The Pirate Story Megapack. R.M. Ballantyne

he called politely.

      “What’s the idea of all the discord?” demanded Ardita cheerfully. “Is this the varsity crew from the county nut farm?”

      By this time the boat was scraping the side of the yacht and a great bulking negro in the bow turned round and grasped the ladder. Thereupon the leader left his position in the stern and before Ardita had realized his intention he ran up the ladder and stood breathless before her on the deck.

      “The women and children will be spared!” he said briskly. “All crying babies will be immediately drowned and all males put in double irons!” Digging her hands excitedly down into the pockets of her dress Ardita stared at him, speechless with astonishment. He was a young man with a scornful mouth and the bright blue eyes of a healthy baby set in a dark sensitive face. His hair was pitch black, damp and curly—the hair of a Grecian statue gone brunette. He was trimly built, trimly dressed, and graceful as an agile quarter-back.

      “Well, I’ll be a son of a gun!” she said dazedly.

      They eyed each other coolly.

      “Do you surrender the ship?”

      “Is this an outburst of wit?” demanded Ardita. “Are you an idiot—or just being initiated to some fraternity?”

      “I asked you if you surrendered the ship.”

      “I thought the country was dry,” said Ardita disdainfully. “Have you been drinking finger-nail enamel? You better get off this yacht!”

      “What?” the young man’s voice expressed incredulity.

      “Get off the yacht! You heard me!”

      He looked at her for a moment as if considering what she had said.

      “No,” said his scornful mouth slowly; “No, I won’t get off the yacht. You can get off if you wish.”

      Going to the rail be gave a curt command and immediately the crew of the rowboat scrambled up the ladder and ranged themselves in line before him, a coal-black and burly darky at one end and a miniature mulatto of four feet nine at to other. They seemed to be uniformly dressed in some sort of blue costume ornamented with dust, mud, and tatters; over the shoulder of each was slung a small, heavy-looking white sack, and under their arms they carried large black cases apparently containing musical instruments.

      “’Ten-shun!” commanded the young man, snapping his own heels together crisply. “Right driss! Front! Step out here, Babe!”

      The smallest Negro took a quick step forward and saluted.

      “Take command, go down below, catch the crew and tie ’em up—all except the engineer. Bring him up to me. Oh, and pile those bags by the rail there.”

      “Yas-suh!”

      Babe saluted again and wheeling about motioned for the five others to gather about him. Then after a short whispered consultation they all filed noiselessly down the companionway.

      “Now,” said the young man cheerfully to Ardita, who had witnessed this last scene in withering silence, “if you will swear on your honor as a flapper—which probably isn’t worth much—that you’ll keep that spoiled little mouth of yours tight shut for forty-eight hours, you can row yourself ashore in our rowboat.”

      “Otherwise what?”

      “Otherwise you’re going to sea in a ship.”

      With a little sigh as for a crisis well passed, the young man sank into the settee Ardita had lately vacated and stretched his arms lazily. The corners of his mouth relaxed appreciatively as he looked round at the rich striped awning, the polished brass, and the luxurious fittings of the deck. His eye felt on the book, and then on the exhausted lemon.

      “Hm,” he said, “Stonewall Jackson claimed that lemon-juice cleared his head. Your head feel pretty clear?”

      Ardita disdained to answer.

      “Because inside of five minutes you’ll have to make a clear decision whether it’s go or stay.”

      He picked up the book and opened it curiously.

      “The Revolt of the Angels. Sounds pretty good. French, eh?” He stared at her with new interest “You French?”

      “No.”

      “What’s your name?”

      “Farnam.”

      “Farnam what?”

      “Ardita Farnam.”

      “Well Ardita, no use standing up there and chewing out the insides of your mouth. You ought to break those nervous habits while you’re young. Come over here and sit down.”

      Ardita took a carved jade case from her pocket, extracted a cigarette and lit it with a conscious coolness, though she knew her hand was trembling a little; then she crossed over with her supple, swinging walk, and sitting down in the other settee blew a mouthful of smoke at the awning.

      “You can’t get me off this yacht,” she raid steadily; “and you haven’t got very much sense if you think you’ll get far with it. My uncle’ll have wirelesses zigzagging all over this ocean by half past six.”

      “Hm.”

      She looked quickly at his face, caught anxiety stamped there plainly in the faintest depression of the mouth’s corners.

      “It’s all the same to me,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “’Tisn’t my yacht. I don’t mind going for a coupla hours’ cruise. I’ll even lend you that book so you’ll have something to read on the revenue boat that takes you up to Sing-Sing.”

      He laughed scornfully.

      “If that’s advice you needn’t bother. This is part of a plan arranged before I ever knew this yacht existed. If it hadn’t been this one it’d have been the next one we passed anchored along the coast.”

      “Who are you?” demanded Ardita suddenly. “And what are you?”

      “You’ve decided not to go ashore?”

      “I never even faintly considered it.”

      “We’re generally known,” he said “all seven of us, as Curtis Carlyle and his Six Black Buddies late of the Winter Garden and the Midnight Frolic.”

      “You’re singers?”

      “We were until today. At present, due to those white bags you see there we’re fugitives from justice and if the reward offered for our capture hasn’t by this time reached twenty thousand dollars I miss my guess.”

      “What’s in the bags?” asked Ardita curiously.

      “Well,” he said “for the present we’ll call it—mud—Florida mud.”

      III

      Within ten minutes after Curtis Carlyle’s interview with a very frightened engineer the yacht Narcissus was under way, steaming south through a balmy tropical twilight. The little mulatto, Babe, who seems to have Carlyle’s implicit confidence, took full command of the situation. Mr. Farnam’s valet and the chef, the only members of the crew on board except the engineer, having shown fight, were now reconsidering, strapped securely to their bunks below. Trombone Mose, the biggest negro, was set busy with a can of paint obliterating the name Narcissus from the bow, and substituting the name Hula Hula, and the others congregated aft and became intently involved in a game of craps.

      Having given order for a meal to be prepared and served on deck at seven-thirty, Carlyle rejoined Ardita, and, sinking back into his settee, half closed his eyes and fell into a state of profound abstraction.

      Ardita scrutinized him carefully—and classed him immediately as a romantic figure. He gave the effect of towering self-confidence erected on a slight foundation—just under the surface of each of his decisions she discerned a hesitancy that was in decided contrast to the arrogant curl