Peter Duck

by Arthur Ransome

  Captain Flint opened his mouth to speak, but said nothing. Peter Duck went on.

  “My three daughters grow up, proper young clippers like their mother, and folk was beginning to leave me alone about that scrap of paper that I wished I’d lost off Ushant all them years before, and then Black Jake come along. My old wife she was dead then, and I was away from the sea, sailing my wherry between Norwich and Lowestoft, me and my three daughters. Knitting needles and quants2 was all the same to them. They was good at both. It was a pretty sight to see them taking that old boat upstream against the wind by themselves with me sitting on the hatch, smoking my pipe and drinking my pot like any admiral.

  “Well, Black Jake come along with his long hair and them ear-rings of his, and always plenty of money in his pockets that nobody knows how he come by. He’d heard that yarn in the taverns in Lowestoft and he waited his chance to get at me. I could never be quit of him. No matter where I tied up, there he’d be, and talking always of the one thing. Nothing else would suit him. I must draw him a picture of that island, a chart, to show him just where my tree was and where I see that bag buried, and then I must give him the sailing directions to find the island and he would be off there to make my fortune as well as his own. You’ve seen Black Jake. He don’t look the sort of man it’s safe to share a fortune with, now does he? And I wasn’t wanting a fortune anyway. Well, naturally, I wouldn’t tell him nothing at all.

  “And then he tried to marry my daughters, thinking he’d get one of them to wheedle what he wanted out of me. He had a try at one and then at another. But my daughters has more sense than to be marrying Black Jakes, and they married farmers, one at Beccles, one at Acle, and one at Potter Heigham. And that’s just right for me. Gives me three ports of call, where I can tie up my old wherry, and have a pipe by the fireside.”

  “And which of them do you like the best?” asked Roger.

  “Depends which way the wind is,” said Peter Duck. “A south wind takes me up the Thurne River, and then I always think most of Rose, that’s the gal that lives at Potter Heigham. An east wind blows fair for Beccles, and my daughter there has a good little farm and a sheltered mooring just above the bridge. And if there comes on a south wind while I’m there, or a north wind while I’m at Potter Heigham, why it’s a right wind for Acle, and when it comes so, why, I just naturally think that Annie’s the best of the lot and I take my chance of the tide to go and have a look at her.”

  “I see,” said Roger, and he really did a little later when Peggy had explained it to him.

  “But their marrying didn’t stop him,” said Peter Duck. “When he knew he couldn’t get what he wanted that way, Black Jake started hanging round my wherry whenever he come home from sea. Again and again I found my cabin rummaged when I’d been ashore. And in the end I found that bit of paper sewed up in the square of old pea-jacket was missing. Missing it was, that bit of cloth with the paper with them figures on it sewed up inside. I searched for it high and low, not but what I knew them figures. It wasn’t that. But I didn’t like letting Black Jake get it after all. And the next thing I hear was that Black Jake was missing and two others with him. That was the first time I’d had a kind thought for them crabs. I knowed where he’d gone, of course, and I hoped they’d make a meal of him.

  “Best part of a year he was gone, and I’d begun to hope we’d seen the last of him, when he come back alone, and I knowed he’d found nothing. How could he, without he’d dug the whole island. Them two that went with him died of fever, he said, and as they was the same sort as himself nobody minded. He come back raging mad, worse than before. For Lowestoft folk knew how I’d missed that square of old pea-jacket, and what was in it, and they knew the old yarn, and there wasn’t a boy that met Black Jake in the street, and had a door handy to bolt into, that didn’t ask him how much treasure them crabs had left him. Raging mad he was, and folk did tell me I should keep a watch for flying knives at night. But ever since then he could never see me down at the harbour without thinking I was shipping foreign to go to the island, and he’s sworn that what I wouldn’t tell him I should tell no man else … Five year ago it is now since he come back, and these last four months he’s been fitting out the Viper for sea, and some rare bad lots he’s taking with him. He’s likely going to have another look. And then when he see me come aboard here, shipping along with you …”

  “That was why he was spying round in the dark,” said Captain Flint. He laughed aloud. “And I told that red-haired boy we were carrying three captains and a couple of mates. That was why he hurried out after us, and turned sharp round and came in again when he met us in the harbour mouth.”

