CHAPTER IX
A MATTER OF JUSTICE
It was quite evident that the man wanted something; but Captain Kettledid not choose definitely to ask for his wishes. Over-curiosity is not athing that pays with Orientals. Stolid indifference, on the other hand,may earn easy admiration.
But at last the man took his courage in a firmer grip, and came up fromthe _Parakeet's_ lower deck, where the hands were working cargo, andadvanced under the bridge deck awnings to Captain Kettle's long chairand salaamed low before him.
Kettle seemed to see the man for the first time. He looked up from theaccounts he was laboring at. "Well?" he said, curtly.
It was clear the Arab had no English. It was clear also that he fearedbeing watched by his fellow countrymen in the lighter which wasdischarging date bags alongside. He manoeuvred till the broad of hisback covered his movements, materialized somehow or other a scrap ofpaper from some fold of his burnous, dropped this into Kettle's lapwithout any perceptible movement of either his arms or hands, and thengave another stately salaam and moved away to the place from whichhe had come.
"If you are an out-of-work conjuror," said Kettle to the retreatingfigure, "you've come to the wrong place to get employment here."
The Arab passed out of sight without once turning his head, and Kettleglanced down at the screw of paper which lay on his knees, and saw on ita scrawl of writing.
"Hullo," he said, "postman, were you; not conjuror? I didn't expect anymail here. However, let's see. Murray's writing, by James!" he muttered,as he flattened out the grimy scrap of paper, and then he whistled-withsurprise and disgust as he read.
"_Dear Captain_," the letter ran. "_I've got into the deuce of a mess, and if you can bear a hand to pull me out, it would be a favor I should never forget. I got caught up that side street to the left past the mosque, but they covered my head with a cloth directly after, and hustled me on for half an hour, and where I am now, the dickens only knows. It's a cellar. But perhaps bearer may know, who's got my watch. The trouble was about a woman, a pretty little piece who I was photographing. You see_--"
And here the letter broke off.
"That's the worst of these fancy, high-toned mates," Kettle grumbled."What does he want to go ashore for at a one-eyed hole like this? Thereare no saloons--and besides he isn't a drinking man. Your new-fashionedmate isn't. There are no girls for him to kiss--seeing that they are allMohammedans, and wear a veil. And as for going round with thatphotography box of his, I wonder he hasn't more pride. I don't like tosee a smart young fellow like him, that's got his master's ticket allnew and ready in his chest, bringing himself down to the level of acommon, dirty-haired artist. Well, Murray's got a lot to learn before hefinds an owner fit to trust him with a ship of his own."
Kettle read the hurried letter through a second time, and then got upout of his long chair, and put on his spruce white drill uniform coat,and exchanged his white canvas shoes for another pair more newlypipeclayed. His steamer might merely be a common cargo tramp, the townhe was going to visit ashore might be merely the usual savage settlementone meets with on the Arabian shore of the Persian Gulf, but the littlesailor did not dress for the admiration of fashionable crowds. He wassmart and spruce always out of deference to his own self-respect.
He went up to the second mate at the tally desk on the main deck below,and gave him some instructions. "I'm going ashore," he said, "and leaveyou in charge. Don't let too many of these niggers come aboard at once,and tell the steward to keep all the doors to below snugly fastened. Ilocked the chart-house myself when I came out. Have you heard aboutthe mate?"
"No, sir."
"Ah, I thought the news would have been spread well about the shipbefore it came to me. He's got in trouble ashore, and I suppose I mustgo, and see the Kady, and get him bailed out."
The second mate wiped the dust and perspiration from his face with hisbare arm, and leant on the tally-desk, and grinned. Here seemed to be anopportunity for the relaxation of stiff official relations. "What'stripped him?" he asked. "Skirt or photographing?"
"He will probably tell you himself when he comes back," said Kettlecoldly. "I shall send him to his room for three days when he getson board."
The second mate pulled his face into seriousness. "I don't suppose hegot into trouble intentionally, sir."
"Probably not, but that doesn't alter the fact that he has managed itsomehow. I don't engage my mates for amusements of that kind, Mr. Grain.I've got them here to work, and help me do my duty by the owners. Ifthey take up low class trades like artisting, they must be prepared tostand the consequences. You'll remember the orders I've given you? IfI'm wanted, you'll say I'll probably be back by tea."
