The deck-hands and the ship-stewards, who had gathered at the gangway to assist in throwing me down it, sprang to the Captain’s aid.
“Over with him, boys,” he roared. “Clear the ship of them. Throw them overboard.” The crew fell upon the astonished soldiers, and drove them to the side. Their curses and shrieks filled the air, the women retreated screaming, and I was left alone, leaning limply against the cabin with my revolver hanging from my fingers.
It began and ended in an instant, and as the ship moved forward and the last red-breeched soldier disappeared headforemost down the companion-ladder, the Captain rushed back to me and clutched me by both shoulders. Had it not been for the genial grin on his fat face, I would have thought that he meant to hurl me after the others.
“Now then, Captain Macklin,” he cried, “you come with me. You come to my cabin, and that’s where you stay as long as you are on my ship. You’re no passenger, you’re my guest, and there’s nothing on board too good for you.”
“But I don’t—understand,” I protested faintly. “What does it mean?”
“What does it mean?” he shouted. “It means you’re the right sort for me! I haven’t heard of nothing but your goings-on for the last three trips. Vice-President of Honduras!” he exclaimed, shaking me as though I were a carpet. “A kid like you! You come to my cabin and tell me the whole yarn from start to finish. I’d rather carry you than old man Huntington himself!”
The passengers had returned, and stood listening to his exclamations, in a wondering circle. The stewards and deck-hands, panting with their late exertions, were grinning at me with unmistakable interest.
“Bring Captain Macklin’s breakfast to my cabin, you,” he shouted to them. “And, Mr. Owen,” he continued, addressing the Purser, with great impressiveness, “this is Captain Macklin, himself. He’s going with us as my guest.”
With a wink, he cautiously removed my revolver from my fingers, and slapped me jovially on the shoulder. “Son!” he exclaimed, “I wouldn’t have missed the sight of you holding your gun on that gang for a cargo of bullion. I suspicioned it was you, the moment you did it. That will be something for me to tell them in ‘Frisco, that will. Now, you come along,” he added, suddenly, with parental solicitude, “and take a cup of coffee, and a dose of quinine, or you’ll be ailing.”
He pushed a way for me through the crowd of passengers, who fell back in two long lines. As we moved between them, I heard a woman’s voice ask, in a loud whisper: