“Hurrah, it’s a ship,” Honey cried excitedly.
“Now, said Mai with a drawl as she fingered her tiny silk panties, “if there were only a skirt in the crowd, we could use it to hail the rescuers in proper style.”
At that, it was an idea! Tuffy tore off his shirt and tying the two sleeves to the end of the oar, waved the improvised signal wildly for several minutes.
Again Honey jumped up on Tuffy’s back for a look at the ship. This time his shirtless torso felt even more intimately the warm touch of the girl’s legs around him, gripping him tightly.
“Say, fellows,” Honey exclaimed from her vintage point. “That isn’t a ship. There’s no mast, no smokestack, no nothing. Not even any people. Looks to me like one of those old barges they used to use on the canal down where I lived as a girl.”
“Come on, you dames,” Tuffy roared. “We gotta get over to that scow.”
“And to think I forgot my roller skates,” Zoe said with a laugh.
“And how is the skipper gonna get his boat over there?” Mai inquired.
Tuffy ripped his shirt from the end of the oar and wrapped it around the middle. “Zoe,” he directed, “you straddle this oar at the stern. Hold it firm now between your legs. I’m gonna swing the oar back and forth. That gives a little forward motion. Mai, you and Honey use your hands at the side. Yes, your hands. Like oars. Everybody get to work. We gotta get to that hulk before sundown. Remember I’m the skipper.”
“Yo ho,” cried Mai, “and I suppose we’re the mates?”
“Oh yeah?” Zoe inquired as she tried to find a comfortable way to hold the oar firmly between her knees.
* * * *
For an hour they worked, making seemingly little progress. Mai took Zoe’s place at the stern, hugging the one oar between her slender bare legs. Then came Honey’s turn. After that they all rested for a few minutes. The scow was closer all right.
“How about breaking open that high-powered keg of water, Cap’n?” Mai asked as they sprawled out.
Tuffy pulled the keg out and yanked out the plug. “Who wants the first drag?” he asked. His own mouth was dry and raw from thirst. But he could wait his turn.
He held the keg up and Honey leaned over for him to pour some of the contents into her open mouth. Tuffy saw her swallow, half choke, and then quickly spit the stuff out.
“It’s terribly salty,” she cried.
Tuffy’s heart sank. He tasted the water. It was just ordinary sea water. Some damn fool of a hand on the gambling ship had neglected to put fresh water in the keg. Now they were in a fix. Under the sun’s hot rays they’d be finished in a day or two. They had to make that scow, and pray there was water on board.
Tuffy told the girls of their danger. There was no jesting when they went back to their tasks. Hour after hour, under the broiling sun, the three all but nude girls and the lone man with his bare upper body glistening in the sweat of his exertions struggled and fought their way foot by foot toward the scow. Slower and slower became their progress. Less often they looked to see if the barge was any closer.
Finally in Tuffy’s thirst crazed mind there seemed only one thought left—to move the oar back just once more. Just once more. And then once more. That way lay madness, he knew. But he couldn’t stop. He had to make one more swing of the oar.
Long ago the two girls had ceased their useless hand paddling, their bodies stretched inert on the boat’s bottom. Honey, who had been straddling the oar, drooped and several times all but slipped backwards into the water. Tuffy pulled the girl toward him and together they slipped wearily to the bottom of the boat.
* * * *
When Tuffy looked up again, the sun had sunk almost to the water’s edge in the west. A strong wind was blowing from the east, a wind that seemed cool and refreshing. Tuffy wished he could open his mouth and let the breeze blow in and cool his tongue with its sweet touch. With some effort he pulled himself to the side of the boat and looked over. He blinked…
There—not fifty yards away was the scow. Square ends, low lying, with one end slightly higher than the other, it seemed to Tuffy’s distorted sensibilities a strange grotesquerie out of some wild nightmare.
With a whoop of wild joy he shook the girls and pointed at the huge object so close to them. Frantically they set to work to cover the short distance.
