CHAPTER VIII
TO CAPTURE AN HEIRESS
The _Parakeet_ had discharged the last of her coal into the lightersalongside, had cast off from the mooring buoys, and was steaming out ofthe baking heat of Suez harbor on her way down toward the worse heat ofthe Red Sea beyond. The clatter and dirt of the-working ships, with thesmells of hot iron and black humanity, were dying out astern, andpresently she slowed up to drop the pilot into his boat, and then stoodon again along her course.
A passenger, a young man of eight or nine-and-twenty, lounged on acamp-stool under the upper bridge awning, and watched the _Parakeet's_captain as he walked briskly across and across, and presently, when thelittle sailor faced him, he nodded as though he had decided somethingthat was in his thoughts.
"Well, sir?" said Captain Kettle.
"I wish you wouldn't look so anxious. We've started now, and may as wellmake up our minds to go through it comfortably."
"Quite so," said Kettle. "I'm thinking out how we are to do thisbusiness in comfort--and safety," and with that he resumed his walk.
The man beside him had introduced himself when the black workers werecarrying the _Parakeet's_ cargo of coal in baskets from the holds to thelighters alongside; and Kettle had been rather startled to find that hecarried a letter of introduction from the steamboat's owners. The lettergave him no choice of procedure. It stated with clearness that Mr. HughWenlock, solicitor, had laid his wishes before them, and that they hadagreed to further these wishes (through the agency of theirservant--Captain Owen Kettle) in consideration of the payment ofL200 sterling.
The _Parakeet_ was a cargo tramp, and carried no passenger certificate,but a letter of recommendation like this was equivalent to a directorder, and Kettle signed Mr. Wenlock on to his crew list as "Doctor,"and put to sea with an anxious mind.
Wenlock waited awhile, watching squalid Suez sink into the sea behind;and then he spoke again.
"Look here, Captain," he said, "those South Arabian ports have got a lotworse reputation than they really deserve. The people down there twentyyears ago were a pack of pirates, I'll grant you, but nowadays they knowthat if they get at any of their old games, a British gunboat promptlycomes up next week and bombards them at two-mile range, and that's notgood enough. They may not be honest from inclination, but they've gotthe fear of the gunboat always handy, and that's a wonderful civilizingpower. I tell you, captain, you needn't be frightened; that piratebusiness is exploded for now and always."
"I know all about the piratical hankerings of those South Arabianniggers, sir," said Kettle stiffly, "and I know what they can do andwhat they can't do as well as any man living. And I know also what I cando myself at a push, and the knowledge leaves me pretty comfortable. Butif you choose to think me frightened, I'll own I am. It's thenavigation down there that gave me cold shivers the first moment youmentioned it."
"Why, it's no worse than the Red Sea here, anyway."
"Red Sea's bad, but you can get good charts of it and rely on them.South Arabian coast is no better, and the charts aren't worth the paperthey're printed on. There are bad tide-rips down there, sir, and thereare bad reefs, and there's bad fog, and the truth of it is, there's nohandier place to lose a ship in all the big, wide world."
"I wouldn't like you to wreck the steamer down there. It might beawkward for me getting back."
"Quite so," said Kettle, "you're thinking of yourself, and I don't blameyou. I'm thinking of myself also. I'm a man that's met a great deal ofmisfortune, sir, and from one thing and another I've been eight yearswithout a regular command. I had the luck to bring in a derelict theother day, and pocket a good salvage out of her, and my present ownersheard of it, and they put me as master of this steamer, just because ofthat luck."
"Nothing like luck."
"If you don't lose it. But I am not anxious to pile up this steamboat onsome uncharted reef just because luck has left me, and have to waitanother eight years before I find another command."
"And, as I say, I'm as keen as you are not to get the steamer wrecked,and if there's any way she can be kept out of a dangerous area, and youcan manage to set me ashore where I want in a boat, just you say, andI'll meet you all I can. But at the same time, Skipper, if you don'tmind doing a swap, you might give me a good deal of help over my matterin return."
"I haven't heard your business yet, sir. All you've told me is that youwant to be set down in this place, Dunkhot, and be taken off again afteryou've stayed there four-and-twenty hours."
"Well, you see I didn't want it talked over beforehand. If thenewspapers got hold of the yarn, and made a lot of fuss about it, theymight upset a certain marriage that I've very much set my heart upon."
Captain Kettle looked puzzled. "I don't seem to quite follow you, sir."
"You shall hear the tale from the beginning. We have plenty of timeahead of us just now. You remember the wreck of the _Rangoon_?"
