Adventure stories; Gold mines and mining -- Fiction; Love stories; Mutiny -- Fiction; Sea stories
Rainey, lame and sore, helped Tamada patch up the wounded, turning the
hunters' quarters into a sick bay, using the table for operation. Beale
was the worst off, but Tamada pronounced him not vitally damaged. After
he had finished with them he insisted upon Rainey's lying, face down, on
the table, stripped to the waist, while he rubbed him with oil and then
kneaded him. Once he gave a sudden, twisting wrench, and Rainey saw a
blur of stars as something snapped into place with a click.
"I think you soon all right, now," said Tamada.
"You and Miss Simms turned the tide," said Rainey. "If they'd got those
tools first they'd have finished us in short order."
"Fools!" said Tamada. "Suppose they kill Lund, how they get away? No one
to navigate. Presently the gunboat would find them. I think Mr. Lund
will maybe trust me now," he said quietly.
"What do you mean?"
"Mr. Lund think in the back of his head I arrange for that gunboat to
come. He can not understand how they know the schooner at island. He
think to come jus' this time too much curious, I think."
"It was a bit of a coincidence."
Tamada shrugged his shoulders slightly.
"I think Japanese government know all that goes on in North Polar
region," he said. "There is wireless station on Wrangell Island. We pass
by that pretty close."
Rainey chewed that information as he put on his clothes, wondering if
they had seen the last of the gunboat. They would have to pass south
through Bering Strait. It would be easy to overhaul them, halt them,
search the schooner, confiscate the gold. They were not out of trouble
yet.
When he went into the cabin to replace his torn coat--he had hardly a
button intact above the waist, from jacket to undershirt--he found the
girl there with Lund. Apparently, they had just come in. Peggy Simms,
with face aglow with the excitement that had not subsided, was
proffering Lund her pistol.
"Keep it," he said. "You may need it. I've got mine."
"But you threw it into the water. I saw you."
"No," He laughed. "That wasn't my gun. They thought it was. I wanted
to bring the thing to grips. But I wasn't fool enough to chuck away my
gun. That was a wrench I was usin' this mornin' to fix the cabin
stove--looks jest like an ottermatic. I stuck it in my inside pocket. I
was ha'f a mind to shoot when they showed their knives, but I didn't
want to use my gun on that mess of hash."
He stood tall and broad above her, looking down at the face that was
raised to his. Rainey, unnoticed as yet, saw her eyes bright with
admiration.
"You are a wonderful fighter," she said softly.
"Wonderful? What about you? A man's woman! You saved the day. Comin' to
me with them drills. An' we licked 'em. We. God!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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