CAPTAIN KIDD CONSENTS TO BE CROSS-EXAMINED BY PORTIA
“Shall we put him under oath?” asked Cleopatra.
“As you please, ladies,” said the pirate. “A pirate’s word is as good as his bond; but I’ll take an oath if you choose—a half-dozen of ‘em, if need be.”
“I fancy we can get along without that,” said Portia. “Now, Captain Kidd, who first proposed this plan?”
“Socrates,” said Kidd, unblushingly, with a sly glance at Xanthippe.
“What?” cried Xanthippe. “My husband propose anything that would contribute to my pleasure or intellectual advancement? Bah! Your story is transparently false at the outset.”
“Nevertheless,” said Kidd, “the scheme was proposed by Socrates. He said a trip of that kind for Xanthippe would be very restful and health-giving.”
“For me?” cried Xanthippe, sceptically.
“No, madame, for him,” retorted Kidd.
“Ah—ho-ho! That’s the way of it, eh?” said Xanthippe, flushing to the roots of her hair. “Very likely. You—ah—you will excuse my doubting your word, Captain Kidd, a moment since. I withdraw my remark, and in order to make fullest reparation, I beg to assure these ladies that I am now perfectly convinced that you are telling the truth. That last observation is just like my husband, and when I get back home again, if I ever do, well—ha, ha!—we’ll have a merry time, that’s all.”
“And what was—ah—Bassanio’s connection with this affair?” added Portia, hesitatingly.
“He was not informed of it,” said Kidd, archly. “I am not acquainted with Bassanio, my lady, but I overheard Sir Walter enjoining upon the others the absolute necessity of keeping the whole affair from Bassanio, because he was afraid he would not consent to it. ‘Bassanio has a most beautiful wife, gentlemen,’ said Sir Walter, ‘and he wouldn’t think of parting with her under any circumstances; therefore let us keep our intentions a secret from him.’ I did not hear whom the gentleman married, madame; but the others, Prince Hamlet, the Duke of Buckingham, and Louis the Fourteenth, all agreed that Mrs. Bassanio was too beautiful a person to be separated from, and that it was better, therefore, to keep Bassanio in the dark as to their little enterprise until it was too late for him to interfere.”
A pink glow of pleasure suffused the lovely countenance of the cross-examiner, and it did not require a very sharp eye to see that the wily Kidd had completely won her over to his side. On the other hand, Elizabeth’s brow became as corrugated as her ruff, and the spirit of the pirate shivered to the core as he turned and gazed upon that glowering face.
“Sir Walter agreed to that, did he?” snapped Elizabeth. “And yet he was willing to part with—ah—his sister.”
“Well, your Majesty,” began Kidd, hesitatingly, “you see it was this way: Sir Walter—er—did say that, but—ah—he—ah—but he added that he of course merely judged—er—this man Bassanio’s feelings by his own in parting from his sister—”
“Did he say sister?” cried Elizabeth.
“Well—no—not in those words,” shuffled Kidd, perceiving quickly wherein his error lay, “but—ah—I jumped at the conclusion, seeing his intense enthusiasm for the lady’s beauty and—er—intellectual qualities, that he referred to you, and it is from yourself that I have gained my knowledge as to the fraternal, not to say sororal, relationship that exists between you.”
“That man’s a diplomat from Diplomaville!” muttered Sir Henry Morgan, who, with Abeuchapeta and Conrad, was listening at the port without.
“He is that,” said Abeuchapeta, “but he can’t last much longer. He’s perspiring like a pitcher of ice-water on a hot day, and a spirit of his size and volatile nature can’t stand much of that without evaporating. If you will observe him closely you will see that his left arm already has vanished into thin air.”
“By Jove!” whispered Conrad, “that’s a fact! If they don’t let up on him he’ll vanish. He’s getting excessively tenuous about the top of his head.”
All of which was only too true. Subjected to a scrutiny which he had little expected, the deceitful ambassador of the thieving band was rapidly dissipating, and, as those without had so fearsomely noted, was in imminent danger of complete sublimation, which, in the case of one possessed of so little elementary purity, meant nothing short of annihilation. Fortunately for Kidd, however, his wonderful tact had stemmed the tide of suspicion. Elizabeth was satisfied with his explanation, and in the minds of at least three of the most influential ladies on board, Portia, Xanthippe, and Elizabeth, he had become a creature worthy of credence, which meant that he had nothing more to fear.
“I am prepared, your Majesty,” said Elizabeth, addressing Cleopatra, “to accept from this time on the gentleman’s word. The little that he has already told us is hall-marked with truth. I should like to ask, however, one more question, and that is how our gentleman friends expected to embark us upon this voyage without letting us into the secret?”
