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King o' the Beach: A Tropic Tale, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 21 |
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_ CHAPTER TWENTY ONE. Carey was not long in communicating to the doctor all he had heard from Bostock, and his words revived his companion wonderfully. "Capital!" he said. "The fact of our being unarmed and this scoundrel keeping all the weapons out of our reach half maddened me." "Yes, wasn't it horrid?" said Carey. "I felt better directly, and, do you know, I don't think we have half so much to fear now from the blacks. I don't feel a bit afraid of them. I can make them do just as I like; so can Bob." "Perhaps so, and if we were alone we could make them our obedient servants. They look up to the whites as superior beings, but they are not to be trusted, my boy. This Mallam has had them under his thumb for years, and as you must have seen, a few sharp orders from him bring out their savage instincts, their faces change, their eyes look full of ferocity, and if their white chief wished it they would kill us all without compunction." "And cook and eat us afterwards without salt?" said the boy, merrily. "You laugh," replied the doctor, "but it is a horrible fact, my boy; and if we knew all that has taken place in connection with this man's rule over them, we should have some blood-curdling things to dwell upon." "I don't feel afraid," said Carey, coolly. "Of course, I should if it came to such a state of affairs as you hint at. But if it came to the worst, I should jump overboard and try to swim ashore." "To be taken by a shark or a crocodile?" "Well, that would be a more natural way of coming to one's end, sir. But, pooh! we're not going to be beaten, doctor. We must get Mr Dan Mallam--Old King Cole, Bob calls him--shut up below somewhere and out of sight of the blacks. They'd obey us then, and we should be all right. Why, we're not going to be afraid of one man." "One man?" said the doctor. "Yes, one man. He's only one man when he's alone. I felt yesterday that we had twenty-one enemies. Now I feel that we've only one. Bob says we must wait." "Yes, it is good advice," replied the doctor, "and we will wait. Carey, my lad, we must bend to circumstances till our chance comes. There, I have been behaving in a poor, cowardly way." "Oh, nonsense, sir!" "I have, Carey, and there is no disguising it; but I am going to pluck up now. Let the scoundrel go on thinking we are submitting and are as much his servant as the blacks are." "Till the right time comes, sir, and he wakes up to the fact that he's our prisoner. I say, if a ship came in sight and saw us we could hand him over and he'd be taken right off and treated as a criminal." "Exactly. It seemed very galling to see him seize the pearls." "Yes," said Carey, "but let him think they're his, and the ship, and all below. We know better." This was a trifling bit of conversation, but from that hour hope grew stronger in the breasts of the three oddly made prisoners and slaves of such a king. Their semi-captivity seemed more bearable, and it showed in their looks and actions, the beachcomber noting it and showing a grim kind of satisfaction. "That's right," he said. "Glad to see you are all settling down and making the best of it. It's no use to go kicking against stone walls or rocks. Be good boys, and I won't be very hard on you. You'll eat and drink your food better, and instead o' grizzling you'll enjoy yourselves and get nice and fat. My pack, too, will like you all the better. I don't think I shall let 'em have that ugly chap Bostock, though; he cooks too well." But Carey took matters, according to the doctor's ideas, too easily--too freely. He did not shrink from speaking out and taking liberties with his position. It was as if he had forgotten that he was a prisoner, and he pretty well did as he liked. "Here, what are you after, youngster? Where are you going?" "Along with the pack to get cocoanuts," said Carey, coolly. "I never told you," growled the old fellow, fiercely. "No, but I want to see them get the nuts down," said Carey, nonchalantly, and he went. It was the same when a party of the blacks went fishing, which was nearly every day, so that there was always an ample supply, and the boy returned flushed and brown, full of the adventures he had had. Black Jack now took to heading the fishing expeditions, and always looked after Carey at starting time, grinning and making signs suggestive of hauling up the fish and hitting them over the heads with a nulla-nulla, while the crew of the outrigger canoe always greeted the boy with a grin of satisfaction. "They are all awfully civil to me now," said Carey to Bostock, "but I think it's a good deal due to the ticky-ticky. I say, Bob, how long will the molasses last?" "Oh, some time yet, sir." "But when the last jar's eaten?" "Then you must try the pickles, sir. And when that's done, as it used to say on a big picture on the walls in London, 'If you like the pickles, try the sauce.' There's no end o' bottles o' sauce." "Are there? Are you sure?" "Yes, sir. There's a big consignment, as they call it, sent from London to Brisbane. One part o' the hold's chock full o' cases. Why, there's a lot o' sugar things too. Oh, we shall find enough to keep them beggars going for a long time yet." Meantime the great tubs had all been emptied with more or less satisfactory results, and re-filling began with the accompanying stacking of the shells. The pearls were stowed away in cigar boxes, which were emptied for the purpose, the beachcomber now taking to smoking some of those turned out, and giving an abundance to Carey, who took them eagerly, always carrying several in his pocket. "Surely you are not going to smoke those, my boy?" said the doctor, who looked quite aghast. "Wait a few years before you try anything of that kind." "Why?" said the boy, with an arch look. "Because if you begin now you