"She was coming home from East Indian ports, wasn't she, and got on firesomewhere off Cape Guardafui? But that'll have been twenty years back,in the old overland days, before the Ditch was opened. Only about ten ofher people saved, if I remember."
"That's about right," said Wenlock, "though it's twenty years ago now.She was full of Anglo-Indians, and their loss made a great sensation atthe time. Amongst others was a Colonel Anderson, and his wife, and theirchild Teresa, aged nine; and what made their deaths all the more sad wasthe fact that Anderson's elder brother died just a week before, and hewould have come home to find a peerage and large estates waitingfor him."
"I can feel for that man," said Kettle.
"I can feel most for the daughter," said Wenlock.
"How do you mean, sir?"
"Well, Colonel Anderson's dead, and his wife's dead, but the daughterisn't, or at any rate she was very much alive twelve months ago, that'sall. The whole lot of them, with others, got into one of the _Rangoon's_boats, and after frizzling about at sea till they were nearly starved,got chucked on that South Arabian coast (which you say is so rocky anddangerous), and were drowned in the process. All barring Teresa, thatis. She was pulled out of the water by the local niggers, and wasbrought up by them, and I've absolutely certain information that not ayear ago she was living in Dunkhot as quite a big personage in her way."
"And she's 'My Lady' now, if she only knew?"
"Well, not that. The title doesn't descend in the female line, butColonel Anderson made a will in her favor after she was born, and thepresent earl, who's got the estates, would have to shell out if sheturned up again."
"My owners, in their letter, mentioned that you were a solicitor. Thenyou are employed by his lordship, sir?"
Mr. Wenlock laughed. "Not much," he said. "I'm on my own hook. Why, hangit all, Captain, you must see that no man of his own free will would beidiot enough to resurrect a long-forgotten niece just to make himselfinto a beggar."
"I don't see why not, sir, if he got to know she was alive. Some menhave consciences, and even a lord, I suppose, is a man."
"The present earl has far too good a time of it to worry about running aconscience. No, I bet he fights like a thief for the plunder, howeverclear a case we have to show him. And as he's the man in possession andhas plenty of ready cash for law expenses, the odds are he'll turn outtoo big to worry at through all the courts, and we shall compromise.I'd like that best myself. Cash down has a desirable feel about it."
"It has, sir," said Kettle with a reminiscent sigh. "Even to pocket atenth of what is rightfully yours is better than getting mixed up withthat beastly law. But will the other relatives of the young lady, thosethat are employing you, I mean, agree to that?"
"Don't I tell you, Captain, I'm on my own hook? There are no otherrelatives--or at least none that would take a ha'porth of interest inTeresa's getting the estates. I've gone into the thing on sheer spec,and for what I can make out of it, and that, if all's well, will be thewhole lump."
"But how? The young lady may give you something in her gratitude, ofcourse, but you can'
t expect it all."
"I do, though, and I tell you how I'm going to get it. I shall marry thefair Teresa. Simple as tumbling off a house."
Kettle drew himself up stiffly and walked to the other end of thebridge, and began ostentatiously to look with a professional eye overhis vessel.
Wenlock was quick to see the change. "Come, what is it now, Captain?" heasked with some surprise.
"I don't like the idea of those sort of marriages," said the littlesailor, acidly.
Wenlock shrugged his shoulders good-humoredly.
"Neither do I, and if I were a rich man, I wouldn't have dreamed of it.Just think of what the girl probably is: she's been with those niggerssince she was quite a kid; she'll be quite uneducated; I'm in hopesshe's good-looking and has a decent figure; but at the best she'll bequite unpresentable till I've had her in hand for at least a couple ofyears, if then. Of course you'll say there's 'romance' about the thing.But then I don't care tuppence about romance, and anyway it's beastlyunconfortable to live with."
"I was not looking at that point of view."
"Let me tell you how I was fixed," said Wenlock with a burst ofconfidence. "I'd a small capital. So I qualified as a solicitor, and putup a door-plate, and waited for a practice. It didn't come. Not a clientdrifted near me from month's end to month's end. And meanwhile thecapital was dribbling away. I felt I was getting on my back legs; it waseither a case of the Colonies or the workhouse, and I'd no taste foreither; and when the news of this girl Teresa came, I tell you I justjumped at the chance. I don't want to marry her, of course; there areten other girls I'd rather have as wife; but there was no other way outof the difficulty, so I just swallowed my squeamishness for good andalways. See?"
"It was Miss Teresa Anderson I was pitying," said Kettle pointedly.