“Oh, as for that,” replied Kidd, with a deep-drawn sigh of relief, for he too had noticed the gradual evaporation of his arm and the incipient etherization of his cranium—“as for that, it was simple enough. There was to have been a day set apart for ladies’ day at the club, and when you were all on board we were quietly to weigh anchor and start. The fact that you had anticipated the day, of your own volition, was telephoned by my scouts to me at my headquarters, and that news was by me transmitted by messenger to Sir Walter at Charon’s Glen Island, where the long-talked-of fight between Samson and Goliath was taking place. Raleigh immediately replied, ‘Good! Start at once. Paris first. Unlimited credit. Love to Elizabeth.’ Wherefore, ladies,” he added, rising from his chair and walking to the door—“wherefore you are here and in my care. Make yourselves comfortable, and with the aid of the fashion papers which you have already received prepare yourselves for the joys that await you. With the aid of Madame Récamier and Baedeker’s Paris, which you will find in the library, it will be your own fault if when you arrive there you resemble a great many less fortunate women who don’t know what they want.”
With these words Kidd disappeared through the door, and fainted in the arms of Sir Henry Morgan. The strain upon him had been too great.
“A charming fellow,” said Portia, as the pirate disappeared.
“Most attractive,” said Elizabeth.
“Handsome, too, don’t you think?” asked Helen of Troy.
“And truthful beyond peradventure,” observed Xanthippe, as she reflected upon the words the captain had attributed to Socrates. “I didn’t believe him at first, but when he told me what my sweet-tempered philosopher had said, I was convinced.”
“He’s a sweet child,” interposed Mrs. Noah, fondly. “One of my favorite grandchildren.”
“Which makes it embarrassing for me to say,” cried Cassandra, starting up angrily, “that he is a base caitiff!”
Had a bomb been dropped in the middle of the room, it could not have created a greater sensation than the words of Cassandra.
“What?” cried several voices at once. “A caitiff?”
“A caitiff with a capital K,” retorted Cassandra. “I know that, because while he was telling his story I was listening to it with one ear and looking forward into the middle of next week with the other—I mean the other eye—and I saw—”
“Yes, you saw?” cried Cleopatra.
“I saw that he was deceiving us. Mark my words, ladies, he is a base caitiff,” replied Cassandra—“a base caitiff.”
“What did you see?” cried Elizabeth, excitedly.
“This,” said Cassandra, and she began a narration of future events which I must defer to the next chapter. Meanwhile his associates were endeavoring to restore the evaporated portions of the prostrated Kidd’s spirit anatomy by the use of a steam-atomizer, but with indifferent success. Kidd’s training had not fitted him for an intellectual combat with superior women, and he suffered accordingly.
KIDD’S COMPANIONS ENDEAVORING TO RESTORE EVAPORATED PORTIONS OF HIS ANATOMY WITH A STEAM-ATOMIZER
X
A Warning Accepted
“It is with no desire to interrupt my friend Cassandra unnecessarily,” said Mrs. Noah, as the prophetess was about to narrate her story, “that I rise to beg her to remember that, as an ancestress of Captain Kidd, I hope she will spare a grandmother’s feelings, if anything in the story she is about to tell is improper to be placed before the young. I have been so shocked by the stories of perfidy and baseness generally that have been published of late years, that I would interpose a protest while there is yet time if there is a line in Cassandra’s story which ought to be withheld from the public; a protest based upon my affection for posterity, and in the interests of morality everywhere.”
“You may rest easy upon that score, my dear Mrs. Noah,” said the prophetess. “What I have to say would commend itself, I am sure, even to the ears of a British matron; and while it is as complete a demonstration of man’s perfidy as ever was, it is none the less as harmless a little tale as the Dottie Dimple books or any other more recent study of New England character.”
“Thank you for the load your words have lifted from my mind,” said Mrs. Noah, settling back in her chair, a satisfied expression upon her gentle countenance. “I hope you will understand why I spoke, and withal why modern literature generally has been so distressful to me. When you reflect that the world is satisfied that most of man’s criminal instincts are the result of heredity, and that Mr. Noah and I are unable to shift the responsibility for posterity to other shoulders than our own, you will understand my position. We were about the most domestic old couple that ever lived, and when we see the long and varied assortment of crimes that are cropping out everywhere in our descendants it is painful to us to realize what a pair of unconsciously wicked old fogies we must have been.”
