Hunting the Skipper: The Cruise of the «Seafowl» Sloop. Fenn George Manville

if you want one, as soon as you get by the winding bits.”

      “The river winds?” said the lieutenant.

      “Winds? I should think she does! Why, look yonder, mister,” continued the man, pointing. “It’s all trees like that for miles. You’ve got to get through them.”

      “Deep water?” asked the lieutenant.

      “Orful! On’y it’s ’bout as muddy as rivers can be made.”

      “And you assure me that you could pilot us in and right up to the slaver’s stronghold?”

      “Pilot yew? Yew don’t want no piloting; all yew’ve got to do is to sail up in and out through the big wilderness of trees. Yew wouldn’t want no piloting, but if you undertake to see that I have that chief’s land, and clear him and his black crews away, I’ll lay yew off his front door where you can blow his palm-tree palace all to smithers without losing a man.”

      “And what about the slaver?” asked Murray.

      “What about her? She’ll be lying anchored there, of course.”

      “With any colleagues?” asked the lieutenant.

      “Whatche’r mean – t’others?”

      “Yes.”

      “Not now, mister. There’s as many as four or five sometimes, but I only see her go up the river this time. Yew should have come later on if you wanted more.”

      “The slaver is up the river now, then?” said the lieutenant, looking at the man searchingly.

      “Yes, of course,” was the reply, as the American involuntarily gave a look round, and then, as if taking himself to task for an act of folly, he added laughingly. “If she wasn’t up there she’d be out here, and you can see for yourselves that she ain’t.”

      “You could show us the way in?” said Murray.

      “Why, didn’t I say I could?” replied the man sharply.

      “Yes; but I should like to have a glimpse of her first,” said Murray.

      “What for, youngster? To let her know that you’re coming? You take my advice, mister, and come upon her sudden like.”

      The lieutenant gazed intently upon the man.

      “Yes; I should like to reconnoitre a bit first. With your assistance we ought to be able to run our boats close up under the shelter of the trees and see what she is like.”

      “See what she’s like, mister? Why, like any other schooner. You take my advice; you’ll slip off and fetch your ship, and I’ll wait here till you come back.”

      Murray looked at the man searchingly, for somehow a sense of doubt began to trouble him as to the man’s trustworthiness, and the lad began to turn over the position in his mind. For though the man’s story seemed to be reasonable enough, an element of suspicion began to creep in and he began to long to ask the lieutenant as to what he thought about the matter.

      But he did not speak, for the keen-looking American’s eyes were upon him, and when they shifted it was only for them to be turned upon the lieutenant.

      “Wal,” he said at last, “whatcher thinking about, mister?”

      “About your running me up to where you could point out the schooner.”

      “But I don’t want to,” said the man frankly.

      “Why?” asked the lieutenant sharply.

      “’Cause I don’t want to lose the chance of getting that there mile of plantation.”

      “There ought to be no risk, sir, if we were careful.”

      “I dunno so much about that there, mister. Them slaver chaps always sleep with one eye open, and there’s no knowing what might happen.”

      “What might happen! What could happen?”

      “Nothing; but the skipper might hyste sail and run his craft right up towards the falls. As I said, I never see them, but there must be falls to keep this river so full.”

      “But we could follow him.”

      “Part of the way p’raps, mister, but he could go in his light craft much further than you could in a man-o’-war.”

      “True,” said the lieutenant; “you are right.”

      “Somewhere about,” said the man, showing his teeth. “There, you slip off and fetch your ship, and I’ll cruise up and down off the mouth of the river here so as to make sure that the schooner don’t slip off. She’s just as like as not to hyste sail now that the fog’s all gone. She’d have been off before if it hadn’t come on as thick as soup. Say, ’bout how far off is your ship?”

      “Half-a-dozen miles away,” said the lieutenant.

      “That ain’t far. Why not be off at once?”

      “Why not come with us?” asked Murray.

      “Ain’t I telled yer, youngster? Think I want to come back and find the schooner gone?”

      The lieutenant gazed from the American to the midshipman and back again, with his doubts here and there, veering like a weather vane, for the thought would keep attacking him – suppose all this about the slave schooner was Yankee bunkum, and as soon as he had got rid of them, the lugger would sail away and be seen no more?

      “You won’t trust him, will you?” said Murray, taking advantage of a puff of wind which separated the two boats for a few minutes.

      “I can’t,” said the lieutenant, in a whisper. “I was nearly placing confidence in him, but your doubt has steered me in the other direction. Hah!” he added quickly. “That will prove him.” And just then the lugger glided alongside again, and the opportunity for further communing between the two officers was gone.

      “That’s what yew have to be on the lookout for, mister, when yew get sailing out here. Sharp cat’s-paws o’ wind hot as fire sometimes. Well, ain’t you going to fetch your ship?”

      “And what about you?” said the lieutenant.

      “Me?” said the man wonderingly, and looking as innocent as a child.

      “Yes; where am I to pick you up again?”

      “Oh! I’ll show you. I’ll be hanging just inside one of the mouths of the river, and then lead yew in when yew get back with yewr ship.”

      Murray softly pressed his foot against his officer’s without seeming to move, and felt the pressure returned, as if to say – All right; I’m not going to trust him – and the lieutenant then said aloud —

      “But why shouldn’t you sail with us as far as our sloop?”

      “Ah, why shouldn’t I, after all?” said the man. “You might show me your skipper, and we could talk to him about what we’re going to do. All right; sail away if you like to chance it.”

      The lieutenant nodded, and a few minutes later the two boats were gliding about half a mile abreast of the dense mangrove-covered shore in the direction of the Seafowl, and only about fifty yards apart.

      “You’ll be keeping a sharp lookout for treachery in any shape, sir?” said Murray, in a low tone.

      “The fellow’s willingness to fall in with my proposal has disarmed me, Mr Murray,” said the lieutenant quietly, “but all the same I felt bound to be cautious. I have given the marines orders to be ready to fire at the slightest sign of an attempt to get away.”

      “You have, sir? Bravo!” said Murray, in the same low tone, and without seeming to be talking to his chief if they were observed. “But I did not hear you speak to the jollies.”

      “No, Mr Murray; I did not mean you to, and I did not shout. But this caution is, after all, unnecessary, for there comes the sloop to look after us. Look; she is rounding that tree-covered headland.”

      “Better and better,