Kit Musgrave's Luck

"Hallo, Musgrave!" said Wolf. "Have you gone to the Commandancia for your papers?"

"I went in the afternoon and got the documents," Kit replied, and started for the road.

Wolf went to the veranda and talked to Mrs. Austin until some others arrived; then he crossed the floor. A chair by Olivia was unoccupied, and noting Wolf's advance, she gave a young man an inviting smile. The young man did not remark this and Wolf got the chair.

"Malin deserves to pay for his dullness," he said.

"Then you saw me signal?" Olivia rejoined. "All the same, you came!"

"One sometimes gets a humorous satisfaction from baffling people. Besides, I wanted to persuade you I'm not revengeful. It's obvious you don't like me."

"Oh well," said Olivia, "I don't claim my prejudices are always logical. Sometimes one likes people, and sometimes one does not."

"We'll let it go and I'll try to be resigned. However, I don't think you ought to prejudice my sobrecargo."

Olivia's eyes sparkled. It looked as if Wolf had seen her touch Kit; he was very keen.

"Do you know I have prejudiced Mr. Musgrave?" she asked.

"He has not hinted this; the young fellow is staunch, for all that, I don't imagine you approve his sailing on board my ship. Do you approve?"

Olivia said nothing, and Wolf resumed: "If it will give you much satisfaction, I'll discharge him after the next voyage."

For a few moments Olivia thought hard. She wanted Kit to leave Mossamedes, but she did not know yet if she wanted him to stop about Las Palmas altogether. Then she felt that Wolf was not the man to whom she would like to owe a debt. The fellow was cunning.

"Oh no!" she said smiling, "it's really not important, and I wouldn't like to feel accountable if he didn't get another post."

"Very well. If he wants to go, I'll use no arguments. If he wants to stop, you won't try to persuade him he ought not?"

"I agree," said Olivia, and getting up, waited until Wolf went off.

CHAPTER IX

THE THIRD VOYAGE

Mossamedes was hauling out from the mole, and Kit, on his way to his room, stopped to look about. The deck was strewn with cargo, for a small steamer that had tied up alongside had just moved astern. Winches rattled and a gang of men lowered some heavy wooden cases into the hold. Another gang got in the slack of a big rope made fast on the wall. There was much shouting; the pilot in front of the wheel-house roared orders, Don Erminio ran up and down the bridge and the mate was vociferous on the forecastle.

Macallister looked out with ironical amusement from the door of the engine-room. As a rule the Scot is not theatrical, and when others were noisy Macallister's dour calm was marked.

"They're pretty clothes," he said, indicating Kit's white uniform. "For a' that, if I had your figure, I'd wear something thick. I alloo Miss Brown thought ye like a tablecloth on a pump. But why are ye no' helping the ithers at the comic opera?"

"I have another job," Kit rejoined, putting a bundle of documents in his pocket. "It doesn't look as if you bothered about yours!"

The engines had begun to throb, and the telegraph rang violently. Macallister signed to somebody below and grinned.

"Yon's Don Erminio taking the floor. He means naething and I dinna mind him. When the action kin' o' drags he shouts and gives the telegraph handle a bit pull. When ye think aboot it, temperament's a curious thing. Maybe ye have seen a big boat haul out on the Clyde? Noo an' then an officer lifts his hand, ye hear a whistle, and a winch starts. All's calm and quiate. She's away, ten thousand tons o' her, before ye ken what's gaun on!"

"You're a grim, efficient lot," Kit remarked. "Just now it looks as if the pilot meant to hit the coaling tug. I don't know if you can stop him; that's your business and his. I'll get to mine before she starts to roll."

He went to his room, pulled up his folding stool, and threw the documents on his desk, for he was rather puzzled about some cases of agricultural machinery and tools. Perhaps these were the boxes transhipped from the other boat, but, so far as Kit knew, agricultural machinery was not much used in Morocco. In fact, he thought the Moors' methods were the methods of Abraham. In the meantime, the shouts got louder, and Kit imagined Juan on the forecastle, disputed with the pilot on the bridge.

"Pero, Señor!" the mate's expostulating cry pierced the turmoil, and then Kit's inkpot jumped from the desk.

He saw a dark smear on his new clothes, Mossamedes trembled, and he felt a heavy shock. His stool tilted, and he went over backwards and struck his head against the locker.