“We all understand that,” said Cleopatra, kindly; “and we are all prepared to acquit you of any responsibility for the advanced condition of wickedness to-day. Man has progressed since your time, my dear grandma, and the modern improvements in the science of crime are no more attributable to you than the invention of the telephone or the oyster cocktail is attributable to your lord and master.”
“Thank you kindly,” murmured the old lady, and she resumed her knitting upon a phantom tam-o’-shanter, which she was making as a Christmas surprise for her husband.
“When Captain Kidd began his story,” said Cassandra, “he made one very bad mistake, and yet one which was prompted by that courtesy which all men instinctively adopt when addressing women. When he entered the room he removed his hat, and therein lay his fatal error, if he wished to convince me of the truth of his story, for with his hat removed I could see the workings of his mind. While you ladies were watching his lips or his eyes, some of you taking in the gorgeous details of his dress, all of you hanging upon his every word, I kept my eye fixed firmly upon his imagination, and I saw, what you did not, that he was drawing wholly upon that!”
“How extraordinary!” cried Elizabeth.
“Yes—and fortunate,” said Cassandra. “Had I not done so, a week hence we should, every one of us, have been lost in the surging wickedness of the city of Paris.”
“But, Cassandra,” said Trilby, who was anxious to return once more to the beautiful city by the Seine, “he told us we were going to Paris.”
“‘HE TOLD US WE WERE GOING TO PARIS’”
“Of course he did,” said Madame Récamier, “and in so many words. Certainly he was not drawing upon his imagination there.”
“And one might be lost in a very much worse place,” put in Marguerite de Valois, “if, indeed, it were possible to lose us in Paris at all. I fancy that I know enough about Paris to find my way about.”
“Humph!” ejaculated Cassandra. “What a foolish little thing you are! You don’t imagine that the Paris of to-day is the Paris of your time, or even the Paris of that sweet child Trilby’s time, do you? If you do you are very much mistaken. I almost wish I had not warned you of your danger and had let you go, just to see those eyes of yours open with amazement at the change. You’d find your Louvre a very different sort of a place from what it used to be, my dear lady. Those pleasing little windows through which your relations were wont in olden times to indulge in target practice at people who didn’t go to their church are now kept closed; the galleries which used to swarm with people, many of whom ought to have been hanged, now swarm with pictures, many of which ought not to have been hung; the romance which clung about its walls is as much a part of the dead past as yourselves, and were you to materialize suddenly therein you would find yourselves jostled and hustled and trodden upon by the curious from other lands, with Argus eyes taking in five hundred pictures a minute, and traversing those halls at a rate of speed at which Mercury himself would stand aghast.”
“But my beloved Tuileries?” cried Marie Antoinette.
“Has been swallowed up by a play-ground for the people, my dear,” said Cassandra, gently. “Paris is no place for us, and it is the intention of these men, in whose hands we are, to take us there and then desert us. Can you imagine anything worse than ourselves, the phantoms of a glorious romantic past, basely deserted in the streets of a wholly strange, superficial, material city of to-day? What do you think, Elizabeth, would be your fate if, faint and famished, you begged for sustenance at an English door to-day, and when asked your name and profession were to reply, ‘Elizabeth, Queen of England’?”
“Insane asylum,” said Elizabeth, shortly.
“Precisely. So in Paris with the rest of us,” said Cassandra.
“How do you know all this?” asked Trilby, still unconvinced.
“I know it just as you knew how to become a prima donna,” said Cassandra. “I am, however, my own Svengali, which is rather preferable to the patent detachable hypnotizer you had. I hypnotize myself, and direct my mind into the future. I was a professional forecaster in the days of ancient Troy, and if my revelations had been heeded the Priam family would, I doubt not, still be doing business at the old stand, and Mr. Æneas would not have grown round-shouldered giving his poor father a picky-back ride on the opening night of the horse-show, so graphically depicted by Virgil.”
“I never heard about that,” said Trilby. “It sounds like a very funny story, though.”
