IX, THE CAPTURE OF HOANG
"What smashed the junk? What wrecked her?" demanded Moran.
The deserting Chinamen huddled around Charlie, drawing close, as iffinding comfort in the feel of each other's elbows.
"No can tell," answered Charlie. "Him shake, then lif' up all the sameas we. Bime-by too much lif' up; him smash all to--Four-piecee Chinamendlown."
"Drown! Did any of them drown?" exclaimed Moran.
"Four-piecee dlown," reiterated Charlie calmly. "One, thlee, five, nine,come asho'. Him other no come."
"Where are the ones that came ashore?" asked Wilbur.
Charlie waved a hand back into the night. "Him make um camp topside olehouse."
"That old whaling-camp," prompted Moran. Then to Wilbur: "Youremember--about a hundred yards north the creek?"
Wilbur, Moran and Charlie had drawn off a little from the "BerthaMillner's" crew. The latter squatted in a line along the shore--silent,reserved, looking vaguely seaward through the night. Moran spoke again,her scowl thickening:
"What makes you think the beach-combers want our schooner?"
"Him catch um schooner sure! Him want um boat to go home. No can get."
"Let's put off to-night--right away," said Wilbur.
"Low tide," answered Moran; "and besides--Charlie, did you see themclose? Were you near them?"
"No go muchee close."
"Did they have something with them, reeved up in a hammock--somethingthat smelled sweet?"
"Like a joss-stick, for instance?"
"No savvy; no can tell. Him try catch um schooner sure. Him velly badChina boy. See Yup China boy, velly bad. I b'long Sam Yup. Savvy?'!
"Ah! the Tongs?"
"Yas. I Sam Yup. Him," and he pointed to the "Bertha's" crew, "Sam Yup.All we Sam Yup; nisi him," and he waved a hand toward the beach-combers'camp; "him See Yup. Savvy?"
"It's a Tong row," said Wilbur. "They're blood enemies, the See Yups andSam Yups."
Moran fell thoughtful, digging her boot-heel into the sand, her thumbshooked into her belt, her forehead gathered into a heavy frown. Therewas a silence.
"One thing," she said, at last; "we can't give up the schooner. Theywould take our stores as well, and then where are we? Marooned, by Jove!How far do you suppose we are from the nearest town? Three hundred mileswouldn't be a bad guess, and they've got the loot--our ambergris--I'llswear to that. They didn't leave that aboard when the junk sank."
"Look here, Charlie," she said, turning to the Chinaman. "If thebeach-combers take the schooner--the 'Bertha Millner'--from us we'll beleft to starve on this beach."
"I tink um yass."
"How are we going to get home? Are you going to let them do it? Are yougoing to let them have our schooner?"
"I tink no can have."
"Look here," she went on, with sudden energy. "There are only nine ofthem now, to our eight. We're about even. We can fight those swine. Iknow we can. If we jumped their camp and rushed them hard, believeme, we could run them into the sea. Mate," she cried, suddenly facingWilbur, "are you game? Have you got blood in you? Those beach-comberesare going to attack us to-morrow, before high tide--that's flat. There'sgoing to be a fight anyway. We can't let them have the schooner. It'sstarvation for us if we do.
"They mean to make a dash for the 'Bertha,' and we've got to fight themoff. If there's any attacking to be done I propose to do it! I proposewe jump their camp before it gets light--now--to-night--right away--runin on them there, take them by surprise, do for one or two of them if wehave to, and get that ambergris. Then cut back to the schooner, up oursails, and wait for the tide to float us off. We can do it--I know wecan. Mate, will you back me up?"
"Back you up? You bet I'll back you up, Moran. But--" Wilbur hesitated."We could fight them so much more to advantage from the deck of theschooner. Why not wait for them aboard? We could have our sails up,anyhow, and we could keep the beach-combers off till the tide rose highenough to drive them back. Why not do that?"
"I tink bes' wait topside boat," assented Charlie.
"Yes; why not, Moran?"
"Because," shouted the girl, "they've got our loot. I don't propose tobe plundered of $150,000 if I can help it."
"Wassa dat?" demanded Charlie. "Hunder fiftee tlousand you hab got?"