Captain Kettle went off then in a shore-boat, past a small fleet ofpearling dhows, which rolled at their anchors, and after a longpull--for the sea was shallow, and the anchorage lay five milesout--stepped on to the back of a burly Arab, and was carried the lastmile dry-shod. Parallel to him were lines of men carrying out cargo tothe lighters which would tranship it to the _Parakeet_, and Kettlelooked upon these with a fine complacency.
His tramping for cargo had been phenomenally successful. He was fillinghis holds at astonishingly heavy freights. And not only would this bringhim credit with his owners, which meant promotion in due course to alarger ship, but in the mean time, as he drew his 2-1/2 per cent, on theprofits, it represented a very comfortable matter of solid cash for thatmuch-needing person himself. He hugged himself with pleasure when hethought of this new found prosperity. It represented so many thingswhich he would be able to do for his wife and family, which through somany years narrow circumstances had made impossible.
The burly Arab on whose hips he rode pick-a-back stepped out of thewater at last, and Kettle jumped down from his perch, and picked hisway daintily among the litter of the foreshore toward the white housesof the town which lay beyond.
It was the first time he had set foot there. So great was his luck atthe time, that he had not been forced to go ashore in the usual waydrumming up cargo. The shippers had come off begging him to become theircarrier, and he had muleted them in heavy freights accordingly. So hestepped into the town with many of the feelings of a conqueror, anddemanded to be led to the office of a man with whom he had doneprofitable business that very morning.
Of course, "office" in the Western meaning of the term there was none.The worthy Rad el Moussa transacted affairs on the floor of his generalsitting-room, and stored his merchandise in the bed-chambers, orwherever it would be out of reach of pilfering fingers. But he receivedthe little sailor with fine protestations of regard, and (after somegiggles and shuffling as the women withdrew) inducted him to the darkinterior of his house, and set before him delicious coffee and somedoubtful sweetmeats.
Kettle knew enough about Oriental etiquette not to introduce the matteron which he had come at the outset of the conversation. He passed andreceived the necessary compliments first, endured a discussion of localtrade prospects, and then by an easy gradation led up to the powers ofthe local Kady. He did not speak Arabic himself, and Rad el Moussa hadno English. But they had both served a life apprenticeship to seatrading, and the curse of the Tower of Babel had very little power overthem. In the memories of each there were garnered scraps from a score ofspoken languages, and when these failed, they could always draw on theunlimited vocabulary of the gestures and the eyes. And for points thatwere really abstruse, or which required definite understanding, therealways remained the charcoal stick and the explanatory drawing on theface of a whitewashed wall.
When the conversation had lasted some half an hour by the clock, and aslave brought in a second relay of sweetmeats and thick coffee, thesailor mentioned, as it were incidentally, that one of his officers hadgot into trouble in the town. "It's quite a small thing," he saidlightly, "but I want him back as soon as possible, because there's workfor him to do on the steamer. See what I mean?"
Rad el Moussa nodded gravely. "Savvy plenty,
" said he.
Now Kettle knew that the machinery of the law in these small Arabiancoast towns was concentrated in the person of the Kady, who, forpractical purposes, must be made to move by that lubricant known as palmoil; and so he produced some coins from his pocket and lifted hiseyebrows inquiringly.
Rad el Moussa nodded again, and made careful inspection of the coins,turning them one by one with his long brown fingers, and biting those hefancied most as a test of their quality. Finally, he selected a goldtwenty-franc piece and two sovereigns, balanced and chinked themcarefully in his hand, and then slipped them into some privatereceptacle in his wearing apparel.
"I say," remarked Kettle, "that's not for you personally, old tintacks.That's for the Kady."
Rad pointed majestically to his own breast. "El Kady," he said.
"Oh, you are his Worship, are you?" said Kettle. "Why didn't you say sobefore? I don't think it was quite straight of you, tintacks, butperhaps that's your gentle Arab way. But I say, Whiskers, don't you trybeing too foxy with me, or you'll get hurt. I'm not the most patient manin the world with inferior nations. Come, now, where's the mate?"
Rad spread his hands helplessly.
"See, here, it's no use your trying that game. You know that I wantMurray, my mate."
"Savvy plenty."
"Then hand him out, and let me get away back on board."
"No got," said Rad el Moussa; "no can."
"Now look here, Mister," said Captain Kettle, "I've paid you honestlyfor justice, and if I don't have it, I'll start in pulling down your oldtown straight away. Give up the mate, Rad, and let me get backpeacefully to my steamboat, or, by James! I'll let loose a wildearthquake here. If you want battle, murder, and sudden death, Mr. Radel Moussa, just you play monkey tricks with me, and you'll get 'emcheap. Kady, are you? Then, by James! you start in without further talk,and give me the justice that I've bought and paid for."