“Well, it wasn’t so humorous for some as it was for others,” said Cassandra, with a sly glance at Helen. “The fact is, until you mentioned it yourself, it never occurred to me that there was much fun in any portion of the Trojan incident, excepting perhaps the delirium tremens of old Laocoon, who got no more than he deserved for stealing my thunder. I had warned Troy against the Greeks, and they all laughed at me, and said my eye to the future was strabismatic; that the Greeks couldn’t get into Troy at all, even if they wanted to. And then the Greeks made a great wooden horse as a gift for the Trojans, and when I turned my X-ray gaze upon it I saw that it contained about six brigades of infantry, three artillery regiments, and sharp-shooters by the score. It was a sort of military Noah’s Ark; but I knew that the prejudice against me was so strong that nobody would believe what I told them. So I said nothing. My prophecies never came true, they said, failing to observe that my warning as to what would be was in itself the cause of their non-fulfilment. But desiring to save Troy, I sent for Laocoon and told him all about it, and he went out and announced it as his own private prophecy; and then, having tried to drown his conscience in strong waters, he fell a victim to the usual serpentine hallucination, and everybody said he wasn’t sober, and therefore unworthy of belief. The horse was accepted, hauled into the city, and that night orders came from hindquarters to the regiments concealed inside to march. They marched, and next morning Troy had been removed from the map; ninety per cent. of the Trojans died suddenly, and Æneas, grabbing up his family in one hand and his gods in the other, went yachting for several seasons, ultimately settling down in Italy. All of this could have been avoided if the Trojans would have taken the hint from my prophecies. They preferred, however, not to do it, with the result that to-day no one but Helen and myself knows even where Troy was, and we’ll never tell.”
“It is all true,” said Helen, proudly. “I was the woman who was at the bottom of it all, and I can testify that Cassandra always told the truth, which is why she was always so unpopular. When anything that was unpleasant happened, after it was all over she would turn and say, sweetly, ‘I told you so.’ She was the original ‘I told you so’ nuisance, and of course she had the newspapyruses down on her, because she never left them any sensation to spring upon the public. If she had only told a fib once in a while, the public would have had more confidence in her.”
“Thank you for your endorsement,” said Cassandra, with a nod at Helen. “With such testimony I cannot see how you can refrain from taking my advice in this matter; and I tell you, ladies, that this man Kidd has made his story up out of whole cloth; the men of Hades had no more to do with our being here than we had; they were as much surprised as we are to find us gone. Kidd himself was not aware of our presence, and his object in taking us to Paris is to leave us stranded there, disembodied spirits, vagrant souls with no familiar haunts to haunt, no place to rest, and nothing before us save perpetual exile in a world that would have no sympathy for us in our misfortune, and no belief in our continued existence.”
“But what, then, shall we do?” cried Ophelia, wringing her hands in despair.
“It is a terrible problem,” said Cleopatra, anxiously; “and yet it does seem as if our woman’s instinct ought to show us some way out of our trouble.”
“The Committee on Treachery,” said Delilah, “has already suggested a chafing-dish party, with Lucretia Borgia in charge of the lobster Newberg.”
“That is true,” said Lucretia; “but I find, in going through my reticule, that my maid, for some reason unknown to me, has failed to renew my supply of poisons. I shall discharge her on my return home, for she knows that I never go anywhere without them; but that does not help matters at this juncture. The sad fact remains that I could prepare a thousand delicacies for these pirates without fatal results.”
“You mean immediately fatal, do you not?” suggested Xanthippe. “I could myself prepare a cake which would in time reduce our captors to a state of absolute dependence, but of course the effect is not immediate.”
“We might give a musicale, and let Trilby sing ‘Ben Bolt’ to them,” suggested Marguerite de Valois, with a giggle.
“Don’t be flippant, please,” said Portia. “We haven’t time to waste on flippant suggestions. Perhaps a court-martial of these pirates, supplemented by a yard-arm, wouldn’t be a bad thing. I’ll prosecute the case.”
“You forget that you are dealing with immortal spirits,” observed Cleopatra. “If these creatures were mortals, hanging them would be all right, and comparatively easy, considering that we outnumber them ten to one, and have many resources for getting them, more or less, in our power, but they are not. They have gone through the refining process of dissolution once, and there’s an end to that. Our only resource is in the line of deception, and if we cannot deceive them, then we have ceased to be women.”
“That is truly said,” observed Elizabeth. “And inasmuch as we have already provided ourselves with a suitable committee for the preparation of our plans of a deceptive nature, I move, as the easiest possible solution of the difficulty for the rest of us, that the Committee on Treachery be requested to go at once into executive session, with orders not to come out of it until they have suggested a plausible plan of campaign against our abductors. We must be rid of them. Let the Committee on Treachery say how.”
“Second the motion,” said Mrs. Noah. “You are a very clear-headed young woman, Lizzie, and your grandmother is proud of you.”
“‘YOU ARE A VERY CLEAR-HEADED YOUNG WOMAN, LIZZIE,’ SAID MRS. NOAH”
The Committee on Treachery were about to protest, but the chair refused to entertain any debate upon the question, which was put and carried with a storm of approval.
