CHAPTER XXV The Tables Turned

Gripping the cutlass, Jasper Minalto followed the Third Officer into the open air, or rather to the edge of the belt of undergrowth that marked the fugitives' hiding-place.

This part of the island had undergone a complete transformation. Trees, scrub, and grass had vanished, leaving an expanse of blackened, still smouldering ashes. The lagoon, previously screened from the mouth of the cave, was fully exposed to an extent of almost a mile. On it, riding to a cable that hung perpendicularly from the hawse-pipe, was the schooner, with her sails lowered but loosely furled in a way that no self-respecting seaman would have been guilty of performing. There was the camp, too, with the shelter constructed from the wreckage of the life-boat lying upon the ground, and a fire still burning in the fire-place.

But what particularly attracted the attention of the two men was the sight of half a dozen or more motionless figures lying in strange attitudes upon the ground.

"By Jove!" exclaimed Burgoyne. "Minalto, my lad, your li'l ole cask has done us a good turn. They're all dead drunk. Two, four, six, eight of them. One's not accounted for. We'll risk that one. Stop here, and don't let yourself be seen. I'll go back and bring Mostyn along."

Burgoyne returned to the cave.

"Game for a big stunt, Peter?" he inquired.

"Rather, I'm on," replied Mostyn promptly. "What's doing?"

"Bring as much rope as you can carry," said Alwyn, "and come along. We've got them cold. Yes, and bring Minalto's spear. We may have to do a bit of gentle persuasion in the clubbing line."

The three men advanced cautiously upon the silent forms of the prostrate pirates, but it was not until they were within twenty paces of their intended prey that Burgoyne checked his companions.

No words were necessary. The three men could see for themselves what had happened.

There were eight pirates all dead. One, a Malay, was lying with his head and shoulders in the still-smouldering embers. The others, all bearing wounds of bullets or knives, had fought to a finish. Jasper's li'l ole cask had vindicated its existence. Unused to spirits for months past, the pirates had hailed the discovery of the keg with wild delight. The potent stuff had made them mad drunk, and in their beastly state of intoxication they had quarrelled, using knives and rifles to back up their senseless arguments until all had fallen. Apparently the Malay had survived the others, but had rolled helplessly into the fire.

"Sarve 'em right!" exclaimed Jasper.

None of the three men felt any sense but that of gratitude for their deliverance. Humane though they undoubtedly were, they had no pity for the ruffianly crew now lying dead almost at their feet.

"Now for the schooner!" exclaimed Peter, stooping and securing a rifle and ammunition that had belonged to one of the villainous dead—an example which Jasper was not slow to follow.

"Steady!" cautioned Burgoyne. "There are eight here; where is the ninth?"

"Black Strogoff?"

"Ay; he'll want watching. He's not on board."

"How do you know that?" asked Mostyn.

"The boat isn't alongside. Come on; we'll find her along the beach."

Skirting the shore of the little creek, they gained the beach fronted by the lagoon. Rather more than a stone's throw away was the schooner's boat with her bow a good twelve feet from the water's edge. Tugging and straining at the boat was Black Strogoff, trying in vain to anticipate the rising tide by launching the small but heavily-built dinghy into the water.

Revolver in hand, Burgoyne stealthily approached the pirate lieutenant. The latter, furtively turning his head, caught sight of the three men whose capture he had so ardently desired, and now as devotedly wished to avoid.

"Hands up, Strogoff!" ordered Burgoyne.

For answer the rogue whipped out an automatic, at the same time kneeling behind the boat and resting the muzzle of the weapon on the gunwale.

Without hesitation Mostyn and Jasper both raised their rifles and took rapid aim. Both weapons barked simultaneously, even as Black Strogoff wildly loosed ten rounds from his pistol. The next instant the automatic was violently wrenched from the pirate-lieutenant's hand, leaving Strogoff not only defenceless, but with a dislocated wrist and his face cut in half a dozen places by fragments of the splayed nickel bullet.

"Surrender!" shouted the Third Officer, brandishing his revolver as he leapt towards the pirate.

Strogoff had not the faintest desire to avail himself of the offer. He knew that capture meant death at the rope's end.

"Shoot away!" he replied tauntingly.

Burgoyne did nothing of the sort. It was one thing to exchange shots in hot blood with a criminal; another to strike a human being down in cold blood.

Strogoff saw the Englishman's hesitation and took his chance. Wading waist-deep, he began swimming for the schooner, which was lying at anchor less than four hundred yards distant.

"Don't fire!" cautioned Alwyn.

"Don't mean to," rejoined Peter, snapping the safety-catch of his rifle.

"Launch the boat," continued Burgoyne. "We'll nab him long before he gains the schooner."

It was a man-hunt with a vengeance. The excitement of the chase provided far greater scope than merely shooting the swimmer through the head. To effect a capture appealed to their sporting instincts. Taking human life, or any animal life for that matter, did not, unless there were ample justification for it.