will most likely be laying up a store of trouble for the future in the shape of a disordered digestion, which may hang about you all your life." "I'm not going to smoke them," said Carey, laughing. "Look here, I roll each one up tight in a bit of paper, and then cut it with a sharp knife into six, ready to give the black fellows if they behave themselves. They'll do anything for me for a bit of tobacco." "But don't they ever try to take it away from you?" "Not now. They tried snatching once or twice, but I gave the one who did a good sharp crack, and they left it off, for I'm always fair to them." "A dangerous game to play." "Oh, no. The others always laugh at the one who's hit. They don't seem to mind taking a crack from me." Those fishing trips were an intense pleasure to Carey, for there was so much that was novel. Now fish with scales as brilliant as the feathers of humming-birds would be caught; now the blacks would be warning their companions to beware of the black and yellow or yellow snakes. "Mumkull--kill a fellow," Black Jack said, and to emphasise his meaning he put out a hand in the water towards one of the basking serpents, snatched it back as if bitten, and went through a regular pantomime indicative of his sufferings. First he drew up one leg, then the other, threw himself on his back in the bottom of the canoe, kicked out, threw his arms in the air, straightened himself out, rolled over, and then, with a wonderful display of strength, curved his spine and sprang over back again, repeating the performance, which was wonderfully like the flopping of a freshly caught roach in a punt, even to the beating of the tail, which was here represented by the man's legs. By degrees this grew more slow; then there was a flap at intervals, finishing with one heavy rap, and he lay quite still as if dead. "Dat a way," he cried, raising his head and grinning hugely. "Mumkull-- kill a fellow." But Carey's greatest treats were upon the hunting expeditions made by the beachcomber's blacks ashore to obtain fresh meat in the way of a delicacy or two for their chief and something substantial for themselves. One day Carey was gazing rather disconsolately at the shore and wondering when the time would come for him and his companions to be free again, when Black Jack bounded to his side, making the boy start round, to find the man in a menacing attitude, his teeth bare, eyes wide open displaying scarcely anything but the whites, for he was squinting so horribly that his pupils had disappeared behind his thick nose, while the club he held was quivering as if he were about to strike. The suddenness of the approach startled Carey for the moment, and he leaped back, but the reaction came as quickly, and with doubled fist he rushed at the black; but the latter was too quick, leaping aside, and Carey's second attack, which took the form of a flying kick, was also unsuccessful. Black Jack's face was now covered with a series of good-tempered wrinkles. "Come 'long," he cried. "Kedge bird--wallaby. Be ticky-ticky, up a tree." "Be ticky-ticky?" said the boy, wonderingly. "Ess. Come 'long; be ticky-ticky. Buzz-zz-uzz," he went, with a wonderfully good imitation of the whirr of an insect's wings, while he made his hand describe the dartings to and fro. "Big fly so," he cried, and drawing his boomerang from the hair girdle, he took a few steps, whirled it a moment or two, and then hurled it towards the shore. "Buzz--hum!" he cried, and then he stood grinning with delight at the boy's admiration of the gyrations made by the curious implement. At the first throw it seemed to Carey that it would drop as soon as the force was exhausted into the sea, where the hard wood must cause it to sink. But nothing of the kind; it went skimming over the water like some gigantic insect, and at last made a graceful curve, rose up on high quivering and fluttering, and came back till it was over the deck, and then came twirling down. "Big tree, ticky-ticky, fly dat how." "Oh, I see; fly ticky-ticky," cried Carey. "Honey?" "Good ticky-ticky," said the black, licking his fingers and smacking his lips. "Come 'long." "Yes, I'll come," cried the boy, and the next minute he was over the side and in the boat, where half-a-dozen more of the blacks were waiting and received him with a frantic shout of delight, flourishing their paddles, which they plunged into the smooth water of the lagoon as soon as Black Jack had dropped to his place; and away they went, with the latter standing up beside Carey. As they were passing round the bows, Bostock's head suddenly appeared over the side, and at a sign from the boy the blacks ceased rowing. "Where away, lad?" said the old sailor. "Ashore, hunting wallabies or something." "I say, young gentleman, is it safe to go alone with those chaps?" "Oh, yes; there's nothing to mind. Haven't I been fishing with 'em lots of times?" "Yes, but that was on the water, my lad," said Bostock, shaking his head. "Bob--Bob, come along; kedge wallaby--snakum--ticky-ticky." "Who's to do the cooking if I do?" growled Bostock. "Cookie, come kedge ticky-ticky." "No. I say, my lad, keep your weather eye open." "Both of them, Bob. I'll take care." The paddles were plunged in again, and the boat glided onward. "I don't half like it," muttered Bostock. "That there boy's too wentersome. S'pose they got hungry--they most always are--and took it into their heads to make a fire. Ugh! They aren't to be trusted, but I b'leeve they all like him and would be precious sorry when they got back and Old King Cole asked where he was. There'd be a row and a bit o' shooting, I dessay, for it's amazing, that it is, amazing, the way the old vagabone has took to our lad. But I don't like his going off with 'em, and with nothing better than a bit of a toothpick of a knife. Wouldn't be long before he got hold of a club, though, I know." Bostock went back to his galley shaking his head, and at the same time Carey was mentally shaking