ns that if he didn't drive
down to the harbor as fast as he knew how and keep his mouth shut the
whole way, he would choke the life out of him. Then we jumped into the
cab on top of the food, slammed the door, pulled down the blinds and
away we went.
"We won't get a chance to pawn the jewelry now," said Polynesia, as we
bumped over the cobbly streets. "But never mind--it may come in handy
later on. And anyway we've got two-thousand five-hundred pesetas left
out of the bet. Don't give the cabby more than two pesetas fifty, Bumpo.
That's the right fare, I know."
Well, we reached the harbor all right and we were mighty glad to find
that the Doctor had sent Chee-Chee back with the row-boat to wait for us
at the landing-wall.
Unfortunately while we were in the middle of loading the supplies from
the cab into the boat, the angry mob arrived upon the wharf and made
a rush for us. Bumpo snatched up a big beam of wood that lay near
and swung it round and round his head, letting out dreadful African
battle-yells the while. This kept the crowd off while Chee-Chee and I
hustled the last of the stores into the boat and clambered in ourselves.
Bumpo threw his beam of wood into the thick of the Spaniards and leapt
in after us. Then we pushed off and rowed like mad for the Curlew.
The mob upon the wall howled with rage, shook their fists and hurled
stones and all manner of things after us. Poor old Bumpo got hit on the
head with a bottle. But as he had a very strong head it only raised a
small bump while the bottle smashed into a thousand pieces.
When we reached the ship's side the Doctor had the anchor drawn up and
the sails set and everything in readiness to get away. Looking back we
saw boats coming out from the harbor-wall after us, filled with angry,
shouting men. So we didn't bother to unload our rowboat but just tied it
on to the ship's stern with a rope and jumped aboard.
It only took a moment more to swing the Curlew round into the wind; and
soon we were speeding out of the harbor on our way to Brazil.
"Ha!" sighed Polynesia, as we all flopped down on the deck to take a
rest and get our breath. "That wasn't a bad adventure--quite reminds me
of my old seafaring days when I sailed with the smugglers--Golly, that
was the life!--Never mind your head, Bumpo. It will be all right when
the Doctor puts a little arnica on it. Think what we got out of the
scrap: a boat-load of ship's stores, pockets full of jewelry and
th
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