“All right,” growled Briggs, giving the revolver an extra shove. “Get to work! And if those other sons of pigs in the canoes board us, we white men will shoot down every last one o’ you here. We’ll take no chances of being knifed in the back. You’ll all have gone to damnation before one o’ them sets foot on my decks. You lay to that, my Mud Baby! Now, tell ’em all I’ve told you, and get it straight! Jao!”
Briggs struck Mahmud a head-cracking blow with the revolver just above the ear and sent him staggering back to the capstan. The song died, as Mahmud gulped out words that tumbled over each other with staccato vehemence.
“Get in there at the bars!” shouted Briggs. “Get to work, you, before I split you!”
Mahmud swung to place, and bent his back to labor, as his thin chest and skinny hands pushed at the bar beside his fellows.
And steadily the war-fleet drew in toward its prey.
CHAPTER VIII
PARLEY AND DEATH
In silence now the capstan turned. No Malays hummed or spoke. Only the grunting of their breath, oppressed by toil and the thrust of the bars, kept rough time with the slither of feet, the ratchet-click, the groaning creak of the cable straining through the chocks.