Local Color to Burn by Charley Wood Read online

  captain and mate, who had been waiting since

  “We couldn’t have found a better place

  sunrise, regarded the procession which came

  to shoot these sets,” said Hesper as he leaked down the dock in lofty wonder.

  admiringly around.

  In the fore they saw Hesper, his

  “It’s all right so long as we don’t get

  assistant director, and Mr. Swiberg, all dressed caught in a gale o’ wind in here,” replied

  in ordinary street clothes. But just behind Captain Jericho, as he squinted distrustfully to them was Florine Faire, whom Joe Bird, the

  windward. “There ain’t no hold-in’ ground

  publicity man, invariable described as “the

  here, and if we get caught we got our choice queen of electric thrills.” She was swathed

  o’ bein’ smashed to death on them rocks or

  from comely head to dainty feet in a long

  chancin’ to run that reef.”

  cloak, and behind her walked a French maid

  But the director, as he thought of what

  with an Irish face. Beside her strode George was going to happen to the Starshine anyhow, Stodd, also swathed in a long cloak, but with was not much concerned at this information.

  wicked appearing mustachios protruding from

  “I’d feel safe on any ship with you two

  the collar of the cloak, and an awe-inspiring aboard,” remarked Miss Faire as the maid

  click of an unseen scabbard as he walked. He helped her off with her cloak.

  had spent many hours of the night learning to

  “I’ll say so,” said Hesper, as he also

  walk naturally with the thing dangling there.

  removed his coat. “I’ve got a little part for the Next came Raymore Wellsville, captain to play, too, when the pirates capture leading man, with a camera man, weighted

  the ship.”

  down with machines and tripods, on either

  From then on for many hours the

  side of him. Following them was the erstwhile captain and his mate watched interestedly

  freighter’s crew, now the most villainous, while more or less dramatic scenes, close-ups, cutthroat, piratical-looking company the and shots of the pirates swarming aboard and captain and mate had ever set eyes on in all over the rigging and the running up the Jolly their years of experience.

  Roger were taken. It was all like a hazy

  Hank took one of the camera men and

  mystery to the captain and his mate, and they left in a motor-boat, for they would take long could make neither head nor tail of the

  “shots” of the ship and pirates.

  proceedings. Finally the sweating director

  The schooner made a brisk run, and

  came over and posed the captain at the wheel some two hours later the captain and mate

  for rehearsal while George Stodd advanced

  were guiding her over the dangerous Horse-

  toward him with a devilish grin and a waving Tail Reefs into the lagoon. Safely inside the cutlass. This also was a hazy mystery to the

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  captain.

  I hate to break, the news, but in order to carry

  “Fine, George!” he heard the director

  out this story we’ve got to set this craft afire, commenting. “Now, hold that, cap—you see

  blow her up with dynamite, then rake her with him, but you think it’s your duty to get the that cannon on the beach where the palm-trees ship over the reef, see? Take another step,

  are.”

  George—no, don’t glare at him, cap, look as if

  “Look here, you underhanded hugger-

  you were praying—you’re not armed, you mugger!” bellowed the captain as he snatched have no hope and he has no mercy—no, don’t

  forth the check and shook it in his large, tough swear, pray! That’s fine! Advance, George,

  fist under the director’s nose. “Take back your slowly—like a snake crawls—that’s it. Hold

  dirty check. We didn’t sell this ship for to be your cutlass up to strike—”

  smashed up by no actors. Jest harm a thread o’

  “If he holds it that way I could easy

  her rig-gin’ and I’ll smash that camera over catch a holt of his arm and heave him your truck!”

  overboard,” objected the captain.

  “If they’s any one o’ you who thinks

  “Never mind, it’ll look all right on the

  he kin mistreat this ship while I’m aboard,”

  screen,” returned Hesper. “Now, Florine, followed up Mate Handy as he looked while George holds that you rush forward and invitingly around at the assembly. “jest step throw your arms around the captain’s neck—

  out here one at a time er all together and see you’re willing to give your life to protect him what happens.”

  from the pirate, see? That’s it, only do it with

  “We don’t want that check back,”

  more abandon. Oh, heck! You’re not Irish

  protested the director. “We’ve got to finish now, but Spanish—that’s more like it—don’t

  this picture and we’ve got the receipted—”

  gulp so much, cap, it’ll soon be over—”

  “Belay that actor gab,” interrupted the

  Shortly after the director had yelled

  captain. “You ain’t going to harm this ship,

  “camera” and the scene was finally filmed,

  not a splinter of her!”

  things that were not in the script began to

  The director, driven to the last resort,

  happen, for the captain and the mate suddenly suddenly raised his hand as a signal.

  spied the freighter’s crew pouring tar about Plainly, the freighter’s crew had been

  the decks while a camera clicked.

  waiting for just such a move, for they all

  They sprang forward simultaneously.

  sprang for the erstwhile owners of the

  “Avast there!” bawled the captain as

  Starshine at the same moment. The camera

  he and the mate vaulted into the scene. “Keep man, sensing the realism, instantly turned his that tar off my decks, you egg-headed actors, lens upon them and began cranking.

  er I’ll tie every one o’ you into anchor-chain

  “Don’t hurt those poor old sailors,

  links!”