"I did have it--we had it, the mate and I. We triced a sperm whale forthe beach-combers, and when they thought they had everything out of himwe found a lump of ambergris in him that will weigh close to two hundredpounds. Now look here, Charlie. The beach-combers have got the stuff.It's mine--I'm going to have it back. Here's the lay. Your men canfight--you can fight yourself. We'll make it a business proposition.Help me to get that ambergris, and if we get it I'll give each one ofthe men $1,000, and I'll give you $1,500. You can take that up and beindependent rich the rest of your life. You can chuck it and rot on thisbeach, for it's fight or lose the schooner; you know that as well as Ido. If you've got to fight anyhow, why not fight where it's going to paythe most?"
Charlie hesitated, pursing his lips.
"How about this, Moran?" Wilbur broke forth now, unheard by Charlie."I've just been thinking; have we got a right to this ambergris, afterall? The beach-combers found the whale. It was theirs. How have we theright to take the ambergris away from them any more than the sperm andthe oil and the bone? It's theirs, if you come to that. I don't know aswe've the right to it."
"Darn you!" shouted Moran in a blaze of fury, "right to it, right toit! If I haven't, who has? Who found it? Those dirty monkeys might havestood some show to a claim if they'd held to the one-third bargain, andoffered to divvy with us when they got me where I couldn't help myself.I don't say I'd give in now if they had--give in to let 'em walk offwith a hundred thousand dollars that I've got as good a claim to as theyhave! But they've saved me the trouble of arguing the question. They'vetaken it all, all! And there's no bargain in the game at all now. Nowthe stuff belongs to the strongest of us, and I'm glad of it. Theythought they were the strongest and now they're going to find out. We'redumped down here on this God-forsaken sand, and there's no law and nopolicemen. The strongest of us are going to live and the weakest aregoing to die. I'm going to live and I'm going to have my loot, too, andI'm not going to split fine hairs with these robbers at this time ofday. I'm going to have it all, and that's the law you're under in thiscase, my righteous friend!"
She turned her back upon him, spinning around upon her heel, and Wilburfelt ashamed of himself and proud of her.
"I go talkee-talk to China boy," said Charlie, coming up.
For about five minutes the Chinamen conferred together, squatting ina circle on the beach. Moran paced up and down by the stranded dory.Wilbur leaned against the bleached whale-skull, his hands in hispockets. Once he looked at his watch. It was nearly one o'clock.
"All light," said Charlie, coming up from the group at last; "him fightplenty."
"Now," exclaimed Moran, "we've no time to waste. What arms have we got?"
"We've got the cutting-in spades," said Wilbur; "there's five of them.They're nearly ten feet long, and the blades are as sharp as razors; youcouldn't want better pikes."
"That's an idea," returned Moran, evidently willing to forget heroutburst of a moment before, perhaps already sorry for it. The partytook stock of their weapons, and five huge cutting-in spades, a heavyknife from the galley, and a revolver of doubtful effectiveness weredivided among them. The crew took the spades, Charlie the knife, andWilbur the revolver. Moran had her own knife, a haftless dirk, such asis affected by all Norwegians, whether landsmen or sailors. They wereexamining this armament and Moran was suggesting a plan of attack, whenHoang, the leader of the beach-combers, and one other Chinaman appearedsome little distance below them on the beach. The moon was low and therewas no great light, but the two beach-combers caught the flash of thepoints of the spades. They halted and glanced narrowly and suspiciouslyat the group.
"Beasts!" muttered Moran. "They are up to the game--there's nosurprising them now. Tal
k to him, Charlie; see what he wants."
Moran, Wilbur, and Charlie came part of the way toward Hoang and hisfellow, and paused some fifteen feet distant, and a long colloquyensued. It soon became evident, however, that in reality Hoangwanted nothing of them, though with great earnestness he asserted hiswillingness to charter the "Bertha Millner" back to San Francisco.
"That's not his game at all," said Moran to Wilbur, in a low tone, hereyes never leaving those of the beach-comber. "He's pretty sure he couldseize the 'Bertha' and never pay us a stiver. They've come down to spyon us, and they're doing it, too. There's no good trying to rush thatcamp now. They'll go back and tell the crew that we know their lay."
It was still very dark. Near the hulk of the beached "Bertha Millner"were grouped her crew, each armed with a long and lance-like cutting-inspade, watching and listening to the conference of the chiefs. The moon,almost down, had flushed blood-red, violently streaking the gray, smoothsurface of the bay with her reflection. The tide was far out, ripplingquietly along the reaches of wet sand. In the pauses of the conferencethe vast, muffling silence shut down with the abruptness of a valvesuddenly closed.
