Hatched in a Mare’s Nest by S Read online

  All-Story Weekly, July 13, 1918

  WHEN the Seafoam came about in the hundred feet away, was the motor-boat shadow of Fort Taylor, Captain Bill Tibby,

  running under reduced speed.

  standing at the wheel, roared out a succession

  “Let ’em come, damn ’em, let ’em

  of tongue-twisting oaths in English and come!” Tibby chewed furiously on his quid Spanish. His execrations were directed at the and spat to windward, and bits of tobacco flew occupants of a motor-boat which had run up to back into his face. He rubbed his sleeve across within a hundred yards of the Seafoam while

  his eyes and gave vent to his wrath in more

  she was on the starboard tack, close hauled.

  hybrid profanity.

  When she started on that tack out at the edge of the gulf, the motor-boat was not in sight, There used to be a great demand for

  and had stolen up on the Sea-foam under her

  smuggled aguardiente in Key West, and lee.

  selling it for five or six times as much as it Tibby knew that aboard the motor-boat

  cost in Cuba caused many a man to cheat

  were customs officials, including Chief Uncle Sam out of duties due him. A drink or Inspector Wray, whose surveillance of the two of aguardiente, so the story goes, makes a Seafoam on her last few trips from Havana

  man more benevolently loquacious than a like had exasperated the captain.

  quantity of any other liquor. He not only

  “The first thing you know, Pab,” Tibby

  desires to be friendly with the world, but is yelled to his mate Pablo Rodriguez, a Cuban, anxious to take the world into his confidence.

  “he’ll be convoying us across the gulf.”

  Very few persons, though, except old-timers

  Tibby, an American, invariably spoke

  with “cured” gullets, make a practise of

  in Spanish to his mate, and the mate invariably drinking aguardiente “straight.” They drink a spoke in English to Tibby.

  concoction known as compuesto, with

  “Look like he’s no chance to put him

  aguardiente as the “stick.” A little water, over, cap.”

  prunes, mint-leaves, and rock-candy are the

  The “him” referred to the five-gallon,

  other ingredients.

  wicker-covered demijohns of aguardiente

  Tibby was looked upon generally in

  stored in the Seafoam’s hold.

  Key West as a smuggler of aguardiente, but The captain, the mate, two other he was very much like a man who is regarded seamen, and the dusky cook looked astern.

  as a town villain, though his town folk cannot There, in the Seafoam’s wake, less than a

  tell of anything wrong in particular he has

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  done; or like a man who is considered along the bay and gulf shores to determine something of a Hercules, though his town folk what were their chances to land aguardiente, cannot point to any specific feat of his and night after night they learned the same strength. It was merely a matter of reputation.

  thing: they were watched closely by customs

  It was even said that Tibby had remarked

  men. Wray had sworn that if Tibby had fifty

  braggingly to a crowd of spongers and demijohns of aguardiente aboard the fishermen that he had built his ninety-ton Seafoam, he would take them back to Havana schooner Seafoam out of money he had earned

  or be arrested if he attempted to get them

  in smuggling, but no sponger or fisherman

  ashore without paying duty.

  could be found who would admit he had heard

  Tibby fumed and swore until he was

  Tibby make the alleged remark.

  well-nigh desperate. He sought Rodriguez’s

  One reason why Wray followed the

  advice, and Rodriguez said:

  Seafoam closely was because he was

  “Let him stay ’board, cap, till we come

  determined not to give Tibby a chance to slip next trip, and then put him over by the tower demijohns overboard. That was one of a dozen in the night.”

  ways the smugglers got the liquor into Key

  “Go to the devil, chico! I’m going to West. The location of each demijohn was stick till I get square with that fellow Wray for marked with a green cork buoy, two or three

  mortifying me.” (Tibby had a larger Spanish

  inches square, tied to one end of a stout piece than English vocabulary, and mortificandome of twine, the other end of which was fastened came readily to him.)

  to a demijohn.

  “All right, cap; you the cap. I’m wees

  A few days after the ship had left on

  you till the hell he freeze over.”

  another trip, thus allaying suspicion among

  And then, while the cook and the two

  government officials, a confederate ashore, ordinary seamen slept, Tibby and Rodriguez who had been given a list of the points at

  discussed several schemes to get the better of which the demijohns were put overboard Wray and his men.

