Argosy All-Story Weekly — 'The Metal Monster' — page 135: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

TEACH: PIRATE DE LUXE. had been the Queen Elizabeth. We’d an armament of a dozen riffes, and an an- tiquated popgun that Drake probably used against the Armada. My aunt! how we used to drill with them! ” “ The skipper was a dear old thing about ninety, an admiral with seventeen letters after his name. He may have understood our orders, but I’m hanged if anybcdy else on board did. As -I read them, they said we had to stop every ship carrying stuff into a German port—except those that wanted to go through. ~. “Lord! that old admiral. I was his No. 1, as I’ve told you, and he seemed to think that the R. N. R. were a slack lot, any- way. But I never knew what spit and polish meant till he’d had the handling of me. “ Fult of fight he was, too. He’d have scrapped with the Seydlitz if she’d come within range of us, and danced at the chance. But gout in the tummy laid him out at the critical time, and when my chance came he was on his back in a cot, wondering when he would die.” ‘““ So you were in command?” “TI was, very thoroughly. I came across a big neutral, cotton laden, for Hamburg. I told her to turn round and go home. She said she wouldn’t, and quoted Jaw at me. I slammed at her with Drake’s popgun, and as that didn’t do any good I just rammed. her. ‘It made a mess of my bows, all right, but we sank Mr. Neutral in style. We even went so far as to salve his crew, in proper navy style. -But my aunt! you should have heard the song they made about it when we. got in. ‘“‘ Court-martial bright and early for the poor old admiral and me. They let him off with ‘ dismissed ship.’ They cashiered me before you could think. To give them their due, they were really curious as to why I should have done it. | ‘““T said I thought we were at war, and that if I’d let the Huris have that ship-load _of cotton to make into explosives to kill our men, and hadn’t the grace to shoot myself for doing it, I certainly ought to have been put to the heavy death when I got back. But they didn’t see it; we weren’t properly ‘at war, early on, you'll remember; and, as 9A 129 I say, they broke me and seemed Surprised I felt annoyed.” “What an abominable shame!” ‘You're always rubbing it into me that I’m a vain man, Mary. Anyway, I am vain enough to think that if I’d stayed on in the navy I’d have brought off something big. I’m not the sort to get killed; and I’m not the man to get held up by politicians’ red tape. ‘ T’d have made that sleepy navy win the war by the end of the second year. As it is, I’ve switched off on to another line of activity which is not in such pleasant lime- hight. ‘So that’s that. Now, then, what about tea? Here’s’ the steward semaphoring ‘ Toast getting cold,’ with his swivel eye.” ‘* Shall I send a cup down to the York- shire Scott?” Mary asked a few minutes later. ‘* Certainly, if you like.” _ “JT will, then. As a shirker, he doesn’t interest me, and if it amuses you to hang him, by all means do it. But isn’t it rather @ waste? You've all those steamers bob- bing up and down and curtseying to one another, and waiting for a ransom. “You know you’ve told me that’s what you planned. Well, you can’t expect the ordinary merchant to step out of his groove and negotiate for them. They may be a Cwptol Syndicate, or there mayn’t. I know nothing about that. But Mr. Shirker’s the first person who’s come along with an offer of any sort or size. “ Here’s a chance to realize. want to be an outlaw forever.” “Do you want to get ashore and settle down?” the pirate asked significantly. Mary felt her cheek flush. “ If you mean am I sick of this hiding about at sea, the answer is in the affirmative.” “You shall have your wish, then, and Murgatroyd—which ts Mac’s real name— shall miss his hanging. . Perhaps, after all, cash in hand is better than our floating se- curities. . But I must rub home the man’s scare. Ah, Mr. Pickles. Half a minute.” ‘“ Sir?” said the octrigamist. “You remember that engaging picture, ‘The Burghers of Calais,’ you pinched from the Norwegian boat?” You don t -Eomic AOO!K (COUNT