How it happened, just who made the first move, in precisely what mannerthe action had been planned, or what led up to it, Wilbur couldnot afterward satisfactorily explain. There was a rush forward--heremembered that much--a dull thudding of feet over the resounding beachsurface, a moment's writhing struggle with a half-naked brown figurethat used knife and nail and tooth, and then the muffling silence again,broken only by the sound of their own panting. In that whirl of swiftaction Wilbur could reconstruct but two brief pictures: the Chinaman,Hoang's companion, flying like one possessed along the shore; Hoanghimself flung headlong into the arms of the "Bertha's" coolies, andMoran, her eyes blazing, her thick braids flying, brandishing her fistas she shouted at the top of her deep voice, "We've got you, anyhow!"
They had taken Hoang prisoner, whether by treachery or not, Wilbur didnot exactly know; and, even if unfair means had been used, he could notrepress a feeling of delight and satisfaction as he told himself that inthe very beginning of the fight that was to follow he and his mates hadgained the first advantage.
As the action of that night's events became more and more accelerated,Wilbur could not but notice the change in Moran. It was very evidentthat the old Norse fighting blood of her was all astir; brutal,merciless, savage beyond all control. A sort of obsession seized uponher at the near approach of battle, a frenzy of action that was checkedby nothing--that was insensible to all restraint. At times it wasimpossible for him to make her hear him, or when she heard to understandwhat he was saying. Her vision contracted. It was evident that she couldnot see distinctly. Wilbur could no longer conceive of her as a womanof the days of civilization. She was lapsing back to the eighth centuryagain--to the Vikings, the sea-wolves, the Berserkers.
"Now you're going to talk," she cried to Hoang, as the bound Chinamansat upon the beach, leaning his back against the great skull. "Charlie,ask him if they saved the ambergris when the junk went down--if they'vegot it now?" Charlie put the question in Chinese, but the beach-comberonly twinkled his vicious eyes upon them and held his peace. With thefull sweep of her arm, her fist clinched till the knuckles whitened,Moran struck him in the face.
"Now will you talk?" she cried. Hoang wiped the blood from his face uponhis shoulder and set his jaws. He did not answer.
"You will talk before I'm done with you, my friend; don't get any wrongnotions in your head about that," Moran continued, her teeth clinched."Charlie," she added, "is there a file aboard the schooner?"
"I tink um yass, boss hab got file."
"In the tool-chest, isn't it?" Charlie nodded, and Moran ordered it tobe fetched.
"If we're to fight that crowd," she said, speaking to herself and in arapid voice, thick from excitement and passion, "we've got to know wherethey've hid the loot, and what weapons they've got. If they have a rifleor a shotgun with them, it's going to make a big difference for us. Theother fellow escaped and has gone back to warn the rest. It's fight now,and no mistake."
The Chinaman who had been sent aboard the schooner returned, carrying along, rather coarse-grained file. Moran took it from him.
"Now," she said, standing in front of Hoang, "I'll give you one morechance. Answer me. Did you bring off the ambergris, you beast, when yourjunk sank? Where is it now? How many men have you? What arms have yougot? Have your men got a rifle?--Charlie, put that all to him in yourlingo, so as to make sure that he understands. Tell him if he don't talkI'm going to make him very sick."
Charlie put the questions in Chinese, pausing after each one. Hoang heldhis peace.
"I gave you fair warning," shouted Moran angrily, pointing at him withthe file. "Will you answer?"
"Him no tell nuttin," observed Charlie.
"Fetch a cord here," commanded Moran. The cord was brought, and despiteHoang's struggles and writhings the file was thrust end-ways into hismouth and his jaws bound tightly together upon it by means of the cordpassed over his head and under his chin. Some four inches of the fileportruded from his lips. Moran took this end and drew it out between thebeach-comber's teeth, then pushed it back slowly.
The hideous rasp of the operation turned Wilbur's blood cold within him.He looked away--out to sea, down the beach--anywhere, so that he mightnot see what was going forward. But the persistent grind and scrapestill assaulted his ears. He turned about sharply.
"I--I--I'll go down the beach here a ways," he said quickly. "I can'tstand--I'll keep watch to see if the beach-combers come up."
A few minutes later he heard Charlie hailing him.
"Chin-chin heap plenty now," said he, with a grin, as Wilbur came up.
