The Queen of the Pirate Isle | Page 4

billows, and, from two o'clock until four, passed six weeks on the island, supported only by a piece of candle, a box of matches, and two peppermint lozenges. It was at this time that it became necessary to account for Polly's existence among them, and this was only effected by an alarming sacrifice of their morality; Hickory and Wan Lee instantly became PIRATES, and at once elected Polly as their Queen. The royal duties, which seemed to be purely maternal, consisted in putting the Pirates to bed after a day of rapine and bloodshed, and in feeding them with licorice water through a quill in a small bottle. Limited as her functions were, Polly performed them with inimitable gravity and unquestioned sincerity. Even when her companions sometimes hesitated from actual hunger or fatigue and forgot their guilty part, she never faltered. It was her real existence; her other life of being washed, dressed, and put to bed at certain hours by her mother was the ILLUSION.
Doubt and skepticism came at last,--and came from Wan Lee! Wan Lee of all creatures! Wan Lee, whose silent, stolid, mechanical performance of a pirate's duties--a perfect imitation like all his household work--had been their one delight and fascination!
It was just after the exciting capture of a merchantman, with the indiscriminate slaughter of all on board,--a spectacle on which the round blue eyes of the plump Polly had gazed with royal and maternal tolerance,--and they were burying the booty, two tablespoons and a thimble, in the corner of the closet, when Wan Lee stolidly rose.
"Melican boy pleenty foolee! Melican boy no Pilat!" said the little Chinaman, substituting "l's" for "r's" after his usual fashion.
"Wotcher say?" said Hickory, reddening with sudden confusion.
"Melican boy's papa heap lickee him--s'pose him leal Pilat," continued Wan Lee doggedly. "Melican boy Pilat INSIDE housee. Chinee boy Pilat OUTSIDE housee. First chop Pilat."
Staggered by this humiliating statement, Hickory recovered himself in character. "Ah! Ho!" he shrieked, dancing wildly on one leg, "Mutiny and Splordinashun! 'Way with him to the yard-arm."
"Yald-alm--heap foolee! Alee same clothes-horse for washee washee."
It was here necessary for the Pirate Queen to assert her authority, which, as I have before stated, was somewhat confusingly maternal.
"Go to bed instantly without your supper," she said seriously. "Really, I never saw such bad pirates. Say your prayers, and see that you're up early to church tomorrow."
It should be explained that in deference to Polly's proficiency as a preacher, and probably as a relief to their uneasy consciences, Divine Service had always been held on the Island. But Wan Lee continued:--
"Me no shabbee Pilat INSIDE housee; me shabbee Pilat OUTSIDE housee. S'pose you lun away longside Chinee boy--Chinee boy make you Pilat."
Hickory softly scratched his leg; while a broad, bashful smile almost closed his small eyes. "Wot?" he asked.
"Mebbe you too flightened to lun away. Melican boy's papa heap lickee."
This last infamous suggestion fired the corsair's blood. "Dy'ar think we daresen't?" said Hickory desperately, but with an uneasy glance at Polly. "I'll show yer to-morrow."
The entrance of Polly's mother at this moment put an end to Polly's authority and dispersed the pirate band, but left Wan Lee's proposal and Hickory's rash acceptance ringing in the ears of the Pirate Queen. That evening she was unusually silent. She would have taken Bridget, her nurse, into her confidence, but this would have involved a long explanation of her own feelings, from which, like all imaginative children, she shrank. She, however, made preparation for the proposed flight by settling in her mind which of her two dolls she would take. A wooden creature with easy-going knees and movable hair seemed to be more fit for hard service and any indiscriminate scalping that might turn up hereafter. At supper, she timidly asked a question of Bridget. "Did ye ever hear the loikes uv that, ma'am?" said the Irish handmaid with affectionate pride. "Shure the darlint's head is filled noight and day with ancient history. She's after asking me now if Queens ever run away!" To Polly's remorseful confusion here her good father, equally proud of her precocious interest and his own knowledge, at once interfered with an unintelligible account of the abdication of various queens in history until Polly's head ached again. Well meant as it was, it only settled in the child's mind that she must keep the awful secret to herself and that no one could understand her.
The eventful day dawned without any unusual sign of importance. It was one of the cloudless summer days of the Californian foothills, bright, dry, and, as the morning advanced, hot in the white sunshine. The actual, prosaic house in which the Pirates apparently lived was a mile from a mining settlement on a beautiful ridge of pine woods sloping gently towards a valley on the one side, and