Chapter XXX: Through Sunda Strait

Laden deep with tea and silk, we dropped down the Chu-Kiang, past Macao and the Ladrone Islands, and out through the Great West Channel. Since the northeast monsoon now had set in and the winds were constant, we soon passed the tide-rips of St. Esprit, and sighting only a few small islands covered with brush and mangroves, where the seas broke in long lines of silver under an occasional cocoanut palm, we left astern in due time the treacherous water of the Paracel Reefs.

Each day was much like every other until we had put the China Sea behind us. We touched at the mouth of the Saigon, but found no promise of trade, and weighed anchor again with the intention of visiting Singapore. Among other curious things, we saw a number of pink porpoises and some that were mottled pink and white and brown. Porpoises not infrequently are spotted by disease; but those that we saw appeared to be in excellent health, and although we remarked on their odd appearance, we believed their strange colors to be entirely natural. A fleet of galleys, too, which we saw in the offing, helped break the monotony of our life. There must have been fifty of them, with flags a-flutter and arms bristling. Although we did not approach them near enough to learn more about them, it seemed probable that they were conveying some great mandarin or chief on affairs of state.

"That man Blodgett is telling stories of one kind or another," Mr. Cledd remarked one afternoon, after watching a little group that had gathered by the forecastle-hatch during the first dog-watch. "The fortuneteller fellow, too, Benson, is stirring up the men."

As I looked across the water at the small island of palms where the waves were rolling with a sullen roar, which carried far on the evening air, I saw a native boat lying off the land, and dimly through the mists I saw the sail of an old junk. I watched the junk uneasily. Small wonder that the men were apprehensive, I thought.

After leaving Singapore, we passed the familiar shores of eastern Sumatra, Banka Island and Banka Strait, and the mouths of the Palambang, but in an inverted order, which made them seem as strange as if we never before had sighted them. Then one night, heading west against the tide, we anchored in a rolling swell, with Kodang Island to the northeast and Sindo Island to the north. On the one hand were the Zutphen Islands; on the other was Hog Point; and almost abeam of us the Sumatran coast rose to the steep bluff that across some miles of sea faces the Java shore. We lay in Sunda Strait.

I came on deck after a while and saw the men stirring about.

"They're uneasy," said Mr. Cledd.

"I'm not surprised," I replied.

The trees on the high summit of the island off which we lay were silhouetted clearly against the sky. What spying eyes might not look down upon us from those wooded heights? What lawless craft might not lurk beyond its abrupt headlands?

"No, I don't wonder, either," said Mr. Cledd, thoughtfully.

At daybreak we again weighed anchor and set sail. Three or four times a far-away vessel set my heart leaping, but each in turn passed and we saw it no more. A score of native proas manoeuvring at a distance singly or by twos caused Roger to call up the watch and prepare for any eventuality; but they vanished as silently as they had appeared. At nightfall we once more hove to, having made but little progress, and lay at anchor until dawn.

In the darkness that night the cook came up to me in the waist whither I had wandered, unable to sleep. "Mistah Lathrop," he muttered, "Ah don't like dis yeh nosing and prying roun' islands whar a ship's got to lay up all night jes' like an ol' hen with a mess of chickens."

We watched phosphorescent waves play around the anchor cable. The spell of uneasiness weighed heavily on us both.

The next evening, still beating our way against adverse winds, we rounded Java Head, which seemed so low by moonlight that I scarcely could believe it was the famous promontory beyond which lay the open sea. I went to my stateroom, expecting once again to sleep soundly all night long. Certainly it seemed now that all our troubles must be over. Yet I could not compose myself. After a time I came on deck, and found topsails and royals set and Mr. Cledd in command.

"All goes well, Mr. Lathrop," he said with a smile, "but that darky cook seems not to believe it. He's prowling about like an old owl."

"Which is he?" I asked; for several of the men were pacing the deck and at the moment I could not distinguish between them.

"They do seem to be astir. That nearest man walks like Blodgett. Has the negro scared them all?"

When, just after Mr. Cledd had spoken, Blodgett came aft, we were surprised; but he approached us with an air of suppressed excitement, which averted any reprimand Mr. Cledd may have had in mind.