Though this tirade was in an alien tongue, Rad el Moussa caught thedrift from Captain Kettle's accompanying gesticulations, which supplieda running translation as he went on. Rad saw that his visitor meantbusiness, and signed that he would go out and fetch the imprisoned mateforthwith.
"No, you don't," said Kettle promptly. "If your Worship once left here,I might have trouble in finding you again. I know how easy it is to hidein a-warren like this town of yours. Send one of your hands witha message."
Now, to convey this sentence more clearly, Kettle had put his fingerson the Arab's clothing, when out fell a bag of pearls, which cameunfastened. The pearls rolled like peas about the floor, and the Arab,with gritting teeth, whipped out a knife. Promptly Kettle drew also, andcovered him with a revolver.
"See here," he said, "I'm not a thief, though perhaps you think I pulledout that jewelry purse on purpose. It was an accident, Rad, so I'llforgive your hastiness. But your Worship mustn't pull out cutlery on me.I'll not stand that from any man living. That's right, put it up. Backgoes the pistol into its pocket, and now we're friends again. Pick upthe pearls yourself, and then you'll be certain I haven't grabbed any,and then send one of your men to fetch my mate and do as I want. You'rewasting a great deal of my time, Rad el Moussa, over a very simple job."
The Arab gathered the pearls again into the pouch and put it back to itsplace among his clothes. His face had grown savage and lowering, but itwas clear that this little spitfire of a sailor, with his handy pistol,daunted him. Kettle, who read these signs, was not insensible to thecompliment they implied, but at the same time he grew, if anything,additionally cautious. He watched his man with a cat-like caution, andwhen Rad called a slave and gave him orders in fluent Arabic, he madehim translate his commands forthwith.
Rad el Moussa protested that he had ordered nothing more than thecarrying out of his visitor's wishes. But it seemed to Kettle that heprotested just a trifle too vehemently, and his suspicions deepened.
He tapped his pistol in its resting-place, and nodded his headmeaningly. "You've friends in this town," he said, "and I dare sayyou'll have a goodish bit of power in your small way. I've neither, andI don't deny that if you bring up all your local army to interfere, Imay have a toughish fight of it; but whatever happens to me in the longrun, you may take it as straight from yours truly that you'll go to yourown funeral if trouble starts. So put that in your hookah and smoke it,tintacks, and give me the other tube."
Captain Kettle was used to the dilatory ways of the East, and he wasprepared to wait, though never doubting that Murray would be surrenderedto him in due time, and he would get his own way in the end. So hepicked up one of the snaky tubes of the great pipe, and put the ambermouthpiece between his lips; and there for an hour the pair of themsquatted on the divan, with the hookah gurgling and reeking betweenthem. From time to time a slave-girl came and replenished the pipe withtobacco or fire as was required. But these were the only interruptions,and between whiles they smoked on in massive silence.
At the end of that hour, the man-slave who had been sent out with themessage re-entered the room and delivered his tidings. Rad el Moussa inhis turn passed it on. Murray was even then waiting in the justicechamber, so he said, at the further side of the house, and could betaken away at once. Kettle rose to his feet, and the Arab stood beforehim with bowed head and folded arms.
Captain Kettle began to feel shame for having pressed this man toohardly. It seemed that he had intended to act honestly all along, andthe suspiciousness of his behavior doubtless arose from some difficultyof custom or language. So the sailor took the Rad's limp hand in his ownand shook it cordially, and at the same time made a handsome apology forhis own share of the misunderstanding.
"Your Worship must excuse me," he said, "but I'm always apt to be a bitsuspicious about lawyers. What dealings I've had with them have nearlyalways turned out for me unfortunately. And now, if you don't mind,we'll go into your court-house, and you can hand me over my mate, andI'll take him back to the ship. Enough time's been wasted already byboth of us."
The Arab, still bowed and submissive, signed toward the doorway, andKettle marched briskly out along the narrow dark passage beyond, withRad's sandals shuffling in escort close at his rear. The house seemed alarge one, and rambling. Three times Rad's respectful fingers on hisvisitor's sleeve signed to him a change of route. The corridors, too, asis the custom in Arabia, where coolness is the first consideration, weredimly lit; and with the caution which had grown to be his second nature,Kettle instinctively kept all his senses on the alert for inconvenientsurprises. He had no desire that Rad el Moussa should forget hissubmissiveness and stab him suddenly from behind, neither did heespecially wish to be noosed or knifed from round any of the duskysudden corners.