It was dark when they finally scraped sides with the old and seemingly deserted hulk. Using their hands they pulled their tiny boat along the edge until they found a chain dangling down to the water.
Cautioning the girls to hold tight to the chain and to stay where they were, Tuffy climbed up to the deck. The place was completely deserted. It had probably been one of a number of scows being towed and had broken loose. Or been cut loose in a storm. Anyway, here it was, empty and with not much promise of protection for help for Tuffy and the girls.
After a circuit of the deck, Tuffy came back and called for the girls to come up. He helped them as they made the ascent. Then with a couple of ropes that he had found on the scow, he pulled their own boat around to the low lying side of the barge and managed to get it up safe and sound on the deck.
Finally with the three skimpily dressed girls trailing his every footstep, Tuffy made a complete search of the barge. And in a little superstructure, open on one side and built evidently to hold towing ropes and chains, he found a barrel half filled with a warm, brackish water.
“Not too much at first,” he cautioned the girls when they would have buried their faces in the stuff. He felt very strong and full of responsibility for the girls now that he had brought them this far. It was a good feeling.
With the fall of the sun, the wind which had sprung up began to whip the sea into a writhing mass of foam and black terror. A flash of lightning revealed a huge bank of clouds overcasting half of the sky.
Tuffy fixed up a sleeping place for the girls back of the ropes in the superstructure. He himself sat with his back to them, and for a time watched the storm’s approach. Then he fell asleep.
* * * *
It was probably some time after midnight when Tuffy awoke. He was rolling wildly down the deck. With a terrific smash he crashed into the row boat he had turned over on the deck. He got up unsteadily.
The storm was now of hurricane proportions. The scow, drifting helplessly, was at the mercy of every crashing wave. The wind roared down and around the lone figure of Tuffy as he fought his way back to the tiny superstructure where the girls were. He crawled in.
At once a pair of arms encircled his neck and a soft face crushed up against his in fright.
“Are we sinking?” It was Zoe who was hugging him so desperately.
“Naw,” Tuffy tried to put confidence and disdain in his voice. “This ain’t nothing. Only a little squall. Be over before morning. We can’t sink in this old tub.”
“Tuffy, will you do something for us girls?” the question was from Mai.
“Anything you say.”
“Then, for Pete’s sake, come on in here and hold us down. We’re all mixed up in this rope and stuff. And every time a wave comes we bounce all over each other.”
Tuffy laughed to himself. What a sweet job this was going to be! To sleep with three of the most beautiful dames he had ever seen.
He crawled over the ropes and lay down beside one smooth, warm body. He reached out a hand. His palm cupped a soft, pointed breast. Then a wave sent him rolling, and he felt the girl’s arms around him, holding him close.
“Lord help the poor working gal,” cried Honey from nearby.
“’Twas a dark and stormy night,” sang Zoe, “when he did wrong by our little Nell.”
“Say, girls, who has Tuffy now?” laughed Mai. “That last wave sorta tore us asunder.”
“Pipe down, you dames,” Tuffy grumbled, only pretending he wasn’t enjoying the situation. “Let’s get some sleep
.”
“Sleep?” cried Honey.
“Sleep?” cried Mai.
“Sleep?” cried Zoe.
“That’s what I said,” Tuffy laughed in spite of himself. And strangely enough, huddled as they all were together, wedged in back of the ropes, they did manage to get some sleep in spite of the storm.
* * * *
Morning found the storm over and Tuffy and his crew of fair damsels eager for a thorough examination of their floating palace. It proved to be an ordinary ore barge. The small superstructure for ropes was the only shelter. Their lifeboat had come through the storm in good shape.
If they only had something to eat, the place wouldn’t be half bad for adventure of this sort.
Tuffy knew he’d have to keep the girls busy to get their minds off their empty stomachs, so he suggested they make their cabin more comfortable and seaworthy.