Five minutes later a note was handed through the port, addressed to Cleopatra, which read as follows:
“Dear Madame,—Six bells has just struck, and the officers and crew are hungry. Will you and your fair companions co-operate with us in our enterprise by having a hearty dinner ready within two hours? A speck has appeared on the horizon which betokens a coming storm, else we would prepare our supper ourselves. As it is, we feel that your safety depends on our remaining on deck. If there is any beer on the ice, we prefer it to tea. Two cases will suffice.
“Yours respectfully,
“Henry Morgan, Bart., First
Mate.”
“Hurrah!” cried Cleopatra, as she read this communication. “I have an idea. Tell the Committee on Treachery to appear before the full meeting at once.”
The committee was summoned, and Cleopatra announced her plan of operation, and it was unanimously adopted; but what it was we shall have to wait for another chapter to learn.
XI
Marooned
When Captain Holmes arrived upon deck he seized his glass, and, gazing intently through it for a moment, perceived that the faithful Shem had not deceived him. Flying at half-mast from a rude, roughly hewn pole set upon a rocky height was the black flag, emblem of piracy, and, as Artemus Ward put it, “with the second joints reversed.” It was in very truth a signal of distress.
“I make it a point never to be surprised,” observed Holmes, as he peered through the glass, “but this beats me. I didn’t know there was an island of this nature in these latitudes. Blackstone, go below and pipe Captain Cook on deck. Perhaps he knows what island that is.”
“You’ll have to excuse me, Captain Holmes,” replied the Judge. “I didn’t ship on this voyage as a cabin-boy or a messenger-boy. Therefore I—”
“Bonaparte, put the Judge in irons,” interrupted Holmes, sternly. “I expect to be obeyed, Judge Blackstone, whether you shipped as a Lord Chief-Justice or a state-room steward. When I issue an order it must be obeyed. Step lively there, Bonaparte. Get his honor ironed and summon your marines. We may have work to do before night. Hamlet, pipe Captain Cook on deck.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” replied Hamlet, with alacrity, as he made off.
“That’s the way to obey orders,” said Holmes, with a scornful glance at Blackstone.
“I was only jesting, Captain,” said the latter, paling somewhat.
“That’s all right,” said Holmes, taking up his glass again. “So was I when I ordered you in irons, and in order that you may appreciate the full force of the joke I repeat it. Bonaparte, do your duty.”
In an instant the order was obeyed, and the unhappy Judge shortly found himself manacled and alone in the forecastle. Meanwhile Captain Cook, in response to the commander’s order, repaired to the deck and scanned the distant coast.
“I can’t place it,” he said. “It can’t be Monte Cristo, can it?”
“No, it can’t,” said the Count, who stood hard by. “My island was in the Mediterranean, and even if it dragged anchor it couldn’t have got out through the Strait of Gibraltar.”
“Perhaps it’s Robinson Crusoe’s island,” suggested Doctor Johnson.
“Not it,” observed De Foe. “If it is, the rest of you will please keep off. It’s mine, and I may want to use it again. I’ve been having a number of interviews with Crusoe latterly, and he’s given me a lot of new points, which I intend incorporating in a sequel for the Cimmerian Magazine.”
“Well, in the name of Atlas, what island is it, then?” roared Holmes, angrily. “What is the matter with all you learned lubbers that I have brought along on this trip? Do you suppose I’ve brought you to whistle up favorable winds? Not by the beard of the Prophet! I brought you to give me information, and now when I ask for the name of a simple little island like that in plain sight there’s not one of you able so much as to guess at it reasonably. The next man I ask for information goes into irons with Judge Blackstone if he doesn’t answer me instantly with the information I want. Munchausen, what island is that?”
“Ahem! that?” replied Munchausen, trembling, as he reflected upon the Captain’s threat. “What? Nobody knows what island that is? Why, you surprise me—”
“See here, Baron,” retorted Holmes, menacingly, “I ask you a plain question, and I want a plain answer, with no evasions to gain time. Now it’s irons or an answer. What island is that?”
“It’s an island that doesn’t appear on any chart, Captain,” Munchausen responded instantly, pulling himself together for a mighty effort, “and it has never been given a name; but as you insist upon having one, we’ll call it Holmes Island, in your honor. It is not stationary. It is a floating island of lava formation, and is a menace to every craft that goes to sea. I spent a year of my life upon it once, and it is more barren than the desert of Sahara, because you cannot raise even sand upon it, and it is devoid of water of any sort, salt or fresh.”
“What did you live on during that year?” asked Holmes, eying him narrowly.
