Kit Musgrave's Luck Part 12

Kit laughed. "They're not keen about going, but the promise of a bottle of _cana_ carries some weight and old Miguel is a useful man at the steering oar. Anyhow, I've got to try. Keeping up steam costs something, and a barque at Palma waits for the onions."

"D'you reckon a _sobrecargo_'s pay covers the risk?" Jefferson asked.

They stood near a lighted wine shop and Kit gave him a puzzled look.

"Perhaps we ought to get paid for an extra awkward job, but in a sense, the pay has nothing to do with it. When you sign on, you engage to do what's required. But you ought to see----"

Jefferson saw and his eyes twinkled. Kit was embarra.s.sed, because he had remembered the others and thought he was talking like a prig. All the same, the young fellow was staunch.

"Miguel will come to the steps for me," Kit resumed, and they went with him along the wall. A quarter of a mile off, the _correillo_'s lights tossed in the dark.

The boat was a thirty-foot cargo launch, rowed double banked by st.u.r.dy fishermen, but swinging about on the white turmoil, she looked small.

Sometime when a thundering roller broke across the mole she vanished. To get on board was awkward, but when she stopped opposite some steps Kit ran forward and stood, stiffly posed, at the top.

"_Ahora, senor!_" somebody shouted.

Kit jumped. The others saw his white figure plunge and vanish. A crash, half drowned by the roar of the sea, indicated that he had got on board, and the boat went out on the backwash that rolled down the harbour like an angry flood. There was no moon, but one could see her dark hull against the phosph.o.r.escent foam. The men were pulling hard; their bodies swung and fiery splashes marked the big oars' path. At the mouth of the harbour she lurched up, almost perpendicular, over a white sea, plunged, and melted into the dark.

"They have got out," said Olivia. "It was very well done!"

"Then we'll go back to the hotel," Mrs. Austin remarked, rather coolly.

"You are wearing your dinner dress and the spray is thick!"

"I'm not going yet," Olivia declared.

Mrs. Austin knew her sister and waited, although she was annoyed. One could not blame Kit for doing what he ought, but the thing was unlucky.

After a minute or two, Jefferson jumped on a lava block and Olivia cried out. Just outside the harbour a long dark object rolled about in the foam. The object was like a boat, but it was obviously not the proper side up.

"She may clear the head of the mole," said Jefferson, and he and Olivia plunged into the spray.

Mrs. Austin hesitated and was too late. A sea washed across the wall, the others had vanished, and she durst not go alone. Men began to run about and she saw the boat was coming back extraordinarily fast. She was upside down, but two or three white objects clung to her, and swimmers'

heads dotted the frothing surge that carried her along. Jefferson and Olivia ran back and Mrs. Austin went with them to the beach. The boat struck the lava and was pulled up. A group of dripping men pushed through the crowd and Jefferson stopped the _patron_.

"Have you all got back?" he asked.

"All but Senor Musgrave," said the other, "We held on to the boat; he went on."

"He went on!" Olivia broke in. "Do you mean swimming? Where did he go?"

"To the s.h.i.+p, senorita. He shouted he must get on board."

The man went off and Jefferson remarked: "I reckon Musgrave will make it. The surf-belt's narrow and there's nothing to bother him after he gets through. If he'd come back, he might have washed past the harbour and hit the rocks. I'll wait at the agent's office and see if the _correillo_ starts."

"I'll stop with you," said Olivia firmly.

They waited for half an hour and then _Campeador_'s whistle pierced the roar of the surf. Her lights began to move and Jefferson said, "She's steaming off. Musgrave has made it!"

Olivia thrilled, but said nothing. Mrs. Austin said they had better go back to the hotel and pondered while they climbed the steep path to the cliff. Kit had tried to get on board because he thought he must; he had not, consciously, wanted to persuade Olivia he had pluck. All the same, he had done a bold thing, with an object that justified his rashness, and Olivia had seen the risk he ran. Mrs. Austin however was rather sorry she had suggested their going to the mole.

CHAPTER X

MRS. AUSTIN MAKES SOME PLANS

Mrs. Austin's veranda was not as crowded as usual. For one thing, a steamer that touched at Las Palmas regularly had arrived from the Argentine and her captain was giving a ball, to which Mrs. Austin had resolved she would not go. Captain Farquhar's friends were numerous but rather mixed; his feasts were not marked by the strict observance of conventional rules, and at Las Palmas Jacinta Austin was something of a great lady. When Kit came up the steps she gave him a gracious smile.

"I'm flattered because you have not, like the others, deserted me," she said.

"You are kind to hint you would note if I came or not," Kit replied.

"However, I must own I don't dance."

"Then, if you did dance, you would have gone to Captain Farquhar's ball?"

Kit smiled. "I think not. To begin with, I'd sooner come here, and I went on board _Ca.r.s.egarry_ when she called on her outward run. Captain Farquhar's kind, but I had enough. In another sense, so had Macallister and Don Erminio."

"You would be nicer if you knew where to stop," Mrs. Austin remarked.

"If you'll let me stop now for half an hour, I'll be satisfied," said Kit.

"Satisfied?" said Mrs. Austin. "Oh, well, I know you're frank.

Frankness has advantages, but perhaps it's not always necessary."

She noted that his glance wandered to Olivia, and she began to talk about something else. He was not going to join Olivia, but while she talked she studied Kit. He was an honest, sober young fellow, and had recently begun to make allowances for others, and had learned to laugh.

In the meantime, however, she thought his laugh was forced.

"If you are not amused, you needn't make an effort to be polite," she said. "When you arrived I knew you were moody."

"Then I'm duller than I thought," Kit rejoined. "You oughtn't to have known. On your veranda one's bothers vanish."

"Why were you bothered?"

"I got another letter and Betty's worse," said Kit. "My mother states she has been warned she must give up her post. Her work's too hard; she must get the sun and fresh air. I feel I ought to help, but it's impossible. Thinking about this, I've begun to see my job on board the _correillo_ leads nowhere. Perhaps they'll let me stop when my engagement's up, but there's no promotion."

Mrs. Austin knew the Spanish manager was satisfied and meant him to stop.

"All the same, you like your job?" she said.

"For the most part, but one gets some jars. Recently we have been buying onions. A s.h.i.+p is going to Cuba, the freight is low, and Havana merchants give a good price for onions, but the _peons_ who grow them in the mountains know nothing about this. They have got a big crop that n.o.body wants to buy and the price has fallen to a very small sum. The poor folks are a remarkably frugal, industrious lot."

"I don't know a country with finer peasants," Mrs. Austin agreed.

"Still, if they're willing to sell you the onions, why should you not buy?"

"We are buying too cheap."

Mrs. Austin turned to Jefferson. "Mr. Musgrave puzzles me. He grumbles because he's buying onions too cheap."