  (obtained in the same way a fisherman marks

  a drop: by objects on land, keys, buoys, et II.

  cetera), went out in a dingey, ostensibly to get stonecrabs and crawfish, and recovered the

  THE next afternoon, shortly before four

  demijohns.

  o’clock, a hack, with Pedro Rodriguez

  The other reason why Wray hung in

  lounging in the back seat, stopped in front of the Seafoam’s wake was because he had the custom-house. Rodriguez knew that the received a cablegram from Havana the inspectors left the building at that hour, and he afternoon before informing him that Tibby

  was anxious to have a talk with Wray.

  had sailed with more than fifty demijohns

  “Che-ef! Hey, che-ef!” Rodriguez

  aboard.

  called, as Wray walked down the broad stone

  The Seafoam beat up the harbor, tied

  steps.

  up at Curry’s wharf, and discharged a cargo of Wray scowled when he saw who had

  mangoes, bananas, sugar-apples, alligator called him. “What do you want?”

  pears, pine-apples, and other fruit. The next

  “He’s

  muy important, che-ef.”

  day Tibby slipped out into the channel and

  Wray started to walk away slowly.

  anchored to be relieved from paying wharfage,

  “Better you know him, che-ef. You get

  he declared, while he waited for a cargo of

  somebody wees the goods.”

  hides from Punta Rassa. Night after night for a Wray walked up to the hack. “What’s

  week he and members of his crew sculled

  it?”

  Hatched in a Mare’s Nest

  3

  “Flippey, you go set the steps one min-

  “That flashed through my mind. Mack,

  yute,” Rodriguez said to the driver. “The chethe instant he mentioned the towers; but we’ll ef and me’s got somesing muy important.”

  guard against that. I’ll let you and Tom keep a The driver did as he was requested, and sharp lockout along the bay front while we’re Rodriguez resumed: “Che-ef, I goine get hunk away. There may be something in what the

  wees the cap. We fuss and he says to hell wees Cube says. It was easy to see he had aboard a me. He’s goine bring aguardiente ashore to-load of aguardiente by the way he opened up night, and he say he damn eef I get my share to me, and I’m pretty sure he’s got it
in for of the mon. I no say nosing, for he get wise Tibby. Anyhow, if there isn’t something in

  and no do it, but he could no hear me sink, and what he said, he wouldn’t have agreed to go

  I sink so: All right, cap, bring aguardiente along with us after I threatened to lam’ him if ashore, and the che-ef he gets him and gets

  he monkeyed with us.”

  you too, for I no get no mon, I goine get hunk; I goine tell the che-ef.”

  Twenty minutes or so before ten

  “You’re drunk, Rodriguez. You don’t

  o’clock Rodriguez stopped in front of the

  know what you’re talking about.”

  customhouse in Flippey’s hack. Another hack

  “Yes, che-ef. I took couple compuesto,

  was drawn up at the curb, and Wray and two

  ’cause I mad ’cause the cap he goine do me

  other inspectors got into that vehicle. The

  dirt. I drink couple all the time I mad. It make drivers were told to go out to the County Road me sink plenty.” Rodriguez pressed his and turn in toward the beach, half a mile forefinger to his temple. “But I know good

  beyond the first tower.

  what I say, and I know I goine get hunk. You The hacks stopped where the woods

  could get the cap wees the goods to-night.”

  fringed the beach, on the gulf side of the

  “See here, Rodriguez, if you’re trying

  island, and the inspectors got out and sat in the to put anything over on me. I’ll kick you to sand near a clump of seven-year apple-trees.

  kingdom come.”

  Rodriguez remained in his hack.

  “You could kick me to mañana, che-

  The inspectors had waited more than

  ef, eef you no get the cap wees the goods.”

  an hour and had become so impatient they

  “Where?”

  were considering the expediency of giving

  “Tonight twelve ’clock the cap goine

  Rodriguez a ducking and returning to town,

  land ten garrajones between first and second when one of them espied two figures walking

  tower—”

  up the beach, fifty yards away.

  Wray eyed Rodriguez narrowly. “Will

  “Sh!”

  you go along with us?”

  The figures continued to go up the

  “Sure I go. I muy glad to go; I want the beach, now and then looking out to sea, until cap see I get hunk.”

  they were within a dozen paces of the

  “All

  right,

  Rodriguez. Meet us here at

  inspectors, when they turned about and

  ten, and, remember, the Cuban run for yours if strolled down the strand.

  you try to do any funny work.”

  “Tibby and his black cook,” Wray

  Wray returned to the custom-house whispered.

  and had a talk with some of his men about

  It was a moonless night with a clear

  what Rodriguez had said.

  sky, but had it been considerably darker, it

  “It seems to me, chief, his object is to

  would have been an easy matter to distinguish get all of us away from the bay front, so that Tibby and his cook. Tibby was squatty, his

  Tibby can get the stuff ashore without taking a body was almost perfectly round, in back as

  chance of being caught.”

  well as in front; and his stomach appeared to

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  reach up to his collarbone. A finger’s breadth and Mose.

  of neck connected his head, which, save for

  “Any trouble, Crim?”

  his hair, looked like a globe used in a class-

  “None

  ’tall,

  sir; dead quiet, sir.”

  room for instruction in geography, to his body.

