Part 18

On the chance of his coming I had given very strict orders that no one should say where Mr. Scarlett had gone, and when I took him all round the _Bunder Abbas_ his face fell as he realized that he was not on board. Not a word would he say about the snake, never so much as a hint to Jaffa; but as he left the ship he spoke to him, looking at me, and Jaffa repeated: "Twenty thousand rupees". I could not resist asking him, through Jaffa (who, if he had a shrewd suspicion that he was the red-bearded leader of the caravan, never mentioned it), how his son was--the wounded man who had been carried through the gap.

At the question Jassim gave me a glance of such terrible hatred that I knew at once that the poor chap was dead, and that he blamed me for it.

This could not help but worry me, and another worry came along about this time: there was disquieting news from Jask. Mr. Fisher, the acting political agent, had telegraphed across that the Baluchis were causing trouble and constantly threatening to come down from the hills and attack the place. The land wire had been cut in several places, and a party of native employees had been beaten and robbed about twenty-five miles to the eastward. He had borrowed a few of the border police from the Mir of Old Jask, but they were such brigands and so much of a nuisance that he had sent them back again.

It really made me angry to think of keeping Miss Borsen and Mrs. Fisher there. I actually asked if the "_B.A._" could not go as soon as ever her repairs had been effected, but Commander Duckworth shook his head.

"It's just as it always is at this time of year," he said. "Those tribesmen keep on threatening, hoping to get 'backsheesh'. They do it every year; but nothing will come of it. They won't risk their skins."

However, this did not relieve my anxiety. I seemed to have a personal interest in little Miss Borsen, because, I suppose, she had come out from England with me, and possibly because we had quarrelled.

One day Nicholson signalled across that he and Popple Opstein were bringing Mr. Scarlett across that evening. They came, he looking desperately ill, although his arm was practically well. When we four were alone he pulled out another letter--Jassim had evidently soon found where he had gone.

"He offers me twenty thousand rupees," he said wearily. "It's a lot of money."

He thought that we should commence the same old arguments again, but, Nicholson winking at me, I went into the cabin, unlocked my drawer, and brought out the bracelet. I handed it to Nicholson, for it was "up" to him to tell the good news. He simply laid it on Mr. Scarlett's thin knees and said quietly: "It's been off your arm for ten days. I took it off when you had the operation."

Mr. Scarlett shrank from it and clutched his arm. "But it's there--I can feel it--I've felt it a hundred times in these last days."

Nicholson smiled, pulled up his sleeve, cut through the bandage, and showed him the signal halyard.

Mr. Scarlett gave a wild look at each of us, dropped the snake on the deck, bolted into the cabin, and we heard him sobbing like a child.

Nicholson yelled for Percy. "Brandy and soda for Mr. Scarlett."

"For all of us," I said, because we needed it.

Eventually Mr. Scarlett came back and asked to see the bracelet, handling it tenderly. He was much too disturbed to talk coherently, or to thank Nicholson or either of us. It was pitiful to watch him. He had not found his "bearings"; did not realize all that it meant to him, and kept on rolling up his sleeve to look at his bare arm as if he did not believe his own eyes.

He gave way again, buried his face in his lean hands, lying half over the table, which shook with his sobs. It was very distressing to watch.

"Can't we hoist that red flag, sir?" he asked presently, lifting a haggard face.

I nodded.

He jumped to our signal locker, picked out a red-and-white flag, tore off the white part like a maniac, bent it to the halyard, and hoisted it to our little yardarm, where it drooped in the heated air. Seizing a pair of glasses he watched the shore as though he expected Jassim to come paddling out. But Jassim did not come, and in his nervous condition Mr. Scarlett worked himself into a terrible state of agitation lest he had disappeared, and was, even now, preparing violent measures to regain the bracelet.

I think that before Nicholson went away he had taken the precaution of giving him a very strong sleeping-draught, because he eventually became calmer and went to sleep.

