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Show WMi K ARTHUR D. 3H M SMITH duenna, arid the three walked past lilm. Ben IngleplD wltb dragging feet Cam lightly under the weight of her greatcoat, the duenna Bashing a quizzical stare from her Jetty eyes. Surely, the fat woman mocked him I Hut why? And why should Cara In glepln, who shortly must answer at the bar to a charge of high treason pity him who hud taken her? Ah, and why should he ask himself such queg lions? What did they matter? He had won; he had his vengeance. He and Joshua would crush these people us as Cuffee's twenty-four-pound shot should crush the Badger. Yes, crush the Badger, crusb Col lish'awe, crush these people crush them all. All 1 He must hate her tli more vigorously because she smiled, because she pitied him. because she knew how desperately he tried to hate-He hate-He stifled a groan. "A lire under each batch, Cuffee," he ordered. "I can't spare hands for an other prize not with the Badger to tight." Cuffee crowed delightedly. "Dis Cbater ship him make plenty big lire. Oh, my aunt, we see him too long time off. Whoosh 1 Him buhn to sky. Vah. yah, yah !" So hatred burned, Fellowes thought, annihilating, all-consuming, destroying even the soul that kindled it. CHAPTER XI Stormy Seas Silence cloaked the Centurian as a twist of flame flickered up from the True Bounty's for'ard hatch. There was something portentious in the spectacle spec-tacle which impressed the roughest sailors. This was no ordinary act of destruction. It partook of the character char-acter of an execution, the condign punishment of a guilty fabric. The ship was dying, as ber master had died, as perhaps her owners should die, In retribution for the offense of which she had been a part. The Inglepins. standing apart on the brig's poop, watched with a kind of sorrowful fascination. When the masts of the dying ship crashed overside, over-side, and a murmur of comment broke the silence on the Centurion, Cara caught her breath and Ben Inglepin's lips framed a curse. Fellowes, eyeing his prisoners uneasily, un-easily, fancied there was something symbolical for them in the True Bounty's fate, but the punishment of the ship would be accomplished in much simpler fashion than the punishment punish-ment he must see dealt to them. Soon, very soon, the charred remnants of the True Bounty would be rent asunder, and she would cease to be. But for Cara and her father remained all the long-drawn agony of public disgrace, dis-grace, the rancor of factional hostility, the torment of the law's delays. Surely, Sure-ly, a punishment sufficient to satisfy any hatred, even Joshua's. Yes, even bis own except that it didn't Perhaps Per-haps nothing ever would. At the moment, mo-ment, he realized, he hated Chnter dead as much as he had Chater living. Ben Inglepin's voice, fretfully insistent, in-sistent, , pierced his reflections. "Captain Fellowes! Have you not some corner to which my daughter may retire? 'Tis insufferable she should be kept on deck." "I have arranged that she and her attendant shall occupy my cabin," Fellowes Fel-lowes interrupted. "You, sir, may have the quarters of my second lieutenant You will be restricted to the after-cabin after-cabin and the poop. Am I plain, sir?" "Sufficiently," Ben assented, flushing. flush-ing. "May we go below, then?" "Within the limits prescribed," re-lolned re-lolned Fellowes. Turning on his beel as the Inglepins left the poop, he saw that the True Bounty was gone. Only the frosty glimmer of the stars relieved the dark-uess. dark-uess. For Fellowes the voyage now was irksome almost beyond bearing. He was Impatient to come up with the Badger, and the inevitable daily contact con-tact with Cara embarrassed and harassed him. And Ben Inglepin, too, was continually in evidence, a set lok on his plump face as be stared into the gray mists that hid the west Only the duenna remained Invisible, keeping to the after-cabin In all weathers, weath-ers, ber presence Indicated by occasional occa-sional gargantuan rumbles when the seasickness