On to Pekin/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII
A STORM AND A QUARREL
"The mail is going asliore, lieutenant. So hand over your letters, if you have any."
It was the adjutant's assistant, who was making the round of the transport, previous to his departure for the Nagasaki post-office. He already had one bag full of letters, and was now picking up a second.
"All right. I'll have a letter for you in a few minutes," responded Gilbert. "I just want to make sure that I put everything in this that I wanted."
"Writing to your best girl, eh?" laughed the other officer. "Well, send her lots of kisses."
"I haven't got that far yet, Peters," responded the young lieutenant, with a laugh equally hearty. "This is a strictly business letter."
"Is that so? Seems to me we are pretty far away from home to do any business except that of fighting."
"That is true, and yet—" Gilbert broke off short. "Hullo! What in the world does this mean?"
He had torn open the envelope addressed to Ralph Branders, and was now staring in amazement at the blank sheets of paper it had contained.
"Blank sheets, eh? Well, you must have been asleep when you put them into the envelope," was the comment of the adjutant's assistant. "Or else somebody has been putting up a joke on you," he added.
Gilbert did not reply, for the reason that he was just then doing some rapid thinking. He remembered how he had been aroused by Nuggy Polk and how he had found the sealed envelope on the passageway floor.
"I believe he tampered with that letter," he said to himself. "He took out my written sheets, and substituted these blanks. He is shrewder than I thought him to be."
"Well, lieutenant, what are you going to do about it?" asked the adjutant's assistant. "I've got to be going inside of ten minutes."
"I'll hunt up my letter—if I can," burst out Gilbert; and, thrusting the empty envelope in his pocket, he hurried off.
He was thoroughly angry, and bent on hunting up Nuggy Polk and having it out with the young man. He had seen Nuggy at the stern of the transport, smoking, and had no doubt that he would still find the young man there.
But, half-way on his rapid walk toward the stem, Gilbert came to a sudden halt. What if Polk should deny everything, and what if the rascal had destroyed the written pages? He could not prove the young man guilty, and such an action would only let Polk know that he had discovered the deception. Would it not be better to let the fellow imagine that his plan to outwit his opponent had proved successful?
"I'll let him rest, and write another letter in secret—and take good care that that goes," said Gilbert to himself. "And in the second letter I'll tell Branders how the first letter was stolen, and that he must be on his guard against the Polks and anybody who represents them."
With Gilbert to think was to act, in this case; and, without losing a second more, he rushed off to one of the desks in the ship's libraiy, secured several sheets of paper and a pen, and dashed off a second letter to Ralph Branders with all speed. It was easy work, for he remembered exactly what he had said in the first letter; and the young lieutenant had always been a rapid penman. He added to the epistle his suspicions concerning Nuggy Polk, and wound up by assuring Branders that he was certain there was a good deal of money coming to him, if only the truth of the matter could be unearthed.
The letter was finished not a second too soon; for Gilbert had barely time in which to hand it to the adjutant's assistant when the latter was off, to catch the United States mail from Nagasaki.
"Made quick work of it, I see," remarked Peters, as he stuffed the letter into one of his bags.
"I had to," answered Gilbert. "I wouldn't have missed this mail for a good deal."
The young lieutenant hurried away, not wishing to be seen by Nuggy Polk. His duties soon took him to the stern; and there he found the young man, still smoking, in company with Jerry Nickerson.
"Ah! lieutenant," cried Nuggy, as he drew closer. "We were just wondering how long it would be before we would start for Taku. Have you any idea?"
"The commander is waiting only for some additional despatches," answered Gilbert, coldly.
"Then we are to leave Nagasaki as soon as he gets them?"
"So I have been informed."
"I am glad of it. I don't like this hot hole at all," growled Nickerson. "It's worse than Manila."
"I reckon you'll find China hotter still," said Gilbert.
"I hope not."
"By the way, we made a curious mistake in your name," went on Nuggy, looking straight out to sea as he spoke. "We thought it was Lieutenant Gilbert, while we've learned since that it is Lieutenant Gilbert Pennington. You'll pardon us, I'm sure."
"Of course," said Gilbert, and looked pointedly at Nuggy and then at Nickerson, both of whom avoided his gaze. "It doesn't amount to anything, anyway."
"I'm glad you look at in that light, lieutenant. Some people are awfully particular about names, you know," continued Nuggy.
He wished to say more,—to bring around the statement that he had known the Penningtons years before, in Richmond; but he could not see his way clear without making an awkward break, and that he wished to avoid. Gilbert passed on, and there the matter rested for the time being.
The run from Nagasaki to Taku is, in round figures, eight hundred miles, the course being past Quelpart Island, up the Yellow Sea, and around the Shantung Peninsula into the Gulf of Pechili. Part of the run was along the south-western coast of Korea; but, in the haze that covered the sea, nothing could be seen of that territory.
