Read Ebook: Ocean Tramps by Stacpoole H De Vere Henry De Vere

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Ebook has 1631 lines and 87193 words, and 33 pages

Harman absorbed this news without interest, merely reminding the other that they weren't "dealin' in fruit," but as two more days added themselves together producing nothing but church processions, brass bands and fireworks, Mr. Harman fell out of tune with himself and the world and the ways of this "dam garlic factory." Davis was acting strangely, nearly always ashore and never returning till midnight. He said the deal was going through, but that it took time, that they weren't selling a mustang, that he wouldn't be hustled and that Harman, if he didn't like waiting, had better go and stick his head in the harbour.

Harman closed up, but that night he accompanied Davis ashore, and instead of playing roulette at the little gambling shop in La Plazza, he hung around the Pereiras' house in Assumption Street listening and watching in the moonlight. He heard the tune of a guitar and a girl's voice singing La Paloma, then came a great silence that lasted an hour and a half, and then came Davis. Hidden in a dark corner, Billy saw that he was not alone. A girl was with him, come out to bid him good-night. She was short, dark and lovely, but the look of adoration on her face as she turned it up for a kiss, left Harman quite cold.

Down by-lanes and cut-throat alleys he made his way running, got to the mole before the other and was rowed off in the same boat. On board he invited the other down below and down below he exploded.

"I ain't wantin' to interfere with any man's diversions," said Mr. Harman. "I ain't no prude, women is women, and business is business, do you get what I'm meanin'? I saw you. I ain't accusin' you of nuthin'--but bein' a fool. Us with a stole ship on our backs and Penhill feelin' for us and you playin' the goat with Pereira's daughter. What kind of deal do you expect to make and a woman hangin' on to it with her teeth. You needn't go denyin' of it. I saw you."

The male and female run through all things, even partnerships, and in the Harman-Davis syndicate it was Harman who wore the skirts. Davis could not get a word in till the other had worked himself free of his indignation and the subject. Then said Davis: "If you'll shut your beastly head, I'll maybe be able to stuff some sense into it. What were you talking about, selling the schooner? It's sold."

"Well," said Harman, "that's news, and what's the price, may I ask?"

"Five thousand, and five thousand for the trade, ten thousand dollars, the whole sum to be paid on Friday next."

"Have you a bit of writin'?" asked Harman, who possessed the French peasant's instincts for stamped paper.

"I've got their cheque," said Davis, "post dated for next Friday, but I'm not bothering about the money, for the ship and cargo, it doesn't matter a hill of beans to me whether they pay ten thousand dollars or five. I've struck a bigger thing than that. What would you say to half a million dollars?"

"I don't know," replied the ingenuous Harman. "I only know chaps generally begin to make asses of themselves when they talk about millions of dollars. It's my opinion no man ever came out of the big end of the horn with the million dollars in his hand he'd gone in to fetch at the little. Most of the million-dollar men I've heard of have started as newsies with their toes stickin' through their boots--but go on, what was you sayin'?"

"I'm saying I've a big thing in sight," replied the exasperated Davis, "and I'd be a lot surer of it if I felt I hadn't such a fool partner. It's this, I'm right into the cockles of the heart of that family, and I've got the news through my left ear that there's trouble in Santiago, that Diaz is going to skip and that a million dollars in gold bars are coming down to the coast. Diaz is taking his movables with him, and he's gutted the Treasury unknown to the chaps that are moving to shoot him out. He's about sick of the presidency and wants to get away and lead a quiet life."

"I see," said Harman. "That's plain enough, but where do we stand?"

"Well," said Davis, "there's a million dollars' worth of gold bars moving down to the coast here and there's us just come in. Don't it look like Providence? Don't it look like as if there's going to be a conjunction?"

"It do," said Mr. Harman meditatively, "but I'm dashed if I see how we're to conjunct on the evidence you've handed in--but you've got more up your sleeve--pull it out."

"It's not much," said Davis, "only the girl. She's going to keep us wise. I told her I might be able to do a deal with Diaz if I knew where and when he was shipping off the boodle, and she's going to let me know. The Pereiras are all in the business same as furniture-removing chaps, they're doing the move for Diaz, and he's using one of their ships. D'you see? See where we come in, nothing to do but watch and wait with the girl for our eyes and ears--then pounce--How? I don't know, but we'll do it."

"That girl," said Mr. Harman after a moment's silence, "she seems pretty gone on you."

Davis laughed.

"Ain't you gone on her?"

Davis laughed again. Then he opened a locker and helped himself to a drink.

Harman's morals, as I have hinted before, were the least conspicuous part of his mental make-up, but he was not without sentiment of a sort. At sing-songs he had been known to sniff over "The Blind Boy," a favourite song of his, and though his ideal of female beauty leant towards sloe-black eyes and apple-red cheeks , beauty in distress appealed to him.