First they dragged out one great interminable tow rope that must have been a quarter mile long. This they wound around and around the small structure in several layers until there was barely enough room to crawl over the top into their now fairly spacious quarters. The place was probably eight or ten feet square and about five feet high. And when the girls finished cleaning it up, it was almost cozy looking.
Tuffy caulked a few bad cracks up in the roof with rope strands. And all in all, the four of them felt proud of their efforts by nightfall.
The evening was as calm and lovely as the previous night had been wild. A half moon gave a silver gleam to the sea and the sky.
Tuffy was sitting near the lifeboat, thinking what a grand thing life was, when the girls came up behind him and all started talking at once.
“Hey, hey, girls,” he cried. “One at a time.”
“Okay, Tuffy,” Honey answered.
Then she hesitated.
“Go on, Honey,” Mai urged teasingly, “Tell him.”
“Well, it’s like this,” Honey began. “You see we’re show girls. And we thought that maybe you’d kinda like to be entertained a bit. You know—we thought we could put on one of our acts for you. You’ve been pretty swell to us poor gals. This pickle we’re in isn’t your fault. We might just as well have as much fun as we can—while we can. What do you say, Tuffy?”
“I say—swell! I’ve been wondering what sorta stuff you did for a living back on the gambling ship.”
“Come on, girls,” Zoe cried. Then to Tuffy she called “See if you can find that empty water cask that was on the small boat and try and make it sound like a drum. You’ll hafta be both orchestra and audience.”
Tuffy smiled broadly at thought of what was to come. “Tuffy and his harem,” he murmured joyfully to himself, as he watched the three girls scamper like kittens over the cables that all but barred the entrance to the tiny cabin.
He looked about him at the silvery ocean and at the sky. On the side of the old scow the lapping waters were making a caressing susurrus of sound. The redolence of southern waters filled the air with the perfume of romance.
By holding the empty water cask on his knees and pounding lightly with a bit of rope in which he had tied a thick knot, Tuffy managed to make a sort of deep booming effect. For some time he amused himself by beating on the crude drum. He even hummed an old sea chantey to himself and beat a low accompaniment with the rope end.
“We’re coming,” Zoe called out to him from the cabin.
He turned. Three pale figures slipped over the rope barrier and approached him silently on bare feet.
The red blood in Tuffy’s body quickened at the sight. Even the silver faintness of the moon’s light was enough to reveal the full loveliness of the three beings coming toward him.
The girls had discarded their dancing outfits, skimpy as they were. Their breasts, snowy mounds, that trembled as they moved, were free and uncovered. And as the girls walked toward Tuffy, the three pairs of breasts seemed to be alive under the moon’s pale light.
Around their middles, the girls had looped up stray ends of ropes. And around their ankles and wrists were more rope strands. Somehow they looked like slim marble goddesses to Tuffy’s highly appreciative gaze.
Slowly he let the rope end strike the top of the water cask. The resulting thud, deep and hollow, set the girls into motion. And such motion!
They lifted their arms and moved in a circle about him, their breasts swaying provocatively as they dipped their knees at each beat of his drum. The drum beat became sure and steady.
Then, as the girls slipped in and out before him on their silent bare feet, he increased the tempo of his beat. The water cask became a throbbing drum between his knees. Swifter the girls danced.
Bare arms and white slender legs and high flung heads, pale in settings of moon-tinted hair, flashed in a gay pattern before his eyes. Tuffy became a little drunk with the sight. Swifter went the rope end on the water cask.
Now the girls were soaring through the evolutions of their wild dance, sometimes close to him, sometimes a score of feet away. From the girls came occasional little animal cries that followed the abandon of their actions.
Suddenly when Tuffy could beat the drum no faster, the girls stopped as of one accord, tore the rope strand girdles from their middles, and ran naked across the deck to the tiny cabin.
For a frenzied moment Tuffy wanted to run after them, seize their lovely bodies in his arms, and crush the three of them to him. Lord, but they were beautiful!
A need for physical action seized him. Tuffy strode to the end of the scow.