“Canned food from wrecks,” replied the Baron, feeling much easier now that he had got a fair start—“canned food from wrecks, commander. There is a magnetic property in the upper stratum of this piece of derelict real estate, sir, which attracts to it every bit of canned substance that is lost overboard in all parts of the world. A ship is wrecked, say, in the Pacific Ocean, and ultimately all the loose metal upon her will succumb to the irresistible attraction of this magnetic upper stratum, and will find its way to its shores. So in any other part of the earth. Everything metallic turns up here sooner or later; and when you consider that thousands of vessels go down every year, vessels which are provisioned with tinned foods only, you will begin to comprehend how many millions of pounds of preserved salmon, sardines, pâté de foie gras, peaches, and so on, can be found strewn along its coast.”
“Munchausen,” said Holmes, smiling, “by the blush upon your cheek, coupled with an occasional uneasy glance of the eye, I know that for once you are standing upon the, to you, unfamiliar ground of truth, and I admire you for it. There is nothing to be ashamed of in telling the truth occasionally. You are a man after my own heart. Come below and have a cocktail. Captain Cook, take command of the Gehenna during my absence; head her straight for Holmes Island, and when you discover anything new let me know. Bonaparte, in honor of Munchausen’s remarkable genius I proclaim general amnesty to our prisoners, and you may release Blackstone from his dilemma; and if you have any tin soldiers among your marines, see that they are lashed to the rigging. I don’t want this electric island of the Baron’s to get a grip upon my military force at this juncture.”
With this Holmes, followed by Munchausen, went below, and the two worthies were soon deep in the mysteries of a phantom cocktail, while Doctor Johnson and De Foe gazed mournfully out over the ocean at the floating island.
“De Foe,” said Johnson, “that ought to be a lesson to you. This realism that you tie up to is all right when you are alone with your conscience; but when there are great things afoot, an imagination and a broad view as to the limitations of truth aren’t at all bad. You or I might now be drinking that cocktail with Holmes if we’d only risen to the opportunity the way Munchausen did.”
“‘THAT OUGHT TO BE A LESSON TO YOU’”
“That is true,” said De Foe, sadly. “But I didn’t suppose he wanted that kind of information. I could have spun a better yarn than that of Munchausen’s with my eyes shut. I supposed he wanted truth, and I gave it.”
“I’d like to know what has become of the House-boat,” said Raleigh, anxiously gazing through the glass at the island. “I can see old Henry Morgan sitting down there on the rocks with his elbows on his knees and his chin in his hands, and Kidd and Abeuchapeta are standing back of him, yelling like mad, but there isn’t a boat in sight.”
“Who is that man, off to the right, dancing a fandango?” asked Johnson.
“It looks like Conrad, but I can’t tell. He appears to have gone crazy. He’s got that wild look on his face which betokens insanity. We’ll have to be careful in our parleyings with these people,” said Raleigh.
“Anything new?” asked Holmes, returning to the deck, smacking his lips in enjoyment of the cocktail.
“No—except that we are almost within hailing distance,” said Cook.
“Then give orders to cast anchor,” observed Holmes. “Bonaparte, take a crew of picked men ashore and bring those pirates aboard. Take the three musketeers with you, and don’t let Kidd or Morgan give you any back talk. If they try any funny business, exorcise them.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” replied Bonaparte, and in a moment a boat had been lowered and a sturdy crew of sailors were pulling for the shore. As they came within ten feet of it the pirates made a mad dash down the rough, rocky hillside and clamored to be saved.
“THE PIRATES MADE A MAD DASH DOWN THE ROUGH, ROCKY HILL-SIDE”
“What’s happened to you?” cried Bonaparte, ordering the sailors to back water, lest the pirates should too hastily board the boat and swamp her.
“We are marooned,” replied Kidd, “and on an island of a volcanic nature. There isn’t a square inch of it that isn’t heated up to 125 degrees, and seventeen of us have already evaporated. Conrad has lost his reason; Abeuchapeta has become so tenuous that a child can see through him. As for myself, I am growing iridescent with anxiety, and unless I get off this infernal furnace I’ll disappear like a soap-bubble. For Heaven’s sake, then, General, take us off, on your own terms. We’ll accept anything.”
As if in confirmation of Kidd’s words, six of the pirate crew collapsed and disappeared into thin air, and a glance at Abeuchapeta was proof enough of his condition. He had become as clear as crystal, and had it not been for his rugged outlines he would hardly have been visible even to his fellow-spirits. As for Kidd, he had taken on the aspect of a rainbow, and it was patent that his fears for himself were all too well founded.