  “He thinks you’re bound for Crab Island sure enough,” said Peter Duck.

  Captain Flint for a moment seemed hardly to see Peter Duck or the others, crowded together in the little deckhouse. Sitting on the edge of the chart-table, his head bent under the roof, he was seeing things very far away. “It stands to reason,” he said at last, “there’s something in that bag, and if no one’s been there and picked it up, it’s the safest, surest thing in buried treasure that ever I heard of. I crossed the Andes, travelling day and night, on much less of a hint than that.”

  The old sailor looked up at Captain Flint, leaning forward to look at him without being dazzled by the lantern.

  “I don’t care who digs up that bag so long as Black Jake don’t,” he said. “But whatever it is it’s best let lie. You don’t want it, not with a tidy little schooner like this fit to take you anywheres. I don’t want it, not with my old wherry that’ll last my time and a bit more.”

  Captain Flint looked away, and tapped the tobacco out of his pipe.

  “I can’t help thinking it’s wasted on those crabs,” he said. “I don’t wonder Black Jake wants to go and have a look for it.”

  “He don’t want to go looking for it,” said Peter Duck. “He wants to walk straight to it on that island, and pick it up. He can’t do that without me. He’ll stick at nothing, will Black Jake. You’ve seen enough to know that. And if you want to have no more trouble, you’d best put me ashore and get another able-seaman for your trip down Channel, and you’ll find Black Jake won’t be bothering you at all.”

  “No, no! Oh, I say! What!” There was a sudden startled chorus of protest. Captain Flint hit the top of his head on a beam under the deckhouse roof. He took no notice of the bump but spoke at once.

  “I thought you said you wanted another voyage?”

  “And so I do,” said Peter Duck.

  “And the ship and the crew suit you?”

  “Couldn’t ask for better.”

  “Then stow this talk of leaving us. If we suit you, you suit us. And if you think I’m the sort to leave you ashore because of a scowling, crook-eyed son of a sea-cook with a fancy for gold ear-rings, you’re mistaken.”

  “That’s the stuff, Captain Flint,” said Nancy delightedly.

  “Of course you mustn’t go,” said Roger.

  “Mr Duck!” said Titty.

  “We’ll sail tomorrow, Mr Duck,” said Captain Flint, “and if your Black Jake is fool enough to follow us, we’ll lead him a bit of a dance.”

  “He’ll follow, sure enough,” said Peter Duck.

  “Let him,” said Captain Flint. “Anyway, we’ll sail. And you’ll sail with us. Below decks, you others! Below decks and into your bunks and sharp about it. We’re sailing first thing.”

  “But what about the anchor?” asked John.

  “It’ll be clean enough by now,” said Peter Duck.

  “Man the capstan then,” said Captain Flint. “Man the capstan and heave it up, and then below decks without waiting another minute.”

  He took the lantern, and the whole ship’s company went forward along the dark deck. There was silence in the harbour. They peered across at the Viper, but all was dark where she lay. The capstan bars were ranged handy along the bulwarks, and in a minute the Swallows and Amazons, all six of them, had fitted their bars into the slots in t
he capstan head, and, walking steadily round and round, were walking the anchor up as if it were a feather. It is astonishing what six people, even small ones, can lift with a capstan, all working together.

  Captain Flint flashed a pocket torch over the side. The anchor had come up clean. The dinghy’s painter must have slipped off it before.

  There was a sudden squawk of annoyance in the darkness.

  “I’d forgotten all about him,” said Titty, rather ashamed.

  The parrot had fallen asleep, perched on the bulwarks, and was not pleased to be waked. Titty picked him up and took him down with her into the saloon and put him into his cage for the night. Roger was nearly as sleepy as the parrot. But the others were for some time too full of talk to sleep. They undressed, talking. And, when they were in their bunks, they talked still from one cabin to another. Treasure. Black Jake. Crabs. Peter Duck. That red-haired boy who was sailing with Black Jake. They had enough to talk about.