Hoang sat on the sand in the midst of the circle. The file and coilof rope lay on the ground near by. The beach-comber was talking in ahigh-keyed sing-song, but with a lisp. He told them partly in pigeonEnglish and partly in Cantonese, which Charlie translated, that theirmen were eight in number, and that they had intended to seize theschooner that night, but that probably his own capture had delayed theirplans. They had no rifle. A shotgun had been on board, but had gone downwith the sinking of the junk. The ambergris had been cut into two lumps,and would be found in a couple of old flour-sacks in the stern of theboat in which he and his men had come ashore. They were all armed withtheir little hatchets. He thought two of the men carried knives as well.There was neither pistol nor revolver among them.
"It seems to me," said Wilbur, "that we've got the long end."
"We catch um boss, too!" said Charlie, pointing to Hoang.
"And we are better armed," assented Moran. "We've got the cutting-inspades."
"And the revolver, if it will shoot any further than it will kick."
"They'll give us all the fight we want," declared Moran.
"Oh, him Kai-gingh, him fight all same devil."
"Give the men brandy, Charlie," commanded Moran. "We'll rush that campright away."
The demijohn of spirits was brought down from the "Bertha" and passedaround, Wilbur and Moran drinking from the tin cup, the coolies from thebottle. Hoang was fettered and locked in the "Bertha's" cabin.
"Now, then, are we ready?" cried Moran.
"I tink all light," answered Charlie.
The party set off down the beach. The moon had long since gone down,and the dawn was whitening over the eastern horizon. Landward, raggedblankets of morning mist lay close in the hollows here and there. It wasprofoundly still. The stars were still out. The surface of Magdalena Baywas smooth as a sheet of gray silk.
Twenty minutes passed, half an hour, an hour. The party tramped steadilyforward, Moran, Wilbur, and Charlie leading, the coolies close behindcarrying the cutting-in spades over their shoulders. Slowly and insilence they made the half circuit of the bay. The "Bertha Millner" wasfar behind them by now, a vague gray mass in the early morning light.
"Did you ever fight before?" Moran suddenly demanded of Charlie.
"One time I fight plenty much in San Flancisco in Washington stleet.Fight um See Yups."
Another half-hour passed. At times when they halted they began to hearthe faint murmur of the creek, just beyond which was the broken andcrumbling shanty, relic of an old Portuguese whaling-camp, where thebeach-combers were camped. At Charlie's suggestion the party made acircuit, describing a half moon, to landward, so as to come out upon theenemy sheltered by the sand-dunes. Twenty minutes later they crossed thecreek about four hundred yards from the shore. Here they spread out intoa long line, and, keeping an interval of about fifteen feet between eachof them, moved cautiously forward. The unevenness of the sand-breaks hidthe shore from view, but Moran, Wilbur, and Charlie knew that by keepingthe creek upon their left they would come out directly upon the house.
A few moments later Charlie held up his hand, and the men halted. Thenoise of the creek chattering into the tidewater of the bay was plainlyaudible just beyond; a ridge of sand, covered thinly with sage-brush,and a faint column of smoke rose into the air over the ridge itself.They were close in. The coolies were halted, and dropping upon theirhands and knees, the three leaders crawled to the top of the break.Sheltered by a couple of sage-bushes and lying flat to the ground,Wilbur looked over and down upon the beach. The first object he made outwas a crazy, roofless house, built of driftwood, the chinks plasteredwith 'dobe mud, the door fallen in.
Beyond, on the beach, was a flat-bottomed dingy, unpainted and foul withdirt. But all around the house the sand had been scooped and piledto form a low barricade, and behind this barricade Wilbur saw thebeach-combers. There were eight of them. They were alert and ready,their hatchets in their hands. The gaze of each of them was fixeddirectly upon the sand-break which sheltered the "Bertha Millner's"officers and crew. They seemed to Wilbur to look him straight in theeye. They neither moved nor spoke. The silence and absolute lack ofmotion on the part of these small, half-naked Chinamen, with theirape-like muzzles and twinkling eyes, was ominous.
There could be no longer any doubts that the beach-combers had knownof their enemies' movements and were perfectly aware of their presencebehind the sand-break. Moran rose to her feet, and Wilbur and Charliefollowed her example.
"There's no use hiding," she said; "they know we're here."
Charlie called up the crew. The two parties were ranged face to face.Over the eastern rim of the Pacific the blue whiteness of the earlydawn was turning to a dull, roseate gold at the core of the sunrise. Theheadlands of Magdalena Bay stood black against the pale glow; overhead,the greater stars still shone. The monotonous, faint ripple of the creekwas the only sound. It was about 3:30 o'clock.