CHAPTER XXIX PETER WILLIAMS

Next morning Floyd called on Hakluyt, while Cardon, who had accompanied him, waited outside the office.

Floyd was half an hour in the office, and when he came out Cardon followed till he had turned the street corner, and there joined him.

"I can't make it out," said Floyd; "I've said good-by to him, and I'm to start to-morrow morning at sunup, and not a word did he say about Luckman or anyone else, not a hint that he was going to send an extra hand on board. What's the meaning of it? Did I dream that business in the office, or was it real?"

"Oh, I guess you'll find it real enough to satisfy you before long," said Cardon. "You see, there's one solid reason behind all this that will make it work out different from a dream, and that reason is pearls. You say you have a third share in the business, which share, if the business is worth twenty thousand as it stands, would work out close on seven thousand pounds. Now, if Hakluyt is a shipowner, he's a scoundrel; and if he's a scoundrel, he'll do a lot to secure seven thousand pounds. Why, men sink ships every day for less than that; and sinking a ship is a lot more risky business than doing up an unknown sailorman. You[Pg 244] needn't be uneasy on that score. You dreamed a real dream. You see, you are worth killing, that's the long and short of it; for not only are you worth the seven thousand, but you are worth a third of all that pearl lagoon will bring in the future, which may be a lot. I wish we could get to know something about this Luckman. Suppose we make inquiries?"

"Whom could we ask?"

"Some one who knows the port. Peter Williams, he's the man; he keeps a bar down on the waterside. I knew him in Melbourne years ago, and I gave him a call when I came here first, and he's a friendly sort of customer. Don't you do any talking; leave it all to me."

They took their way down to the waterside, and here, before a rather dingy bar with the name Peter Williams done in huge letters on the front, Cardon paused.

"This is the place," said he, "and we'd better go in separate. You see, if Williams by any chance was to know Luckman and tell him two strangers had been inquiring about him, Luckman would ask for a description of them, and might spot you. Don't pretend to know me, then we will be on the safe side."

Peter Williams, a red-headed Welshman in shirt sleeves, was leaning across the bar talking to Cardon when Floyd entered. There was no one else in the place.

Floyd glanced round him with disgust. The walls were dingy and showed a dado of grease marks above the benches where the heads of customers had rested against the wall. The atmosphere was heavy with stale tobacco and the smell of gin and sawdust.

[Pg 245]He called for a drink, and took his seat on one of the benches while Peter Williams returned to his conversation with Cardon.

"Well, I wouldn't have him here," said Peter. "Not that I'm a prying man into another man's character, for a publican has nothing to do with the character of his customers. No, it's not that; it's my other customers I'm thinking of. If he was to come in here or be seen here regular, I'd lose my trade—and no wonder. He's never been had by the law, but he's got the name of having drowned more sailormen than is good for him. It's so. He's lost three ships out of this port alone, and God He knows how many more, and has done it so artful that the law can't touch him. And still he gets ships. What's that you say—you wonder that sailormen will sign on under him? How are they to pick and choose? Give them drink enough, and they'd sign on under Satan. And there's more than that to it. The Baralong, she was known to be rotten right down to her garboard strake and Huffer was her captain, and he was known to be as bad as her; and there were two jacks in here drinking and talking her over and talking Huffer over and giving them both their proper names. Well, next day both those chaps signed on under Huffer, and the day after they were off to Valparaiso on the Baralong. I believe some of those chaps would sooner sign on in a crazy vessel than a sound one. They seem to like the danger. All the same, when they sit down to their drinks they don't want to have the taste of their liquor spoiled by the sight of chaps like Huffer or Luckman. They'll sail under them, but they won't drink near them. That's the plain truth."

[Pg 246]Cardon, after a little while, went out, and presently Floyd followed him.

"Well," said Floyd, when they met in the street, "you've heard Luckman's character. What do you think of it?"

"I never think about men's characters, or bother a cent about anything than the man himself," replied Cardon. "A man may have a tremendous big character—or, better, call it reputation for being a holy terror; and when you overhaul him you may find him to be a merchantman painted in imitation of a pirate, or, again, he may have the reputation of being a very quiet man indeed; then you take his lid off, and—oh, my!

"I've seen a little bit of a man who looked like a parson with the pip, a little bit of a chap with a pale face that looked as if it had been trying all its life to raise a beard and then given up the business as unworkable. Well, that chap swam out to a ship somewhere down the Chile coast, talked the crew over, and made them mutiny. With the crew he took the ship, and with the ship he took a town, and with the town he'd have taken Chile, I believe, only the Chilean government chipped in in time and sent troops and beat him in a big battle near Valdivia and then hanged him at Concepción. I saw him hanged. Benken was his name—an American from nowhere, with a past history that showed nothing except the fact that he had once been a prisoner in Numea and had escaped by raising a revolt and murdering the guards. Yet to look at him he was quite a quiet man; might have been a shopman.

