CHAPTER TEN

Aboard the Floating Prison

Moving away from the forward portholes, Sandy and Jerry sat on the edges of the bunks and waited for their captors to come and get them. Both boys made themselves look as if they were completely dejected—as if they had already given up any hopes they might have had of escaping or of being rescued.

In a few minutes the footsteps on the deck and cabin top stopped and the little craft lay bobbing and wallowing in the sea swell that rose and fell alongside the freighter.

Rope bumpers, large braided lengths of thick cordage, were lashed to the sides of the sloop to keep it from being damaged by rubbing and banging against the steel side of the big ship.

Although they were listening as closely as possible to everything that went on, they could not make out the words they heard shouted from the freighter’s deck far above. Nevertheless, the sense of them was made clear by the answer that Turk bellowed back.

“Yeah! we got the stuff this time, all right! And we got a couple of other pieces of cargo with us, too! Wait and we’ll show you!”

This was the moment, Sandy thought. He would have to be careful, he warned himself, not to lose his temper as he had done last time, even if he was roughed up and shoved around again. And above all, he must be careful about the way he moved. One false step would surely outline the telltale shape of the flare gun taped to his leg—and that would be the end of the only “weapon” that he and Jerry had! Not only that, but it might well be the end of the only chance they would have to get away with whole skins!

A bolt grated in its slide on the companionway door and the hatch slid open to reveal Turk, pistol in hand, grinning nastily at them.

“Okay, gents,” he said. “The first-class passage on the local ferry is over. Just step up on deck, and we’ll transfer to the next vessel.”

As Sandy reached the companionway steps, Turk reached down and grabbed him by the neck of his shirt. With a swift heave, he sent Sandy sprawling on the cockpit deck. Keeping a tight control on his temper, Sandy confined his thoughts to worrying about getting his leg tucked under him in such a position that the flare pistol wouldn’t show.

But he need not have worried, for Turk was too busy enjoying himself giving the same treatment to Jerry, who came flying out of the cabin to land heavily on the deck alongside Sandy.

“These boys sure play a lot of rough games,” he murmured. “And I’m afraid that this is only the beginning of a whole world’s series!”

“Take it easy,” Sandy whispered to his friend. “Let’s just go along with them quietly. Maybe we can keep in one piece until we have a chance to figure a way out.”

At Turk’s orders, they rose to their feet. Looking up to the freighter’s deck high above them, they saw the other sailor, Bull, already on board, at the top of a long rope ladder. He too had his pistol held ready, and the expression on his face gave every indication that he would be only too glad to use it if he were given even half an excuse to do so.

“Get up that ladder,” Turk ordered, “and don’t try nothing funny. We’ll have you covered all the way.” He waved his pistol at Jerry to indicate that he wanted him to go up the ladder first.

Sandy’s heart seemed to sink in his chest. The order of climbing was all wrong—it couldn’t be wronger! Jerry first, himself next, and Turk last! Surely Turk, if he was below him looking up as he climbed, couldn’t fail to notice the flare pistol taped to Sandy’s leg!

Acting as if he misunderstood Turk’s wordless command, Sandy stepped forward and grabbed the rope ladder, but the sailor’s big hand gripped him by the shoulder hard and firmly pulled him back.

“You sure are eager, ain’t ya, kid? And you’re tricky, too. Now why did you want to go up that ladder first? That ain’t no picnic or party up there!” He screwed his big face into a frown of deep thought. Apparently unable to reach a decision, he undid his thinking expression and snarled at Sandy. “Just stop thinkin’ up tricks, see! You let me do the thinkin’ here! Now, you go on first, the way I told ya!” He pushed Jerry toward the ladder.

Resigned to having his flare gun discovered, and almost resigned to whatever would happen next, Sandy moved to the ladder to take his turn, when once more the big hand of Turk pulled him back. “I told you I’d do the thinkin’!” Turk said. “I don’t know what you got up your sleeve, but whatever it is, you’d better forget it. I’m goin’ up next!”

At last, here was a turn of luck! Sandy could hardly keep from grinning as Turk started to mount the rope ladder. The big sailor swung up easily, keeping his eyes always turned downward to Sandy. Halfway up, he stopped.

“Come on, now,” he said. “You won’t be able to play no tricks this way. You’re too far back for any leg grabbing, and I got this gun aimed right at the top of your head. Now come on up, and come slow!”

Sandy stepped from the deck of the sloop to the lower rungs of the rope ladder and did as he was told, moving his “gun leg” as carefully as he could without running the risk of attracting any attention to it. At least, he thought with some satisfaction, he had gotten over the first hurdle!

On the deck of the freighter, the boys were met by Jones, Bull, and a mean-looking crew of some of the dirtiest men they had ever seen. The freighter itself was none too clean, with paint scaling from the decks and splotches of grease covering the cargo-handling winches and other deck machinery. The white deckhouse, seen from close quarters, was a dingy and spotted gray, and the portholes were streaked with dirt and dried salt.

In the midst of a rat’s nest of coiled ropes, fraying cables and other ship’s debris, Jones sat on an overturned crate as if it were an easy chair. He seemed perfectly at ease and completely out of place at the same time, his smart sports clothes and yachting cap making an odd contrast to the mixed clothing of the freighter’s crew.

Despite his air of being a gentleman of leisure, Jones had his rifle still with him, lying across his knees, and his long fingers played restlessly with the safety catch and the trigger.

“Gentlemen,” he smiled. “Welcome aboard. I hope you will find our modest accommodations suitable for your long journey. The Captain will arrive in a moment, and I am sure that he will do whatever is in his power to see to it that you are treated—appropriately.” Still smiling, he turned to Bull and said, “Bull, see to it that our passengers aren’t carrying any unnecessary luggage.”