"What are you going to do with him?" asked Peter, when by the united efforts of the three men the boat was launched and the oars manned.

"Maroon him on the island," replied Burgoyne grimly. "He'll have the same chances as we did, anyway, and if he wins through——"

He stopped suddenly, let go the tiller, and sprang to his feet.

"Your rifle—quick, Peter!" he exclaimed hurriedly.

Mostyn handed over the weapon. The rowers laid on their oars and turned their heads to see what their companion was aiming at.

Black Strogoff was now only fifty yards ahead, swimming strongly in spite of his broken wrist, but close behind him was a dark, triangular-shaped object following the disturbed wake of the swimmer.

It was the dorsal fin of an enormous shark.

The pirate, unconscious of the dire peril that threatened him, swam steadily towards the schooner. Burgoyne, looking along the sights of the rifle, hesitated to fire, for the shark and the swimmer were in line with the muzzle. He might hit the shark, but the bullet would then ricochet and settle Strogoff into the bargain.

"Look out!" shouted the Third Officer. "Sharks!"

At the warning the pirate-lieutenant turned his head just in time to see the monster's dorsal fin disappear. The shark was turning on its back in order to seize its prey.

With a blood-curdling scream Black Strogoff threw up his arms and disappeared.

Thirty seconds later the boat was over the spot, where an ever-widening circle of ripples surrounded the blood-tinged patch that indicated the manner of Black Strogoff's death.

Burgoyne, pale under his tan, slipped the safety-catch of his rifle, laid the weapon in the stern-sheets, and resumed the tiller. As he did so he noticed that the boat's bottom boards and gratings were awash.

Kicking aside the stern-sheets grating, Alwyn felt for the plug. It was in position and jammed hard into the bung-hole.

"We've sprung a leak!" exclaimed Mostyn, stating an obvious fact; then, laying aside his oar, he quickly extracted a cartridge from one of the rifles, and inserted the bullet in a small hole just under the middle thwart.

Peter and Jasper exchanged meaning glances. One of the two had fired the shot that had completely penetrated both sides of the boat, although one of the holes was above water-line. Each, by that glance, tried to insinuate that the other was the culprit, at the same time proving that the shot that had disabled Black Strogoff was his.

"We'll appraise responsibility when we've finished the job," declared Burgoyne. "Now, steady all. Give way."

Keeping a keen watch on the apparently deserted schooner, the Third Officer steered the boat in her direction, holding a rifle ready to fire at the first sign of resistance.

"Easy all! Lay on your oars," ordered Burgoyne.

The boat, being bluff-bowed and laden, soon lost way, drifting idly at a distance of about twenty yards from the schooner.

Burgoyne fancied he heard a scuffling sound like metal being dragged across the deck. It might have been the grinding of the badly secured main-boom and yard as the vessel rolled sluggishly in the gentle swell.

"Take both oars, Minalto," continued Burgoyne. "Peter, old son, stand by with a rifle. Unless I'm much——"

Before he could complete the sentence the head and shoulders of a negro appeared above the low bulkhead. There was a flash, and a bullet sung past Burgoyne's right ear.

The rifles of the two Englishmen cracked in unison. Leaping a full three feet in the air, the negro fell writhing across the rail, and, slowly overbalancing, toppled into the sea.

The boarders waited, finger on trigger, for a full minute. All was quiet on board. Burgoyne judged it prudent to take possession of the craft.

"Stroke ahead, Jasper.... Good enough."

Minalto fended off the dinghy as she ranged up alongside. Then, holding the slack of the painter in his left hand, he grasped the main shrouds and swung himself on to the chain-plate.

Burgoyne was about to follow Minalto's example when Jasper, relinquishing his hold and raising a shout of alarm, fell backwards. Missing the gunwale of the boat by a hair's-breadth, he fell with a terrific splash into the water. Where his hand had been grasping the bulwark not a second before, a glittering knife was quivering, its point sunk an inch deep into the teak rail.

Leaving Jasper to shift for himself, Burgoyne leapt on deck just in time to see Ah Ling disappearing into a low deck-house just for'ard of the wheel.

The door crashed to. Alwyn could hear the Chinaman hurriedly barricading it. Then a spurt of flame leapt from one of the side scuttles, and a revolver bullet chipped the mainmast.

"Keep where you are, Peter!" shouted Burgoyne. "I'll manage this part of the show. Where's Minalto?"

"In t' boat," replied that worthy.

"Hurt?"

"No, sir."

"Then stay there," said the Third Officer peremptorily.

Burgoyne had already thrown himself flat upon the deck behind the raised coaming of the main hatch. With his rifle by his side he exposed no more than a part of his head, his right shoulder and arm to the fire of the trapped Chinaman.