visited her. Yet Fellowes sensed that in some mysterious fashion of her own the fat woman maintained a surveillance upon all that occurred aboard the privateer. One and all, the men of the Centurian Cen-turian were admirers of Cara. Sorry for her, perhaps, pitying ber plight, old Noggle and Spencer very paternal : Breed and Noggle's sons and nephew and O'Shaughnessy, the surgeon, ardent ar-dent In varying degrees; Nlmrod j Sopher pompously devoted. (TO BE CONTINUED) CHAPTER X Continued 13 Fellowes was puzzled, nonplused, hj Cara's testimony for him. the more so. as Sopher twittered Immediately: "Ah. then the case Is simplified! Two witnesses, two impartial witnesses, wit-nesses, should nullify any attempt at prosecution. But I will, with your permission. I .Ion, proceed to take di'po sitions, and draw them up in due order. or-der. 'Tis a safeguard " "We have more important work to do than accounting for the death of that scoundrel." Fellowes Interrupted sternly. And for the first time he looked Cara In the eye. disturbed by the directness of her gaze, the absence ab-sence of any indication of a sense of guilt. "1 am under a certain embarrassment embar-rassment ma'am," he continued, trying to keep his voice level, to hide from her the distraction her mere presence caused In him. "1 must ask you to pledge me your word of honor you and your attendant have no documents.-or papers upon yout persons." "We have none." she replied readily "And your luggage? 1 am loath to search It." "You'll Bnd naught, sir. of any tm port." "You say this upon your word ot honor?" "Upon my word ot honor," she re peated haughtily. "I am, wliutevei my sins, not one to practice lies, sir." Ben Inglepin hemmed fussily. "Since we are upon the subject, Captain Fellowes." he remarked. "1 will cive you my word of honor that no documents, other than those of a strictly business nature, are comprised in my effects." "Then what Is the purpose of your voyage, Mr. inglepin?" "'Tis revealed in the ship's papers." Ben answered with new-found suavity. "A commercial venture to Spain 1 am persuaded the war will soon be ended, and am anxious to establish satisfactory connections with Spanish clients against that eventuality." Miss Inglepin abruptly gave them her back, and Fellowes conceived a suspicion that she meant by this action ac-tion to divorce herself from connection connec-tion with her father's assertion. "I am compelled to doubt you, Mr. Inglepin." he returned. "1 must detain de-tain you on deck while your luggage is examined." The merchant shrugged his shoulders, shoul-ders, somewhat light-heartedly, Fellowes Fel-lowes imagined, his bearing similar to that he had displayed at Chafer's house. But the realization that his task would not be easy only stiffened the Long Islander's determination. ' "Cuffee." he called, and when the negro approached : "You are responsible responsi-ble for these three people. Keep them here until I release you." "Yah, Mars'r Fellowe'. Yo' look fo lettah?" "Yes." Some quality In CulTee's tone made Fellowes expectant. "Why?" "Yo' wait fo' see,- Mars'r. Yo' no fin' him lettah below, Cuffee make juju fo' him." Going through the True Bounty's clearance papers, manifest and log. and ransacking the contents of ('hater's desk and locker, Fellowes was disposed to favor the employment of all the juju at Cuffee's command After Ben Inglepin's cabin had been searched with equal unsuccess. tie called In the Centurion's hands to hunt for loose floorboards or concealed .wall closets; and they tore the cabin to pieces quite fruitlessly. Frustrated at each point he assailed, Fellowes was striding the fo'c's'le deck, cudgeling his wits for some nook or cranny he hadn't attempted, when Tom Grognu accosted him. "Cuffee'll have a word with ye, Cap'n." "About what?" "I dunno, but he's mortal Itchin' for It Wants to know can he bring his pris'ners for'ard?" Rppnlllnp tlie npuro's talk of lulu. "Papers? Why. you have had access to all we possess." Cara Inglepin turned away with a faint si;;h. Cuffee. wandering softly annul the deck, touched