Back Aa

Pagan Madonna, The

Close

<h2>CHAPTER XVI</h2></div> After they had gone below Dennison dropped into Jane’s chair. Immediately Dodge began to talk: “So you nearly throttled that ornery coyote, huh? Whata you know about this round-up? The three o’ ’em came in, and I never smelt nothin’ until they were on top o’ me. How should I smell anythin’? Hobnobbing together for days, how was I to know they were a bunch of pirates? Is your old man sore?” “Naturally.” “I mean appertainin’ to me?” “I don’t see how he could be. Who took care of you—bound you up?” “That nice-lookin’ greaser with the slue foot. Soft speakin’ like a woman and an eye like a timber wolf. Some hombre! Where we bound for?” “God knows!”—dejectedly. “Bad as that, huh? Your girl?” “No.” “No place for a girl. If they hadn’t busted my arm I wouldn’t care so much! If it comes to a 194 show-down I won’t be no good to anybody. Gimme my guns and we’d be headin’ home in five minutes. These hombres know somethin’ o’ my gun play. Gee, it’s lonesome here!” Dodge mused for a moment. “Say, what’s your old man’s idea hog-tyin’ you that-a-way?” “He’ll tell you perhaps.” “Uh-huh. Say, what did the Lord make all that stuff for?” with a gesture toward the brazen sea. “What’s it good for, anyhow?” “But for the sea we wouldn’t have any oysters or codfish,” said Dennison, soberly. Dodge chuckled. “Oysters and codfish! Say, you’re all right! Never knew the old man had a son until you blew in. Back in New York nobody ever said nothin’ about you. Where you been?” “Lots of places.” “Any ridin’?” “Some.” “Can you shoot?” “A little.” “Kill any o’ them Bolsheviks?” “That would be guesswork. Did you ever kill a man?” “Nope. Didn’t have to. I’m pretty good on the draw, and where I come from they knew it and didn’t bother me.” 195 “I see.” “Shootin’ these days is all in the movies. I was ridin’ for a film company when your old man lassoed me for this job. Never know when you’re well off—huh? I thought there wouldn’t be nothin’ to do but grub pile three times a day and the old man’s cheroots in between. And here I be now, ridin’ along with a bunch of pirates! Whata you know about that? And some of them nice boys, too. If they were riff-raff, barroom bums, I could get a line on it. But I’ll have to pass the buck.” “You haven’t got an extra gun anywhere, have you?” “We’d be headin’ east if I had”—grimly. “I’d have pared down the odds this mornin’. That hombre with the hop-a-long didn’t leave me a quill toothpick. Was you thinkin’ of startin’ somethin’?”—hopefully. “No, but I’d feel more comfortable if Miss Norman could carry a gun.” “Uh-huh. Say, she’s all right. No hysterics. Ain’t many of ’em that wouldn’t ’a’ been snivellin’ all day and night in her bunk. Been listenin’ to her readin’. Gee, you’d think we were floatin’ round this codfish lake just for the fun of it! She won’t run to cover if a bust-up comes. None whatever! And I bet she can cook, too. Them kind can always cook.” 196 Conversation lapsed. Below, Jane was passing through an unusual experience. Said Cleigh at the start: “I’m going to show you the paintings—there are fourteen in all. I will tell you the history of each. And above all, please bear in mind the price of each picture.” “I’ll remember.” But she thought the request an odd one, coming from the man as she knew him. Most of the treasures were in his own spacious cabin. There was a Napoleonic corner—a Meissonier on one side and a Detaille on the other. In a stationary cabinet there were a pair of stirrups, a riding crop, a book on artillery tactics, a pair of slippers beaded with seed pearls, and a buckle studded with sapphires. “What are those?” she asked, attracted. “They belonged to the Emperor and his first Empress.” “Napoleon?” “The Corsican. Next to the masters, I’ve a passion for things genuinely Napoleonic. The hussar is by Meissonier and the skirmish by Detaille.” “How much is this corner worth?” “I can’t say, except that I would not part with those objects for a hundred thousand; and there 197 are friends of mine who would pay half that sum for them—behind my back. This is a Da Vinci.” Half an hour passed. Jane honestly tried to be thrilled by the splendour of the names she heard, but her eye was always travelling back toward the slippers and the buckle. The Empress Josephine! Romance and gallantry in the old, old days! “The painting in your cabin is by Holbein. It cost me sixteen thousand. Now let us go out and look at the rug. That is the apple of my eye. It is the second finest example of the animal rug in the world. A sheet of pure gold, half an inch thick, covering the rug from end to end, would not equal its worth.” Jane admired the rug, but she would have preferred the gold. Her sense of the beautiful was alive, but there was always in her mind the genteel poverty of the past. She was beginning to understand. To go in quest of the beautiful required an unlimited purse and an endless leisure; and she would have never the one nor the other. “How much gold would that be?” she inquired, na�vely. “Nearly eighty thousand. Have you kept in mind the sums I have given you?” “Yes. Let me see—good heavens, a quarter of a million! But why do you carry them about like this?” 198 “Because I’m something of a rogue myself. I could not enjoy the rug and the paintings except on board. The French, the Italian, and the Spanish governments could confiscate every solitary painting except the Meissonier and the Detaille, for the simple reason that they were stolen. Oh, I did not steal them myself; I merely purchased them with one eye shut. If I hadn’t bought them they would have gone to some other collector. Do you get a glimmer of the truth now?” “The truth?”