"Good Lord, man, why? Isn't it the finest thing in the world for her?"
"It might be fine to get away from where she is, and land home to find anice property waiting. But I don't care to see a woman have a husbandforced on her. It would be nobler of you, Mr. Wenlock, to let the younglady get to England, and look round her for a while, and make herown choice."
"I'm too hard up to be noble," said Wenlock drily. "I've not come hereon philanthropy, and marrying that girl is part of my business.Besides, hang it all, man, think of what she is, and think of what Iam." He looked himself up and down with a half humorous smile--"I knownice people at home who would be civil to her, and after all, hang it,I'm not unmarriageable personally."
"Still," said Kettle doggedly, "I don't like the idea of it."
"Then let me give you an inducement. I said I was not down here onphilanthropy, and I don't suppose you are either. You'll have mypassage money?"
"Two and a-half per cent of it is my commission. The rest goes to theowners, of course."
"Very well, then. In addition to that, if you'll help this marriage onin the way I ask, I'll give you L50."
"There's no man living who could do more usefully with L50 if I saw myway of fingering it."
"I think I see what you mean. No, you won't have to wait for it. I'vegot the money here in hard cash in my pocket ready for you to take overthe minute it's earned."
"I was wondering, sir, if I could earn it honorably. You must give metime to think this out. I'll try and give you an answer after tea. Andfor the present I shall have to leave you. I've got to go through theship's papers: I have to be my own clerk on board here just now, thoughthe Company did certainly promise me a much better ship if I beat upplenty of cargo, and made a good voyage of it with this."
The _Parakeet_ worked her way along down the Red Sea at her steady nineknots, and Mr. Hugh Wenlock put a couple of bunk pillows on a canvasboat-cover under the bridge deck awnings, and lay there and amusedhimself with cigarettes and a magazine. Captain Owen Kettle sat before atable in the chart-house with his head on one side, and a pen in hisfingers, and went through accounts. But though Wenlock, when he hadfinished his magazine, quickly went off to sleep, Captain Kettle'sstruggles with arithmetic were violent enough to keep him verythoroughly awake, and when a due proportion of the figures had beenchecked, he put the papers in a drawer, and was quite ready to tacklethe next subject.
He had not seen necessary to mention the fact to Mr. Wenlock, but whilethat young man was talking of the Miss Teresa Anderson, who at presentwas "quite a big personage in her way" at Dunkhot, a memory had come tohim that he had heard of the lady before in somewhat less prosaic terms.All sailormen who have done business on the great sea highway betweenWest and East during recent years have had the yarn given to them at onetime or another, and most of them have regarded it as gratuitous legend.Kettle was one of these. But he was beginning to think there wassomething more in it than a mere sailor's yarn, and he was anxious tosee if there was any new variation in the telling.
So he sent for Murray, his mate, a smart young sailor of the newerschool, who preferred to be called "chief officer," made him sit, andcommenced talk of a purely professional nature. Finally he said: "Andsince I saw you last, the schedule's changed. We call in at Dunkhot, forthat passenger Mr. Wenlock to do some private business ashore, before wego on to our Persian Gulf ports."
Murray repeated the name thoughtfully. "Dunkhot? Let's see, that's onthe South Arabian coast, about a day's steam from Aden, and a beast of aplace to get at, so I've heard. Oh, and of course, that's the placewhere the She-Sultan, or Queen, or whatever she calls herself, is boss."
"So there is really a woman of that kind there, is there? I'd heard ofher, like everybody else has, but I thought she was only a yarn."
"No, she's there in the flesh, sir, right enough; lots of flesh,according to what I've gathered. A serang of one of the B. and I. boats,who'd been in Dunkhot, told me about her only last year. She makes war,leads her troops, cuts off heads, and does the Eastern potentate up tothe mark. The serang said she was English, too, though I don't believemuch in that. One-tenth English would probably be more near the truth.The odds are she'll be Eurasian, and those snuff-and-butter coloredladies, when they get amongst people blacker than themselves, always tryto ignore their own lick of the tar-brush."
"Fat, is she?"
"The serang said she-was a big buffalo bull of a woman, with a terror ofa temper. I don't know what's Mr. Wenlock's business, sir; but whetherhe wants to start a dry-goods agency, or merely to arrange for smugglingin some rifles, he'd better make up his mind to square her first andforemost. She will have a finger in every pie. She's as curious as amonkey, too, and there's no doing anything without letting her know. Andwhen she says a thing, it's got to be done."
"Is she the head chief's favorite wife, then?"