In fact he was as much on the _qui vive_ as he ever had been in all hislong, wild, adventurous life, and yet Rad el Moussa, who meant treacheryall along, took him captive by the most vulgar of timeworn stratagems.Of a sudden the boarding of the floor sank beneath Kettle's feet. Heturned, and with a desperate effort tried to throw himself backwardwhence he had come. But the boarding behind reared up and hit him aviolent blow on the hands and head, and he fell into a pit below.
For an instant he saw through the gloom the face of Rad el Moussa turnedsuddenly virulent, spitting at him in hate, and then the swing-floorslammed up into place again, and all view of anything but inky blacknesswas completely shut away.
Now the fall, besides being disconcerting, was tolerably deep; and butfor the fact that the final blow from the flooring had shot him againstthe opposite side of the pit, and so broken his descent at the expenseof his elbows and heels, he might very well have landed awkwardly, andbroken a limb or his back in the process. But Captain Owen Kettle wasnot the man to waste time over useless lamentation or rubbing ofbruises. He was on fire with fury at the way he had been tricked, andthirsting to get loose and be revenged. He had his pistol still in itsproper pocket, and undamaged, and if the wily Rad had shown himselfanywhere within range just then, it is a certain thing that he wouldhave been shot dead to square the ac
count.
But Kettle was, as I have said, wedged in with darkness, and for thepresent, revenge must wait until he could see the man he wanted to shootat. He scrambled to his feet, and fumbled in his pocket for a match. Hefound one, struck it on the sole of his trim white shoe, andreconnoitred quickly.
The place he was in was round and bottle shaped, measuring some ten feetacross its floor, and tapering to a small square, where the trap gave itentrance above. It was a prison clearly, and there was evidence that ithad been recently used. It was clear also that the only official way ofreleasing a prisoner was to get him up by a ladder or rope through thesmall opening to which the sides converged overhead. Moreover, to allcommon seeming, the place was simply unbreakable, at least to anycreature who had not either wings or the power of crawling up theunder-side of a slant like a fly.
But all these things flashed through Kettle's brain in far less timethan it takes to read them here. He had only two matches in hispossession, and he wished to make all possible use of the first, so asto keep the second for emergencies; and so he made his survey with thebest of his intelligence and speed.
The walls of this bottle-shaped prison were of bricks built withoutvisible mortar, and held together (it seemed probable) by the weight ofearth pressing outside them; but just before the match burned hisfingers and dropped to the floor, where it promptly expired, his eyefell upon an opening in the masonry. It was a mere slit, barely threeinches wide, running vertically up and down for some six courses of thebrick, and it was about chin-high above the ground.
He marked this when the light went out, and promptly went to it andexplored it with his arm. The slit widened at the other side, and therewas evidently a chamber beyond. He clapped his hands against the lip ofthe slit, and set his feet against the wall, and pulled with the utmostof his strength. If once he could widen the opening sufficiently toclamber through, possibilities lay beyond. But from the weight of wallpressing down above, he could not budge a single brick by so much as ahairs-breadth, and so he had to give up this idea, and, stewing withrage, set about further reconnoitring.
The darkness put his eyes out of action, but he had still left his handsand feet, and he went round with these, exploring carefully.
Presently his search was rewarded. Opposite the opening he haddiscovered before, was another slit in the overhanging wall of thisbottle-shaped prison, and this also he attacked in the hope of wrenchingfree some of the bricks. He strained and panted, till it seemed asthough the tendons of his body must break, but the wall remained wholeand the slit unpassable; and then he gave way, almost childishly, to hispassion of rage, and shouted insults and threats at Rad el Moussa in thevain hope that some one would hear and carry them. And some one didhear, though not the persons he expected.
A voice, muffled and foggy, as though it came from a long distance, saidin surprise: "Why, Captain, have they got you here, too?"
Under cover of the darkness, Kettle blushed for shame at his outcry."That you, Murray? I didn't know you were here. How did you guess itwas me?"
The distant voice chuckled foggily. "I've heard you giving your blessingto the hands on board, sir, once or twice, and I recognized some of thewords. What have they collared you for? You don't photograph. Have youbeen messing round with some girl?"
"Curse your impudence; just you remember your position and mine. I'llhave respect from my officers, even if I am in a bit of a fix."
