"Take a look at them," I whispered to Riggs, and made way for him at the scuttle peephole.
"Blast him!" raged Riggs as he saw the scene on the bridge. "I never thought I would live to see the like of that!"
"But how does he keep her engines going? The fireroom crew must know what has happened," I said.
"What's left of 'em do," said Riggs. "He's likely got a few men below who think they will get a share of the loot if they keep up steam. Perhaps the Filipino chief is at his post keeping the chinkies going—leave that to the devil on the bridge—he knows his game."
He drew back into the companion, and I looked out again. I could see a pair of shoes sticking out past the donkey-engine, just abaft the foremast; but the machinery hid the man from me. Presently a strip of canvas fluttered in the breeze, and Long Jim stood up, with a sail-needle and a length of sail-twine in his teeth, and cut out a square of tarpaulin on the deck.
"Look at the cockney," I said to Riggs. "I can't make out what he is up to."
He studied the sailor for a minute, and then drew back and whispered:
"Sewing sacks to carry the gold away. They are getting ready to scuttle her. The starboard boats are hanging in the davits, ready to lower away when we are behind the island. There is a channel a mile wide in there, and deep soundings. He may find an anchorage until night and then get away in the dark, but I'm afraid he won't take that long, because he knows a coast-guard cutter is liable to spy him out. This coast is being watched pretty close by the navy and the Japs and the customs, because there is so much blockade-running."
"It may be that he is planning to maroon us on the island."
"That wouldn't be his way. The Devil's Admiral never leaves a man alive. Four men will get out of the Kut Sang, and you know who they are. He ain't the man to take a chance of meeting you or me, or even letting us tell about him. It's 'Dead men tell no tales' with him, you may be sure of that."