The Rose of Paradise. Говард ПайлЧитать онлайн книгу.
I come hither to discover what steps you propose taking to insure the safety of the stone."
Now it hath come under my observation that if a man be permitted to talk without let or stay, he will sooner or later betray that which lieth upon his mind. So from the very moment that Captain Leach uttered his last speech I conceived the darkest and most sinister suspicions of his purposes; nor from that time did I trust one single word that he said, or repose confidence in any of his actions, but was ready to see in everything something to awaken my doubts of his rectitude. Nor did these sentiments arise entirely from his words, but equally as much from my having discovered him, as it were, so prying upon my privacy.
"Sir," said I, rising from my seat, "I am infinitely obliged to you for your kindness in this affair, but as I have at present matters of considerable import that demand my closest attention, I must beg you to excuse me."
Captain Leach looked at me for a moment or two as though he had it upon his mind to say something further. However, he did not speak, but rising, delivered a very profound bow, and left the cabin without another word. But there was no gainsaying the wisdom of the advice which he had given me as to concealing the treasure. Accordingly I obtained from the carpenter a basket of tools, and, bearing in mind the late visit with which he had favored me, having shaded the little window in the door of my cabin, I stripped off my coat and waistcoat, and after an hour or so of work, made shift to rig up a very snug little closet with a hinged door, in the bottom of my berth and below the mattress, wherein I hid the jewel. After that I breathed more freely, for I felt that the treasure could not be discovered without a long and careful search, the opportunities for which were not likely to occur.
Although my interview with Captain Leach might seem of small and inconsiderable moment to any one coolly reading this narrative in the privacy of his closet, yet coming to me as it did upon the heels of my other interview with Mr. Longways, it cast me into such disquietude of spirit as I had not felt for a long time. I would have heaved anchor and away, without losing one single minute of delay, had it been possible for me to have done so; but not a breath of air was stirring, and there was nothing for it but to ride at anchor where we were, though, what with the heat and delay, it was all that I could do not to chafe myself into a fume of impatience.
So passed the day until about four o'clock in the afternoon, when there happened a certain thing that, had thunder and lightning burst from a clear sky, it could not have amazed me more. I being in my cabin at the time, comes Mr. Langely, my first mate, with the strange news that the lookout had sighted a vessel over the point of land to the southward. I could hardly accredit what he said, for, as above stated, not a breath of air was going. I hurried out of my cabin and upon deck, where I found Mr. White, the second mate, standing at the port side of the ship, with a glass in his hand directed a few points west of south, and over a spit of land which ran out in the channel towards that quarter, at which place the cape was covered by a mightily thick growth of scrub-bushes, with here and there a tall palm-tree rising from the midst of the thickets. Over beyond these I could see the thin white masts of the vessel that the lookout had sighted. There was no need of the glass, for I could see her plain enough, though not of what nature she might be. However, I took the telescope from Mr. White's hands, and made a long and careful survey of the stranger, but as much to hide my thoughts as for any satisfaction that I could gain; for what confounded me beyond measure was that a vessel should be sighted so suddenly, and in a dead calm, where I felt well assured no craft had been for days past. Nor was I less amazed to find, as I held the stranger steadfastly in the circle of the object-glass, a tall palm-tree being almost betwixt the Cassandra and her, and almost directly in my line of sight, that she was slowly and steadily making way towards the northward, and at a very considerable angle with the Gulf current, which there had a set more to the westward than where we lay at anchor.
I think that all, or nearly all, of my passengers were upon the poop-deck at that time, Captain Leach with a pocket field-glass which he had fetched with him from England, and with which he was directing Mistress Pamela's observation to the strange craft. Nearly all the crew were also watching her by this time, and in a little while they perceived, what I had seen from the first, that the vessel was by some contrivance making head without a breath of wind, and nearly against the Gulf current.
As for the stranger herself, so far as I could judge, seeing nothing of her hull, she was a bark of somewhat less tonnage than the Cassandra; and the masts, which we could perceive very clearly against the clear sky, had a greater rake than any I had ever before seen.
I do not know whether or not it was because my mind was running so much upon the pirates and upon the great treasure which I had in my keeping, but I am free to say that I liked the looks of the strange craft as little as any I had ever beheld in my life, and would have given a hundred guineas to be safe away from where I was, and with no more favor than a good open sea and a smart breeze, for the Cassandra was a first-rate sailer, and as good a ship as any the East India Company had at their docks.
As it was, we were cooped up in what was little more than a pond, and I did not like the looks of the business at all.
"What do you make her out to be, Mr. Langely?" said I, after a bit, handing him the glass.
He took a long and careful look at the stranger without speaking for a while. By-and-by he said, without taking his eye from the glass, and as though speaking half to himself, "She's making way against the current somehow or other."
"Yes," said I; "I saw that from the first. But what do you make of her?"
"I can make nothing of her," says he, after a little while.
"Neither can I," I said; "and I like her none the better for that."
Mr. Langely took his eye from the glass, and gave me a very significant look, whereby I saw that he had very much the same notion concerning the stranger that I myself entertained.
By this time there was considerable bustle aboard the Greenwich, which rode at anchor not more than a furlong or two from where we lay, and by the gathering of the men on the forecastle I could see that they had sighted the craft, as we had already done.
So the afternoon passed until six o'clock had come, against which time the stranger had almost come into open sight beyond the cape to the south, the hull alone being hidden by the low spit of sand which formed the extremity of the point.
That evening I took my supper along with the passengers, as I had been used to do, for I wished to appear unconcerned, as, after all, my suspicions might be altogether groundless. Nevertheless, I came upon deck again as soon as I was able, and found that the stranger was now so far come into sight as to show a part of her hull, which was low, and painted black, and was of such an appearance as rather to increase than to lessen my serious suspicions of her nature.
I could see there were two whale-boats ahead of her, and it was very plain to me that it was by means of these that the bark was making head against the current. At first I was more than ever amazed at this, seeing that the current at that point could not run at less than the rate of two or three knots an hour, against which two boats could not hope to tow a craft of her size without some contrivance to aid their efforts. Every now and then I could hear the clicking of the capstan, as though the vessel was heaving anchor, and led by this sound, I after a while perceived how she was making way, though if I had not seen the same plan used in the Strait of Malacca by the City of Worcester, when I was there in the year '17, I much misdoubt whether I could have so readily discovered the design which they were in this instance using. As it was, I was not long in finding out what they were about.
The two boats ahead of the strange craft were towing a square sail through the water by a line fastened to the middle of the same. From all four corners of this sail ran good stout ropes, which were made fast to the anchor cable of the bark. The two boats might tow this square through the water easily enough by that one line fastened to the middle, because the sail would then close and so slip easily through the water; but so soon as the bark began to haul upon it from all four corners it spread out as though filled with wind, and so offered a vast resistance to the water. By this contrivance the bark was making headway at about the rate of a knot an hour against the current, so that by seven o'clock she was clear out beyond the cape and into the open water beyond.
At that