“Will you come aboard alone, sir?”
“Oh, quite alone, of course, since it is your wish, or you can come aboard here with half a dozen or a dozen men as your bodyguard, if you like. Bring the cannon, too, if it makes you feel any safer.”
“I’d rather you came aboard here, sir.”
“Very good. Fling over a slightly stronger line than you’d have sent down for the letter, and I’ll be with you in a jiffy.”
“But how am I to know some others won’t climb up?”
“Well, hang it, arm your men with handspikes, and knock ’em down again. Don’t keep me waiting here all night. It will be dark very soon, and I shan’t occupy more than ten minutes of your time. You seem spoiling for a fight, but I can’t accommodate you. I’m a man of peace, and that’s why I shudder when you speak to me of cannon. I swear I’ll tell Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman and President Roosevelt the way you’re behaving. You’re a positive danger on the high seas, with your ultimatums, and your shots through the engine room, and all that. Heave over a line, and get your men to watch that the yacht doesn’t spring aboard of you. No wonder we English are disliked for our browbeating.”
The captain seemed rather ashamed of his fears in face of this bantering, and besides, some of his crew had laughed, which still further disconcerted him. A rope fell coiling through the air, and came slap on deck.
“Hang tight aloft there,” cried Stranleigh, as he jerked the rope taut, swung himself free of his own boat, and clambered up the black cliff of the Rajah hand over hand, feet against the side like a monkey.