CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Barry's thoughts kept him busy along with his duties for half an hour, by which time the schooner had taken up her boat, and a general transfer of men had been accomplished. The big pinnace, which belonged to the invisible gunboat, took on board the Dutch seamen and the survivors of Leyden's band, leaving the Barang's crew under Rolfe and Blunt on board the schooner with Barry. Tom Little was in close conversation with Houten, and Gordon stood by as if quietly awaiting the outcome of it. Old Bill Blunt was forward, making the decks rattle with his lusty roar as he drove the little brown sailors to their jobs of preparing for sea. Outwardly the old fellow had managed to keep intact; it was only when he cut himself a quid of tobacco by jamming the plug into the sheave of a block and sawing at it with one hand that it could be noticed his left hand never left his belt and that his sleeve was dark and soggy.
Mrs. Goring and Natalie Sheldon appeared on deck while Little and Houten were still talking, and they had regained their color and self-control, only revealing a slight shudder of recollection when their eyes fell upon the devastated creek. Houten noticed this and cut short his consultation.
"So, dot iss settled, Mister Leedle," he said abruptly and met the ladies with a vast and paternal smile. "Captain Barry, when dot launch I had comes back from dot gunboat, we schall sail. Mister Leedle has agreed to go back to the station unt take charge until Mister Gordon returns, unt he takes dot launch unt some navy mans to stay mit him in case dose leedle brown mans ouf Leyden's make more bodder. So now mine boy Hendrik schall tell you somedings, yes?"
Barry kept silent, merely nodding. Vandersee spoke in low tones to Gordon and Mrs. Goring for a moment, received their aquiescence to his question, then faced the skipper with an expression of resignation to a task not entirely to his liking.
"Some of the story is not very pleasant, Barry, so I'll make it brief," he said. "It's due to you and to Little, otherwise I'd ask you to let your doubts remain unanswered. Beginning with my uncle's engagement of Little and yourself, at that time everybody concerned believed that gold was to be found on this river,—everybody, that is, except Leyden and Gordon here. Gordon desires me to tell the entire story, so I am not going to waste time by repeated apologies. The chief thing in this gold business is that Houten believed it implicitly, and naturally he wanted to know where his property was going to. Hence your engagement.
"Now to explain some of the mystery that has bothered you, Captain, it was discovered by my government some time back that Leyden was operating a tremendous opium smuggling business, and the entire interior of the island was in his grip. You'll see now how he could command such numbers of native fighters to drive you out or kill you. Eventually I was detailed to the duty of running him down. I am, as you perhaps have gathered, a lieutenant in the Dutch navy."