  “Get ’em ashore. Mose, kick off your

  His legs were short, fat, and round, and

  brogans and give ’em a hand.”

  his pudgy hands and his feet, with their high The men put the demijohns together

  insteps, seemed to be trying to conform with high up on the beach.

  the rest of his person.

  “I told you it ’ud be easy, boys. Mose,

  Mose, the cook, looked as though he

  you go on out and see if the hack has

  had been built with a plane and square. He

  showed—”

  was as fiat as a twelve-inch plank, and not

  “Hands up!” The inspectors, revolvers

  many inches wider. His face, too, was flat. He in their hands, ran up to Tibby and his men.

  had long, dangling hands, and legs that were

  “Walk this way, one after the other,” Wray

  as thin and seemed as disproportionately long commanded.

  as the front legs of a giraffe. Tibby took two Tibby cursed his luck and cursed his

  or three steps to Mose’s one, and every now

  men. He cursed his two boatmen for not

  and then Tibby looked up into Mose’s face

  arriving before, and he cursed Mose for

  and asked: “See anything from up there, whistling too loudly.

  Mose?”

  “Dat wasn’t ma fault, cap, ’cause yer

  “Nuffin’,

  cap.”

  tole me ter do it.”

  “Damn it, I told ’em to be here afore

  “Shut up, you coon! If I had you out in

  twelve.”

  the middle of the gulf, I’d chuck you

  “Dey’s buckin’ de tide, cap.”

  overboard. And I’d chuck Crim and Jack after They walked up and down the beach

  you.”

  half a dozen times before Mose said he

  “That’s enough of that,” Wray

  thought he saw a dingey off shore.

  interposed. “Come on!”

  “Give ’em the whistle.”

  “All right, chief; but there ain’t no

  Mose whistled low.

  need of them guns. I ain’t never been fool

  “Louder, Mose; nobody ain’t within a

  enough to try to fight the law. Put ’em away; mile of us.”

  we’ll go along easy.”

  Mose trilled, like the long-drawn-out

  Wray and one of the inspectors

  note of a redbird, and from off shore replaced their revolvers in their pockets, but somebody answered with a similar trill, the other inspector, who walked behind, kept though it was not nearly as musical as Mose’s.

  his in his hand.

  Tibby and Mose walked down to the

  For the first time in many a day Tibby

  water’s edge, and Mose and the man off shore swore in one tongue only, and that tongue was repeated their whistles several times.

  Spanish, when he saw Rodriguez seated in the

  “Dere dey is, cap, a little ter—”

  hack. None of that gang of Spanish pirates

  “I see ’em. Here, Crim! Head her who made Key West their base when that straight in.”

  island was known as Cayo Hueso (Bone

  Two men were in the dingey, one of

  Key—the name by which Cubans and

  them sculling. The latter swung her bow Spaniards still call it) ever swore more toward the shore and then started to pole. He caustically and euphoniously than Tibby did.

  continued to do that until the dingey grounded

  “You no call me that, you old Tib, eef

  in the sand. In the mean time the inspectors I no drink couple compuesto. I show you sing had crawled up to within ten yards of Tibby

  or two and make—”

  Hatched in a Mare’s Nest

  5

  “I’d call you that, you ——. if you

  his upper lip. The clerk winked at the deputy had
n’t had a drink in a year! And I’m going to clerk, the United States marshal and his

  give you a taste of this the first time I get a deputy nudged each other, Wray and other

  chance.” Tibby shook his fist at Rodriguez.

  inspectors skewed up their mouths and

  “Ha, ha, you old Tib! Your ten glanced at one another out of the corners of garrajones gone, and you go up for—”

  their eyes, and persons in the audience tittered

  “Cut it out!” Wray exclaimed. He had

  and shuffled and bent forward and leaned

  been listening with not a little admiration to sidewise and whispered to one another.

  Tibby’s voluble Spanish. “Captain, get in this Before the jury was drawn, the court

  hack with Inspector Carson, and let your cook told Tibby that he could object peremptorily to sit up in front. Here, you two men, get up in at least three of them, and explained to him front here.”

  what peremptorily meant. Tibby was told

  Wray sat in the back seat with further that he could make objections to any or Rodriguez, and an inspector was left on the

  all of the men, and that, if the objections were beach to guard the demijohns.

  considered sufficiently valid, the court would sustain him.

  III.

  “Any of them’s good enough for me,

  judge, your honor. I kin win this case without NEXT mowing Tibby, Mose, and the two

  no jury.”

  seamen were arraigned before a United States More tittering and smiling and

  commissioner, who held each defendant to

  significant glances and nudges and

  await the action of the grand jury and fixed his whisperings followed that remark.

  bail at five hundred dollars. Two of Tibby’s After the jury had been sworn in,