When he was asleep I took the bracelet away from him and locked it in my drawer, hoping most devoutly that Jassim would soon come and claim it; and next morning, without saying anything to him, I took the precaution of sending the bracelet across to the _Intrepid_, so that the sight of it should not upset him, and that Jassim, if he came, should not be able to terrorize him into giving it away before the money was produced.

Jassim did come that day, and his manner was mysterious and threatening; nor did I like the look in his eyes when Mr. Scarlett bared his arm and he realized that the bracelet had disappeared and that the gunner had not now the fear of taking it off.

Jassim evidently wanted to get rid of me; but I would not go.

"When he puts down his twenty thousand rupees he shall have it, not before," I told Mr. Scarlett. "The bracelet is not on board, and I shall not tell you where it is. Never you mind where it is." I stopped him enquiring. "You tell him to bring his money and he shall have it."

As I imagined, Jassim could not produce the money, nor do I think that he ever intended doing so, hoping all along so to work on the gunner's fears that he could get it for nothing. The two of them began talking very excitedly, waving their arms and thumping the little table. From the fierce looks which Jassim occasionally turned on me I was evidently being talked about, and was not very popular in that quarter.

I saw that hateful muddy colour spread over Mr. Scarlett's face and his eyes narrow with fear. He turned to me, hardly able to speak.

"For God's sake, sir, give up the wretched thing," he stuttered. "Tell me where it is and I will give it him. I don't want any of his money; all I want is to be quit of it."

"When you've got your money, not before," I said.

"But, sir, remember we are not in England. He swears he'll kill you; that if you land he will kill you; if you don't he'll find other ways of killing you. He won't touch me, because I gave his wife that drink of water. But, sir, it's different with you."

"I gave his son water a month ago," I said, with a sudden inspiration.

Mr. Scarlett was too much agitated to enquire when or where. He turned to Jassim and asked him something. Jassim replied bitterly.

"He says you shot him, and he died; the drink of water made no difference. You don't know these people out here," he implored. "Don't run any risk. I don't want the money, indeed I don't."

Jassim had risen to his feet and stood not three feet from me, glaring at me as if he would willingly kill me then and there. I saw in his eyes that what Mr. Scarlett had said was true. I don't know what made me do it--I certainly never thought, and regretted it immediately afterwards--but I suddenly locked my arms round him, and before he could make a move I had tripped him over the railings and dropped him overboard.

The boat which had brought him off was close there, and he scrambled on board like a drowned rat, sat down in the stern-sheets, folded his clinging wet burnous round him, and, without deigning to turn his head in our direction, was paddled ashore.

"You've done it now, sir," Mr. Scarlett moaned, burying his face in his hands and sprawling across the table. "For God's sake let's get away from Muscat."

I tried to pacify him by pointing out that if Jassim killed me he would lose all chance of finding the snake. "He won't be such a fool as that," I said.

"He'll want revenge--revenge more than the snake--now, sir," Mr. Scarlett groaned.

There are times in plenty in most men's lives when, either through anger or stubbornness, danger does not influence them. This was a case in point. I had suffered so much from Jassim and his wretched snake that his threats simply stiffened my back to such an extent that I much preferred to be killed than give in. The mail steamer was leaving next day so to make certain that Jassim should not get it, I went aboard the _Intrepid_, told Popple Opstein what had happened, and after one last look at the bracelet we packed it up and sent it home to my bankers in London. At any rate, whatever happened to me (and I did not really believe that anything would happen) Jassim should never have it, and later on we might be able to negotiate for the reward of thirty thousand rupees with the rightful owner, the Khan of Khamia himself.

I breathed more freely when the mail steamer left the harbour, and not until it had gone did I tell Mr. Scarlett what I had done.

He and I stood watching till she disappeared behind the rocks at the entrance, and, drawing a deep breath of relief, he said:

"It seems wonderful, sir; don't it, sir? Here for thirteen years it's been part and parcel of me, and now I'm finished with it. I never want to set eyes on the beastly thing again."