  Teddy!” pleaded Miss Faire of the director.

  The pouring of the tar ceased and “They’re hurting them, aren’t they?”

  every one lapsed into silence. Miss Faire

  “Calm yourself, Florine,” returned the

  clutched the main shrouds and registered director, as he noted with pleasure that the realistic alarm as she waited for the outcome.

  camera man was on the job. “That freighter’s Mr. Swiberg, who had been lolling crew’ll be lucky if they don’t get hurt luxuriously on the cabin deck-house with a

  themselves by the looks of things. They’ve got cigar, sat upright and hoped inwardly that the orders not to hurt ’em, but only to capture ’em erstwhile owners would win.

  and put ’em somewhere where they won’t

  “This is not your deck now, it’s our

  bother us again till we’re done. Look, ain’t deck,” said the director, at last. But his heart that great? Oh, boy!”

  was heavy within him as he continued: “Boys, But the business of “capturing” them

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  was evidently no easy job, for the captain and began to manifest itself almost before the

  his mate were fighting like a pair of hungry work was well started again. The cameraman

  wildcats. Down and up and in and out among

  noticed it first when he began to complain of a their adversaries the t
wo mariners battled, and

  “yellow” light, and then for the first time they the fray, owing to the piratical costumes, noticed that the sun was growing hazy. The became a seething mass of changing and director gazed off into the southeast and noted varied colors. Neckerchiefs were torn from

  a bank of darkish clouds which seemed to be

  heads and necks, earrings rattled to the deck, approaching with terrific speed. It was

  false mustachios and whiskers floated away

  preceded by a line of white-caps and the

  on the breeze, tin cutlasses were bent double, winds was freshening each moment.

  and top-boots sailed through the air with the The director then bethought himself of

  feet of their owners inside them.

  the remark the captain had made about the

  Finally the fighters were separated into

  lagoon being a dangerous place in a storm. He two piles, which was caused by the captain

  also noticed, with a sinking feeling in his

  and the mate being at last on their backs and stomach, that the owners of the boat in which held down by sheer weight.

  Hank had been taking “long shots” were

  “We can’t hold ’em very long, heading her for the reefs at full speed, though,” yelled one of the victors to Hesper.

  evidently seeking to clear them before the

  The director scratched his head as he

  storm broke.

  realized that although the recalcitrant pair He gazed anxiously at the way the sea

  were “captured,” the picture could not be gone was dashing ever higher on the jagged rocks

  on with if the freighter’s crew had to spend all which thrust their noses up all about, and

  their time holding them down. Then he wondered what would happen if the Starshine suddenly remembered the slave irons. He struck one, broke up, and left them to swim immediately dispatched a man for two sets of for their lives in that raging sea. The wind was them, and while the camera still clicked they beginning to sing: a weird, awe-inspiring song were adjusted about the mariners’ wrists and in the rigging, too. Suddenly a heavy gust

  ankles.

  caught the Starshine’s sails and she jibed with But even then the trouble was not the noise of a thunderclap.

  settled, for the ironed twain kept up such a run

  “We better get out of here before it’s

  of fiery language that the director, in another too late, mister,” advised one of the freighter’s fit of desperation, ordered them removed to

  crew, all of whom were beginning to look

  the hold. There the sailors, who had had a hard anxious, for they realized the danger better fight and wished to vent some of their spite on than the landsmen;

  the causes of it, took advantage of the fact that

  “I don’t want to be drowned out here

  the director could not see them, and clapped in this lonely place, Teddy,” said Miss Faire, on all the other sets of irons they could find.

  who had been studying the situation on her

  Therefore, when they left them, the very own account. “You know, I can’t swim, weight of the encumbrances forced the irate

  either.”

  mariners into harmlessness.

  “Neither can I,” spoke up Swiberg.

  Peace and quiet was thus somewhat

  “Remember, I got a family.”

  restored to the Starshine, and the work of

  “I give up!” finally said the director as

  taking the rest of the scenes prior to the he threw up his hands in disgust. “All right, burning of the craft were gone ahead with.

  get her out of here, boys.”