"Beg pardon, sir. Sorry I forgot myself. It sha'n't occur again."
"You'll go to your room for three days when we get back on board."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"I decided that before I left the ship. I can't have my officers stayingaway from duty without leave on any excuse. And if they have such lowtastes as to bring themselves on the level of common mop-headed portraitpainters and photographers, they must pay for it."
"Ay, ay, sir."
"What were you run in for?"
"Oh, photographing."
"There you are, then! And did they bring you straight along here?"
"Yes, sir. And lowered me in a bowline to this cellar."
"Ah," said Kettle, "then you don't want so much change out of them. Theydropped me, and some one will have a heavy bill to square up for, overthat. Do you know whose house this is?"
"Haven't a notion. After I'd been here an hour or so, some heathensneaked round to a peep-hole in the wall and offered to take off amessage to the ship, on payment. I hadn't any money, so I had to give upmy watch, and before I'd written half the letter he got interrupted andhad to clear off with what there was. Did he bring off themessage, sir?"
"He did. And I came ashore at once. You remember Rad el Moussa?"
"The man that consigned all that parcel of figs for London?"
"That man. I considered that as he'd been doing business with thesteamer, he was the best person to make inquiries of ashore. So I cameto him, and asked where I could find the Kady to bail you out. Heshuffled a bit, and after some talk he admitted he was the Kady, andtook palm-oil from me in the usual way, and then I'll not deny that wehad a trifle of a disagreement. But he seemed to simmer down all right,said he'd send along for you, and after a bit of time said you'd come,and wouldn't I walk through the house and see you myself. The crafty oldfox had got his booby trap rigged in the mean time, and then I walkedstraight into it like the softest specimen of blame' fool youcan imagine."
"Rad el Moussa," came the foggy comment. "By Jove! Captain, I believewe're in an awkward place. He's the biggest man in this town far andaway, and about the biggest blackguard also from what I've heard. He's amerchant in every line that comes handy, from slaves and palm fibre tohorses and dates; he runs most of those pearling dhows that we sawsweltering about at the anchorage; and he's got a little army of his ownwith which he raids the other coast towns and the caravans up-countrywhen he hears they've got any truck worth looting. I say, this isscaring. I've been taking the thing pretty easily up to now, thinking itwould come all right in time. But if I'd known it was old Rad who hadgrabbed me, I tell you I should have sat sweating."
"It takes a lot more than a mere nigger, with his head in clouts, toscare me," said Kettle truculently, "and I don't care tuppence what hemay be by trade. He's got a down on me at present, I'll grant, but I'mgoing to give Mr. Rad el Moussa fits a little later on, and you maystand by and look on, if you aren't frightened to be near him."
"I'm not a funk in the open," grumbled Murray, "and you know it. You'veseen me handle a crew. But I'm in a kind of cellar here, and can't getout, and if anybody chooses they can drop bricks on me, and I can't stopthem. Have they been at you about those rifles, sir?"
"What rifles? No, nobody's said 'rifles' to me ashore here."
"It seems we've got some cases of rifles on board for one of thoselittle ports up the coast. I didn't know it."
"Nor did I," said Kettle, "and you can take it from me that we haven't.Smuggling rifles ashore is a big offence here in the Persian Gulf, andI'm not going to put myself in the way of the law, if I know it."
"Well, I think you're wrong, sir," said the Mate. "I believe they're insome cases that are down on the manifest as 'machinery.' I saw themstowed down No. 3 hold, and I remember one of the stevedores in Londonjoking about them when they were struck below."
"Supposing they were rifles, what than?"
"Rad wants them. He says they're consigned to some of his neighbors upcoast, who'll raid him as soon as they're properly armed; and he doesn'tlike the idea. What raiding's done, he likes to do himself, and at thesame time he much prefers good Brummagen rifles to the localironmonger's blunderbusses."
"Well," said Kettle, "I'm waiting to hear what he thought you could dowith the rifles supposing they were on board."
"Oh, he expected me to broach cargo and bring them here ashore to him.He's a simple-minded savage."
"By James!" said Kettle, "the man's mad. What did he think I should bedoing whilst one of my mates was scoffing cargo under my blessed nose?"
"Ah, you
see," said the foggy voice, with sly malice, "he did not knowyou so well then, sir. That was before he persuaded you to come into hishouse to stay with him."
It is probable that Captain Kettle would have found occasion to makeacid comment on this repartee from his inferior officer, but at thatmoment another voice addressed him from the slit at the other side ofhis prison, and he turned sharply round. To his surprise this new personspoke in very tolerable English.