"That's the funny part of it: she isn't married. These Orientals alwaysget husbands early as a general thing, and you'd have thought that inher juvenile days, before she got power, they'd have married her to someone about the town, whether she liked it or not. But it seems theydidn't, because she said she'd certainly poison any man if they sent herinto his zenana. And later on, when she came to be boss, she still keptto spinsterhood. Guess there wasn't any man about the place white enoughto suit her taste."
"H'm. What you've told me seems to let daylight on to things."
"Beg pardon, sir?"
Captain Kettle put his hand kindly on Murray's shoulder. "Don't ask meto explain now, my lad, but when the joke comes you shall share thelaugh. There's a young man on this ship (I don't mind telling you inconfidence) whose ways I don't quite like, and I think he's going to geta lesson."
He went out then under the awnings of the bridge deck, and told Wenlockthat he would probably be able to earn his fee for helping on themarriage, and Wenlock confidently thought that he quite understood thesituation.
"Skipper's a bit of a methody," thought Mr. Hugh Wenlock, "but hisprinciples don't go very deep when there are fifty sovereigns to beearned. Well, he's a useful man, and if he gets me snugly married tothat little girl, he'll be cheap at the price."
The _Parakeet's_ voyage to Dunkhot wa
s not swift. Eight-and-a-half knotswas her most economical pace for coal consumption, and at that gait shesteamed. With a reputation to make with his new owners, and two anda-half per cent, commission on all profits, Kettle had developed into aregular glutton for cargo; and the knowledge of men and places which hehad so laboriously acquired in former days served him finely. Threetimes he got doles of cargo at good stiff freights at points where fewother men would have dreamed of looking. He was an ideal man for themaster of an ocean tramp. He was exactly honest; he had a world ofmisfortunes behind to spur him on; he was quick of decision; and he haddeveloped a nose for cargo, and a knack of extorting it from merchants,that were little short of miraculous. And, in fact, if things went on asthey had started, he stood a very good chance of making 50 per cent, onthe _Parakeet's_ capital for the voyage, and so earning promotion to oneof the firm's better ships.
But though in the many days of his adversity Captain Kettle had nevershunned any risks which came in his way, with this new prosperity freshand pleasant at his feet, he was beginning to tell himself that riskswere foolish things. He arrived off Dunkhot and rang off his engines,and frowned angrily at the shore.
The town stood on an eminence, snugly walled, and filled with cool,square houses. At one side, the high minaret of a mosque stood up like abayonet, and at the other, standing in a ring of garden, was a largerbuilding, which seemed to call itself palace. There was a small fringeof cultivation beside the walls of the town, and beyond was arid desert,which danced and shimmered under the violent sun.
But all this lay small and far off, like a tiny picture in some hugeframe, and showing only through the glass. A maze of reefs guarded theshore, and tore up the sleek Indian Ocean swells into spouting breakers;and though there was anchorage inside, tenanted indeed by a score ofsailing craft, the way to it was openly perilous. And so for the presentthe _Parakeet_ lay to, rolling outside the entrance, flying a pilotjack, and waiting developments.
Captain Kettle might have his disquieting thoughts, still outwardly hewas cool. But Mr. Hugh Wenlock was on deck in the sprucest of hisapparel, and was visibly anxious and fidgety, as befitted a man whoshortly expected to enter into the bonds of matrimony.
A double-ended boat came off presently, manned by naked Arabs, andsteered by a man in a white burnous. She swept up alongside, caught arope and made fast, and the man in white introduced himself as a pilot.They are all good Mohammedans down there, or nominally, and so of coursethere was no question of a clean bill of health. Islam is not impiousenough to check the spread of any disease which Allah may see good tosend for its chastening.
The pilot wanted to take them in at once. He spoke some English, andcarried an air of confidence. He could guide them through the reefs inthe most complete of safety, and he could guarantee fine openings fortrade, once inside.
"I dare say," grunted Kettle under his breath, "but you're a heap toouncertificated for my taste. Why, you don't even offer a book of forgedlogs to try and work off your humbug with some look of truth. No, I knowthe kind of pilot you are. You'd pile up the steamboat on the firstconvenient reef, and then be one of the first to come and loot her."--Heturned to Murray: "Now, look here, Mr. Mate. I'll leave you in charge,and see you keep steam up and don't leave the deck. Don't let any ofthese niggers come on board on any pretence whatever, and if they try iton, steam out to sea. I'll get through Mr. Wenlock's business ashore asquick as lean, and perhaps pick up a ton or two of cargo for ourselves."
