Hell's Hatches

by Lewis R. Freeman

I told him all that he needed to know as quickly as possible, making a point, however, of omitting to state that the man I wanted him to smuggle away to the Islands had confessed to committing the outrage upon Hartley Allen. "Slant" was an old friend of "Choppy's," and I felt sure that the latter, far from being a witting party to helping the man who had attacked him escape from justice, would undoubtedly lend every aid to placing him where he would receive his just deserts. Luckily, the quixotic old Scot was not a man to ask searching questions. He was plainly disappointed that it was not I who was fleeing the law, but there was ready consolation in the fact that a friend of mine, in very sore straits, might be saved from being torn to pieces by a pack of bloodhounds if he was picked up at a certain point on the north coast before morning.

We located the cove of the old sugar mill on the chart without difficulty, and in his bulky volume of "Sailing Directions" found the comforting assurance that it afforded especially good shelter in a northerly blow. There was no surf, it was stated, and the shore was almost steep-to. This was all in our favour. He was sailing at midnight, the Captain said. The hurricane was central over the New Hebrides, so it was only the tail of it flirting across the Great Barrier—nothing he would dream of sticking in harbour for. Doubtless he would be able to find an excuse to heave-to off the cove, while I piloted the launch in to get our man. Then, if I didn't care to return and take a pleasure voyage with him to Insulinde and the Straits, I could drop off and make the best of my way home.

The Captain had just finished telling me how he had made a point of bringing his old launch crew with him from the Utupua—"the lads I use for speshul wark, ye ken"—when the freight clerk who had brought me off entered the cabin with a number of papers and letters. On the top of the pile was a red envelope marked "Rush." "Choppy" tore the letter open at once. The up-flop of his grizzled side-burns at the sudden flexing of the jaw muscles at their roots gave me warning of the coming jolt.

"We'll nae be gettin' under wa' the nicht, Ryerson," he said quietly to the freight clerk. "Will ye be sae guid as to bid the Chief an' the Mate to step this wa'. Mair carga the morrow," he added by way of explanation. To the Chief Engineer, when he came, the Captain merely countermanded an order for steam on the capstan at seven bells, and warned him to keep the pressure in the boilers high for fear the steamer might part a mooring cable if the wind increased. The Mate he ordered to be ready to handle a consignment of silver bullion and ingot copper that would come in a tug from the Moresby as soon as she arrived from the south in the morning. He also told him to have the crew of the steam launch called away at once, so as to put "yon gentleman" ashore as quickly as possible. If the Mate was lively about it, "Choppy" suggested, he might find that the fires of the launch had not yet been drawn from her trip to the landing. If so, that would save time in getting up steam.

Not until all of this was ordered did he turn to me with: "The de'il's ain luck, lad. Nae gettin' awa' afore eight bells, noon, the morrow. Shipment frae Broken Hill catchin' up wi' us in the Moresby."

"That means that the game's up and you're sending me back because there's no hope of doing anything?" I asked in dismay.

"Nae, nae, lad," he soothed. "No' so fast. Just a wee bit o' a shift o' program, that's a'. True I'm sendin' ye ashore in the launch, but when she comes back I'm hopin' tae find oor mon in yer place. Do ye ken noo wha' I'm drivin' at?"

"Do you mean to send the launch all the way round from here?" I demanded in astonishment; "and then to keep him aboard here in the harbour for ten or twelve hours before you sail? Isn't that asking for trouble both ways? Even if the launch stands up against the gale outside, aren't you done for if they come off from town and make a search of the steamer?"

Old "Choppy's" blue eyes twinkled merrily at the latter suggestion. The police never did seem to have any luck in searching his ships, he laughed. As for the launch—it was new, its engine was unusually powerful, and it would have "Pisco" at the wheel. "Pisco," he explained, was a Chilean who had been with him for years, and had never been known to fail at a pinch. He thought that combination ought to win out. I didn't mind a bit of slap-banging off the point, did I? That settled it. If he was willing to risk his own launch and his own career to save my friend, it was not for me to hang back. Fifteen minutes later we had been lowered over the side and were rounding under the Mambare's fine clipper bows into the teeth of the gusty norther. It had been agreed that I should pilot "Pisco" to the rendezvous and deliver my man into his care. "Choppy" undertook to do the rest.

What the hard-bit old sea-dog had characterized as a "bit o' slap-banging" off the point proved to be a frontal attack upon as ruffianly a bunch of headseas as it was ever my lot to face in anything smaller than a ninety-ton schooner. Stoutly built and over-engined as she was, the launch was quite equal to the task of driving her nose through the waves, but—not being built for submarine service—proved a dismal failure at getting rid of the solid green water that deluged her as a consequence. Knot by knot, cursing fluently in picturesque roto Spanish the while, "Pisco" rang down the engine, until finally the pugnacious little craft ceased tunnelling the bases of the seas and contented herself with boring neat round holes in their curling crests. By this method she shipped no more water than her scuppers could put back where it came from. The only fear now was that enough spray might splash down her squat funnel to quench the fires, and to minimize the chances of this, the resourceful "Pisco" made the lookout stand so that his broad chest would receive and deflect the heaviest rushes of the threatening flood. Fortunately, the distance to be run head-on to the seas was comparatively short. Once round the point the alteration of course brought the wind and the waves on the starboard beam, and though she now just about rolled her side-lights under, it was fairly quiet going compared to the buffeting outside.