The weather continued to be all that was desired until the transport gained the vicinity of the Shantung Peninsula, upon which the British port of Wei-Hai-Wei is situated, when a violent storm came up late in the afternoon. It had been extremely hot, but now the temperature went down as if by magic.
"We are in for it," remarked Major Morris, as he watched the sky grow black. "Just listen to that wind coming up!"
"I am glad we are not in a sailing vessel," responded Gilbert. "It looks as if it was going to blow great guns, as the jackies say."
Gilbert was right; for, soon after the sun was hidden behind the dense clouds, the wind came up with a rush, whistling through the windows and ports of the ship and banging many an unlatched door. Some of the soldiers were not looking for such a gust; and one lost his hat overboard, and another a precious bundle of newspapers obtained in Nagasaki at the cost of three Mexican dollars.
"We are up against it fer kapes!" cried Dan Casey, as he vainly tried to keep his feet. "Sure, an' I'm goin' below to kape from fallin' all over meself!" And he lost no time in literally sliding out of sight, for to keep erect on the companionway was impossible.
Some of the soldiers were at mess when the storm came up; and, as pea soup happened to be on the bill of fare, my readers can imagine how the contents of the tin soup plates were slopped around, much to the ire of the owners of the soup and the anger of those who happened to get the boiling hot liquid over them.
Nuggy Polk and Jerry Nickerson had just finished their repast when the first heavy blow struck the transport, sending the craft almost on her beams' end. Both had eaten heartily of a great variety of food, for they had had the quartermaster lay in an extra supply for them at Nagasaki.
"Gracious! what's struck us?" cried Jerry, in alarm.
"Feels to me as if we were going to upset," replied Nuggy, his face growing pale. "Just listen to the wind whistle!"
"I hope we don't go to the bottom," went on Nickerson.
He did not like the ocean, and had come along on the trip only at the earnest solicitation of Nuggy, who hated to travel alone. He was no sailor, but so far the mildness of the weather had kept him from becoming seasick.
Both of the young men felt that they must go on deck, and started for the companionway side by side.
They had just reached the foot of the steps, when a dark object loomed up before them. It was a soldier, who was actually rolling down the companionway. The man plumped with such force into Jerry Nickerson that the latter was sent sprawling.
"Hi! what do you mean by knocking me down?" spluttered Nickerson, as soon as he could get wind enough to speak.
"Vot's der matter mit you?" was the return. "Vy didn't you git out of der vay, ven you see me coming, hey?" The speaker was Carl Stummer, and he was in no humor for wasting words.
"You Dutch idiot!" roared Nickerson. "You bumped into me on purpose!"
"That's what he did," put in Nuggy, who had not liked Carl since the day they had had the talk concerning Gilbert. "Jerry, you ought to teach him a lesson for that."
"I will," answered Jerry; and, as the German soldier arose to his feet, Nickerson strode forward, and gave him a blow in the chest which knocked him up against a near-by railing. "That will teach you to behave yourself in the future."
In his school-days Nickerson had been a good deal of a bully, and this at times cropped out, upon the slightest provocation. As Carl staggered back, Nuggy gave a low laugh.
"Good for you, Jerry! He deserved it," he said.
Carl's face grew as red as a beet; and his eyes—those eyes which were sky-blue, and generally as mild as those of a lamb—flashed fire.
"So I vos von Dutch idiot, hey?" he demanded angrily. "And you vos teach me von lesson, not so? Meppe I vos teach dot lesson, hey? How you like dot, hey? und dot?"
He hauled off suddenly; and two blows straight from the shoulder made Jerry see stars, and sent him staggering into Nuggy. A third blow followed, which loosened one of Nickerson's front teeth, and made him drop upon a near-by settee, dazed and bewildered.
"Haf you got enough?" demanded Carl, as he followed his opponent with fists clenched for another blow.
"Don't! Don't!" cried Nickerson.
"Hi! let my friend alone!" came from Nuggy, in alarm. He was afraid Nickerson would be killed. "Let him alone, I say, you clown!"
"Ton't call me a klown!" roared Carl. "Of you do, I'll gif you a lickin', too!" And he squared off at Nuggy in a manner which caused that unworthy one to fall back in dismay.
By this time the attention of a number of soldiers who were near was attracted, and they gathered arouiid. "A fight, boys!" cried one. "The Dutchman is going to polish off one of the newspaper men!"
"Go for him, Carl, and show him how we licked the Tagals!"
"Make them fight one at a time, Dutchy! Two to one isn't fair."
"Form a ring, boys, and let 'em have it out to a finish."
So the talk ran on, and soon the crowd grew larger. Then Jerry Nickerson tried to hit Carl again. The German dodged, struck out swiftly and surely, and in an instant Nickerson measured his length on the deck, and lay there like a log.