Getting up rather shakily, he remarked that the ship had listed, for the floor of his room was sharply inclined. When she lurched upright with a jerk he seized the doorpost and then, since it was obvious she was not capsizing, put the cork in the inkpot and began to pick up his papers. He had something of the sobriety that marks the puritan temperament, and it was characteristic that he occupied himself with his proper job. The papers for which he was accountable must not get stained by ink. When he had put all straight he went on deck.

Not far off, the coaling tug circled back for the wharf. Her bulwarks were broken, some plates were bent, and she had let go the string of barges she towed. On board Mossamedes Don Erminio leaned against the bridge-screens and his face was very white. The pilot stated loudly the course the tug's patron ought to have steered, and the mate and a number of sailors ran about the deck. Kit did not think they were usefully employed.

Going to the forecastle, he found Macallister leaning over the rails. A plate was bulged and the stem was bent, but it looked as if all the damage were above the water. Lines of foam ran by and melted ahead, for Mossamedes was steaming stern-foremost out of port.

"She's no' much the worse; I dinna ken aboot the tug," Macallister remarked, and took Kit to a spot beneath the bridge. "Tell the captain to brace up and get away to sea," he resumed. "If he's no' quick, the Commandancia launch will come off and stop us to make reports. They'll forget a' aboot it before we're back."

Kit translated and Don Erminio, pulling himself together, advanced upon the pilot. A savage dispute began, but presently the captain stopped and spread out his hands.

"The animal is not satisfied. He will not go."

"Aweel, I'll come up and pit him off," Macallister remarked and climbed the ladder.

The pilot hesitated. His duty was to take the ship outside the mole, but the engineer's look was resolute, and he retreated to the ladder at the opposite end of the bridge. When Macallister reached the top the pilot had reached the bottom, and a few moments afterwards, went down a rope to his boat.

"Noo, if ye'll put the helm across, I'll give her a bit shove ahead and we'll get away," Macallister said to the captain and rejoined Kit.

"Nane o' it was my job and maybe on board a British ship I'd no' ha' done as much," he observed and vanished below.

Mossamedes circled, the engines throbbed harder, the mole dropped back, and Kit began to laugh. He agreed that Macallister would not have done as much on board a British ship. For all that, his rude but cool efficiency was rather fine.

Half an hour afterwards Kit took some documents to the captain's room. Don Erminio was stretched on a locker, and a bottle of vermouth and some Palma cigars balanced the swing-table. When he saw the documents he frowned.

"Another day. Just now I am ill," he said. "When one has an assassin for a pilot, to command a ship is not amusing. I bear much, but some time I take Enrique Maria Contallan y Clavijo by the neck and throw him in the sea. In the meantime, I have saved the ship and we will take a drink."

Kit refused politely and did not smile. He liked Don Erminio and the captain was not a fool. Kit had known him calm and steady when things were awkward, and sometimes his pluck was rash. All the same, he was unstable; one could not foresee the line he would take. The Spanish character frankly puzzled Kit. It was marked by sharp contrasts, and one could use no rules. Macallister and Jefferson were not like that. Their qualities, so to speak, were constant. When the strain was heavy one knew they would be cool.

Mossamedes steered for the eastern islands, and in the morning the parched rocks of Lanzarote melted in the glitter on the horizon. Then she headed for Africa and at sunset Don Erminio stopped the ship and used the lead. He got soundings on the coast-shelf, and Kit, passing the chart-room, imagined the mate and captain argued about the ship's position, but when Mossamedes went on again the compass indicated that Don Erminio had hauled out to avoid shoals. When the moon rose one saw nothing but sparkling water, the swell was long and measured, and the leadsman, making another cast, got no bottom. It looked as if they had left the hummocks on the coast-shelf astern, and Mossamedes went full-speed.

About midnight Kit lounged and smoked on a locker in the engine-room. He was not sleepy, and since Mossamedes sailed, had thought much about Olivia. On the whole, his thoughts were disturbing. When he was with Olivia he forgot his poverty; all he saw was her charm. She was beautiful, she was clever and now and then he got a hint of tenderness that gave him a strange thrill. The thrill moved and braced him; while it lasted all looked possible. Somehow he would mend his fortune and make his mark. Austin, who had held Kit's post, had done so and married Olivia's sister.