Bonaparte embarked the leaders of the band first, returning subsequently for the others, and repaired with them at once to the Gehenna, where they were ushered into the presence of Sherlock Holmes. The first question he asked was as to the whereabouts of the House-boat.
“That we do not know,” replied Kidd, mournfully, gazing downward at the wreck of his former self. “We came ashore, sir, early yesterday morning, in search of food. It appears that when—acting in a wholly inexcusable fashion, and influenced, I confess it, by motives of revenge—I made off with your club-house, I neglected to ascertain if it were well stocked with provisions, a fatal error; for when we endeavored to get supper we discovered that the larder contained but half a bottle of farcie olives, two salted almonds, and a soda cracker—not a luxurious feast for sixty-nine pirates and a hundred and eighty-three women to sit down to.”
“That’s all nonsense,” said Demosthenes. “The House Committee had provided enough supper for six hundred people, in anticipation of the appetite of the members on their return from the fight.”
“Of course they did,” said Confucius; “and it was a good one, too—salads, salmon glacé, lobsters—every blessed thing a man can’t get at home we had; and what is more, they’d been delivered on board. I saw to that before I went up the river.”
“Then,” moaned Kidd, “it is as I suspected. We were the victims of base treachery on the part of those women.”
“Treachery? Well, I like that. Call it reciprocity,” said Hamlet, dryly.
“We were informed by the ladies that there was nothing for supper save the items I have already referred to,” said Kidd. “I see it all now. We had tried to make them comfortable, and I put myself to some considerable personal inconvenience to make them easy in their minds, but they were ungrateful.”
“Whatever induced you to take ‘em along with you?” asked Socrates.
“We didn’t want them,” said Kidd. “We didn’t know they were on board until it was too late to turn back. They’d broken in, and were having the club all to themselves in your absence.”
“It served you good and right,” said Socrates, with a laugh. “Next time you try to take things that don’t belong to you, maybe you’ll be a trifle more careful as to whose property you confiscate.”
“But the House-boat—you haven’t told us how you lost her,” put in Raleigh, impatiently.
“Well, it was this way,” said Kidd. “When, in response to our polite request for supper, the ladies said there was nothing to eat on board, something had to be done, for we were all as hungry as bears, and we decided to go ashore at the first port and provision. Unfortunately the crew got restive, and when this floating frying-pan loomed into view, to keep them good-natured we decided to land and see if we could beg, borrow, or steal some supplies. We had to. Observations taken with the sextant showed that there was no port within five hundred miles; the island looked as if it might be inhabited at least by goats, and ashore we went, every man of us, leaving the House-boat safely anchored in the harbor. At first we didn’t mind the heat, and we hunted and hunted and hunted; but after three or four hours I began to notice that three of my sailors were shrivelling up, and Conrad began to act as if he were daft. Hawkins burst right before my eyes. Then Abeuchapeta got prismatic around the eyes and began to fade, and I noticed a slight iridescence about myself; and as for Morgan, he had the misfortune to lie down to take a nap in the sun, and when he waked up, his whole right side had evaporated. Then we saw what the trouble was. We’d struck this lava island, and were gradually succumbing to its intense heat. We rushed madly back to the harbor to embark; and our ship, gentlemen, and your House-boat, was slowly but surely disappearing over the horizon, and flying from the flag-staff at the fore were signals of farewell, with an unfeeling P.S. below to this effect: ‘Don’t wait up for us. We may not be back until late.’”
There was a pause, during which Socrates laughed quietly to himself, while Abeuchapeta and the one-sided Morgan wept silently.
“That, gentlemen of the Associated Shades, is all I know of the whereabouts of the House-boat,” continued Captain Kidd. “I have no doubt that the ladies practised a deception, to our discomfiture, and I must say that I think it was exceedingly clever—granting that it was desirable to be rid of us, which I don’t, for we meant well by them, and they would have enjoyed themselves.”
“But,” cried Hamlet, “may they not now be in peril? They cannot navigate that ship.”
“They got her out of the harbor all right,” said Kidd. “And I judged from the figure at the helm that Mrs. Noah had taken charge. What kind of a seaman she is I don’t know.”
“Almighty bad,” ejaculated Shem, turning pale. “It was she who ran us ashore on Ararat.”
“Well, wasn’t that what you wanted?” queried Munchausen.
“What we wanted!” cried Shem. “Well, I guess not. You don’t want your yacht stranded on a mountain-top, do you? She was a dead loss there, whereas if mother hadn’t been in such a hurry to get ashore, we could have waited a month and landed on the seaboard.”