Bull looked puzzled. “I don’t getcha,” he mumbled.

Jones rose with a swift movement, his smile turned at once to ice. “If you weren’t such a stupid lout, perhaps you’d get me the first time I speak to you! If you weren’t such a stupid lout, we wouldn’t have had these boys here with us in the first place.”

He moved forward as if to strike the cowering Bull, but stopped and regained control over himself. Once more, he put on his bland smile.

“Pardon my temper and my little jokes, Bull,” he said. “What I meant by ‘unnecessary luggage’ was concealed weapons. In other words, frisk them.”

Bull shook his head and said, “Why’ntcha say so inna first place?” and started toward Jerry and Sandy.

Once again Sandy tensed. If only his luck would hold and he could get through without having Bull find the flare gun! Otherwise....

He watched as Bull patted Jerry, none too gently. He realized that, if Jerry had been wearing a jacket under which to hide the flare gun, it would surely have been discovered. Soon Bull was finished with Jerry, and it was Sandy’s turn. Bull frisked him quickly and clumsily, patting his chest and under his arms, even though it was obvious that he couldn’t possibly have hidden anything there. Bull’s big hands continued down to Sandy’s pockets, hesitated for a moment, and stopped right there. He turned to face Jones.

“They’re clean,” he said.

Jones nodded, not paying too much attention to Bull or to the search. “I didn’t think that they would have had the foresight to bring any weapons. Still—there’s no sense taking any chances. In this business, one can’t be too careful.”

Noticing that Jones was not looking directly at either Bull or themselves as he said all this, Sandy followed his gaze to the upper decks of the freighter, wondering what he _was_ looking for. A door swung open and a man stepped out into the late afternoon sunshine. Jones rose, waved to the man and called, “Captain! Come down! We have a little surprise for you!”

Sandy had not known what to expect of the captain of such a ship as this, but surely, the man who came down the ladder did not look in the least like anything he might have imagined! He would not have been really surprised by a bearded giant, or another tough, such as one of the crew, or even, perhaps, by a turbaned oriental—but this captain was surely a complete surprise!

He was a thin, wispy-looking old man—how old, Sandy could not begin to guess—with a face like a wise preacher’s or perhaps a college professor’s. He was dressed entirely in white, down to his old-fashioned white high-buttoned shoes, and he carried a bamboo cane with a gold head. To finish off this spotless outfit, so out of keeping with his ship, the Captain wore a pith helmet, such as British officers wear in the tropics!

The old man moved briskly down the steep ladder from the upper decks and, with scarcely a glance at the boys, addressed himself to Jones.

“Who are these children?” he asked, his voice thin and reedy, but carrying authority and as sharp as the crack of a whip.

As Jones explained the presence of the boys on board the freighter, the Captain looked from them to Jones and back again. When Jones told him how Bull and Turk had mistaken Sandy’s sloop for his own, the Captain shifted his gaze to the two sailors, who almost winced under his cutting stare of scorn. Then, when the tale was done, he devoted his attention exclusively to Jones once more.

“What do you want to do about it?” he asked.

“I leave that entirely up to you,” Jones said. “I want no part of any violence—if it can be avoided. Besides, you will have them on your hands, and I’ll be ashore, so that it’s hardly my place to dictate the conditions of their—er—disposal.”

Jones rose, leaning casually on his rifle as if it were a walking stick. “Whatever you want to do is all right with me. Just get rid of them, that’s all. And do it in a way that won’t attract any suspicions ashore. I don’t want anyone poking around the island asking questions about them.”

The Captain thought for a minute, then answered, “I don’t think we’ll have anyone poking around the island. Not if we handle this thing right. They must not, you see, simply disappear. If they just drop out of sight without a trace, it will surely bring on a search, and someone may have seen them near your place. No, that won’t do. On the contrary, they must be found. But they must be found in such a condition that they can answer no questions—ever. And it must look natural.”

“Perfect logic,” Jones said. “I agree completely. But how are you going to manage it?”

“We will keep them aboard,” the Captain answered, “locked up below. I will tow their sloop after us. When we are a satisfactory distance from shore—say a thousand miles—we will put them into their boat and cut them loose.”

“But,” Jones protested, “isn’t there a chance that they could make it in to shore somewhere? Men have managed rougher trips than that in the past.”

“Don’t worry about details,” the Captain said in his quiet, scholarly voice. “I’ll take care of everything. First, we will drop them far out of any regular shipping lanes. In addition, we will first wreck their sails, their mast and their rigging as if it had been done by a storm. When they are finally found, it will be too late to do anything about them. It will just look as if a storm had wrecked them and blown them out to sea. It’s a tidy way to operate—no messy violence—and there will be no clues to lead to your precious island.”

Jones considered for a minute before answering. “It sounds all right to me, if you say so. After all, you know your end of the business better than I do.”

“Indeed I do,” the Captain answered calmly.

“Now,” Jones said briskly, dismissing the matter of the boys from his mind, “we have my other cargo to discuss before our dealings are finished for this trip.”

The Captain held up a thin, white hand to stop Jones. “Not now,” he said. “Our business can wait until we have refreshed ourselves and had a bit of dinner. Then when it is dark, you can turn over your cargo—if the terms are satisfactory—and sail home unobserved.”

He waved his stick at the boys and motioned to two of his crew members. “Take them below and lock them in an empty cabin. And set a close watch on them.”

As Sandy and Jerry were led off by the two crewmen, they saw the Captain precede Jones to the foot of the deckhouse ladder. He paused and bowed, indicating that Jones should go first. Somehow, the courtly, old-fashioned gesture seemed to Sandy more sinister than anything else he had seen since the start of this day.