various ob jects with his hands, his eyes, close lidded, darting snakily at the mer chant's face, his lips moving in a guttural gut-tural refrain : No him oowsprit! No him capstan! No him powl! No him hawse-pipe! No him "Oh. my aunt, Mars'r Fellowe'! Him lettah in anchor-stock!" Fellowes stared unbelievingly bul the negro pointed to Inglepin's gaping consternation while with his other hand he pulled out a plugged section in the end of one ot the balks of timber tim-ber tli at stocked the heavy bow-anchors. "My God!" exclaimed Ben. Cara's face was devoid of feeling, but she stepped forward beside her father, squarely in front of Fellowes "I knew not its hiding place." she said icily, "since 1 refused longer to be concerned with secrecy. But 'twas 1, no less than my father, who drew np that paper, and secured the signa tures. And 1 am responsible for having hav-ing interested Lord Wellington and the Prince Regent's ministers " Ben Inglepin emitted a groan of despair. "Oh, have done, have done," . he begged. "Are we not sufficiently exposed ex-posed to this man, who would ruin us? I tell you. Cara, he and your uncle will see us hung!" "And if we merit it, shall we complain?" com-plain?" she retorted. "We have made a cast. Father. Let us not weep for having lost." From the cavity in the anchor-stock Cuffee produced a thick roll of oiled silk. It was on Fellowes' tongue to tell the negro to , toss it in the sea. but Joshua's voice rang in his ears, Joshua's face, so absurdly like Ben's, appeared before his eyes. Hate I If you'll only hate enough! And after all, he had been given a trust. "Hand it here, Cuffee," he said In a voice that was strange to him. The scroll, inside the covering, was written in a bold, free script, and the Import of its message took his breath away : To the Right Hon. The Lord Liverpool, Liver-pool, K. G., H.ftt.'s Prime Minister My Lord: Jour petitioners, political representatives representa-tives o( the Federalist Party In the United States, and In especial, those sections ot the Party established in New England and New fork, do represent repre-sent and make manifest Fellowes flipped through the pages to the end. Page after page of names. Names of senators, of representatives, of state officials, of those high in com merce. In the law and In the church. Cara Inglepin nodded sadly, partly to herself, partly to him. "That Is the Federalist party," she said. "And they are Americans, Captain Cap-tain Fellowes, no more than Aonerlcans who disagree with you." Fellowes gritted his teeth. "They are traitors," he disputed her. "Your errand was treason of the blackest." Ben Inglepin cried out In agony: "Not treason I No, no I We want peace. Oh, d n Jos I" "Let us damn nobody, Father," Cara Interrupted. "Treason or no, we need not be ashamed, for what we did we intended honorably." She had pluck, this girl, Fellowes owned, but resolutely he curbed the admiration she Inspired, bowing coldly. cold-ly. Implacably. "If It please yon, ma'am I I must remove you all to the Centurion. Will you show the men your luggage?" She smiled, and he had an uncom fortnble sensation that she pitied him. "It does not please me, sir; but I'll ne a docile prisoner. Come, Father!" She spoke in Portuguese to the Fellowes' Interest was awakened "Tell him to come along. Tom." he directed. And presently, Cuffee shepherded the Inglepins and the duenna to the fo'c's'le. "Him big debbll " Cuffee nodded to Ben Inglepin "sweat plenty ebery time yo' walk on fo'c's'le, Mars'r." "Yes?" Fellowes prompted. "Cuffee make Juju. Mnrs r. Juju tell Cuffee him lettah been on fo'c's'le." Fellowes look sidewlse at Inglepin There were tiny beads of moisture on the merchant's forehead, despite the evening cool. Cara. however, seemed ' serenely indifferent, and the duenna was content to click away at her beads. "Sir, this Is nonsense," protested Ben. "Will you permit a superstitious negro to Incommode persons, who, for no fault of their own. happen to be In your power?" "Where are these papers concealed?" Fellowes demanded stetnly. |