From that moment Mr. Scarlett began very rapidly to mend. He grew stouter, his eyes lost their hunted look, and though he worried much about the risks I was running, still it is a different thing to worry about other people's risks from worrying about one's own, and he rapidly recovered his spirits.

I made light of any danger and took no precaution whatever, until one night, shortly afterwards, I was awakened by the noise of a scuffle and a splash in the water alongside.

"What's that?" I sang out, springing up.

Webster answered out of the darkness: "It's all right, sir. It's that Arab chap you hove overboard the other day. He was trying to creep on board over the stern. I spotted him, sir, and popped him back into the 'ditch'."

Another day I was bathing with the _Intrepids_, and we were skylarking afterwards on the beach, when a bullet hit the sand close to me and we heard the report of a revolver. Spotting someone moving behind a rock we all darted in that direction, but when we reached it saw no one.

I don't mind saying that those two things happening made me extremely nervous, and made me stick pretty close to the "_B.A._".

I could now realize what mental agony Mr. Scarlett had suffered, and though perhaps I did not show it as much I felt it most acutely. The boot was on the other foot now with a vengeance, and it was I who, when it grew dark, looked longingly at the little hot oven of a cabin and felt a great temptation to lock myself in until daylight.

A few days after the revolver-shot incident Mr. Scarlett astonished me by asking leave to go ashore for a walk in Muscat itself. Remember that he had not dared to land since he and I had had that first walk there and had run across Jassim. Away he went, taking Jaffa and Webster with him, and they did not return on board until long after I had finished dinner.

Mr. Scarlett was chuckling--I had never seen him so pleased with himself--Jaffa had a contented smile on his face, and Webster so far forgot himself as to wink at me.

"Hallo, what have you been doing?" I asked.

"He's all right, sir," the gunner said, rubbing his hands. "Mr. Jassim won't be worrying you again for some time."

"What has happened?" I asked eagerly. "Have you killed him?"

"Well, sir, not exactly, but we just happened to meet him--after we'd been hunting round for him all the afternoon--and we just happened to have a bit of a row, and there just happened to be a couple of the Sultan's soldiers handy. I made a bobbery, Jaffa and I calling out that he had stolen money from us, and off they took him up there," and Mr. Scarlett jerked his thumb towards the big fort on the right, whose towers and battlemented walls showed out in the moonlight over our heads. "There he'll stay, sir, as long as we like to pay for his keep. It cost us five chips to the soldiers and another twenty to the sheikh in charge of the fort. It was well worth it. Don't you think so, sir? So long as we pay the governor of that fort or jail, call it what you like, five rupees a day he'll keep him there and feed him," Mr. Scarlett said, emphasizing the "feed him" as if that made his action quite meritorious.

Well, it was a very "low-down" game to play, and if I had known they were going to play it I should have put a "stopper" on it; but now the man was under lock and key it was so much a relief that I had not the honest courage to blame the gunner or take steps to have Jassim set free.

After that Mr. Scarlett visited the jail nearly every day, to assure himself that Jassim was still there; nor was he content until he had peered through a grating overlooking the court-yard in which untried prisoners were kept, and seen him. He seemed to take a fiendish delight in those visits, and I must say that I fully shared his satisfaction, for, to me, the resulting comfort and relief from anxiety was cheap at the price--only five rupees a day. It may have been a cowardly, despicable thing to do, but I don't believe that anyone placed in the same circumstances would have done otherwise.

We had now been very nearly a month at Muscat, and the artificers from the _Intrepid_ had not quite finished my engine-room defects, when one morning, four or five days after Jassim had been secured, an urgent signal came from Commander Duckworth that he wanted to see me at once. I had a presentiment that something had gone wrong at Jask.

I was right. As I went into his cabin the Commander sang out: "You'll have to go across to Jask after all, and as soon as ever you are ready. There's more trouble there. One of the European telegraph people has been killed somewhere along the coast by a marauding lot of brigands who have cut the wire again. Fisher dare not send his people to repair it without an escort, so you had better go across and see what you can do. When can you start?"

