CHAPTER XXVII
In Which I Receive a Telegram That Troubles Me
For a moment there was a dead silence among the crews of the sister ships. Then Captain Bowditch himself took off his hat and started the cheering.
And how he did yell! If both vessels had come home safely we could not have given tongue more joyfully. For in that moment every man of us knew that whatever friction there had been betwixt Jim and Alf Barney, they were once more brothers and friends!
Of course, the crowd ashore thought we were just glad to get home again—that we were expressing our satisfaction upon getting to Baltimore, safe and sound. But the Barneys knew what it meant and both of them waved their hands in response to our hearty hurrah.
As the newspaper reporters crowded aboard to interview Captain Bowditch I saw that the three Barneys walked away. The old man did not even speak to the skipper of the Gullwing. I reckoned any comment upon the skipper’s actions by the members of the firm of Barney, Blakesley & Knight would be postponed until some later time.
The newspaper fellows were eager for a story; but Mr. Gates and Mr. Hollister “shooed” them away from the foremast hands. The men would not be discharged until the next day, when they would be taken to the offices of the firm for a settlement of their accounts, and to receive their discharges. Until that time they must remain aboard and continue under the discipline of the officers.
“If you writer chaps,” said Mr. Gates, with a grin, “want to get these old hardshells to spinning yarns, you’ll have to wait till they lay their course for Front Street. You’ll have to be contented with facts from Captain Bowditch just now.”
So the stories of the Seamew’s tragedy were not very ornate in the afternoon papers after all; and public interest in the affair was soon quenched.
When my watch was piped to dinner the doctor gave me the tip to wait on deck and in a few minutes Mr. Gates beckoned me to the afterhouse.
“Quarterdeck etiquette is busted all to flinders, Clint,” he said, in an unusually jolly tone, for he was naturally a grave man. But the fact that we were in the home port after so many months was bound to thaw the iciest manner. “You’re to dine with the old man and Miss Philly.”
It was a shame the way I looked! My second suit of slops from the chest were pretty well worn out and my head was a regular mop. I had reckoned on seeing a barber about the first thing I did when I went ashore; and I hoped to squeeze out money enough for a cheap suit, too, in which I might make a more presentable appearance going home.
“Never mind your clothing, Clinton,” said Captain Bowditch, when I made some remark of this kind. “We’ll excuse your looks.”
“And I’m not much better off than you,” laughed Philly. “I have to go to bed when Singh washes this dress.”
“By the way, where is Singh?” demanded the captain. “After dinner I want we should all go up to the British consul—and I want Singh to go to.”
But Dao Singh was not to be found. I said nothing about my talk with the Hindoo. I knew that nobody had seen him after we got into our berth. He might, even, have gone ashore ahead of the Barneys. However, gone he was and the captain was quite put out.
“That’s the trouble with these natives,” he growled. “Can’t trust ’em. I’d ought to put him in irons——”
“What for, Captain? What has poor Singh done?” asked Philly.
And then the captain took a tumble to himself. The little girl knew nothing about the man murdered in the boat from the wreck of the Galland.
“Well, it’s a serious thing—for me—to have let him get away without his going before the authorities,” Captain Bowditch growled.
That was not exactly true however. Nobody would blame him because the Hindoo had departed. But the old man said he would take us both up town right after dinner. I begged for a little time to make myself presentable and was given an hour’s leave ashore. I found a barber and got my hair trimmed properly and then went to a second hand shop and got an outfit of coat, pants and shoes, with a new hat for six dollars. Nothing very fashionable, you may be sure; but I reckoned the butler would let me into the house with ’em on—by the side door, at least!
So the captain and Philly and I walked over to the British consulate and saw a young man with eyeglasses and something of a lisp, dressed in clothes that could not possibly be made so badly anywhere else but in London. He was a nice young man, though; and he insisted upon making tea for Philly when he heard that she had been two weeks in an open boat, as though she might still need a “pick-me-up” because of that adventure.
It seemed that he had already heard of the loss of the Galland. Her burned hull had been sighted by two steamships and reported before the Gullwing arrived in port. But none of the crew or passengers of the ill-fated ship, until Phillis Duane came, had been reported as saved. The Galland had been posted as a complete loss, with crew and passengers.
“What puzzles me,” said the English official, “is the distance the Galland and the boat you found drifted apart. Her bulk was reported as sighted only a day or two after your Gullwing picked up the little girl and the Hindoo.” The captain had already explained about Dao Singh. “Yet,” continued the consul, “the Galland had drifted far up the coast in the steamship route—she’s a dangerous derelict, and has been so reported to the Hydrographic office at Washington, and to Lloyds in London.
“Whereas, Captain, the latitude and longitude you give is far, far to the south. South of the Straits, in fact.”
“Three hunder’ mile sou’east of the Capes of the Virgin, sure enough,” admitted Captain Bowditch.
“Yes. The Galland had come through the Straits and must have met with her accident not far outside. It seems strange that only one boat got away from her—and that one improperly manned.”
“As near as we can find out, sir,” said the skipper, “she had but two seamen in her beside the Hindoo and the little girl here.”
He had taken the captain and I into his private office while he examined us regarding the particulars of the affair. I told him frankly about the dead man in the boat.
“I must find this Dao Singh,” he said. “Until I get him I cannot call the case closed, of course. And then, there’s the little girl.”
Captain Bowditch spoke up for me, then. He had had a good report of me from Captain Hiram Rogers of the Scarboro, and he believed what I had told him about my folks. He would go bail for my appearance, and the production of Philly safe and sound, whenever we should be wanted.
“A very good arrangement,” agreed the consul, seemingly mightily relieved regarding the girl. He was a bachelor himself. “Meanwhile I will do my best to locate her people. Of course, she must have been consigned to somebody in England, even if she does not know who. It seems to me as though the name of Captain Erskin Duane is not unfamiliar to me.”
So we got away from there after a while. When I had gone ashore to get my fancy rigout I had sent a telegram to Ham Mayberry. I did that so as not to startle my mother, believing that Ham would know how to break the news of my arrival to her better than anybody else. Ham had been with us so many years that he was like one of the family.
And having telegraphed him I was mighty anxious for a reply that all was well.
Captain Bowditch left us to report at the offices of the ship owners and Philly and I went back to the Gullwing where Ham was to send his message. It had arrived while we were at the consul’s and Mr. Gates handed the envelope to me the moment I came aboard.
With some perturbation, I broke the seal, and to say the least I was amazed when I read Hamilton Mayberry’s telegram:
“I will meet every train. Speak to nobody until you see me.—H. M.”