Below, in the dancing boat which ground against the steamer's side, thepilot clamored that a ladder might be thrown to him so that he mightcome on board and take the _Parakeet_ forthwith into the anchorage; andto him again Kettle turned, and temporized. He must go ashore himselffirst, he said, and see what offer there was of trade, before he tookthe steamer in. To which the pilot, though visibly disappointed, saw fitto agree, as no better offer was forthcoming.
"Now, sir," said Kettle to Wenlock, "into the boat with you. The lesstime that's wasted, the better I shall be pleased."
"All right," said Wenlock, pointing to a big package on the deck. "Justtell some of your men to shove that case down into the boat, andI'm ready."
Kettle eyed the bulky box with disfavor. "What's in it?" he asked.
"A present or a bribe; whichever you care to call it. If you want toknow precisely, it's rifles. I thought they would be most acceptable."
"Rifles are liked hereabouts. Is it for a sort of introductory present?"
"Well, if you must know, Captain, it's occurred to me that Teresa isprobably an occupant of somebody's harem, and that I shall have to buyher off from her husband. Hence the case of rifles."
A queer look came over Captain Kettle's face. "And you'd still marrythis woman if she had another husband living?"
"Of course. Haven't I told you that I've thought the whole thingthoroughly over already, and I'm not inclined to stick at trifles? But Imay tell you that divorce is easy in these Mohammedan countries, and Ishall take care to get the girl set legally free before we get away fromhere. You don't catch me getting mixed with bigamy."
"But tell me. Is a Mohammedan marriage made here binding for anEnglishman?"
"It's as legally binding as if the Archbishop of Canterbury tied theknot."
"Very well," said Kettle. "Now let me tell you, sir, for the last time,that I don't like what you're going to do. To my mind, it's not a nicething marrying a woman that you evidently despise, just for her money."
Wenlock flushed. "Look here," he said, "I refuse to be lectured,especially by you. Aren't you under promise to get L50 from me themoment I'm safely married? And didn't you fairly jump at the chance offingering it."
Captain Kettle did not hit this man who cast such an unpleasantimputation on him; he did not even let him feel the lash of his tonguein return. He merely smiled grimly, and said: "Get down into the boat,you and your case of rifles."
For the moment Wenlock started and hesitated. He seemed to detectsomething ominous in this order. But then he took a brace on hiscourage, and after a couple of deck hands had lowered the rifles intothe dancing boat, he clambered gingerly down after them, and sat himselfbeside the white-robed man in the stern sheets. Kettle followed, andthe boat headed off for the opening between the reefs.
The Indian Ocean swells swung beneath them, and presently were breakingon the grim stone barriers on either hand in a roar of sound. Thetriangular dorsal fins of a couple of sharks convoyed them in, in caseof accidents; and overhead a crowd of sea-fowl screamed and swooped andcircled. But none of these things interested them. The town ahead, whichjerked nearer to every tug of the oars, held the eye. In it was TeresaAnderson, heiress, a personage of whom each of them had his own privateconception. In it also were fanatical Arabs, whom they hoped the fear ofshadowy British gunboats would deter from open piracy.
The boat passed between a cluster of ragged shipping which swayed at theanchorage, and Wenlock might have stared with curious eyes (had he beenso minded) on real dhows which had even then got real slaves ready formarket in their stuffy 'tween decks. But he was gazing with a fascinatedstare at the town. Over the arch of the water-gate, for which they wereheading, was what at first appeared to be a frieze of small roundedballs; but a nearer view resolved these into human heads, in variousstages of desiccation. Evidently justice in Dunkhot was determined thatthe criminal who once passed through its hands should no more tread thepaths of unrighteousness.
The boat landed against a jetty of stone, and they stepped out dryshod.Wenlock stared at the gate with its dressing of heads as though theyfascinated him.
"And Teresa will have been brought up within sight of all this," hemurmured to himself, "and will be accustomed to it. Fancy marrying awoman who has spent twenty years of her life in the neighborhood of allthis savagery."
"Strong place in its way," said Kettle, squinting up at the brass cannonon the walls. "Those guns up there are well kept, you can see. Of courseone of our cheapest fourpenny gunboats could knock the whole shop intobri
cks in half an hour at three-mile range; but it's strong enough tohold out against any niggers along the coast here, and that's all theQueen here aims at. By the way, Emir, not Queen, is what she callsherself, so the pilot tells me. I suppose she thinks that as she's doinga man's job in a man's way, she may as well take a full man's ticket."