Afterwards, when Olivia was not about, Kit knew himself to be a fool. To begin with, he had not Austin's talents and must be satisfied to keep his proper level. Then supposing he did get rich? After all, he was not Olivia's sort. Kit was staunch and stopped there; he would not admit that sometimes he vaguely doubted if Olivia were the girl for him. Instincts he had inherited from sober and frugal ancestors were strong. Yet for the most part he resisted unconsciously. When one is young and carried away by an attractive girl one is not logical.

Lighting a fresh cigarette, he looked about. Mossamedes rolled and light and shadow played about the machinery. In front, the bright cranks flashed and faded in a shallow pit, the crossheads slammed between their guides and the connecting-rods, shining like silver, swung out of the gloom. Above, the big cylinders throbbed and shook with the impulse that drove the ship ahead. Men like shadows moved about with oilcans and tallow-swabs, but now and then a moving beam touched a face beaded by sweat. Macallister occupied the top of a tool box and smoked a black pipe.

Kit liked the engine-room. The steady beat of the machine was soothing. One got a sense of order, measured effort and strength that matched the strain. Force was not wasted but sternly controlled. In the engine-room Macallister was another man, quiet, keen, concentrated, and Kit understood the Scots' satisfaction when all ran well. They sprang from a stock that counted rule and effort to be worth more than beauty.

There was a crash, and Kit jumped from the locker. Mossamedes stopped and the shock threw him against a column. He seized the iron and held on, conscious that he trembled. The jar was terrifying because it was not expected. A sea broke about the vessel, she shook and water rolled across the deck. A greaser shouted and Kit saw Macallister on the grated platform above. He had not seen him go, but his hand was on the throttle-wheel. He did not look disturbed, and signed a man to the control of the reversing-gear. If the link were pulled across, the engines would go astern. The telegraph, however, was silent and Macallister did not turn the wheel.

The ship lifted, lurched forward, as if a sea had borne her up, and went on. Macallister waited for a few moments and then went up to the door with Kit. The door on the starboard side looked out towards Africa, but nothing broke the furrowed plain of glittering sea.

"I'm thinking she bumped a bit hummock," Macallister remarked. "She got a jolt, but the old boat was built by men who dinna scamp their job. Where ye see yon house's name, ye ken the work is good."

"All the same, you have started the bilge pump," said Kit, for a sharp throbbing pierced the beat of machinery.

"Pepe will let her rin a few minutes. Although I dinna expect she'll draw much water, ye keep the rules," Macallister replied and turned to Miguel, who came along the alleyway. "What do you think about it, friend? The third voyage has not begun well."

Macallister's Castilian was uncouth, but Miguel understood. "It is not good, Don Pedro! A bad coast and a treacherous people, but one is not disturbed. Some of the saints were fishermen, and mine is king of all. But I go to try the after well."

He went off, but Kit had noted that the line he carried was neatly coiled and the sounding-rod was wet. He thought it typical that the old quartermaster had tried the forward well a few moments after the ship struck. Moreover his talk about his saint somehow was not extravagant. One felt that Miguel knew and trusted his great patron.

"A most queer fellow," Macallister remarked. "A believer in wax images and pented boards."

"Pented boards?" said Kit.

"Just that," Macallister rejoined. "Ye'll no ken the Scottish classics. When the great reformer was a galley slave they gave him the image to worship. 'A pented brod, mair fit for swimming than praying til,' says he and threw't overboard. Weel, for Miguel, the images are not pented things, and I've met weel-grounded Scots I wouldna trust like him. He kens his job and his word goes. I alloo it's much."

Kit went on deck. The sea sparkled in the moon and long regular combers rolled up from the north. One could not see land and nothing indicated shoals ahead. Mossamedes dipped her bows to the knight-heads and showers of spray leaped about the rail. Then her stern went down and the rising forecastle cut the sky. For a time Kit forgot Olivia and mused about the engineer and Miguel.

Macallister's mood was sometimes freakish and his humour rude, but behind this was a stern, honest efficiency. The quartermaster was a mystic, but when the big white combers chased the cargo launch one could trust him with the steering oar. After all to know one's job was much.

