Читать книгу The Queen Versus Billy, and Other Stories онлайн

45 страница из 53

Resisting my first impulse to kick him, I controlled myself sufficiently to say that I was not going to Sydney—telling him at the same time that I washed my hands of Bo, whom I had now the satisfaction of returning to him.

“My word!” he said, “you don’t think I’m going to tyke her?”

“That’s your affair,” said I, moving off.

“Oh, I s’y!” he cried in consternation, attempting, as he spoke, to lay a detaining hand on my sleeve. But I jerked it off, and stopping suddenly in my walk towards the gangway, I gave him such a look that he turned pale and shrank back from me.

“Oh, I s’y!” he faltered, and allowed me to descend in quiet to my boat.

Most of that afternoon I spent in the schooner’s cabin, covertly watching Bo from a port-hole. For hours she remained where I had left her on the quarter-deck, seated imperturbably on her chest, the monkey and parrot on either hand. As for the Beautiful Man, he, like myself, had also disappeared from view, and was doubtless watching the situation from some secure hiding-hole of his own. Bo was again and again accosted by the officers of the ship, who alternately cajoled and threatened her in their fruitless attempts to get her off the vessel. But nothing was achieved until five o’clock, when the captain came off from the station, and, in an off-with-his-head style, commanded the presence of the Beautiful Man. I was too far off, of course, to hear one word that passed between them, but the pantomime needed no explanation, as Hinton cringed and the captain fumed, while Bo looked on like a graven image in a joss-house. In the end Bo was removed bodily from the ship to the shore, and landed, with her things, on the beach, where, until night fell and closed round her, I could see her still roosting on her box. Seriously alarmed, I began to experience the most disquieting fears for the result, especially as I could perceive the Beautiful Man lounging serenely about the barque’s deck, smoking a cigar and spitting light-heartedly over her side. It made me more than uneasy to see him afloat and her ashore; and the barque’s loosened sail lying ready to open to the breeze warned me there was little time to lose. It was some relief to my mind to learn from Captain Brice that the barque was not due to sail before the morrow noon; but even this short respite served to quicken my apprehension when I reflected on my utter powerlessness to interfere. I passed a restless night, revolving a thousand plans to hinder the Beautiful Man’s departure, and rose at dawn in a state of desperation.