They passed in through the gate, the sentries staring at them curiously,and once inside, in the full heat and smell of the narrow street beyond,Wenlock said: "Look here, Skipper, you're resourceful, and you knowthese out-of-the-way places. How had we better start to find the girl?"
Kettle glanced coolly round at the grim buildings and the savage Arabswho jostled them, and said, with fine sarcasm: "Well, sir, as theredoesn't appear to be a policeman about, I should recommend you to applyat the post office."
"I don't want to be mocked."
"Then, if you'll take the tip from me, you'll crowd back to my steamboatas fast as you can go. You'll find it healthier."
"I'm going on with it," said Wenlock doggedly. "And I ask you to earnyour L50, and give me help."
"Then, if you distinctly ask me to help you on into trouble like that,of course, the best thing to do is to go straight on to the palace."
"Show the way, then," said Wenlock curtly.
Kettle gave the word to the white-robed pilot, and together they set offdown the narrow winding streets, with an ever-increasing train of Arabsand negroes following in their wake. Wenlock said nothing as he walked,but it was evident from the working of his face that his mind was veryfull. But Kettle looked about him with open interest, and thoughts inverse about this Eastern town came to him with pleasant readiness.
The royal residence was the large building encircled with gardens whichthey had seen from the sea, and they entered it with little formality.There was no trouble either about obtaining an audience. The Lady Emirhad, it appeared, seen the steamer's approach with her own eyes; indeed,the whole of Dunkhot was excited by such an unusual arrival; and theHead of the State was as human in her curiosity as the meanest niggeramong her subjects.
The audience hall was imposing. It was bare enough, according to therule of those heated Eastern lands, but it had an air of comfort andcoolness, and in those parts where it was not severely plain, the beautyof its architecture was delicious. Armed guards to the number of someforty men were posted round the walls, and at the further end,apparently belonging to the civil population, were some dozen other mensquatting on the floor. In the centre of the room was a naked wretch inchains; but sentence was hurriedly pronounced on him, and he was hustledaway as the two Englishmen entered, and they found themselves face toface with the only woman in the room, the supreme ruler of this savageSouth Arabian coast town.
She was seated on a raised divan, propped by cushions, and in front ofher was a huge water-pipe at which she occasionally took a meditativepull. She was dressed quite in Oriental fashion, in trousers, zouavejacket, sash, and all the rest of it; but she was unmistakably Englishin features, though strongly suggestive of the Boadicea. She was alarge, heavily-boned woman, enormously covered with flesh, and shedandled across her knees that very unfeminine sceptre, an Englishcavalryman's sword. But the eye neglected these details, and wasirresistibly drawn by the strongness of her face. Even Kettle was almostawed by it.
But Captain Owen Kettle-was not a man who could be kept in awe for long.He took off his helmet, marched briskly up toward the divan, and bowed.
"Good afternoon, your Ladyship," he said. "I trust I see you well. I'mCaptain Kettle, master of that steamboat now lying in your roads, andthis is Mr. Wenlock, a passenger of mine, who heard that you wereEnglish, and has come to put you in the way of some property at home."
The lady sat more upright, and set back her great shoulders. "I amEnglish," she said. "I was called in the Giaour faith Teresa Anderson."
"That's the name," said Kettle. "Mr. Wenlock's come to take you away tostep into a nice thing at home."
"I am Emir here. Am I asked to be Emir in your country?"
"Why, no," said Kettle; "that job's filled already, and we aren'tthinking of making a change. Our present Emir in England (who, by theway, is a lady like yourself) seems to suit us very well. No, you'll bean ordinary small-potato citizen, like everybody else, and you willprobably find it a bit of a change."
"I do not onderstand," said the woman. "I have not spoke your languagesince I was child. Speak what you say again."
"I'll leave it to Mr. Wenlock, your Majesty, if you've no objections, ashe's the party mostly interested; and if you'd ask one of your young mento bring me a long drink and a chair, I'll be obliged. It's been a hotwalk up here. I see you don't mind smoke," he added, and lit a cheroot.
Now, it was clear from the attitude of the guards and the civilianspresent, that Kettle was jostling heavily upon court etiquette, and atfirst the Lady Emir was very clearly inclined to resent it, and hadsharp orders for repression ready upon her lips. But she changed hermind, perhaps through some memory that by blood she was related to thisnonchalant race; and presently cushions were brought, on which CaptainKettle bestowed himself tailor-fashion (with his back cautiously upagainst a wall), and then a negro slave knelt before him and offeredsweet sticky sherbet, which he drank with a wry face.