The cold-blooded blackguardliness of Davis almost shocked him for a moment--making a girl love him like that just to use her as a spy on her family! The upright man in the soul of Billy Harman, the upright man who had never yet managed somehow to get on his feet, humped his back and tried to rise, but he had half a million dollars on top of him. He moved in his chair uneasily, and refilled his pipe. But all he said was: "Tell us about them gold bars."

Davis told. A peon runner had come in that afternoon with a chit for Pereira saying that the mules, eight in number, bearing the stuff, would reach Buenodiaz by night-time of the following day.

"The stuff will be shipped to-morrow night, then?" said Harman.

"Well, you don't think they'd go leaving it on the beach," replied Davis.

"Didn't you get out of her what ship they were taking it off on?" asked Harman.

"No," said Davis, "I didn't, she don't know herself, but she's going to find out."

"Bud," said Harman, "give us the straight tip, I'm not wantin' to prod into your 'amoors,' but how far have you nobbled her into this business?"

"Well, as you ask me, I'll tell you," replied Bud. "She's fell into it head first, and up to the heels of her boots, given me the whole show and location all but the name of the hooker which she don't know yet."

"You mean to say she's workin' for you to collar the stuff?"

"Yep."

"But where does she come in?"

"She's coming with us if we can pull off the deal."

"Oh, Lord!" said Harman. "A petticut--I knew there must be some fly in the 'intment--it was too good to be true. A million dollars rollin' round waitin' to be took and a petticut--I've never known one that didn't mess a job it was wrapped up in."

"It's a million to one it don't come off," said Davis, removing his boots before turning in, "but there's just one chance, and that's her."

Next morning Mr. Harman did not go ashore. He spent his time fishing over the side, fishing and smoking and dreaming of all sorts of different ways of spending dollars. Now he was rolling round 'Frisco in a carriage, and a boiled shirt with a diamond solitaire in it, calling at the Palatial for drinks. Now he was in the train of quality eastward bound for N'York, smoking a big cigar. He did not delude himself that the deal would come off, but that didn't matter a bit. The essence of dreams is unreality. There was a chance.

Davis went ashore about eleven o'clock, and did not return till two in the afternoon. When he came back he was a different man. He seemed younger and brighter, and even better dressed, though he had not changed his clothes. Harman, watching him row up to the ship, noticed the difference in him even before he came on board.

He swept him down to the cabin, and before letting him speak, poured out drinks.

"I see it in your mug," said Harman. "Here, swaller that before handin' out the news. Cock yourself on the bunk side. Well, what's the odds now?"

"Twenty to one on," said Davis, "or a hundred--it's all the same. It's as good as done. Bo, we got it."

"Don't say!" said Billy.

"Got it, saddle and bridle an' pedigree and all. She's given it all in and to-night's the night."

"Give us the yarn," said the other.

"Yes," said Harman.

"Where does the girl come in?" asked Billy, after a moment's pause.

"There's a place called Coimbra seven mile south down the coast," said Davis, fetching a chart from the locker. "Here it is. That point. I've only to put out a blue light and she'll put off in a boat. Pereira's brother lives down at Coimbra, and she's going to-night to stay with him. She'll be on the watch out from one on to sunrise, and she'll easy get taken out in one of the night fishermen's boats."

To all of which Mr. Harman replied, "Damn petticuts!" He was biting his nails. He was no feminist. That is to say, he had an inborn conviction that women tended to spoil shows other than tea parties and such like. Why couldn't this rotten girl have kept out of the business? What did she want coming along for? Seeing that she was letting down her people for the love of Davis, it seemed pretty evident that she was coming along also for the love of him, but Harman was not in the mood to consider things from the girl's point of view.

However, there was no use complaining. With the chance of a million dollars for nothing, one must expect a few thorns, so he kept his head closed whilst Davis, taking him on deck, drew a lightning sketch of the plan of campaign.

"Righto," said Mr. Harman, "and if we're shiftin' moorin's, let's shift now."

Night had fallen on Buenodiaz, and the band on La Plazza had ceased braying. Eleven o'clock was striking. Cathedral and churches tinkling and tankling and clanging the hour; a drunken crew had just put off for the grain ship lying farther out, and silence was falling on the scene, when, whizz-bang, off went the fireworks.

"Damn the place!" cried Harman, whose nerves were on edge. "It's clangin' and prayin' and stinkin' all day and closes down only to go off in your face--some saint's day or 'nuther, I expect."

Davis said nothing. He was watching the blue and pink of bursting rockets and the fiery, fuzzy worms reflecting themselves in the harbour.

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