"Ye'd talk in hell, youngster, wouldn't ye?" he said. "No old Wong Ho stays here. That was the Big Boss."
They were moving across the courtyard, obedient to Murphy's command. The guard of Chinamen had closed around them.
"But, say," asked Frank, "will they carry that thing through the streets?"
"Shut up," growled Murphy, "an' do what you're told. Here we are. Now in with you."
They had emerged upon the dimly lighted street of Chinatown whence they had approached the courtyard trap under the impression they were being taken to a Joss House. Not a shuffling sandal slithered up or down the block. All was deserted as a graveyard. There was a reason. Guards at either end of the block, unostentatiously loitering on the sidewalk, had dropped a word, and in that quarter it was sufficient. No whites happened to be passing, and as for the Chinamen they scurried away without looking back.
"In with you," repeated Murphy, pushing the boys and Mr. Temple into a taxicab with blinds drawn, which stood at the curb. It was the same in which they had approached Chinatown, although they did not realize that fact.
A motor van stood behind. The palanquin had been placed in it with the ends of the supporting poles resting in leather thongs dependent from the sides. This was calculated to break any shocks of the passage to the pain-wracked form of "Black George."
Murphy swung in with his prisoners, as did one of the Chinese guards.
The taxi started downhill. Behind lumbered the van.
CHAPTER X
CARRIED CAPTIVE TO SEA
"What did you say your name is, Mister Enemy?" questioned Bob of Murphy who sat next to him.
"Murphy'll do," grunted the other. "Matt Murphy."
"Well, Mr. Matt Murphy, you don't mind if I talk a little, do you? It relieves my feelings."
"Talk all ye please," said Murphy, "so long as I hear ye. But don't shout. An' don't try any funny business, because ye have no weapons, none of ye, while I an' my little Chinee friend have 'em to spare."
"Then," said Frank, impudently, "why don't you spare us some, and make matters more even?"
"Gwan wid ye," said Murphy, secretly amused at the boy's daring. "None o' yer lip."
Frank was not speaking thus without cause or merely from folly. He cherished the hope that perhaps their two captors could be thrown off guard and overpowered, whereupon they could proceed to overawe the taxi driver outside. But he quickly realized Matt Murphy was on the alert, while the Chinaman, whose head showed in the little light coming in from the front window, undoubtedly also was ready to cope with any attack. It was difficult for Frank to realize that in a great city they could thus be carried away captive. Yet he was forced to admit to himself that such was the case. A similar realization of the hopelessness of their position, had he only known it, was being borne in on his companions, too.
If he alone were in danger, thought Frank, he would shout for help, attack his captors, and run the risk of being shot or stabbed. But when he thought that such an attempt to gain freedom might result in Bob or Jack or Mr. Temple being killed, he shuddered, and could not bring himself to make the attempt. Similar considerations restrained each of the others.
All this time the auto had been making good progress, although the boys from their sketchy knowledge of San Francisco's topography were unable to make any surmise as to the direction in which they were being driven.
They had climbed and descended several hills and were now on a stretch of level going which, however, was rutted and uneven and far from smooth.
Abruptly the auto was brought to a stop. The chauffeur tapped on the window in front. All but a small oval of the partition was boarded up, and the Chinaman's head obscured that. At the signal, Murphy reached for the door, but the chauffeur was ahead of him and opened it from the outside.
"Here we are," said Murphy. "Climb out."
Mr. Temple and the boys descended, the Chinaman bringing up the rear.
The motor van drew up behind them at almost the same moment, its rear doors were swung open and the palanquin was thrust out and lowered to the shoulders of its former bearers.
They stood in a lonely spot on the northern shore of the peninsula where San Francisco is built. The nearest habitations were rusty ship chandleries and homes of Italian fishermen on a ragged street some distance in the rear. A suspended street lamp, swinging in the wind, cast strange shadows over the rough frame structures as the boys looked back. Not far away rose Telegraph Hill, with other lights starring it in irregular pattern.
About them were scattered odds and ends of the waterfront, broken oars, tarry barrels and even the skeleton of a long boat from which the boards had been ripped away, exposing the curved ribs half buried in the sand.
Ahead and not far distant lay an unroofed wharf with a steam craft of considerable size beside it. Toward this the palanquin was borne, and up a gangplank to the deck of the boat. Beyond the bow of the craft, pointing into the stream, showed the dark waters of the Straits, with the wooded and mountainous Marin County shore opposite, and the lights of Sausalito shining in the distance.
A last desperate hope of escape was in each boy's mind as they glanced anxiously about. But the surroundings were not prepossessing. Who was there to hear a cry for help in those desolate surroundings? Who to lend a helping hand? No, it would be folly to make a dash for freedom now.
Especially, inasmuch as not only did they have Matt Murphy, his Chinese satellite and the chauffeur to reckon with, but also a half-dozen others indistinguishable in the gloom, who stood a little to one side, prepared to deal with them if necessary.
Obedient, therefore, to Murphy's command, they followed toward the vessel, trod the loose boards of the wharf with lagging feet, passed up the gangplank beneath the light and stepped aboard. Not giving them any time for looking about, Murphy immediately led the way to a small salon from which opened a number of cabins. Mr. Temple and Bob were given one, Frank and Jack another. Their bags from the Palace Hotel already were in the rooms, and on a bunk Mr. Temple found a small heap of silver and bills with a brief note of explanation that this constituted change from his check. A receipted bill was with the money.
"This looks bad, boys," said he, pocketing the money. "This scoundrel Folwell evidently has a tremendously effective organization. The way in which we were brought here, this steam trawler-for such I take her to be, and that means a ship that can weather heavy storms, the expedition with which our belongings were brought from the hotel, even the careful accounting for my money-all these give convincing proof that it is no common desperado with whom we have to deal."
Frank yawned. They were all gathered in the little cabin assigned Mr.
Temple and Bob.
"Ho, ho," said Frank, stretching, "I'm sleepy."
The older man regarded him enviously.
"I wish I could feel like that," he said.
"Well, I don't see anything much to worry about," said Frank. "We're going on a sea voyage, and I love the sea. We are on what practically amounts to a pirate ship, and pirates always have fascinated me. We don't know where we're going, but I'll bet it's to the smugglers' cove.
And we don't know what dark and dreadful fate is being reserved for us, but we can cross that bridge when we come to it."
"For my part," he added, lowering his voice, "I'll bet that before he's through with us Mr. 'Black George' Folwell will wish he had let us alone. Such trusty adventurers as Bob and Jack here, to say nothing of myself-notice my modesty-are liable to take his ship away from him before we're through with this business."
Jack clapped him on the back, and Bob roughed his hair.
"Attaboy."
"That's the idea."
Frank merely had given an expression to their own sentiments.
"If we only had a weapon or two," mourned Jack.
Mr. Temple, with an exclamation, reached for his bag. Then he groaned dismally.
"No use."
"What's the matter, Dad?" asked Bob.
"Oh, Jack made me think of an automatic which I carried in my bag. But you see the bag's open. These fellows foresaw the possibility of their containing weapons and probably have gone through them all."
"Let's have a look, anyhow," said Bob, starting to rummage. He was unsuccessful. The revolver had been taken from the receptacle.
"Oh, well," said Jack, "we'll have to keep our eyes open and our wits about us, that's all. In a shipload of armed men, it would be strange if we couldn't come by a weapon somehow."