  But, though the director did not suspect it,

  “The only men who can get her out are

  there was a worse trouble breeding, and it

  down in the hold with chains on,” said Miss

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  Faire, but no one seemed to heed her.

  entire movie company sprang into the rigging With all speed the freighter’s crew got

  as with one thought, leaving the more adept

  up the anchor, and the Starshine was soon

  freighter’s crew still wrestling with the irons headed at a smart clip for the reefs in an effort and the seas.

  to get to deep water.

  Owing to the force of the wind they

  “Get those old salts up here, I don’t

  found speech impossible. Mr. Swiberg,

  know this course!” suddenly yelled the man at George Stodd, and Raymore Wellsville clung

  the wheel.

  palely in the port main rigging. The director The director started, for with his other

  and the camera man climbed well up in the

  worries he had forgotten all about them for the starboard fore ratlines, and Miss Faire and her moment.

  little French maid hung desperately to

  “Sufferin’ cats, yes! Get ’em up here

  whatever they could grasp in the starboard

  quick!” sang out the director. Several of the main shrouds. Each time they tried to speak

  freighter’s crew dropped into the hold and

  the wing flung the words back into their

  passed the captain and his mate up. All but the mouths.

  freighter’s crew started as they saw the

  They watched in helpless silence while

  number of irons the pair were weighted down

  sea after sea came aboard and the crew, stung with. The freighter’s crew set frantically to to desperation, still wrestled with the irons.

  work to release them and were staggered to

  The wind bit and tore at them and the seas,

  discover that it might be a long, hard job to with their white crests hissing like escaping remove so many and such rusty irons.

  steam, seemed to be growing to the height of

  “How did they get all those on two

  houses. Finally, after what seemed hours, the men?” asked Swiberg.

  last irons succumbed to the efforts of the crew

  “Don’t ask me, I don’t know,” and the captain and mate rose slowly to their answered the director.

  feet.

  At that moment there came a sickening

  The people in the rigging watched

  jar, and all on board were thrown from one

  them aghast as, instead of belching into

  side of the deck to the other as the schooner activity as they had expected them to, they

  listed heavily over.

  merely took a firm hold on the wheel and

  “You’re aground, you Junk-heads,” conversed by putting their mouths to each yelled the captain.

  other’s ears. Finally Mr. Swiberg, divining

  The director paled as he looked what the delay was about, drew a piece of around, for although it was true that the paper from his pocket and waved it at the Starshine was aground, the nearest land which captain with a trembling hand.

  met his eye was the sand reef where the palms The captain reached up, took the piece

  were planted. He reckoned it was about a half of paper, read it, then tore it into shreds. It was mile away, and that half mile was a wind-the receipted bill of sale! Then suddenly

  swept mass of water, impossible to swim.

  everybody on the deck of the ship was filled Simultaneously, the gale was on them,

  with action and new hope. Under the direction with all its fury. The wind reached such of the captain and mate the crew worked like strength that the palms lay flat on the ground.

  maniacs. As the pair had had a life-long

  As the freighter’s crew struggled with the training at making their voices heard above irons a great sea reared and roared and crashed sea and wind, the rigging occupants heard

  over the deck, sweeping everything before it.

  snatches
of the magic words.

  Luckily, it swept no one overboard, but the

  “You three there, get that dory over the

  moment they found their footing again the

  side and get that port kedge anchor in it—look

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  alive or I’ll make splinters out o’ them of the shallows was begun. Straight for the wooden heads with a belayin’ pin—

  apparently unbroken line of breakers she went,

  “The rest o’ you clap on to them jib

  and all but the captain and his mate paled

  and fore downhauls and slack away them again as though she was headed for certain halliards—come on, you lazy swabs—lay doom. Sometimes she passed so close to back on that downhaul—get some beef into it

  jagged rocks that the spray from the waves

  afore I knock you out o’ them pirut boots—”

  which broke over them covered the decks.

  In this manner, while the movie people

  More than a few times it seemed as if the next looked admiringly on, the captain and his moment would see the piercing of her hull, but mate worked and bellowed amid the breaking

  each time the captain gave her a spoke this

  seas. With the lowering of the head-sails, the way or that and cleared in safety. It was a

  hauling home of the main sheet, and the passage dangerous enough to make in good leading of a kedge anchor hause to the weather and doubly hard in a gale.

  capstan, the Starshine began to twist her nose Despite the danger, the director was

  toward deeper water. Hesper, even in his recovering his equilibrium to such an extent predicament, grunted with admiration and did that he caught himself cursing because he had his best to share his thought with the camera no camera man stationed on the rocks to film man, but was unsuccessful.

  the thrilling passage.

  Round and round at the capstan went