Not a breath of wind stirred the swell to break the shimmering reflections of the spars and sails of the locked ships. Stem to stern they lay, the junk spars locked in the rigging of the schooner, the two great eyes painted on the Chinaman’s bows staring straight at the oncoming boat. Round and about the deserted ships fins moved and grey forms glided in the green—sharks. On the smooth water, the letters on the counter repainted the name of the schooner, Haliotis.
Keller gave the order to lay in the oars, and they came duddering along the schooner’s side, Harman standing up. He seized one of the stanchions of the rail and was about to hoist himself on deck when Keller bade him stop.
“A minit,” said Keller, “who’s to tell it’s not a trap. Claw on and listen.”
The cry of a far-off gull on the reefs came, and the creak and grind of the ships’ sides as the swell lifted them. No other sound but the occasional click of the rudder chain as the rudder of the schooner shifted with the heave and fall of the hull.
Then, sure of themselves, with the cry of predatory animals, they tumbled on board, fastened up and scattered, Bud and Billy over the decks of the schooner, Keller, led by some vulturous instinct, on to the junk.
“Here’s a stiff,” shouted Harman as Davis followed him forward towards a bundle lying by the galley. “Lord, ain’t he a stiff? Head split with a hatchet. Here’s two more.” He pointed to a foot protruding from the galley, where lay a Chink and a white man, both very stiff indeed.
Then, turning and quite unconcerned, they came racing aft and down through the companion-way to the little cabin.
Here everything was quiet and trim; on the table under the swinging lamp lay a soap dish and shaving brush and razor. Someone had been shaving himself before the little mirror on the after bulkhead when whatever happened had begun to happen. In the after cabin, presumably the captain’s, the bunk bedding showed just as the sleeper had left it when he turned out. Then they set to and rooted round, the instinct for plunder so strong on them that they forgot Keller, the stiffs, the tragedy and the very place where they were.
They found a gold watch and chain which Harman put in his pocket, and a gold ring and fountain pen which Davis promptly annexed, they found the log, which, being written in Spanish, was useless to them, and the ship’s money, a big chamois leather chinking bag of Australian sovereigns. This glorious find recalled Keller.
“Bud,” said Billy, “this h’ain’t nothing to do with him; hide them, swaller them; here, give me your handkerchief and take half, tie them up tight so’s they won’t chink. I’ll keep my lot in the bag. He won’t guess nothin’, he’ll think the chows have cleared the place—ain’t nothin’ more to take, is there? Then come ’long and have a squint at the lazarette.”