"Capt'n, I want t'make contrack wid you."
"The deuce you do. And who might you be, anyway?"
"I cullud gen'lem'n, sar. Born _Zanzibar_. Used to be fireman on P. andO. I want arsk you--"
"Is this the Arabian Nights? How the mischief did you get here, anyway?"
"Went on burst in Aden, sar. Th'ole Chief fired me out. Went Yemen.Caught for slave. Taken caravan. Brought here. But I'm very clevergen'lem'n, sar, an' soon bought myself free. Got slave of my own now.An' three wives. Bought 'nother wife yesterday."
"You nasty beast!" said Kettle.
"Sar, you insult me. Not bally Christian any longer. Hard-shellMohammedan now, sar, and can marry as many wives as I can buy."
"I'm sure the Prophet's welcome to you. Look here, my man. Pass down arope's end from aloft there, and let me get on deck, and I'll give you asovereign cash down, and a berth in my steamboat's stoke-hold if youwant one. I'm not asking you to help me more. I guess I'm quitecompetent to find my way on board, and to wipe this house tolerablyclean before it's quit of me."
"Nothing of the kind, sar," said the man behind the slit. "You insultme, sar. I very big gen'lem'n here, sar, an' a sovereign's no use to me.Besides, I partner to ole man Rad, an' he say he want dem rifles you goton your ole tramp."
"Does he, indeed? Then you can tell him, Mr. Niggerrunaway-drunken-fireman, that I'll see you and him in somewhere a bigsight hotter than Arabia before he gets them. I didn't know they wererifles; if I had known before this, I'd not have put them ashore; but asthings are now, I'll land them into the hands of those that orderedthem, and I hope they come round to this town of yours and give youfits. And see here, you talk more respectful about my steamboat, oryou'll get your shins kicked, daddy."
"An ole tramp," said the man relishingly. "I served on P. an' O., sar,an' on P. an' O. we don't care 'sociate wid tramps' sailors."
"You impudent black cannibal. You'll be one of the animals thosepassenger lines carry along to eat the dead babies, to save the troubleof heaving them overboard."
The ex-fireman spluttered. But he did not continue the contest. Herecognized that he had to deal with a master in the cheerful art ofinsult, and so he came back sulkily to business.
"Will you give Rad dem rifles, you low white fellow?"
"No, I won't."
"Very well. Den we shall spiflicate you till you do," said the man, andafter that Kettle heard his slippers shuffling away.
"I wonder what spiflicating is?" mused Kettle, but he did not remaincudgelling his brain over this for long. It occurred to him that if thisnegro could come and go so handily to the outside of this undergroundprison, there must be a stairway somewhere near, and though he could notenlarge the slit to get at it that way, it might be possible to burrow apassage under the wall itself. For a tool, he had spied a broken crocklying on the floor, and with the idea once in his head, he was not longin putting it to practical effect. He squatted just underneath the slit,and began to quarry the earth at the foot of the wall with skill anddetermination.
But if Kettle was prompt, his captors were by no means dilatory. BetweenKettle's prison and the mate's was another of those bottle-shaped_oubliettes_, and in that there was presently a bustle of movement.There came the noises of some one lighting a fire, and coughing as hefanned smouldering embers into a glow with his breath, and then morecoughing and some curses as the fire-lighter took his departure. Thedoor above clapped down into place, and then there was the sound ofsomeone dragging over that and over the doors of the other two prisonswhat seemed to be carpets, or heavy rugs.
There was something mysterious in this manoeuvre at first, but thesecret of it was not kept for long. An acrid smell stole out into theair, which thickened every minute in intensity. Kettle seemed dimly torecognize it, but could not put a name to it definitely. Besides, he wasworking with all his might at scraping away the earth from the foot ofthe wall, and had little leisure to think of other things.
The heat was stifling, and the sweat dripped from him, but he toiled onwith a savage glee at his success. The foundations had not been dug out;they were "floating" upon the earth surface; and the labor ofundermining would, it appeared, be small.
But Murray in the other prison had smelt the reek before, and was ableto put a name to it promptly. "By Jove! Captain," he shouted mistilyfrom the distance, "they're going to smoke us to death; that'sthe game."
"Looks like trying it," panted the little sailor, from his work.
"That's dried camel's dung they're burning. There's no wood in Arabiahere, and that's their only fuel. When the smoke gets into your lungs,it just tears you all to bits. I say, Skipper, can't you come to someagreement with Rad over those blessed rifles? It's a beastly death todie, this."