"No; as I was saying, there's nothing counts but[Pg 247] the man himself, and by the man himself I don't mean a man's character or face, but just the something that drives him on. If he hasn't got that something, he may have the face of a Napoleon Bonaparte or the character of a white lamb—it doesn't matter, he arrives nowhere. Now, from all accounts, the man I fear most in this business is not Luckman but Schumer. Schumer seems to be all there from what you tell me, and he doesn't seem to make much show. Is he a quiet sort of chap?"

"Yes, very."

"Fair spoken and easy in his talk?"

"Yes."

"That's the sort of man that gives trouble. Well, we will see what we will see when the time comes; and now I propose we go and have a bit of dinner. It's the last we'll have on shore for some time."

That afternoon Floyd, having paid off his landlord, called a porter and had his gear, together with Cardon's, taken down to the wharfside. Here they took a shore boat and rowed off to the Southern Cross. Mountain Joe was hanging over the rail as they approached. He and the whole Kanaka ship's company had been specially provided for when on shore by Hakluyt. He had sent the whole lot, in fact, under the guidance of one of his men, to a fishing village down the coast, there to amuse themselves till the time of sailing. He did not want them knocking round Sydney and maybe talking, though indeed they knew little enough as to the truth concerning the pearl fishery.

Mountain Joe grinned when he saw Floyd; then he lowered the ladder for them.

[Pg 248]It was a lovely late afternoon, the great harbor like a sheet of glass, the gulls crying and wheeling above the water and the trees of the shore and the far-stretching hills green against a sky of summer. Cardon, when he stepped on deck, looked round him with approval. The Southern Cross was not a fast boat, as schooners go, but she was only some six years old and she had been well looked after. Built by McDowell, of Sydney, than whom no better schooner builder exists, she had been laid down to the plans of a private firm with ideas of their own, as though one were to go to Mr. Pool or Messrs. Stultz for a suit of clothes to be made according to one's own ideas of cut and style.

The result was that the Southern Cross turned out to be something of a failure as far as speed was concerned, but a splendid sea boat. Every bit of stuff in her was good, and spars, rigging, and hull would have stood the criticism of an English navy dockyard inspection.

Floyd took Cardon down below and showed him the main cabin and the cabins of the captain and the first and second mate.

The captain's cabin had two bunks—an upper and a lower one—and they arranged that Cardon should sleep that night in the upper bunk, which had curtains.

"If Hakluyt should turn up before we start," said Cardon, "I can lie in the upper bunk with the curtains drawn and you can say I'm some of your gear you have stowed there. There's no fear of any of those tomfool Kanakas coming and poking their noses in here?"

[Pg 249]"No, I'll look to that. The fellow that acts as steward is a born fool, and if he did see you he wouldn't take notice; and, anyhow, you're on board, and, Hakluyt or no Hakluyt, you are going to sail with me."

He got out the spirits and some cigars, and they sat smoking and talking till the steward came in to light the lamps.

Cardon, at sight of this person, felt no uneasiness; he was of the stupid type of native—"wore his mouth open," to use Cardon's expression, and was afflicted with deafness due to adenoids.

They came up on deck after dark, and sat smoking and watching the lights of Sydney and the harbor all spangled with star reflections and the anchor lights of the shipping.

"Well," said Cardon, "if old man Hakluyt had been intending to come off for the purpose of dumping Luckman on you, I guess he'd have come by this."

"You never know," replied Floyd. "That sort of reptile is pretty cunning, and I don't give up a fear of surprise till I'm outside the Heads. Look! There's a shore boat come off, and it's making for us if I'm not mistaken."

Cardon looked in the direction indicated.

"You're right," said he.

Without another word he turned and dived below.

Floyd, quite sure as to the other's ability to take cover, remained on deck.

He could see the boat now clearly as she drew near across the starlit water.

There were four fellows rowing, and a figure in the[Pg 250] stern steering. It was Hakluyt alone and unaccompanied by Luckman.

Hakluyt came on board and gave Floyd good evening, inquired if the crew were all right, and then came below.

Floyd, who preceded him, looked anxiously round, but Cardon had removed all traces of himself, and the door of the captain's cabin was closed.

"Well," said Hakluyt, as he took his seat and a drink, "here's luck to the voyage and a quick return with another cargo of shell, though I expect it is Schumer himself who will come next to Sydney. You will give him my very good respects?"

"Certainly," replied Floyd, "and perhaps the next time I meet you will be on the island. You are sure to pay us another visit."

"Maybe," replied Hakluyt, "and maybe not. I am getting old for sea work, but I shall always be glad to welcome you in Sydney."

He produced a pocketbook, and they went into accounts as to stores, et cetera. This business took them some half hour or so, and then Hakluyt took another cigar and talked on indifferent subjects till it was time to go.

He shook hands effusively with Floyd on deck, and wished him good luck again as he went down the side.

Floyd watched the boat draw off and the oars making rings on the star-spangled water; then he returned to the cabin, where he found Cardon released from his prison and seated at the table.

"He's gone," said Floyd.

"And no sign of Luckman?"

"Not a sign."

[Pg 251]"Well," said Cardon, "it's beyond me. However, we're not out of Sydney harbor yet, and there's no knowing what may happen before we are."