But in the mean while Mr. Wenlock was stating his case with smallforensic eloquence. The sight of Miss Teresa Anderson in the flesh awedhim. He had pictured to himself some slim, quiet exile, perhaps a littlegauche and timid, but at any rate amenable to instruction and to hiswill. He had forgotten the developing power of tropical suns. The womanbefore him, whose actual age was twenty-nine, looked fifty, and even fora desperate man like himself was impossible as a wife in England.
He felt daunted before her already. It flashed through his mind that itwas she who had ordered those grisly heads to be stuck above thewater-gate, and he heartily wished himself away back on the steamer,tramping for cargo. He was not wanting in pluck as a usual thing, thisunsuccessful solicitor, but before a woman like this, with such a recordbehind her, a man may well be scared and yet not be accused ofcowardice.
But the Lady Emir looked on Wenlock in a very different way to that inwhich she had regarded Kettle. Mr. Wenlock possessed (as indeed he hadhimself pointed out on the _Parakeet_) a fine outward appearance, and infact anywhere he could have been remarked on as a personable man. Andthings came about as Kettle shrewdly anticipated they would. The LadyEmir had not remained unmarried all these years through sheer distastefor matrimony. She had been celibate through an unconquerable pride ofblood. None but men of colored race had been around her in all her wars,her governings, and her diplomacies; and always she had been too proudto mate with them. But here now stood before her a male of her own race,handsome, upstanding, and obviously impressed by her power and majesty.He would not rule her; he would not even attempt a mastery; she wouldstill be Emir--and a wife. The chance had never occurred to her before;might never occur again. She was quick to make her decision.
Ruling potentates are not as other folk with their love affairs, and theLady Emir of Dunkhot (forgetting that she was once Teresa Anderson, anda modest English maiden) unconsciously fell in with the rule of hercaste. The English speech, long disused, came to her unhandily, but thepurport of what she said was plain. She made proclamation that theEnglishman Wenlock should there and then become her husband, and letslaves fetch the mullah to unite them before the sun had dropped belowanother bar of the windows.
She did not ask her future husband's wishes or his permission. Shesimply stated her sovereign will and looked that it should be carriedout forthwith.
A couple of slaves scurried out on their missions--evidently their Emirwas accustomed to have her orders carried out with promptness--and forlong enough Wenlock stood wordless in front of the divan, far more likea criminal than a prospective bridegroom. The lady, with the tube of thewater-pipe between her lips, puffed smoke and made no further speech.She had stated her will: the result would follow in due course.
But at las
t Wenlock, as though wrenching himself into wakefulness out ofsome horrid dream, turned wildly to Kettle, and in a torrent of wordsimplored for rescue.
The little sailor heard him quite unmoved. "You asked my help," he said,"in a certain matter, and I've given it, and things have turned out justas I've guessed they would. You maundered about your dear Teresa on mysteamboat till I was nearly sick, and, by James! you've got her now, andno error about it."
"But you said you didn't approve," cried the wretched man.
"I quite know what I said," retorted Kettle grimly. "I didn't approve ofyour way. But this is different. You're not a very fine specimen, butanyway you're English, and it does good to the old shop at home tohave English people for kings and queens of foreign countries. I've gota theory about that."
"I'M A BRITISH SUBJECT"]
Now the Lady Emir was not listening to all this tirade by any meansunmoved. To begin with, it was not etiquette to speak at all in herpresence if unaddressed, and to go on with, although she did notunderstand one word in ten of what was being spoken, she gathered thegist of it, and this did not tend to compose her. She threw away thesnaky stem of water-pipe, and gripped both hands on the trooper's sword,till the muscles stood out in high relief.
"Do you say," she demanded, "you onwilling marry me?"
"Yes," said Wenlock, with sullen emphasis.
She turned her head, and gave orders in Arabic. With marvellousreadiness, as though it was one of the regular appointments of theplace, a couple of the guards trundled a stained-wooden block into themiddle of the floor, another took his station beside it with anominous-looking axe poised over his shoulder, and almost before Wenlockknew what was happening, he was pinned by a dozen men at wrist andankle, and thrust down to kneel "with his neck over the block.
"Do you say," the Lady Emir repeated, "you onwilling marry me?"
"I'm a British subject," Wenlock shouted. "I've a Foreign Officepassport in my pocket. I'll appeal to my Government over this."
"My lad," said Kettle, "you won't have time to appeal. The lady isn'tbeing funny. She means square biz. If you don't be sensible, and seethings in the same way she does, it'll be one _che-opp_, and whathappens afterward won't interest you."
"Those spikes," said Wenlock faintly.