"You aren't dead--by a long chalk--yet. More'm I. I'd hate tobe--smoke-dried like a ham--as bad as any Jew. But I don't start in--toscoff the cargo--on my own ship--at any bally price."
There was a sound of distant coughing, and then the misty question:"What are you working at?"
"Taking--exercise," Kettle gasped, and after that, communication betweenthe two was limited to incessant staccato coughs.
More and more acrid grew the air as the burning camel's dung saturatedit further and further with smoke, and more and more frenzied grewKettle's efforts. Once he got up and stuffed his coat in the embrasurefrom which the smoke principally came. But that did little enough good.The wall was all chinks, and the bitter reek came in unchecked. He feltthat the hacking coughs were gnawing away his strength, and just now theutmost output of his thews was needed.
He had given up his original idea of mining a passage under the wall.Indeed, this would have been a labor of weeks with the poor broken crockwhich was his only tool, for the weight of the building above had turnedthe earth to something very near akin to the hardness of stone. But hehad managed to scrape out a space underneath one brick, and found thatit was loosened, and with trouble could be dislodged; and so he wasburrowing away the earth from beneath others, to drop more bricks downfrom their places, and so make a gangway through the solid wall itself.
But simple though this may be in theory, it was tediously difficult workin practice. The bricks jammed even when they were undermined, and thewall was four bricks thick to its further side. Moreover, everyalternate course was cross-pinned, and the workman was rapidly becomingasphyxiated by the terrible reek which came billowing in from thechamber beyond.
Still, with aching chest, and bleeding fingers, and smarting eyes,Kettle worked doggedly on, and at last got a hole made completelythrough. What lay in the blackness beyond he did not know; either Rad elMoussa or the fireman might be waiting to give him a _coup de grace_ themoment his head appeared; but he was ready to accept every risk. He feltthat if he stayed in the smoke of that burning camel's dung any longerhe would be strangled.
The hole in the brickwork was scarcely bigger than a fox-earth, but hewas a slightly built man, and with a hard struggle he managed to pushhis way through. No one opposed him. He found and scraped his onlyremaining match, and saw that he was in another bottle-shaped chambersimilar to the one he had left; but in this there was a doorway. Therewas pungent smoke reek here also, and, though its slenderness came tohim as a blessed relief after what he had been enduring, he lusteddesperately for a taste of the pure air outside.
The door gave to his touch, and he found a stair. He ran up this andstepped out into the corridor, where Rad had lured him to capture, andthen, walking cautiously by the wall so as not to step into any morebooby-traps, he came to the place where he calculated
Murray would bejailed. A large thick carpet had been spread over the door so as toprevent any egress of the stinging smoke, or any ingress of air, andthis he pulled away, and lifted the trap.
There was no sound from below. "Great heavens," he thought, "was themate dead?" He hailed sharply, and a husky voice answered. Seeingnothing else at hand that would serve, he lowered an end of the carpet,keeping a grip on the other, and presently Murray got a hold andclambered up beside him.
In a dozen whispered words Kettle told his plans, and they were on thepoint of starting off to carry them out, when the _slop-slop_ ofslippers made itself heard advancing down the corridors. Promptly thepair of them sank into the shadows, and presently the ex-fireman came upwhistling cheerfully an air from some English music-hall. He did not seethem till they were almost within hand-grips, and then the tune frozeupon his lips in a manner that was ludicrous.
But neither Kettle nor his mate had any eye for the humors of thesituation just then. Murray plucked the man's legs artistically frombeneath him, and Kettle gripped his hands and throat. He thrust hissavage little face close down to the black man's. "Now," he said,"where's Rad? Tell me truly, or I'll make you into dog's meat. And speakquietly. If you make a row, I'll gouge your eyes out."
"Rad, he in divan," the fellow stuttered in a scared whisper. "Sort o'front shop you savvy, sar. Don' kill me."
"I can recommend my late state-room," said Murray.
"Just the ticket," said Kettle. So into the _oubliette_ they toppledhim, clapping down the door in its place above. "There you may stay, youblack beast," said his judge, "to stew in the smoke you raised yourself.If any of your numerous wives are sufficiently interested to get youout, they may do so. If not, you pig, you may stay and cure into bacon.I'm sure I sha'n't miss you. Come along, Mr. Mate."
