The Big Snapper by Katherine Holubitsky Page A

foot of the ladder, staring up.
    â€œHe was a frightful-looking fellow with black, stringy hair tied back with a dirty kerchief, and one eye permanently shut tight. ‘Where’d youcome from, boy?’ he hollered. He tapped his bayonet sheath on the deck. ‘Get down here and present yourself.’
    â€œWell, obviously, I had no choice. I climbed down and stood before him. He glared at me with his one yellow eye. ‘I asked you where you came from?’ he repeated.
    â€˜I come from Tow Hill,’ I answered. ‘I didn’t mean to disturb your ship, sir, and you have my promise I won’t say anything to anyone about what you did.’
    â€œI wasn’t sure why I blurted that out, but I’d no sooner said it when I knew it was a mistake. He cocked his head and poked me with his bayonet. ‘Oh, and what did I do?’ he enquired.
    â€œâ€˜Well, the gunshot, sir, and what went overboard.’ I stopped myself because his face was getting snarlier as I spoke. He showed his teeth, the same horrid yellow as his eye. ‘Well, you can be sure you won’t,’ he sneered. ‘Mapface!’ he hollered. At once, a squat fellow—his face a network of broken veins—stood next to him. ‘Throw this boy in the hold. I’ll dispose of him later. I don’t like boys who drop out of the sky.’
    â€œMapface grabbed me by an arm. He was a short sailor, but his arm was four times thethickness of my own. He hauled me down a narrow flight of steps and along a dark passage. On either side, chains rattled and men groaned behind barred doors. Some doors had small squares cut in them. Through these, I spotted the squished faces of desperate men. ‘Let us out now, and no one will be the wiser,’ begged one man as we passed. Mapface ignored him. ‘In there,’ he growled. He stuffed me into a room with a door so low that I had to crouch to get in.
    â€œIt took several minutes for my eyes to adjust to the dark. Finally I detected half a dozen pairs of eyes around the room. Someone said something about me being just a boy. ‘You a stowaway?’ one of them asked. I told them, no, I’d only been beachcombing and lost my footing. They chuckled sadly at the misfortune of my stumbling into their predicament by unlucky chance. It seemed it was the cook who’d taken over the ship; he was the yellow-eyed man who was now posing as captain. He’d put something in their morning coffee to make them all fall asleep; then he locked them up while they were snoring.”
    â€œWhy did he want to take over the ship?” Eddie asks.
    â€œIt wasn’t clear,” answers Granddad, “but I gathered from what was said that it was revenge. The men told me he was a terrible cook and they’d all been complaining. He made them eat liver and onions three times a week.
    â€œWell, that gave me an idea. I knew I was no match for old Yellow-eye with his weapons and strong-arm tactics. I didn’t say a word to anyone about my plan. When Mapface came around with our meal, sure enough, it was liver and onions. I ate it like I hadn’t eaten in a week. I then called Mapface through the hole in the door and asked for a second helping. After that, I asked if I could give my compliments to the chef.”
    â€œWas it really good?” asks Eddie.
    Granddad scrunches his nose. “It was awful! I could hardly swallow the first plate let alone the second. But I had to make the best of a bad situation. I knew I had no choice but to stomach it if I was to get off that ship. Well, Mapface looked very confused at my request, but he opened the door and he had me follow him to the new captain’s cabin. The yellow-eyed man was surprised to see me, of course. He dabbed his mouth with his bib and looked up from his dinner of lobster and small roasted potatoes. He spoke toMapface, ‘I thought I told you to stuff that one in the hold.’ But