Ah Ling was evidently prepared to put up a stiff fight. With Oriental fatalism he seemed to realize that his chance of escape was hopeless, but at the same time he had no intention of surrendering. Nor had Burgoyne any desire to invite the Chink to give himself up, for with Ah Ling a prisoner the fugitives would be constantly in fear that the Celestial would free himself. And Alwyn had had experience of the ferocity and diabolical cunning of Chinese.

"'Tany rate," he soliloquized. "It's a fair scrap. One against one, not three."

A hand grasping an automatic appeared through one of the scuttles on the port side of the deck-house. Burgoyne promptly fired at it. The hand remained, although the marksman felt sure that at that comparatively short range it was impossible to miss.

Ejecting the still-smoking cylinder, Burgoyne thrust another cartridge into the breech, keeping the cut-off of the magazine closed in order to provide against the possibility of a blind rush on the part of his yellow antagonist.

At the second shot the automatic fell to the deck and the hand was withdrawn. Yells of pain issued from the deck-house.

"That's got him!" ejaculated Burgoyne, and, springing to his feet, he rushed towards Ah Ling's retreat. It was a false, almost fatal move, for as the Third Officer emerged from behind the cover of the hatchway a tongue of flame leapt from the deck-house close to the rise of the door-step. The bullet literally sent some of the Englishman's hair flying.

Partly dazed by the nickel missile, Burgoyne retained sufficient presence of mind to drop flat upon the deck and wriggle back to his cover, but not before Ah Ling had fired two more shots that were quite ineffectual.

Burgoyne decided that he was up against a tough proposition. He had to take into consideration the fact that he was not only fighting a well-armed man but a wily one into the bargain. Ah Ling had certainly got the best of the first round, for Alwyn's rifle was lying on the deck beyond reach of his hand and in an uninterrupted line of fire from the deck-house.

"That hand was a dummy," decided Burgoyne. "The whole time the Chink was lying on the deck waiting for me. When I get hold of that rifle again, I'll let him know what's what."

He scorned the idea of calling upon his comrades to throw him another rifle, nor would he entertain the suggestion that they should join in the scrap. Somehow it didn't seem quite British. The odds were level, and that appealed to his sense of fair play.

Keeping close to the deck, Burgoyne crawled to the base of the main-mast, thanking his lucky stars that nine inches of heavy oak faced with iron comprised the construction of the main-hatch coaming. That was sufficient to stop a bullet, otherwise Ah Ling would have raked the woodwork and rendered the Englishman's position untenable.

From the spider band of the main-mast Alwyn took a coil of light rope. With this he retraced his course, and, arriving at his "sniper's post", proceeded to throw a bight of the rope over the rifle until it engaged in the upturned bolt.

"That's the ticket!" he chuckled, as he retrieved the weapon. "Now, my festive Chink, you're going to have the time of your life."

Aiming at the lower part of the door at a height of a foot or eighteen inches from the deck, Burgoyne sent bullet after bullet crashing through the woodwork; then, varying the performance, he peppered the whole exposed front of the deck-house indiscriminately until he could see daylight through it.

Not a sight nor a sound of the Celestial could be seen or heard.

"No hurry," decided Alwyn, bearing in mind his former rashness. "By Jove! This is where a stink-bomb would come in jolly handy."

"When you've done smashing up his happy home, old bird!" sung out Mostyn from the dinghy, "where do we come in?"

"You sit tight," replied Burgoyne. "The Chink very nearly pipped me. He's as artful as a waggon-load of monkeys. I'll let you know when you're wanted."

Placing his rifle by his side, Alwyn resumed his passive attitude towards the silent and invisible Celestial. There could be very little doubt, he reasoned, that Ah Ling had survived that fusillade.

For quite five minutes he remained on the alert, but a strange, uncanny silence seemed to brood over that bullet-riddled structure.

"I'll put in five more rounds," he decided. "Then I'll investigate at close quarters. The blighter must be done in absolutely by this time."

He was on the point of carrying his intention into effect when Mostyn hailed excitedly:

"He's done you, my festive! The Chink's half-way to shore."

Burgoyne sprang to his feet and looked over the side. Swimming towards the little inlet was a Chinaman, bareheaded and with his pigtail trailing in the water. Ah Ling, he knew, wore a pigtail. Very few of the Chinese pirates did, but he was evidently not a believer in the Western craze that was sweeping over the yellow republic. But it might be just possible that there had been a third man on board the schooner.

Unhesitatingly the Third Officer ran aft and peered into the riddled deck-house. It was empty as far as human beings were concerned. There were a couple of rifles and several pistols, while raised at an angle of about 45 degrees to the floor was a sheet of steel that, while not stout enough to stop a direct hit, was capable of deflecting an obliquely striking bullet.

Unseen and unheard, Ah Ling had abandoned his defences and had slipped over the taffrail. He was now within fifty yards of the shore, where, to the horror of Burgoyne and his companions, Hilda Vivian was standing gazing with perplexity at the captured schooner.