The Golden Age of Pulp Fiction MEGAPACK ™, Vol. 1: George Allan England. George Allan England

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СКАЧАТЬ Hannaford, back there to Mariners’ House? I seen a few thing’s made me think mebbe—”

      “‘Mebbe I was wantin’ to lay long-side an’ take that craft in tow?’ he asks, laughin’. ‘All right. Fair an’ square question. Square answer. You’re dead right, Shifty, old man,’ says he. ‘I do—an’ what’s more, I will! Next time in Portland!’ says he an’ laughs agin.

      “‘You won’t!’ says I. ‘’Cause I’m a bigger man than you, an’ by that same token she’s mine!’

      “‘She ever say so?’ he inquired, earnest.

      “‘No. How ’bout you?’

      “‘No more to me, neither; but if a look means anythin’—’ says he.

      “‘I’ve had a look myself,’ says I, ‘that’s what you’re navigatin’ on. Mebbe one an’ a half. Now see here,’ says I, ‘I make you an offer. One or t’other of us has got to up-stick an’ away from this here course.

      “‘When we make Portland,’ says I,’ there’s a quiet bit o’ beach over on Cushing’s where two seafarin’ men could meet an’ argy out a proposition, fair an’ proper like, with their bare fists. Winner takes all,’ says I. ‘How ’bout it?’

      “Split my tops’l if he don’t laugh an’ gimme the grip on it!

      “‘Done!’ says he, free an’ hearty. ‘That’s the way I like to hear a lad talk! I misjudged you, old man,’ says he. ‘Always thought you was—well—different—though you was layin’ fer to take some underhand advantage an’ the like o’ that.

      “‘But now,’ says he, ‘I know you better. Back on deck with you now,’ he orders, ‘an’ let’s have no more words about it this trip. But when we’re docked there’ll be one whale of a time on that beach over to Cushing’s,’ says he. ‘Come—stir a stump!’

      “I gives him a look and goes. An’ that’s the last him an’ me ever—ever speaks the name o’ Sallie Hannaford.

      “A week later, 38 deg. 26 min. west, 45 deg. 17 min. north, he was—he was hit—”

      V.

      Shifty lays back on his pillows an’ gasps. I thinks it’s the end, but it ain’t. In a minute he begins again.

      “Ame!”

      “Well, what? There ain’t no mur­der in that, far’s I can see. If two deep-water men ain’t got the right to plan up a little shindy, to see who’s got a fair an’ free course fer a skirt, who has?

      “If that’s all you got on your chest, Shifty, you can go easy. I ain’t no sky-pilot nor nothin’, but to the best o’ my jedgment, you’re cleared O. K, papers an’ all A1.”

      “That ain’t all!” he chokes, holdin’ it off by main strength, while the life flickers an’ fades an’ comes agin in his eyes, same as you’ve seed a candle die.

      “That ain’t all—that’s only the beginnin’! So far, all fair an’ open. The—the murder—”

      “Murder, your grandmother! You didn’t bite Tref! You ain’t gave him no hydrophoby! Come, come, Shifty, lay down an’ come round on another tack. Here, I’ll git you a fresh noggin!”

      He holds me back with a grip onta him like an anchor ten foot in the mud.

      “No, no! I had enough, Ame! I’m goin’ under now, any time. Wa­ter’s nigh up to my scuppers, I ain’t goin’ to drift inta the bay an’ go ashore to ray Harbor-master in no stewed condition! You lemme be, now—lemme go middlin’ sober! I—I—”

      “Yes?”

      “Say, Ame, she—”

      “What?”

      “After it was all over, an’ I braced her, know what she done?”

      “No. What?”

      “Blast my hull, if she don’t let out jest one word—‘You?—an’ laugh plumb in my face—an’ then bust inta tears! Tears, so help me—an’ whip out o’ her parlor, where we was settin’ an’ slam the door!

      “She—she was thinkin’ o’ Gash all the time! I never had no look-in at all, not from the start, no way you look at it! Oh—”

      “Come, come, Shifty, this ain’t no time to think of marryin’ or givin’ in marriage. No time to recollect—”

      “It is! Time to recollect the rest o’ that v’yage, when I lost my ’tarnal soul tryin’ to git a wench that wouldn’t ha’ had me, nohow! Time—”

      “How you mean, Shifty? Anythin’ more to it?” I asks, uneasy, fer I’m a parson if I don’t begin to see some kind of a dim glimmer o’ somethin’ cold an’ terrible a-weighin’ on that tortured critter’s soul, somethin’ loomin’ up through the mist, same as a berg on the Banks.

      “How you mean?”

      Shifty, he sort of rares up agin. He grips the Book with one hand. With t’other he vises my flipper till he numbs it.

      “I’m goin’ now, Ame,” says he “Goin’, and not yet saved. Hark!” His words come thick, between wheezes. “Hark now, an’ don’t you stop me, or my damnation be upon you!

      “When Gash was bit, an’ they crowded the Benicia Boy to make port in time fer doctorin’ that’d save him, the devil come to me.

      “That same night he come, an’ I seen him standin’ right there in the fo’c’sle, Ame, an’ his eyes was red as a port-light in a fog.

      “He tells me what to do, so’s I can have Sallie, plain an’ easy. He tells me how to git her, an’ the wad in bank, Mariners’ House an’ all—yes, this here same place where he’s a waitin’ now to grab me, if I don’t git through in time!

      “Plain an’ clear he puts it to me, ‘Shifty,’ says he, ‘Gash is a better man with his dukes than what you be, every time, an’ you know it.

      “‘If he gits to Portland in time, an’ they squirt that dope to him an’ head off this here hydrophoby an’ he gits well, he’ll wallop you to a bleedin’ pulp, over there on the beach at Cushing’s.

      “‘Sallie, she’ll natchally be all sym­pathy an’ interest in him, after his narrer escape,’ says the old boy, ‘an’ that, with the damnation lickin’ he’ll give you, will land you in the lee scup­pers an’ him on the quarterdeck.

      “‘Mark my words,’ says he, grinnin’. ‘They say I can’t tell the truth nohow, but I can, an’ do; an’ you knows it, this time! You’re done for, Shifty,’ says he, ‘that is, if I don’t help you.

      “‘Which I will,’ says he, ‘fair an’ free, an’ no conditions. You do what I say, an’ everything’s yours, Sallie an’ all Pool!’ says he. ‘Can’t you grab a good thing when it’s put right in your fin?’

      “I СКАЧАТЬ