his own. "An old stupid," he said. "I wish he hadn't said that. Just as if it was likely that Black Jack or either of the others would hurt me without Old King Cole was there to say 'Css!' to them and hound them on. Wouldn't hurt me, would you, Black Jack?" he said aloud. "Hey? Wood hurt um?" cried the man, and he pulled the boy on one side, dropped on his knees, and began to feel about the bottom of the canoe with his hand. "No hurt." "No; all right now," said Carey, smiling. "Here, Jackum, I want to learn to throw the boomerang. Give me hold." The boy made a snatch at the crescent-moon-like weapon, and got hold; but the black seized it too, shouting, "No, no, no!" and his companions began to shout what sounded like a protest. "No, no throw. Go bottom." "I should make it come back." The black grinned knowingly. "Jackum show soon. Jackum fro." He sent the strange weapon flying on before them, and cleverly caught it as it returned; but then he stuck it in his girdle again, shaking his head. "Go bottom," he said. Carey was disappointed, but his attention was taken up directly by something more exciting, for as the canoe glided along, with the outrigger literally skipping over the water, the boy suddenly became conscious of what seemed for the moment like another canoe of nearly the same size, sunk beneath the surface and gliding along at the same speed. For the moment he thought it must be the canoe's shadow somehow cast beside them, but the next moment he grasped the fact that it was a great fish, probably a shark, which had come in through the opening with the last high tide, and was now on the prowl. There was no doubt about it, for the blacks had seen it, and they laughed as they saw their passenger shrink to the other side and lean over towards the outrigger. The next moment Jackum drew his attention with a touch, and began making hideous grimaces at the creature, while the others began to shout and were apparently calling it every opprobrious name that their limited vocabulary supplied. But the monster, which must have been some fourteen feet long, only rose a little so that his black triangular fin appeared above the surface. Jackum grinned, stooped, and picked up one of a bundle of spears which lay along at the side, and handed it to the boy, signing to him to stand up in the boat. It was not much of a weapon, being only a straight bamboo sapling with an ill-made point hardened in the fire. "Gib big poke," cried the black. "If I don't they'll think I'm afraid," thought Carey; so he seized the spear, feeling not the slightest inclination for his task, and drove the point down on the shark's back. It was an unlucky stroke, for, instead of penetrating as intended, it glided over the slimy skin, while, overbalancing himself in consequence of meeting with no resistance, Carey to his horror found himself following his stroke, and he would have plunged overboard had not a muscular black arm darted like a great snake about his waist and plucked him back. For a moment or two the boy gasped, but he recovered himself directly. "Shake hands, Jackum. Thankye." The black grinned, and took the extended hand for a few seconds. "Let's try again," said Carey; but the shark had sunk down out of sight. "Ticklum," said the black, grinning. "Come soon." Carey was disappointed, for he wanted to redeem his character, though it was not an easy task to try and emulate the blacks with their own weapons. But Jackum was right; it was not long before the great fish re-appeared, now on the other side of the canoe, rising slowly till its fin was above water, its intention being apparently to pick one of the paddlers out for a meal. His appearance there, however, was not approved of, the blacks by their actions showing that they considered it highly probable that their visitor would get entangled with the bamboos of the outrigger and capsize the boat. Jackum took the lead by snatching the spear from Carey, evidently considering that the position required skilled instead of amateur manipulation; and, as his fellows turned their paddles into choppers and struck heavily at the shark's back, Jackum drove his spear down with all his might. It went home in spite of its clumsy make and miserable point, for in a moment it was twitched out of the strong hands that held it, the water came flying in a shower over Carey, consequent upon a tremendous blow delivered by the fish's tail; then there was a violent eddy at the boat's side, a great shovel-shaped head rose, and the monster shot out of the water, rising several feet and falling with a crash across the main boom of the outrigger, taking it down lower and lower, while Carey clung to the other side of the boat. The water came creeping in over the lower side, and they would, he felt, be taken down and lie at the mercy of the enemy the blacks had tried to destroy. In rushed the water faster and faster, and Carey looked towards the shore to see how far it was to swim, when all at once the weight glided off the great bamboo, which rose quickly, the boat was level again, but half full of water, and the blacks chattered and grinned with delight, as they began shovelling the water out on both sides with their paddles. Jackum used his hands, but stopped short directly after to point. "Tickum, tickum. Mumkull," he cried, and Carey made out the spear-shaft performing some strange gyrations some twenty yards away, before it once more disappeared. As Carey owned afterwards to the doctor and Bostock, he still felt a little white, and his heart was beating heavily. But it calmed down rapidly as he felt that the worst that was to happen to him was to feel his legs wet until the sun had dried his trousers and boots, while the blacks chattered away, taking it as an every-day occurrence, rapidly emptying the boat, and once more in high glee paddling hard for the shore, where the great enjoyments of the day were to begin. _ |
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