"Keep the old man quiet until he comes to himself," I warned. "If you don't, he'll publish your little gold-bar plot to the whole ship's company," and I briefed the pathetic little scene we had broken in upon when we found Goff.
"Plucky old duffer!" said Bonteck warmly, when Quinby and his mate had half led and half carried Goff up the ladder. "I've been telling you all along that he was the right sort. But come aboard. We're going to hold a drumhead court-martial and try these amateur pirates right here and now."
"You don't need me for that," I objected. "Let me have a couple of the Portuguese sailormen and I'll take the long-boat and go around to our abandoned camp for the dunnage we left behind."
"Oh, damn the dunnage—let it go!" he broke out impatiently; but he changed his tune when I reminded him that since the abandoned luggage was made up chiefly of the women's steamer trunks, it would be wise for us to salvage it if only in the interests of peace and quietness.
"All right; go to it," he yielded; and after I had picked my crew of two, I took the long-boat and set about the salvaging.
It was a short horse, soon curried. The gasoline boat was fairly speedy, and the run down the lagoon was quickly made. With two huskies to do the porterage, little time was lost in stripping the camp of everything that was worth carrying away, and well within the hour we were back at the Andromeda's accommodation ladder. Waiting only long enough to see the trunks going overside in a whip tackle that had been rigged for the purpose, I went aboard and found that the sea court had been in session, that the yacht's anchor was catted, and that the stage was set for the final act in the drama of the night of alarms.
"We were waiting for you—or rather for that long-boat," said Van Dyck, after I had climbed to the bridge from which he was directing the luggage bestowal.
"What are you going to do?" I asked.
"Wait and you will see," he replied; and then he told me the findings of the drumhead court. The mutineers, with Le Gros for their leader, were members of a Central American revolutionary junta which had its headquarters in New York. At first, the intention had been to capture the Andromeda and use her as a means of transportation for arms and ammunition, and, as Goff had told us, one cargo of the munitions had already been carried and landed. But the secret of Van Dyck's buried gold—which, as it appeared, was no secret at all so far as Lequat and the bandit chief were concerned—had brought them back to the island.
"Goff says they made no bones about telling him that they were killing time in the ammunition shipment, with the cold-blooded purpose of letting us starve in the interval," Van Dyck said in conclusion. "It was not Le Gros's intention to give us any provisions at all when we were marooned, but Goff, who was shrewd enough not to make any resistance when he found it would be useless, overpersuaded him."