“You might have turned her into a summer hotel,” suggested Munchausen.
“Well, we must up anchor and away,” said Holmes. “Our pursuit has merely begun, apparently. We must overtake this vessel, and the question to be answered is—where?”
“That’s easy,” said Artemus Ward. “From what Shem says, I think we’d better look for her in the Himalayas.”
“And, meanwhile, what shall be done with Kidd?” asked Holmes.
“He ought to be expelled from the club,” said Johnson.
“We can’t expel him, because he’s not a member,” replied Raleigh.
“Then elect him,” suggested Ward.
“What on earth for?” growled Johnson.
“So that we can expel him,” said Ward.
And while Boswell’s hero was trying to get the value of this notion through his head, the others repaired to the deck, and the Gehenna was soon under way once more. Meanwhile Captain Kidd and his fellows were put in irons and stowed away in the forecastle, alongside of the water-cask in which Shylock lay in hiding.
XII
The Escape and the End
If there was anxiety on board of the Gehenna as to the condition and whereabouts of the House-boat, there was by no means less uneasiness upon that vessel itself. Cleopatra’s scheme for ridding herself and her abducted sisters of the pirates had worked to a charm, but, having worked thus, a new and hitherto undreamed-of problem, full of perplexities bearing upon their immediate safety, now confronted them. The sole representative of a sea-faring family on board was Mrs. Noah, and it did not require much time to see that her knowledge as to navigation was of an extremely primitive order, limited indeed to the science of floating.
When the last pirate had disappeared behind the rocks of Holmes Island, and all was in readiness for action, the good old lady, who had hitherto been as calm and unruffled as a child, began to get red in the face and to bustle about in a manner which betrayed considerable perturbation of spirit.
“Now, Mrs. Noah,” said Cleopatra, as, peeping out from the billiard-room window, she saw Morgan disappearing in the distance, “the coast is clear, and I resign my position of chairman to you. We place the vessel in your hands, and ourselves subject to your orders. You are in command. What do you wish us to do?”
“Very well,” replied Mrs. Noah, putting down her knitting and starting for the deck. “I’m not certain, but I think the first thing to do is to get her moving. Do you know, I’ve never discovered whether this boat is a steamboat or a sailing-vessel? Does anybody know?”
“I think it has a naphtha tank and a propeller,” said Elizabeth, “although I don’t know. It seems to me my brother Raleigh told me they’d had a naphtha engine put in last winter after the freshet, when the House-boat was carried ten miles down the river, and had to be towed back at enormous expense. They put it in so that if she were carried away again she could get back of her own power.”
“That’s unfortunate,” said Mrs. Noah, “because I don’t know anything about these new fangled notions. If there’s any one here who knows anything about naphtha engines, I wish they’d speak.”
“I’m of the opinion,” said Portia, “that I can study out the theory of it in a short while.”
“Very well, then,” said Mrs. Noah, “you can do it. I’ll appoint you engineer, and give you all your orders now, right away, in advance. Set her going and keep her going, and don’t stop without a written order signed by me. We might as well be very careful, and have everything done properly, and it might happen that in the excitement of our trip you would misunderstand my spoken orders and make a fatal error. Therefore, pay no attention to unwritten orders. That will do for you for the present. Xanthippe, you may take Ophelia and Madame Récamier, and ten other ladies, and, every morning before breakfast, swab the larboard deck. Cassandra, Tuesdays you will devote to polishing the brasses in the dining-room, and the balance of your time I wish you to expend in dusting the bric-a-brac. Dido, you always were strong at building fires. I’ll make you chief stoker. You will also assist Lucretia Borgia in the kitchen. Inasmuch as the latter’s maid has neglected to supply her with the usual line of poisons, I think we can safely entrust to Lucretia’s hands the responsibilities of the culinary department.”
“I’m perfectly willing to do anything I can,” said Lucretia, “but I must confess that I don’t approve of your methods of commanding a ship. A ship’s captain isn’t a domestic martinet, as you are setting out to be. We didn’t appoint you housekeeper.”
“Now, my child,” said Mrs. Noah, firmly, “I do not wish any words. If I hear any more impudence from you, I’ll put you ashore without a reference; and the rest of you I would warn in all kindness that I will not tolerate insubordination. You may, all of you, have one night of the week and alternate Sundays off, but your work must be done. The regimen I am adopting is precisely that in vogue on the Ark, only I didn’t have the help I have now, and things got into very bad shape. We were out forty days, and, while the food was poor and the service execrable, we never lost a life.”