“What, you ran all this risk and hadn’t the nerve to search her? Well, that’s rich! Unless you’ve read her from my book. She would probably have scratched out your eyes. There’s an Amazon locked up in that graceful body. I’d like to see her head against a bit of clear blue sky—a touch of Henner blues and reds. What a whale of a joke! Abduct a young woman, risk prison, and then afraid to lay hands on her! You poor old piker!” Cunningham laughed.
“Cunningham——”
“All right, I’ll be merciful. To make a long 117 story short, it means that for the present I am in command of this yacht. I warned you. Will you be sensible, or shall I have to lock you up like your two-gun man from Texas?”
“Piracy!” cried Cleigh, coming out of his maze.
“Maritime law calls it that, but it isn’t really. No pannikins of rum, no fifteen men on a dead man’s chest. Parlour stuff, you might call it. The whole affair—the parlour side of it—depends upon whether you purpose to act philosophically under stress or kick up a hullabaloo. In the latter event you may reasonably expect some rough stuff. Truth is, I’m only borrowing the yacht as far as latitude ten degrees and longitude one hundred and ten degrees, off Catwick Island. You carry a boson’s whistle at the end of your watch chain. Blow it!” was the challenge.
“You bid me blow it?”
“Only to convince you how absolutely helpless you are,” said Cunningham, amiably. “Yesterday this day’s madness did prepare, as our old friend Omar used to say. Vedder did great work on that, didn’t he? Toot the whistle, for shortly we shall weigh anchor.”
Like a man in a dream, Cleigh got out his whistle. The first blast was feeble and windy. Cunningham grinned.
Cleigh set the whistle between his lips and blew a blast that must have been heard half a mile away.