They fell upon Rad el Moussa placidly resting among the cushions of thedivan, with the stem of the water-pipe between his teeth, and his mindprobably figuring out plans of campaign in which the captured rifleswould do astonishing work.
Kettle had no revolver in open view, but Rad had already learned howhandily that instrument could be produced on occasion, and had the witto make no show of resistance. The sailor went up to him, delicatelyextracted the poignard from his sash, and broke the blade beneath hisfeet. Then he said to him, "Stand there," pointing to the middle of thefloor, and seated himself on the divan in the attitude of a judge.
"Now, Mr. Rad el Moussa, I advise you to understand what's going to besaid to you now, so that it'll be a lesson to you in the future.
"I came to you, not very long ago, asking for your card to the Kady. Itold you my business was about the mate here, and you said you were Kadyyourself. Whether you are or not I don't know, and I don't vastly care,but anyway, I paid for justice in hard money, and you said you'd give upthe mate. You didn't do that. You played a trick on me, which I'll ownup I was a fool to get caught by; and I make no doubt that you've beenlaughing at me behind my back with that nasty nigger partner of yours.
"Well, prisoner at the bar, let alone I'm a blooming Englishman--andEnglishmen aren't sent into this world to be laughed at by anyforeigners--I'm myself as well, and let me tell you I don't stand eitherbeing swindled out of justice when I've paid for it, or being playedtricks on afterward. So you are hereby sentenced to the fine of one bagof pearls, to be paid on the spot, and furthermore to be incarcerated inone of those smoke boxes down the alleyway yonder till you can find yourown way out. Now, prisoner, don't move during the next operation, orI'll shoot you. Mr. Mate, you'll find a small bag inside the top part ofhis nightgown, on the left-hand side. Got 'em?"
"Here they are, sir," said Murray.
"Thanks," said Kettle, and put the bag in his pocket. "And now, if youplease, Mr. Mate, we'll just put His Whiskers into that cellar with thenigger, and leave him there to get smoked into a better and, we'll hope,a more penitent frame of mind."
They completed this pious act to their entire satisfaction, and leftthe house without further interruption. The townspeople were justbeginning to move about again after the violence of the midday heat, butexcept for curious stares, they passed through the narrow streetsbetween the whitewashed houses quite without interruption. And in duetime they came to the beach, and hired a shore boat, which took them offto the steamer.
But here Kettle was not inclined to linger unnecessarily. He saw Grain,the second mate, and asked Mm how much more cargo there was to come off.
"The last lighter load is alongside this minute, sir."
"Then hustle it on deck as quick as you can, and then call thecarpenter, and go forward and heave up."
Grain looked meaningly at Murray. "Am I to take the fore deck, sir."
"Yes, I appoint you acting mate for three days; and Mr. Murray goes tohis room for that time for getting into trouble ashore. Now put somehurry into things, Mr. Grain; I don't want to stay here longerthan's needful."
Grain went forward about his business, but Murray, who looked somewhatdisconsolate, Kettle beckoned into the chart-house. He pulled out thepearl bag, and emptied its contents on to the chart table. "Now, lookhere, my lad," said he, "I have to send you to your room because I saidI would, and because that's discipline; but you can pocket a thimblefullof these seed pearls just to patch up your wounded feelings, as yourshare of old Rad el Moussa's fine. They are only seed pearls, as I say,and aren't worth much. We were due to have more as a sheer matter ofjustice, but it wasn't to be got. So we must make the best of what thereis. You'll bag L20 out of your lot if you sell them in the right placeashore. I reckoned my damages at L500, and I guess I've got hereabout L200."
"Thank you, sir," said Murray. "But it's rather hard being sent to myroom for a thing I could no more help than you could."
"Discipline, my lad. This will probably teach you to leave photographingto your inferiors in the future. There's no persuading me that it isn'tthat photograph box that's at the bottom of the whole mischief. Hullo,there's the windlass going already. I'll just lock up these pearls inthe drawer, and then I must go on the bridge. Er, and about going toyour room, my lad: as long as I don't see you for three days you can domuch as you like. I don't want to be too hard. But as I said to old Radel Moussa, justice is justice, and discipline's got to be kept."
"And what about the rifles, sir?"
Captain Kettle winked pleasantly. "I don't know that they are rifles.You see the cases are down on the manifest as 'machinery,' and I'm goingto put them ashore as such; but I don't mind owning to you, Mr. Mate,that I hope old Rad finds out he was right in his information. I supposehis neighbors will let him know within the next week or so whether theyare rifles really, or whether they aren't."