"By midnight, sir," I told him, having taken the precaution of finding out before I left the "_B.A._".

"Right you are! Off you go! I don't fancy that there is anything serious. If there is you can telegraph for me and I will bring the _Intrepid_ along. Good-bye! Good luck!"

What a grand chap he was! I left his cabin feeling that he had not hampered me with any restrictions whatsoever, and had placed entire confidence in my judgment. If only senior officers would always treat their juniors in that way they would not so often have to grumble at the way they are served--and, what is more important still--they would make more efficient officers of them.

I met Popple Opstein outside. For once he had shipped a long face.

"Did the skipper tell you who has been killed?" he asked. "I'm afraid it's our poor little friend's brother. What rotten hard luck on her if it's true!"

In my excitement at getting this job I had never thought. Of course it must be Borsen; he was the only other European there. Poor fellow! Poor little sad-eyed slip of a girl, she would be weeping her heart out.

I had a burning feeling inside me, and I wished that I could have started off then and there to blow a dozen or more of those cowardly treacherous Baluchis to atoms.

"I wish I could come along with you," my chum said wistfully. "I'd love to have a 'go' at them!"

He tried to get leave, but without success, so back I went to the "_B.A._", angry, and impatient to get away.

"Good-bye, old chap! Tell her how very sorry I am," he called after me.

"Right you are!" I shouted back, but had an uneasy thought that perhaps she was still too angry to allow me to speak to her.

I told Mr. Scarlett the news, rather expecting him to show the old half-frightened expression, and was quite taken aback when he smiled and said: "A chance of our seeing a bit more scrapping--eh, sir?" He said it as if he, too, rather looked forward to such a thing happening, and I had to look again at his face to make sure. Well, his disposition seemed to be changing, and as there was nothing else to account for the change except the parting with the snake I put it down to that.

It was splendid the way those artificers and lascars worked to finish their job. They knew why they had to hurry, and they toiled and sweated in the heat of the engine-room like demons.

By half-past ten that night we were ready. I sent the _Intrepid's_ artificers back to their ship with something inside them to warm their stomachs, flashed across the "Permission to part company", and steamed out of the harbour.

"He won't be there very long now," Mr. Scarlett grunted, jerking his thumb towards the fort, whose towers and walls showed up above us in the moonlight.

I really had forgotten Jassim, and did not care how soon he bribed the jailers and got free. I despised myself for having allowed him to be kept there.

Off we went to Jask---easily at first, to give the engines a chance of settling down; later on as fast as they would whizz round.

We were all so impatient to get there that however fast they went the "_B.A._" seemed to crawl along.

At ten o'clock next morning we met the fortnightly mail-steamer coming from Jask, on her way to Muscat and Hartley semaphored across to ask if all was well there.

Someone on board took in the signal and answered "Yes," to our great relief, and then I asked if the two ladies from Jask were on board.

"No," was semaphored back, and I was half-glad and half-sorry--glad to know that I should see them, sorry that another fortnight must elapse before another steamer would give them a chance of escaping.

By noon the little white telegraph buildings showed up over the horizon, and two hours later I steamed close in under the rocks on which they stood, and anchored. No white handkerchief fluttered from the signal-mast. Poor little lady, if it was her brother who had been killed she must be somewhere inside those white walls in a terrible state of grief.

I landed immediately.

*CHAPTER XV*

*A Tragedy of the Telegraph*

As the keel of the dinghy grated on the sand, and I scrambled ashore, Mr. Fisher, the acting political agent, came down the path to meet me, looking so thin and haggard I scarcely recognized him.

In answer to my eager questions he told me that he feared Borsen had been killed, but was not yet certain.