"If you please, sir," he said, "there's a sail to windward."

"To windward? You're mistaken. You ought to call out if you see a sail, but it's just as well you didn't this time."

Mr. Cledd turned his back on Blodgett after looking hard up the wind.

"If you please, sir, I've got good eyes." Blodgett's manner was such that no one could be seriously offended by his persistence.

"My eyes are good, too," Mr. Cledd replied rather sharply. "I see no sail."

Nor did I.

Blodgett leaned on the rail and stared into the darkness like a cat. "If you please, sir," he said, "I beg your pardon, but I _can_ see a sail."

Now, for the first time I thought that I myself saw something moving. "I see a bank of fog blowing westward," I remarked, "but I don't think it's a sail."

After a moment, Mr. Cledd spoke up frankly. "I'll take back what I've just said. I see it too. It's only a junk, but I suppose we'd better call the captain."

"Only a junk!" Blodgett repeated sharply. "When last we saw 'em, a junk was all they had."

"What's that?" Mr. Cledd demanded.

"Ay, ay, sir, they was sailing away in a junk, sir."

Mr. Cledd stepped to the companionway. "Captain Hamlin," he called.

The junk was running free when we first sighted her, but just as she was passing astern of us, she began to come slowly about. I could see a great number of men swaying in unison against the helm that controlled the gigantic rudder. Others were bracing the curious old sails.

"I wish she were near enough for us to watch them handle the sails on the after masts," I said.

She had a pair of mizzen-masts, one on the larboard side, one on the starboard, and I was puzzled to know how they were used.

"She'll pass close aboard on this next tack," Mr. Cledd replied. "I think we'll be able to see." He had paused to watch her manoeuvres.

"Here's the doctor," Blodgett murmured.

Black Frank was coming aft with a quick humpy walk. "'Scuse me, sah, 'scuse me!" he said. "But I's skeered that we--"

Mr. Cledd now had gone to the companion. "Captain Hamlin," he called again, "there's a junk passing close aboard."

I heard Roger's step on the companion-way. It later transpired that he had not heard the first summons.

"Mah golly! Look dah!" the cook exclaimed.

The junk was looming up dangerously.

Mr. Cledd caught my arm. "Run forward quick--quick--call up all hands," he cried. Then raising the trumpet, "Half a dozen of you men loose the cannon."

Leaping to the spar deck, I ran to do his bidding, for the junk now was bearing swiftly down upon us. On my way to the forecastle-hatch I noted the stacked pikes and loaded muskets by the mainmast, and picked out the most likely cover from which to fire on possible boarders. That my voice was shaking with excitement, I did not realize until I had sent my summons trembling down into the darkness.

I heard the men leaping from their bunks; I heard Roger giving sharp commands from the quarter-deck; I heard voices on the junk. By accident or by malice, she inevitably was going to collide with the Island Princess. As we came up into the wind with sails a-shiver, I scurried back to the stack of muskets.

Neddie Benson was puffing away just behind me. "I didn't ought to 'ave come," he moaned. "I had my warning. Oh, it serves me right--I might 'a' married the lady."

"Bah, that's no way for a _man_ to talk," cried Davie Paine.

It all was so unreal that I felt as if I were looking at a picture. It did not seem as if it could be Ben Lathrop who was standing shoulder to shoulder with Neddie Benson and old Davie. There was running and calling on all sides and aloft. Blocks were creaking as the men hauled at braces and halyards; and when the ship rolled I saw that the men on the yard-arms were shaking the courses from the gaskets. Although our crew was really too small to work the ship and fight at the same time, it was evident that Roger intended so far as possible to do both.

But meanwhile the junk had worn ship and she still held her position to windward. Suddenly there came from her deck the flash of a musket and a loud report. Then another and another. Then Roger's voice sounded sharply above the sudden clamor and our own long gun replied.

Flame from its muzzle burst in the faces of the men at the bow of the junk, and the ball, mainly by chance, I suppose, hit her foremast and brought down mast and sail. Then the junk came about and bumped into us abreast, with a terrific crash that stove in the larboard bulwark and showered us with fragments of carved and gilded wood broken from her towering bow.