The Lady And The Pirate - The Lady and the Pirate Part 41
Library

The Lady and the Pirate Part 41

"Aw, shucks, Black Bart," said Jimmy, turning to me--"ain't that just like a woman?--They won't never play the game."

CHAPTER XXXV

IN WHICH I FIND TWO ESTIMABLE FRIENDS, BUT LOSE ONE BELOVED

The weather now, moderating, after the fashion of weather on this coast, as rapidly as it had become inclement, we passed a more comfortable night on our desert island. No doubt the lighthouse tender knew of our presence, for he easily could see our tent by day and our fire by night, and he surely must have seen our good ship riding at anchor under his nose at the edge of the channel; but no visit came from that official--for the very good reason, as we later learned, that the storm had stove in his boat at her mooring; so that all he himself could do was to cross his Cajun bosom and pray that his supply skiff might come from across the bay. So, as much alone as the Swiss family by name of Robinson--an odd name for a Swiss family, it always seemed to me--we remained on our desert island undisturbed, the ladies now in the comfortable tent, my hardy pirates under the tarpaulin, and the rest of us as we liked or might, all in beds of the sweet scented grasses which grew along the lagoon where the great ranks of wild fowl kept up their chatter day and night.

It was a land of plenty, and any but a man in my situation might well have been content there for many days. Content was not in my own soul.

I was up by dawn and busy about the boats, before any sign of life was visible around the tent or the canvas shelter. But since the sun rose warm, it yet was early when we met at John's breakfast fire. I felt myself a shabby figure, for in my haste I had forgotten my razors; and by now my clothing was sadly soiled and stained, even the most famous of the Davidson waistcoats being the worse for the salt-water immersions it had known; and my ancient flannels were corkscrewing about my limbs. But as for Helena, young and vital, she discarded her sweater for breakfast, and appeared as she had before the shipwreck, in lace bridge coat and wearing many gems! L'Olonnois, with the intimacy of kin and the admiration of youth--and with youth's lack of tact--saluted her now gaily. "Gee! Auntie," said he, at table on the sand, "togged out that way, all them glitterin' gems, you shore look fit for a pirate's bride!"

Poor Helena! She blushed red to the hair; and I fear I did no better myself. "Jimmy!" reproved Aunt Lucinda.

"Don't call me 'Jimmy'!" rejoined that hopeful. "My name is L'Olonnois, the Scourge of The Sea. Me an' Jean Lafitte, we follow Black Bart the Avenger, to the Spanish Main. Auntie, pass me the bacon, please. I'm just about starved."

Mrs. Daniver, as was her custom, ate a very substantial breakfast; Helena, almost none at all; nor had I much taste for food. In some way, our constraint insensibly extended to all the party, much to L'Olonnois' disgust. "It's _her_ fault!" I overheard him say to his mate. "Women can't play no games. An' we was havin' such a bully chance! Now, like's not, we won't stay here longer'n it'll take to get things back to the boat again. I don't want to go back home--I'd rather be a pirate; an' so'd any fellow."

"Sure he would," assented Jean. They did not see me, behind the tent.

"Somethin's wrong," began L'Olonnois, portentously.

"What'd you guess?" queried Lafitte. "Looks to me like it was somethin' between him an' the fair captive."

"That's just it--that's just what I said! Now, if Black Bart lets his whiskers grow, an' Auntie Helena wears them rings, ain't it just like in the book? Course it is! But here they go, don't eat nothin', don't talk none to nobody."

"I'll tell you what!" began Lafitte.

"Uh-huh, what?" demanded L'Olonnois.

"A great wrong has been did our brave leader by yon heartless jade; that's what!"

"You betcher life they has. He's on the square, an' look what he done for us--look how he managed things all the way down to here. Anybody else couldn't have got away with this. Anybody else'd never a' went out there last night after John, just a Chink, thataway. An' her!"

Jimmy's disapproval of his auntie, as thus expressed, was extreme. I was now about to step away, but feared detection, so unwillingly heard on.

"But he can't see no one else but yon fickle jade!" commented Jean Lafitte, "unworthy as she is of a bold chief's regard!"

"Nope. That's what's goin' to make all the trouble. I'll tell you what!"

"What?"

"We'll have to fix it up, somehow."

"How'd you mean?"

"Why, reason it out with 'em both."

Jean apparently shook his head, or had some look of dubiousness, for L'Olonnois went on.

"We _gotta_ do it, somehow. If we don't, we'll about have to go back home; an' who wants to go back home from a good old desert island like this here. _So_ now----"

"Uh, huh?"

"Why, I'll tell you, now. You see, I got some pull with her--the fair captive. She used to lick me, but she don't dast to try it on here on a desert island: so I got some pull. An' like enough you c'd talk it over with Black Bart."

"Nuh--uh! I don't like to."

"Why?"

"Well, I don't. He's all right."

"Yes, but we got to get 'em _together_!"

"Shore. But, my idea, he's hard to _get_ together if he gets a notion he ain't had a square deal nohow, someways."

"Well, he ain't. So that makes my part the hardest. But you just go to him, and tell him not to hurry, because you are informed the fair captive is goin' to relent, pretty soon, if we just don't get in too big a hurry and run away from a place like this--where the duck shootin' is immense!"

"But kin you work _her_, Jimmy?"

"Well, I dunno. She's pretty set, if she thinks she ain't had a square deal, too."

"Well now," argued Lafitte, "if that's the way they both feel, either they're both wrong an' ought to shake hands, or else one of 'em's wrong, and they either ought to get together an' find out which it was, or else they ought to leave it to some one else to say which one _was_ wrong. Ain't that so?"

"O' course it's so. So now, thing fer us fellows to do, is just to put it before 'em plain, an' get 'em both to leave it to us two fellers what's right fer 'em both to do. Now, _I_ think they'd ought to get married, both of 'em--I mean to each other, you know. Folks _does_ get married."

"Black Bart would," said Jean Lafitte. "I'll bet anything. The fair captive, she's a heartless jade, but I seen Black Bart lookin' at her, an'----"

"An' I seen her lookin' at him--leastways a picture--an' says she, 'Jimmy----'"

"Jimmy!" It was I, myself, red and angry, who now broke from my unwilling eavesdropping.

The two boys turned to me innocently. I found it difficult to say anything at all, and wisest to say nothing. "I was just going to ask if you two wouldn't like to take the guns and go out after some more ducks--especially the kind with red heads and flat noses, such as we had yesterday. And I'll lend you Partial, so you can try for some more of those funny little turtles. I'll have to go out to the ship, and also over to the lighthouse, before long. The tide will turn, perhaps, and at least the wind is offshore from the island now."

"Sure, we'll go." Jean spoke for both at once.

"Very well, then. And be careful. And you'd--you'd better leave your auntie and her auntie alone, Jimmy--they'll want to sleep."

"You didn't hear us sayin' nothin', did you, Black Bart?" asked L'Olonnois, suspiciously.

"By Jove! I believe that's a boat beating down the bay," said I. "Sail ho!" And so eager were they that they forgot my omission of direct reply.

"It's very likely only the lighthouse supply boat coming in," said I.

"I'll find out over there. Better run along, or the morning flight of the birds will be over." So they ran along.

As for myself, I called Peterson and Williams for another visit to our disabled ship, which now lay on a level keel, white and glistening, rocking gently in the bright wind. I left word for the ladies that we might not be back for luncheon.