  And then, long after they had stopped getting answers from each other when they spoke, long after they had stopped talking and fallen asleep, they woke again, listening to steps going to and fro overhead, along the Wild Cat’s decks.

  “It’s Mr Duck,” said Susan quietly.

  “Yes,” said Titty. “It was Captain Flint before. I heard him tapping his pipe.”

  “They must think Black Jake may come again in the night,” said John.

  “Keeping watch,” said Titty.

  “Who?” A voice came now from the Amazons’ cabin.

  “Mr Duck and Captain Flint,” whispered Susan. “Listen.”

  “Let’s all go up and help,” said Nancy.

  “No, no,” said Peggy. “Stop here.”

  “What’s happening now?” This was Roger’s squeak in the dark.

  “Nothing. Go to sleep,” said Susan. “We all ought to,” she added. “If they want help they’ll thump on the deck for us, or call down through the skylight.”

  They slept again.

  But all night long, watch and watch about, Captain Flint and Peter Duck walked up and down above their sleeping crew.

  1 Not to be confounded with the much larger Crab Island east of Porto Rico.

  2 A quant is long pole for poling (“quanting”) a wherry along when there is no wind to help her or where the channel is too narrow for sailing against the wind.

  CHAPTER VII

  OUTWARD BOUND

  “HULLO! WHAT’S HAPPENING?” Nancy was the first to wake as a heavy warp slapped on the deck above her head.

  “My engine’s going,” said Roger half-asleep. He woke, feeling the throbbing of the hull and hearing the chug, chug, chug of the little engine that already he looked on as his own, rolled out of his bunk, reached up to tug at John, and then, in his pyjamas, ran out of the cabin, through the saloon, and wriggled round the companion stairs.

  “She’s moving,” said Titty.

  “Keep your head out of the way. I’m coming down,” said Susan.

  “Listen.” John, sitting up in his bunk, called out from his cabin. “There’s a headsail flapping.”

  That noise stopped and there was a sharp creak and the groan of blocks.

  “That’s the boom going over,” called Nancy.

  “She’s slanting the other way,” said Peggy.

  “Heeling, you mean,” said Nancy. “Yes, she is.”

  “They must have got the sails up without us,” said Titty.

  “Somebody’s started my engine,” said Roger indignantly, coming back after having a look at it.

  There was a general rush and scramble below decks. John, Susan and Roger came up on deck through the companion out of the saloon. Nancy, Peggy, and Titty came up the ladder out of the forehatch. They came on deck in the summer morning, to find sunshine and a strong north-easterly breeze clearing away the light morning mist. The Wild Cat, with her engine running in case of trouble, was tacking out of harbour under jib and mainsail.

  “Why did you start without us?” said Roger. “Who’s engineer?”

  “You are,” said Captain Flint, “and in another minute or two you can stop her. But keep out of the way now. Stand by to go about, Mr Duck.”

  “Aye, aye, sir.”

  Captain Flint spun the wheel, and the Wild Cat swung round, while Peter Duck let fly the port jib sheets.

  “Smart enough,” he said, finding Nancy all ready to haul in on the other side as the sail blew across.

  “Well, but why did you start without us?” said Nancy.

  “Ask the skipper,” said Peter Duck. “But you ain’t got left behind.”

  “We thought we’d take our chance of a little practice without you,” said Captain Flint. “Tide served. And it seemed a pity to waste any of this wind.”

  “We heard you walking up and down all night,” said Titty.

  “Ready to repel boarders,” said Nancy.

  “But that man didn’t come again,” said Peggy.

  “No. He didn’t,” said Captain Flint, glancing back over his shoulder towards the inner harbour. “And if he wants to come now, he’s too late. And now, you scallywags, what do you think our ship looks like with all of you slopping about in pyjamas all over the place? A floating dormitory. All pyjamas go below. Get dressed as quick as you can. We shall be in fairly quiet water going down the Pakefield, but after that we’ll probably catch it. Much more wind than yesterday.”