"Above the water-gate?" said Kettle. "Queer, but the same thing occurredto me, too. You'd feel a bit lonely stuck up there getting sun-dried."
"I'll marry her."
"You'd better spread a bit more politeness about," Kettle advised. "Itwill be all the more comfortable for you afterward if you do." And soWenlock, with desperation nerving him, poured out all the prettyspeeches which he had in store, and which he had looked to use to thisvery woman under such very different circumstances. But he did not evensuggest taking his future spouse back to England.
She, too, when she graciously pardoned his previous outburst, mentionedher decision on this matter also.
"I am Emir here," she said, "and I could not be Emir in your Englandwithout many fights. So here I shall stay, and you with me. When thereis war, you shall ride at my side; in peace I will give you agovernorship over a ward of this town, from which you can get yourtaxes. And if there are children, you shall bring them up."
The mullah, who knew better than to keep his ruler waiting, had come in,and they were forthwith married, solemnly and irrevocably, according tothe rites and ceremonies of the Mohammedan Church, as practised in thekingdom of Dunkhot. And in witness thereof, Captain Kettle wrote hisname from left to right, in contradistinction to all the othersignatories, who wrote from right to left, except the bridegroom.
"And now, Mr. Wenlock, if you please," said Kettle, "as you'recomfortably tied to the lady of your choice, I'll trouble you for thatfee you promised."
"I'll see you in somewhere hotter than Arabia," said the bridegroom,mopping his pale face.
"Now look," said Kettle, "I'm not going to scrap with you here, and Idon't want to break up this happy home with domestic unpleasantness; butif you don't hand me over that L50, I shall ask your good lady to getit for me."
Wenlock sullenly handed out a note.
"Thank you. I know you feel injured, but I'm earning this money exactlyaccording to promise, and of you don't quite like what's been done, youmust remember that it's your own fault for not wording the agreement abit more carefully. And now, as I seem to have got through my businesshere, if it's agreeable to all parties, I'll be going. Good-by, Mrs.Wenlock, madam. Let me call you by your name for the first time."
The Lady Emir set back her great shoulders. "That is not my name," shesaid. "I am Emir. My name does not change."
"Beg pardon," said Kettle, "he takes yours, does he? Didn't know thatwas the custom of this country. Well, good-afternoon."
"But do you want," said the lady, "no present?"
"Thank you," said Kettle, with a cock of the head, "but I take presentsfrom no one. What bit of a living I get, your ladyship, I earn."
"I do not onderstand. But you are sailor. You have ship. You wishcargo?"
Captain Kettle snapped his fingers ecstatically. "Now, ma'am, thereyou've hit it. Cargo's what I do want. I'll have to tell you thatfreights are up a good deal just now, and you'll have to pay foraccommodation, but my ship's a good one, and my firm's reliable, andwill see that you are dealt by honest at the other end."
"I do not onderstand."
"Of course you don't, your Majesty; of course you don't. Ladies like youdon't have to bother with the shipping trade. But just you give me aline to the principal merchants in the town saying that you'd like me tohave a few tons of their stuff, and that'll do. I guess that what yourladyship likes round here is usually done."
"You wish me write. I will write. Now we will wash hands, and there isbanquet."
And so it came to pass that, some twenty-four hours later, CaptainKettle returned to the _Parakeet_ sun-scorched, and flushed withsuccess, and relieved the anxious Murray from his watch. The mate wasnaturally curious to know what happened ashore.
"Let me get a glass of Christian beer to wash all their stickynastinesses from my neck, and I'll tell you," said Kettle, and he didwith fine detail and circumstance.
"Well, Wenlock's got his heiress anyway," said Murray, with a sigh, whenthe tale was over. "I suppose we may as well get under way now, sir."
"Not much," said Kettle jubilantly. "Why, man, I've squeezed every tonof cargo they have in the place, and stuck them for freights in a waythat would surprise you. Here's the tally: 270 bags of coffee, 700packets of dates, 350 baskets of figs, and all for London. And, markyou," said Kettle, hitting the table, "that or more'll be waiting for methere every time I come, and no other skipper need apply."
"H'm," said the mate thoughtfully; "but will Wenlock be as civil andlimp next time you call, sir?"
Captain Kettle winked pleasantly, and put a fifty-pound note in hislock-up drawer. "That's all right, my lad. No fear of Master Wenlockgetting his tail up. If you'd seen the good lady, his wife, you'd knowwhy. That's the man that went hunting an heiress, Mr. Murray; and by theholy James he's got her, and no error."