CHAPTER X

SMOKE ON THE HORIZON

An angry swell rolled along the coast, dust blew across the flat-roofed town, and Mossamedes, with two anchors out, rode uneasily. She had unloaded some cargo and Kit, going ashore in the evening, speculated about the rest. He did not think he was superstitious, but the voyage had not begun well, and he wanted to get it over. There was something strange about the business in which he was engaged, and he resolved he would talk to Wolf when he returned.

Moreover, he did not like the dirty Moorish town. When it got dark the narrow streets were forbidding, but Yusuf declared he could not transact the ship's business until he closed his shop. In the Canaries and Morocco, rich merchants keep a shop. One could buy a shipload of their goods or a few pesetas' worth.

Yusuf's little room was very hot. The dust had blown in, and the floor was gritty. Flies hovered about the copper lamp which burned an aromatic oil. The agent gave Kit coffee and a cigarette. The tobacco was bitter but soothing and Kit imagined it was mixed with an Eastern drug. At Yusuf's he generally felt dull; perhaps it was the smell of the lamp, leather and spices. They began to talk, and presently Kit remarked: "If you send your boats to-morrow, we will hoist out the last of the cargo. Have you got much stuff for us?"

"I have got nothing," said Yusuf, smiling. "Your cargo is on board."

"All the goods we carry are consigned to the Greek merchant here and you."

"That is so, but I will endorse the bill of lading, and file a statement for the Customs officers that the cases of machinery will be landed at another port."

"Ah!" said Kit who began to see a light. "Then we are to carry the cases along the coast? I was puzzled about this lot of cargo; but we got it from a Spanish ship at Las Palmas. The cases were put on board in daylight when two of the port captain's men were on deck.

"The plan was good," Yusuf remarked. "When one does things openly nobody is curious."

"All the same, the Moorish officers know machinery is not used in the Sahara."

"It is not the officers' business. They are friends of mine, and in this country a present carries some weight."

Kit knew Wolf and his agent were clever, but began to think they were cleverer than he liked. He felt he was being used, and, so to speak, kept in the dark. He did not know the others' plans, in which he was involved, but if the plans did not work, he thought he ran some risk. Yusuf was subtle, and Kit's instinctive antagonism hardened. For all that, he was Wolf's servant and must carry out his agent's orders.

"I will endorse the bill of lading," the other resumed. "You will land the boxes at the spot you got the camels, and the owner will take his goods. Perhaps he will keep the document for a talisman. Some of these people have a strange respect for all that is written on paper."

"Very well," said Kit, who got up.

Yusuf went with him to the door, and Kit starting along the street, heard the heavy bolts shoot back. To know the business was over was something of a relief. Although Yusuf was inscrutable at his house one got a sense of fear and secrecy. In Morocco a Jew trader was perhaps forced to use caution, but Kit thought he would sooner deal with the wild Berbers who ruled the open desert. Yet he owned he had no firm grounds for doubting Wolf's agent. When he got on board Mossamedes he went to the chart-room and found Don Erminio playing cards with the mate. The captain had won two pesetas and was jubilant.

"Juan is clever and cautious. I am not clever, but I am bold," he said.

Kit noted the bottle on the table. When Don Erminio drank a few glasses of caña he philosophised. Kit narrated his interview with Yusuf, and the captain looked thoughtful.

"It is plain the boxes hold guns," he said. "The Moors do not carry guns to shoot the rabbit, and if we land the boxes somebody will get killed. However, it is not important. The Moors are numerous and all are bad."

"I was not thinking about the Moors," Kit rejoined. "The business is strange. The guns were on board a Spanish ship and if the Moors use them to steal camels, the camels will no doubt be stolen on soil that is claimed by France. There may be trouble afterwards. Our employer knows this."

Don Erminio picked up the cards. Spanish cards are not marked like English cards, but Kit thought the one the captain indicated stood for the ace of clubs.

"Bastones!" Don Erminio remarked and shuffled the pack. "I put it at the bottom. You see it is there? Now take three away and you will find it at the top. A trick, but clever. Señor Wolf plays a game like this."

Kit carried out his instructions and laughed. "Wolf is, no doubt, clever, but this is not the card."

Don Erminio frowned and swept the pack on to the floor. The swing-table tilted, but Juan stretched out his hand and seized the bottle.

"Señor!" he expostulated. "The caña cost two pesetas!"

