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Will you be my guest, or will you be my prisoner?" The velvet fell away from Cunningham's voice. "Have I any choice? I'll accept the condition because I must. But I've warned you. I suppose I'd better ask at once what the ransom is." "Ransom? Not a copper cent! You can make Singapore in two days from the Catwick."
Her reproach, no doubt justified, cut deeply. "No, I'm beginning to become a little afraid afraid that the men may get out of hand. I don't care what you and your father think, but I believe Cunningham honestly wishes us to reach the Catwick without any conflict." "Ah, Cunningham!" "There you go again angry and bitter! Why can't you take it sensibly, like your father?"
Silence except for the rumble of the weather canvas standing up against the furious blasts of the wind. Dennison stepped over to the chart table. "Cunningham, I would like to have a word with you." "Go ahead. You can have as many as you like." "At dinner you spoke of your word." "So I did. What about it?" "Do you keep it?" "Whenever I humanly can. Well?" "What's this Catwick Island?"
The orders were that none should sleep on deck during the voyage to the Catwick. "All because the old man brings a skirt on board, we have to sweat blood in the forepeak!" growled Flint. "We've got a right to a little sport." "Sure we have!" The speaker was sitting on the edge of his bunk. He was a fine specimen of young manhood, with a pleasant, rollicking Irish countenance.
Truth is, I'm only borrowing the yacht as far as latitude ten degrees and longitude one hundred and ten degrees, off Catwick Island. You carry a boson's whistle at the end of your watch chain. Blow it!" was the challenge. "You bid me blow it?" "Only to convince you how absolutely helpless you are," said Cunningham, amiably.
Cleigh, we're off on a big gamble, and if we win out ten thousand wouldn't interest me. Life on board will be exactly as it was before you put into Shanghai. More I am not at liberty to tell you." "How far is the Catwick?" "Somewhere round two thousand eight or nine days, perhaps ten. We're not piling on short of coal. It's mighty difficult to get it for a private yacht.
There will be no change at all in the routine. Simply we lay a new course that will carry us outside and round Formosa, down to the South Sea and across to the Catwick. I'll give you one clear idea. A million and immunity would not stir me, Cleigh." "What's the game if it's beyond ransom?" Cunningham laughed boyishly. "It's big, and you'll laugh, too, when I tell you."
"Lord!" said Cleve, a vast discouragement in his tone. "You lay a course as true and fine as a hair, and run afoul a rotting derelict in the night!" Flint laughed. "Oh, I shan't make any trouble. I'll say my prayers regular until we make shore finally. The agreement was to lay off the Cleigh booze. I brought on board only a couple of quarts, and they'll be gone before we raise the Catwick.
Cleigh will not prosecute us for piracy if we play a decent game until we raise the Catwick. On old Van Dorn's tub we can drink and sing if we want to. If Cunningham gets a whiff of your breath, when you've had it, you'll get yours. Most of the boys have never done anything worse than apple stealing. It was the adventure.
In the dry stores there are many cases of liquor and wine. The men may break into the stuff before we reach the Catwick. That will take ten or twelve days if Cunningham lays a course outside Formosa. What's his game? I don't know. Probably he will maroon us on the Catwick, an island I know nothing about, except that it is nearer to Saigon than to Singapore.
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