Hot Cargo by G.H. Otis

Author:G.H. Otis [Otis, G. H.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4405-4122-3
Publisher: F+W Media
Published: 2012-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

I SAT DOWN right in the middle of a group of the passedout warriors and started to eat.

The aroma of the coffee and the click of silver against plates woke one or two of them up, and they sat there rubbing their eyes and yawning.

I ate with as much gusto as I could muster, and pretty soon they got the idea all by themselves and went up to chow.

One oldtimer woke up and looked at me with disgust. “Never did think you was a real sailor,” he said. “Too young.” He fumbled around until he found his bottle, took a healthy swig, belched, and went back to sleep.

But pretty soon I had most of them on their feet and going after dinner. Those that came to had a chance of surviving if we sank or caught fire later tonight. The others would die in their sleep.

I hadn’t finished my own chow when one of Ringle’s boys came down from the monkey island and stood in front of me, but just out of reach. He kept one hand on the butt of his forty-five.

“Let’s go,” he said.

Now I’m very easy going. A guy my size has to be or he gets accused of being a bully. But I hadn’t slept much, and I was cross and irritable.

“Are you asking me or telling me?” I said.

He decided that he would play tough. I don’t look big sitting down; besides, he had that forty-five.

“I’m telling you,” he bluffed.

He wasn’t very good, that man, because he tried to duck the coffee cup when I threw it. He should have taken the coffee in the face and shot me instead.

I threw the plate next, then got up and gave him a left jab to get my weight set and let go with a short hooking right. He left the deck a couple of feet and bounced on his head when he came down.

And there he lay out cold with that revolver half out of the holster and no one to stop me from picking it up.

Could I use a gun?

Sure, it would be like having a flit gun in a school of sharks. Maybe I could get as far as Ringle with it, or even Ringle and Croup, but what good would it do? I would be dead, and our cargo, the ship, and the men would still wind up where they were going, with one of Ringle’s men in charge.

I pushed the forty-five back into the holster with my foot, so that the boys on the bridge wouldn’t think I was getting ideas and cut loose at me. Then I leaned over and picked the sailor up and put him on my shoulder and went up the ladder to the monkey island.

Croup was in his cabin, and I dumped the sailor at his feet. “Did you send for me?” I asked.

“You goddamned clown,” said Croup.

“You want to go for a ride, too?”

“Take one step toward me and I’ll put six holes in you before you take the second.

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