"I have forgotten something. All the same, you see the moral," Don Erminio resumed. "Merchants are cheats and use cunning tricks. One thinks one knows their plan, but one does not. One puts one's money on the wrong card and it is gone. Sailors are honest and do not get rich. Well, we will carry out our orders. That is enough for me. I have drunk some caña and in the morning my throat is bad."

Two days afterwards Mossamedes hove her anchors and steamed south. As a rule, the Trade-breeze blows steadily, but now and then its strength varies. Sometimes a little rain falls and the day is nearly calm; sometimes the wind backs north and blows hard. Mossamedes' holds were almost empty and her rolling was wild. When she plunged across the long swell, half her screw came out of the water and one heard the top blades thrash. Don Erminio followed the coast, steering as near land as he durst. He wanted to avoid the traffic, and Mossamedes, going light, did not draw much water. She was built to cross the sands at African river mouths.

One morning Kit went to the bridge. The sun was not high and the air was fresh. The wind had dropped, and the faint haze that generally softens the light and glitter when the Trade-breeze blows had vanished. The sky was a harsh, vivid blue, and the tops of the long rollers cut the horizon with sharp distinctness. They did not break, but rose and subsided, leaving here and there soft streaks of foam. For all that, the swell ran high, Mossamedes lurched about, and Kit thought wind was coming. He was bothered about it. If the wind were fresh, they could not land their dangerous cargo. The mate leaned against a stanchion and searched the sky-line with his glasses. After a time he gave the glasses to Kit.

"Look!" he said.

Kit saw a faint brown smear drawn across the sky. It was rather like a thin cloud, but he thought it smoke. When the wind is light, a steamer's smoke spreads far and floats for some time. The strange thing was, the steamer was there, inside the proper track. He glanced at Mossamedes' funnel but the last coal they had got was good and diaphanous vapour rolled astern. Kit put down the glasses and went to the captain's room. Don Erminio came out, studied the smoke, and frowned. He wore pyjamas and a shooting jacket, torn at the back.

"The animals cannot see us, but a steamer ought not to be so near the coast," he said. "Then we will soon reach the spot where we land the guns."

"Perhaps the captain takes a drink," Juan remarked.

"It is possible. When I drink much caña, my calculations are not good," Don Erminio agreed. "All the same, to run a risk is foolish. We will stop and use the lead."

After he got a sounding he changed his course three or four points east and steered obliquely for the land. In the meantime the smoke vanished and Kit went down and told Macallister to keep his fires clean. To see smoke where smoke ought not to be was disturbing, and if the others had seen Mossamedes, they would speculate about her captain's object for navigating shallow water.

When Kit went on deck again the swell had begun to break and ran ominously high. The wind was not yet strong, but it strengthened and the sky in the north was black. At noon, a sailor in the rigging thought he saw smoke again. Don Erminio went up with his glasses, but saw nothing and gave the glasses to Kit.

"The Norther begins," he said.

In the distance, a brown fog obscured the horizon and Kit knew it was a dust-storm blowing off the coast. Spray leaped about Mossamedes' forecastle, her plunges were violent and to hold on to the rigging while the mast swung was hard. They went down and soon afterwards the look-out hailed. Kit was on deck and joined Don Erminio on the bridge. When Mossamedes lifted, two masts and the top of a funnel cut the horizon. Kit thought it ominous that he saw no smoke.

The sea had got up and long, white-topped combers rolled after the ship. When her stern swung out of the water the engines ran away and their savage throbbing shook the deck. With her rudder lifted, she did not steer, and while the helmsman sweated at the wheel she yawed about until her quarters sank and the screw got hold. One could not drive her fast, but much of her side was above water and the savage wind helped. For a time the other vessel's smoke vanished in the thickening spray. Then they saw her again, sharp and distinct. The ominous thing was, they did not, as they might have expected, see her on the quarter but abeam. It was plain that when Mossamedes changed her course, or soon afterwards, the stranger had changed hers.

"The French gunboat!" Don Erminio said and clenched his fist. "Somebody has sold us."

Going to the compass, he got the other's bearing, and Kit marked his coolness. When the strain was steady the captain did not tear his hair. He took Kit and the mate to the chart-room, and a few moments afterwards Macallister came up. The rules of the British liners were not used on board Mossamedes, and Don Erminio spread a chart on the table. Then he lighted a cigarette and indicated the steamer's course along, but converging on, the coast.