the door. Captain Hamilton had drawn the blind at the window.
"Well, what's up?" he murmured.
Drew wasted no time, but in whispers repeated the conversation he had overheard between Bingo and the mate. When he had finished, Tyke observed coolly:
"I'd 've bet dollars to doughnuts that that was the way she headed. Now we know. Eh, Cap'n Rufe?"
"Yes," grunted the captain.
"What shall we do?" asked Drew.
"Do? Keep on," Captain Hamilton said firmly. "What d' you say, Tyke?"
"Yes," agreed Grimshaw. "Ditty is playing a waiting game. So will we. An' we have the advantage."
"I don't see that," Drew muttered.
"Why, we know his plans. He don't know ours," explained the old man. "We haven't got to worry about them swabs till we've found the doubloons, anyway."
"If we find 'em," murmured the captain.
"By George! we're bound to find 'em," Tyke said, with confidence. "That's what we come down here for."
His enthusiasm seemed unquenched. Drew could not lose heart when the old man was so hopefully determined.
"But Miss Ruth?" Allen suggested timidly, looking at Captain Hamilton.
"Don't bother about her," answered the captain shortly. "She'll not be out of my sight a minute. She must go ashore with us every day. I'll not trust her aboard alone with these scoundrels."
They talked little more that night; but it was agreed to take all the firearms and much of the ammunition, disguised in wrappings of some kind, ashore with them in the morning and conceal all with the digging tools.
"Jest as well to take them all along," Tyke had advised. "I hope we won't have to use 'em. But if we're going to take Rogers with us to-morrow and leave Ditty in charge here, the rascal might go nosing around an' find them guns."
"I hate to leave Ditty in possession of the schooner," returned the captain, with a worried look.
"So do I," admitted Tyke. "But after all, it isn't only the schooner he wants. She's no good to him until we git the treasure aboard. The only men it will be wise to take with us to-morrow are Rogers an' a boat's crew that you know you can trust."
Immediately after breakfast the next morning the captain summoned the second officer.
"I want you to take me ashore this morning, Mr. Rogers," he said; "and as I have a lot of heavy dunnage that the men will have to carry, I'll want a husky crew. Take six men; and I want you to take special pains in picking out the best men we have. Men whom we can trust and who haven't been mixed up with the whispering and the queer business that you mentioned."
The second officer's eye flashed, and he nodded understandingly.
"Aye, aye, sir," he replied. "As for the men, sir," he went on reflectively, "there's a dozen I could stake my life on who wouldn't be in any crooked game. Suppose," he counted off on his fingers, "we take Olsen and Binney and Barker and Dodd and Thompson and Willis. They're all true blue, and I don't think they're in such a funk over the volcano as some of the others."
"They'll do," assented the captain. "They're the very men I had in mind. Call some of them down now and have them get this stuff up on deck. And tell the cook to send dinner grub along, for we may be gone all day."
"Aye, aye, sir," answered Rogers, as he left the cabin.
A little later the party gathered at the rail, and the captain spoke to the mate.
"Mr. Rogers is going to take us ashore, Mr. Ditty," he said pleasantly. "There are no special orders. You can let some of the men have shore leave if they want it, although after yesterday I don't suppose they will."
"I suppose not," replied Ditty surlily. "They'll all be glad when we turn our backs on this cursed island."
The captain pretended not to hear. The goods were stowed in the boat, the party and crew took their places, and the craft was pulled smartly to the beach.
"Now, my lads," said the captain briskly, as he stepped ashore, "there's quite a trip ahead of you and you've got a man's job in carrying this stuff, but I'll see that you don't lose anything by it. Step up smartly now."
The men shouldered their burdens and started off on the trail that had now grown familiar to the treasure seekers. The men were able to maintain a fairly rapid pace, and before long the party arrived at the edge of the clearing within which the treasure was supposed to be buried.
The captain took Rogers aside.
"Take your men back to the beach now, Mr. Rogers," he directed. "Remember, I want none of them poking about here. We'll rejoin you in good season for supper, if not before."
"Aye, aye, sir!" was the cheerful reply.
Rogers turned with his men, and the captain watched their backs far down the forest path, until they were lost to sight in the greenery of the jungle.
"Well now," he remarked, as he turned again to the others, "lively's the word. Let's get busy and——. Great Scott! Look at that!" he exclaimed, staring at the top of the whale's hump.
A column of black smoke was rising from the crater.
"Looks like the whale was going to blow again," Tyke said, with a feeble attempt at levity to disguise his apprehension.
The next moment the ears of the party were deafened by a terrific explosion.