"Right-O," said Mr. Gibney, and turned to walk down the beach to the boat. A second later a hoarse scream of rage and terror broke from his lips.
"What's up?" cried McGuffey, the laughter dying out of his voice, for there was a hint of death in Mr. Gibney's cry.
"Marooned!" said the commodore hoarsely. "Those two sailors have pulled back to the schooner, and—there—look, Mac! My Gawd!"
McGuffey looked, and his face went whiter than the foaming breakers beyond which he could see the Maggie II, under full sail, headed for the open sea. The small boat had been picked up, and there was no doubt that at her present rate of speed the schooner would be hull down on the horizon by sunset.
"The murderin' hound," whispered McGuffey, and sagged down on the sands. "Oh, the murderin' hound of a mate!"
"It's—it's mutiny," gulped Captain Scraggs in a hard, strained voice. "That bloody fiend of a mate! The sly sneak-thief, with his pleasant smile and his winnin' ways! Saw a chance to steal the Maggie and her rich cargo, and he is leavin' us here, marooned on a desert island, with two cannibals."
Captain Scraggs fairly shrieked the last two words and burst into tears. "Lord, Gib, old man," he raved, "whatever will we do?"
Thus appealed to, the doughty commodore permitted his two unmatched optics to rest mournfully upon his shipmates. For nearly a minute he gazed at them, the while he struggled to stifle the awful fear within him. In the Gibney veins there flowed not a drop of craven blood, but the hideous prospect before him was almost more than the brave commodore could bear. Death, quick and bloody, had no terrors for him, but a finish like this—a slow finish—thirst, starvation, heat——
He gulped and thoughtfully rubbed the knuckles of his right hand where the skin was barked off. He thought of the silly joke he and McGuffey had thought to perpetrate on Captain Scraggs by leading him up against a beating at the hands of a cannibal king, and with the thought came a grim, hard chuckle, though there was the look of a thousand devils in his eyes.
"Well, boys," he said huskily, "who's looney now?"