—perplexedly. “Yes—where Cunningham will get his pearls?”—bitterly. “Oh!” “And I could not touch him. A quarter of a million! And with his knowledge of the secret marts he could easily dispose of them. Worth a bold stroke, eh?” “But how will he get them off the yacht—transship them?” Her faith in Cunningham began to waver. A quarter of a million! The thought was as bells in her ears. “Of the outside issues I have no inkling. But I have shown you his pearls.” “But the crew! Certainly they will not return to any port with us. And why should he lie to 199 me? There is no reason in the world why he shouldn’t have told me, if he had committed piracy to obtain your paintings. And he was poring over maps.” “Some tramp is probably going to pick him up. He’s ordered us away from the wireless. Cunningham must have his joke, so he is beguiling you with twaddle about hunting pearls. He is robbing me of my treasures, and I can’t strike back on that count. But I can land him in prison on the count of piracy; and by the Lord Harry, I’ll do it if it takes my last dollar! He’ll rue this adventure, or they call me Tungsten for nothing!” “I wanted so to believe in him!” “Not difficult to understand why. He has a silver tongue and a face like John the Baptist—del Sarto’s—and you are romantic. The picture of him has enlisted your sympathies. You are filled with pity that he should be so richly endowed, facially and mentally, and to be a cripple such as children laugh over.” “Have you never considered what mental anguish must be the portion of a man whose body is twisted as his is? I know. So I pity him profoundly, even if he is a rogue. That’s all I was born for—to pity and to bind up. And I pity you, Mr. Cleigh, you who have walled your heart in granite.” 200 “You’re plain-spoken, young lady.” “Yes, certain sick minds need plain speaking.” “Then my mind is sick?” “Yes.” “And only a little while gone it was romantic!” “Two hundred million hands begging for bread, and you crossing the world for a string of glass beads whose value is only sentimental!” “I can’t let that pass, Miss Norman. I have trusted lieutenants who attend to my charities. I’m not a miser.” “You are, with the greatest thing in the world—human love.” “Shall a man give it where it is not wanted? But enough of this talk. I have shown you Cunningham’s pearls.” “Perhaps.” <hr class='tb' /> Night and wheeling stars. It was stuffy in the crew’s quarters. Half naked, the men lolled about, some in their bunks, some on the floor. The orders were that none should sleep on deck during the voyage to the Catwick. “All because the old man brings a skirt on board, we have to sweat blood in the forepeak!” growled Flint. “We’ve got a right to a little sport.” “Sure we have!” The speaker was sitting on the edge of his bunk. 201 He was a fine specimen of young manhood, with a pleasant, rollicking Irish countenance. He looked as if he had been brought up clean and had carried his cleanliness into the world. The blue anchor and love birds on his formidable forearms proclaimed him a deep-sea man. It was he who had given Dennison the shirt and the ducks. “Sure, we have a right to a little sport! But why call in the undertaker to help us out? You poor fish, all the way from San Francisco you’ve been grousing because shore leaves weren’t long enough for you to get prime soused in. What’s two months in our young lives?” “I’ve always been free to do as I liked.” “You look it! I’ll say so! The chief laid down the rules of this game, and we all took oath to follow those rules. The trouble with you is, you’ve been reading dime novels. Where do you think you are—raiding the Spanish Main? There’s every chance of our coming out top hole, as those lime-juicers say, with oodles of dough and a whole skin.” “Say, don’t I know this Sulu game? I tell you, if he does find his atoll there won’t be any shell. Not a chance in a hundred! Somebody’s been giving him a song and dance. As I get the dope, some pearl-hunting friend of his croaks and leaves him this chart. Old stuff! I bet a million boobs 202 have croaked trying to locate the red cross on a chart.” “Why the devil did you sign on, then?” “I wanted a little fun, and I’m going to have it. There’s champagne and Napoleon brandy in the dry-stores. Wouldn’t hurt us to have a little of it. If we’ve got to go to jail we might as well go lit up.” “Flint, you talk too much,” said a voice from the doorway. It was Cunningham’s. He leaned carelessly against the jamb. The crew fell silent and motionless. “Boys, you’ve heard Hennessy. Play it my way and you’ll wear diamonds; mess it up and you’ll all wear hemp. The world will forgive us when it finds out we’ve only made it laugh.” Cunningham strolled over to Flint, who rose to his feet. “Flint, I want that crimp-house whisky you’ve been swigging on the sly. No back talk! Hand it over!” “And if I don’t?” said Flint, his jaw jutting. <hr class='major' /> <div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'> 203 <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2