"Five days ago the poor chap went down the coast on his usual monthly duty of paying the local people at the different relay stations along the telegraph-line. He took with him a Goanese telegraphist and half a dozen native employees. The party rode away on their camels, and the next I heard of them--two days later--was a telephone message that they had seen some wandering parties of Baluchis or Afghans and had been warned, by a friendly village where they had halted, that they might be attacked and robbed. He intended to send the pay-chest, that night, secretly, to the next village and to push on after it next morning.

"A message came from him to his sister, next morning, saying that he was thoroughly enjoying himself and wished she was with him--that was to allay her anxiety. Within an hour the Goanese telephoned in that he had been killed, but the message was then interrupted, the wire was cut, and we have heard nothing since. Quite probably this man was killed as well.

"All we know is that the wire was broken somewhere about twenty-eight miles away, and that when I took a large party out to try to reach the spot, we found the coast swarming with brigands and were glad enough to get back safely. We only returned a few hours ago, and now I want you to take us down there as quickly as you can. It is our only chance of finding any of the party alive--and a very poor chance, I'm afraid."

Of course I was ready to go anywhere or do anything. He and his party were "standing by" to embark, and some ten or twelve natives were already coming down from the telegraph-station with folding-ladders, a portable telephone apparatus, coils of telegraph-wire, and repairing tools. They also brought with them a roughly-made coffin, and, as fast as they arrived, I sent them aboard the _Bunder Abbas_. Whilst Griffiths was pulling the dinghy backwards and forwards I asked Mr. Fisher how his wife and Miss Borsen were bearing up.

"Wonderfully well," he said, his face twitching. "Women sometimes make us men almost ashamed of ourselves--they are so patient and brave."

The dinghy had returned for us, and just as we were stepping in we heard a girl's voice calling, and saw poor little Miss Borsen standing behind us, looking the picture of misery and distress, so sad and so pale under her big, white topee that I felt horribly sorry for her. I saluted and tried to show my sympathy. As I did so she flushed scarlet, and as quickly every trace of colour left her face; she seemed to freeze, and only bowed in the most distant manner. I knew that she meant this as a direct "cut", to remind me that she had not yet forgiven me for carrying her over the swamp that night.

Speaking to Mr. Fisher, and ignoring me, she implored him to take her.

He tried his best to dissuade her, but she insisted on coming.

"Do you mind if she comes?" he asked, turning to me.

"Not at all," I answered coldly, as if she were a complete stranger. "Anybody you care to bring may come."

I looked to see if that hurt her, but she gave no sign whatever that she had heard. I felt angry to be so snubbed, and a brute to feel so enraged with her just when she was so miserable; but I could not help it.

So they both came aboard with me, and an extremely uncomfortable trip it was--squeezed up together in the little dinghy as we were, with Miss Borsen ignoring me completely.

However, I was sitting where I could see her profile, and she looked so utterly woebegone and lonely that my anger died away, until we got alongside, when she smiled so sweetly on Mr. Scarlett, as he helped her out of the boat, that I was furious again. I beat the feeling down, and, as she evidently loathed the sight of me, kept away, giving her and Mr. Fisher the use of the cabin and the little deck aft of it, and rigging up a screen for'ard of it, so that she need not see me whilst I took the "_B.A._" out of harbour. Percy fetched my pipe and tobacco, and I smoked furiously and fumed inwardly all the way down the coast, unable to avoid hearing Mr. Scarlett, on the other side of the screen, spinning one of his most exciting yarns and trying to take her thoughts away.

However, he soon found that was no use, and came for'ard to me shaking his head. "Poor little lady! Poor little soul!"

Percy was a fickle youth. Whilst Popple Opstein had been aboard, on that amusing "Prodigal Son" adventure, he had transferred his worship from Mr. Scarlett to him. Now he transferred it again to Miss Borsen, and waited on her hand and foot, standing by with his big eyes fixed on her as if she was some beautiful angel come straight down from heaven into this little world of his. He was such a nuisance that Mr. Scarlett had to drag him out and drop him down the ladder on to the fo'c'sle.