He was still alive, but cholera had him. Burke understood, but it was no time for punishment. He carried the stiffened form to the hospital and for an hour fought with Death; but the shock had been too much for the disease-racked body. When there was nothing left to do, Burke turned back the blanket over the rigid face, then stood still, his eyes cast down at the deck.
"Tionko," he finally said, as if giving the answer to some problem.
He picked up an iron belaying-pin, bared his arms, and started toward the bow. As he reached the foremast, however, three shadows sprang at him from the darkness ahead. With a sidewise leap he evaded them, then waited, crouched low, with one hand upon the deck. The men scattered in a circle surrounding him, but before they could close in he sprang at one, felled him with the shock of his body, and darted behind the mast, where he stood, waiting.
There was a moment of hesitation among the bravos, and they retreated toward the bow. Burke left the mast to peer into the darkness; a knife whizzed by his head, and he sprang back to his shelter.
They came forward again, and they were four this time. Burke saw that the defensive would be useless. With one leap he was among them, whacking to right and left with his belaying-pin. A hatchet was raised above his head, but the belaying-pin cracked the wrist that held it and it clattered to the deck. A streak of fire scorched his shoulder, but the badly-aimed dagger dropped as the belaying-pin came down upon its owner's cranium.
And all this time, while he laid about him with instinctive parry and thrust, his eyes were riveted on an indistinct form in the shadow behind, a form from which came a running sound of encouragement, suggestion, command. Suddenly he sprang back, then to one side, then forward—and he had passed the four struggling men. He took two running steps forward, then his body left the deck and shot through the air. With a thud it struck the man in the shadow and crushed him down. Like a cat, Burke was on his feet again. He picked up the body by the waist, held it off at arm's length, brought it back close to him long enough to see Tionko's face in a grin of horror, then his arms distended like great springs and Tionko shot over the bulwarks.
He turned to the others, but they had slunk away in the darkness, and he knew that, the Chino gone, there was no more to fear.
He peered out into the water, and the phosphorescence showed him an indistinct form swimming slowly away. Then it turned back, splashing painfully, and a cracked falsetto voice whined in beggar-like modulations.
"Señor, for the love of Christ, let me on!"
Burke hesitated, and suddenly the thing was settled for him. From the right a phosphorescent flash cut the water in a streak. Swift and luminous as a rocket it came, straight toward the splashing form; it struck it, and then the spot burst out in a great bubble of light, in which Burke caught a flash of the Chino, his arms raised to heaven, his mouth distended in abominable fear. There was a hoarse croak, a gurgle, and then the phosphorescence sank slowly and went out in the depths below. A gentle ripple undulated over the darkened surface of the water and broke softly against the flanks of the lorcha.