The Argus Pheasant

The captain replaced his cigar between his teeth with a flourish. Muller's pudgy hands caught each other convulsively. The folds under his chin flutterred. He licked his lips before he spoke.

"Kapitein– you mean he might come to an unhappy end on the way?" he faltered.

"Why not?" Van Slyck concentrated his attention on his cigar.

"Neen, neen, let us have no bloodshed," Muller vetoed anxiously. "We have had enough – " He looked around nervously as though he feared someone might be overhearing him. "Let him alone. We shall find some way to get rid of him. But let there be no killing."

Van Slyck turned his attention from the landscape to the controlleur. There was a look in the captain's face that made Muller wince and shift his eyes, a look of cyincal contempt, calm, frank, and unconcealed. It was the mask lifting, for Van Slyck despised his associate. Bold and unscrupulous, sticking at nothing that might achieve his end, he had no patience with the timid, faltering, often conscience-stricken controlleur.

"Well, mynheer," Van Slyck observed at length, "you are getting remarkably thin-skinned all of a sudden."

He laughed sardonically. Muller winced and replied hastily:

"I have been thinking, kapitein, that the proa crews have been doing too much killing lately. I am going to tell Ah Sing that it must be stopped. There are other ways – we can unload the ships and land their crews on some island – "

"To starve, or to be left to the tender mercies of the Bajaus and the Bugis," Van Slyck sneered. "That would be more tender-hearted. You would at least transfer the responsibility."

Muller's agitation became more pronounced.

"But we must not let it go on, kapitein," he urged. "It hurts the business. Pretty soon we will have an investigation, one of these gun-boats will pick up one of our proas, somebody will tell, and what will happen to us then?"

"We'll be hung," Van Slyck declared succinctly.

Muller's fingers leaped in an involuntary frantic gesture to his throat, as though he felt cords tightening around his windpipe. His face paled.

"Lieve hemel, kapitein, don't speak of such things," he gasped.

"Then don't talk drivel," Van Slyck snarled. "You can't make big profits without taking big chances. And you can't have piracy without a little blood-letting. We're in this now, and there's no going back. So stop your squealing."

Settling back into his chair, he looked calmly seaward and exhaled huge clouds of tobacco smoke. The frown deepened on Muller's troubled brow as he stared vacantly across the crushed coral-shell highway.

"You can think of no reason why his excellency should be offended with us, kapitein?" he ventured anxiously.

The controlleur's eagerness to include him in his misfortune, evidenced by the use of the plural pronoun, evoked a sardonic flicker in Van Slyck's cold, gray eyes.

"No, mynheer, I cannot conceive why the governor should want to get rid of so valuable a public servant as you are," he assured ironically. "You have certainly done your best. There have been a few disturbances, of course, some head-hunting, and the taxes have not been paid, but outside of such minor matters everything has done well, very well indeed."

"Donder en bliksem," Muller exclaimed, "how can I raise taxes when those Midianites, the hill Dyaks, will not let my coast Dyaks grow a spear of rice? Has there been a month without a raid? Answer me, kapitein. Have you spent a whole month in the stockade without being called to beat back some of these thieving plunderers and drive them into their hills?"

The sardonic smile flashed across Van Slyck's face again.

"Quite true, mynheer. But sometimes I don't know if I blame the poor devils. They tell me they're only trying to get even because your coast Dyaks and Ah Sing's crowd rob them so. Ah Sing must be making quite a profit out of the slave business. I'll bet he shipped two hundred to China last year."

He glanced quizzically at his associate.

"By the way, mynheer," he observed, "you ought to know something about that. I understand you get a per cent on it."

"I?" Muller exclaimed, and looked affrightedly about him. "I, kapitein?"

"Oh, yes you do," Van Slyck asserted airily. "You've got money invested with Ah Sing in two proas that are handling that end of the business. And it's the big end just now. The merchandise pickings are small, and that is all I share in."

He looked at Muller meaningly. There was menace in his eyes and menace in his voice as he announced:

"I'm only mentioning this, mynheer, so that if the new resident should happen to be one of us, with a claim to the booty, his share comes out of your pot, not mine. Remember that!"

For once cupidity overcame Muller's fear of the sharp-witted cynical soldier.

"Wat de drommel," he roared, "do you expect me to pay all, kapitein, all? Not in a thousand years! If there must be a division you shall give up your per cent as well as I, stuiver for stuiver, gulden for gulden!"

A hectic spot glowed in each of Van Slyck's cheeks, and his eyes glittered. Muller's anger rose.

"Ah Sing shall decide between us," he cried heatedly. "You cannot rob me in that way, kapitein."

Van Slyck turned on his associate with an oath. "Ah Sing be damned. We'll divide as I say, or – "

The pause was more significant than words. Muller's ruddy face paled. Van Slyck tapped a forefinger significantly on the arm of his chair.

"Just remember, if the worst comes to the worst, there's this one difference between you and me, mynheer. I'm not afraid to die, and you – are!" He smiled.

Muller's breath came thickly, and he stared fascinatedly into the evilly handsome face of the captain, whose eyes were fixed on his with a basilisk glare. Several seconds passed; then Van Slyck said:

"See that you remember these things, mynheer, when our next accounting comes."

The silence that followed was broken by the rhythmic pad-pad of wicker sandals on a bamboo floor. Cho Seng came on the veranda, bearing a tray laden with two glasses of finest crystal and a decanter of colorless liquid, both of which he placed on a small porch table. Drops of dew formed thickly on the chilled surface of the decanter and rolled off while the Chinaman mixed the juices of fruits and crushed leaves with the potent liquor. The unknown discoverer of the priceless recipe he used receives more blessings in the Indies daily than all the saints on the calendar. When Cho Seng had finished, he withdrew. Muller swallowed the contents of his glass in a single gulp. Van Slyck sipped leisurely. Gradually the tension lessened. After a while, between sips, the captain remarked:

"I hear you have a chance to pick up some prize money."

Muller looked up with interest. "So, kapitein!" he exclaimed with forced jocularity. "Have you found a place where guilders grow on trees?"

"Almost as good as that," Van Slyck replied, playing his fish.

Finesse and indirection were not Muller's forte. "Well, tell us about it, kapitein," he demanded bluntly.

Van Slyck's eyes twinkled.

"Catch Koyala," he replied.

The captain's meaning sank into Muller's mind slowly. But as comprehension began to dawn upon him, his face darkened. The veins showed purple under the ruddy skin.

"You are too clever this morning, kapitein," he snarled. "Let me remind you that this is your duty. The controlleur sits as judge, he does not hunt the accused."

Van Slyck laughed.

"And let me remind you, mynheer, that I haven't received the governor's orders as yet, although they reached you more than a week ago." Ironically he added: "You must not let your friendship with Koyala blind you to your public duties, mynheer."

Muller's face became darker still. He had not told any one, and the fact that the orders seemed to be public property both alarmed and angered him.

"How did you hear of it?" he demanded.