CHAPTER 23During the small pause that followed, Culver noticed that more than one anxious eye turned not toward the Captain at the port, but upward toward the canvas which was slatting, and the spars jarring most unnaturally against the masts. He himself felt a distinct unease. They were in a ship without an acknowledged master, as though life were in a body without a brain.
Burke sang out: “I’ll talk for myself, and I’ll talk for the others, Captain Valdez.”
“I’ll have no dealings with a mutineer and a ringleader,” said Valdez. “I’ll see the Spindrift go down and all hands aboard her, before I’ll talk with Burke. . . . Keep forward there, Ukko! None of you try to sneak aft and get under the break of the poop. I’ll wing you, my lads, if you try it!”
Sally said to Culver: “Tell me—are yo