And there, in his little way, Tuffy looked out over a moon-shimmering sea and felt himself a king of men. Here on this scow was his kingdom, the girls were subjects, the sea was his royal enemy, and who cared what the future brought.
* * * *
A long time later when Tuffy went back to the cabin, he could hear their soft regular breathing, and he knew that the girls were asleep. With a smile he sank down, his back to the entrance. There would be more days coming! And more nights!
But about the middle of the next morning. Mai called excitedly to the others that she had seen a ship. Tuffy clambered up on the cabin and peered in the direction she pointed. In a moment he saw it—a small vessel in the distance.
Again Tuffy tied his shirt to the oar and waved it steadily over his head. At length the boat, which was nothing more than a small fishing tug, had covered enough of the intervening distance so that they were at last sure they had been seen.
Instinctively the girls tidied up their mops of blonde hair and patted smooth the frayed silk of their panties and bandeaux. Their faces were glowing with joy, and they kept jumping upon the cabin for a look and then running around like children.
Tuffy peered at the oncoming boat and felt sad about it. Of course he knew why. But he didn’t like to admit that the idea of his little harem had made such an impression on him. It was sorta hopeless now.
As the fishing tug drew close, Tuffy looked with some misgivings at the rascally crew of six or seven Mexicans who were lined up at the tug’s side. The man were swarthy and looked like movie villains. But worst of all were the broad grins that covered their ugly faces as they leered at the three almost nude girls on the scow.
“Any of you speak English?” Tuffy hailed the tug.
“I do,” was the answer from the man at the wheel, a huge, filthy-looking rascal, even bigger in body than Tuffy himself.
“Will you take us to San Diego?” Tuffy cried. “We’ll pay you well for it.”
“Si, si.” The man broke into a still wider grin as his black eyes went avidly from one girl to the next.
The girls turned and looked at Tuffy, “Well, girls,” he said to them, “here’s a hitch-hike you can’t walk back from. Want to take a chance with those mugs?”
“We may not get another chance,” Mai insisted, “and I’m hungry enough to eat those guys if they get fresh
.”
“Aw, come on, girls,” Honey declared. “I’ve yet to meet the man I can’t handle. These guys are too dumb to be dangerous.”
Tuffy took another look at the tug and kept his own opinion on that score. “All right, girls,” he said with finality. “Let’s get our lifeboat launched. They don’t seem to want to come after us. We’ll have to go to them.”
Soon they were next to the tug and dirty Mexican hands were lifting the three blonde girls to the deck. Tuffy went at once to the man at the wheel.
“You, the captain of this boat?” he asked the man.
“Cap’n and owner,” the other replied proudly. “But how does thees thing happen, you and thees girls on the old scow?”
Tuffy gave a brief summary of their experience. It was evident the Mexican captain didn’t believe a word of it.
“The fishing ees very bad—until now,” the fellow added as he took a look over his shoulder at the three girls standing in the midst of his leering crew. “Lovely girls,” he averred as he winked at Tuffy.
“You’ll get a damned good reward for saving us when we get to San Diego,” Tuffy stated, trying to divert the fellow’s thoughts away from the girls.
“Si—” the captain grinned suggestively. “—when we get to San Diego.”
Tuffy turned to go back to the girls. The captain stopped him.
“What ees your name?”
“Scott.”
“You like thees girls, no?”
“I’m taking care of them, if that’s what you mean,” Tuffy replied.
“Ees not one woman enough for you?” the captain grinned.
Tuffy looked straight back into the Mexican’s pig-like eyes. He read cruelty there, and worse… None of the dangers they had faced so far equaled this Mexican tug boat captain, Tuffy felt.
A shrill scream rent the air!
Tuffy turned. One of the men had grabbed Mai and was pulling her through the entrance into the tug’s small cabin.
With a half dozen leaps Tuffy pushed aside others of the crew and had the fellow by the neck. Mai pulled herself free and ran back to Zoe and Honey who were huddling together in terror.
The Spicy-Adventure Page 23