  “We must stay on deck just till we’re outside the harbour.”

  “Tally on to the foresail halyards then, and help Mr Duck.”

  “Smartly now, my hearties,” cried Nancy, as they ran forward to help Mr Duck hoist the foresail.

  “Slack away foresail sheet,” said Mr Duck, seeming almost to forget that the six Swallows and Amazons in their pyjamas were not some sort of native crew. “Handsomely now. Belay. Now then. You three on the throat. T’other three on the peak. Hoist away. Up she goes. Hoist away. Belay peak halyard. Haul away on the throat. Swig away there. Let me get a hold. So. Belay. Haul on the peak. Handsomely now. So. Belay. Slacken away topping lifts. Not that, Cap’n Nancy. That’s right. Coil down halyards. Haul in the sheet.…”

  As he spoke he hauled in the sheet himself, with John and Nancy tallying on to help him.

  “Staysail halyards!” he called, and Nancy and John flew forward again. In a very few moments the staysail was up and drawing.

  “A year or two of practice and you’ll be a goodish crew,” said Peter Duck.

  “Ready about!” came Captain Flint’s voice from the wheel.

  There was a bit of a bustle for a moment, letting go sheets and hauling in again on the lee side as the sails came over. Then all was quiet once more, and the crew gathered aft by the wheel where Roger and Titty were already, Titty watching the jetty slip by as the Wild Cat headed for the harbour mouth, and Roger hopping in and out of the deckhouse, waiting to be allowed to shut down the engine, or move the lever to full ahead, or do something else that really mattered in the engine line.

  “All right, Roger,” said Captain Flint. “Stop her!”

  The chug-chug of the little engine came to an end. Roger came on deck again.

  “The engine wants some more cleaning,” he said.

  “Job for you and Gibber,” said Captain Flint. “But get dressed and let’s have breakfast over first.”

  Roger was gone.

  “Hurry up, you others,” said Captain Flint. “We’re hungry. Besides, I want to be free to look at charts and things, and some of you will be wanted to take the wheel.”

  Nancy, John, Susan, and Peggy disappeared in a bunch.

  “What are you waiting for, Titty?”

  Titty was looking back at the harbour they were leaving. Far away there, beyond the swing bridge, in the inner basin, loose grey canvas was climbing up among tall masts and rigging.

  “The Viper’s hoisting her sails,” said Titty. “I do believe she’s coming after us.”

  Captain Flint glanced over his shoulder.

  “It may b
e some other vessel,” he said. “You can’t tell from here. What do you think, Mr Duck?”

  “Able-seaman’s right, sir, seems to me. Aye, they’re getting their sails up.” He took the telescope from the rack close inside the deckhouse, and looked through it towards the inner harbour. “Aye,” he said, “they’re setting their sails, sure enough. They’ve a halyard unrove, I reckon. I can see that young Bill up at the mast-head.”

  “Good luck to them,” said Captain Flint. “They can set them and welcome for all we care.”

  But Peter Duck kept the telescope to his eye, watching that fluttering grey canvas, until the Wild Cat was well outside the pier heads.

  “Skip along, Titty,” said Captain Flint, and Titty disappeared below, to change from pyjamas into something more fitting for an able-seaman to wear on a schooner bound down Channel.

  *

  Below decks things were very unsteady. Dressing was not so easy as it had been when the Wild Cat was tied to the quay. Slap. Slap. Bang. The waves hit the bows of the little green schooner in a cheerful, welcoming manner, as she came out of the sheltered harbour to meet them. There was a good deal more noise than there had been during the trial trip, and members of the crew, dressing in the cabins, looked at each other doubtfully. Then, suddenly there was a sharp change in the motion, and, as the Wild Cat heeled over on the starboard side, shoes, clothes, hairbrushes and human beings slid unexpectedly across the floor. Roger sat down. Captain John had forgotten that he was not in harbour, and had stood an enamelled mug of tooth water on the little shelf that served as a table. It went flying. John tried to save it, tripped over Roger, and fell head first into the lower bunk.