It was about an hour later that the doctor went below to his other
patient, to find him lying perfectly still and hardly breathing, so
softly his pulsation seemed to rise and fall, while, faithful to his
post, Rasp was by his side.
Laure was evidently sleeping, and, after a brief examination, Mr Meldon
turned thoughtfully away, for there were peculiarities in the case which
he could not fathom.
As he reached the deck, he was touched on the shoulder, and, turning
sharply, he found Rasp behind him.
"Is he going to die to-night, doctor, like t'other poor chap?"
"I can't say, Rasp," was the reply. "His case puzzles me. To-night he
sleeps so easily that he seems to me better, and as if he were rallying
fast."
"Oh no, he ain't," said Rasp, shaking his head oracularly; "that's the
artfulness of his nature. He's a-dying sharp."
"How do you know?"
"'Cause I heerd him a muttering to hisself when he thought as I warn't
listening, and then he got talking to hisself in his foreign lingo; and
when I came into sight again he began picking at his blanket."
"May be," said Mr Meldon, "but all the same, he is certainly better."
"Yah! stuff!" ejaculated Rasp, as he descended to the cabin. "He's
dying fast, and it's going to be to-night. I can feel it as plain as
can be, poor chap. But he's an out and out bad 'un, and only got what
he deserves."
Rasp took several pinches of snuff in succession.
"How rum this snuff is to-night," he muttered, as he settled himself on
the locker opposite where Laure lay, and then proceeded to watch the
night through, after refusing the help of Oakum and 'Pollo, both of whom
had offered to relieve him, and in the course of half-an-hour he was
sleeping heavily.
And so a couple of hours glided away; when, just as all was perfectly
silent on board the schooner, and all save the watch on deck slept
soundly, Laure, the Cuban, rose from his simulated sleep, and after a
glance at Rasp stole to the locker in which lay his clothes, slipped
them on silently, and then made softly for the deck.
It was no tottering walk of a feeble man, but the quick, soft cat-like
tread of some one full of life and energy, and bent upon some set
design. And so it was; for the time for the execution of the fell
purpose upon which his mind had been fixed ever since he had lain there,
feeble at first from the shock, but daily growing stronger and
meditating revenge, had arrived.
He was too well acquainted with the routine of the schooner not to be
fully aware of what he could do, and while the man bent drowsily over
the wheel, and Oakum and another were on the look-out in the bows, he
took the falls in his hands, and cleverly let the boat on the davits
glide down and kiss the softly heaving wave almost without a sound, but
not until he had secured the painter to one of the pins, after which he
slid down the falls with the activity of a boy, unhooked the boat, and
climbed back on deck.
Next he paused to listen for a few moments in the darkness, and then
with cat-like step descended into the portion of the vessel which had
been set apart for the store connected with the diving apparatus.
It was evident that he had often been here before, as he seemed to know
where everything was kept; and after lifting down the large jar of the
galvanic battery, which, from the care with which he took it was
evidently half-full of acid, he bore it to the steps, and then placing
his hand on a particular shelf he took down a canister of dynamite
cartridges and placed it against the bulkhead.
This done he felt along the shelf to where, days before, he had placed a
large reel of thin silk-covered wire, and tying it to the loop of metal
in one of the cartridges, he backed slowly out of the cabin, unwinding
the wire as he went till he reached the deck, where he continued his way
to the side, and lowered the reel into the boat.
The next thing was the awkward jar of the battery; but his plans had all
been made, and with a piece of cord he lowered it down carefully,
raising it again and again until he felt that it rested safely in the
bottom of the boat.
Water was already there, and provisions that he had been storing up for
days; and now the first sound that had left his lips escaped in the form
of a low demoniacal chuckle as, lightly raising himself upon the
bulwark, he sat there for a moment, and he shook his fist in the
direction of the cabin.
"Curse you!" he muttered. "You thought to outwit me, but you did not
know your enemy. Sink! perish with the silver that carries you down,
for revenge is sweet even at such a cost."
He swung himself down by the ropes hanging from one of the davits, and
there felt that he had outwitted himself for the boat was not beneath
his feet, and he was getting nearly exhausted by his efforts.
"I shall have to let go," he muttered; "and in the darkness I shall
never reach the boat again."
He swung himself to and fro, and struggled hard to reach the boat, but
though he nearly touched it each time, he was never near enough to trust
himself to lose his hold, and with the perspiration running down his
face, and his hair bristling with horror, he began to thoroughly realise
that his long rest in bed had weakened him terribly. The thought was
horrible now that he had been brought face to face with it--that he who
had been so careful in laying his plans for the destruction of others
had been caught in his own trap, and was himself called upon to die.
The idea was terrible. He was not fit to die. When roused by his
passions to fight desperately, he could, perhaps, have faced death with
a certain amount of manly composure, but now swinging at the end of this
rope, to hold on till he could cling no longer, and then plunge suddenly
into the sea to feel the black rushing and thundering waters close over
his head--it was too horrible to be borne.
He made a desperate struggle to get his legs up, and cling with them to
the rope, but his strength was gone, and he only weakened himself, and
hanging now at the full stretch of his arms, feeling, as the sinews of
his wrists seemed ready to crack, that any moment he must leave go, he--
The thought was too horrible. He could not face death; sooner must he
shriek for help and forego his revenge--anything to be saved.
His lips parted, and he tried to yell loudly, but a harsh gurgle was all
that came now from his dry throat. He tried again and again, but horror
had paralysed him, and he could do nothing but pant hoarsely like one in
a nightmare, and believe that, after all, this was but some fearful
dream from which he would awaken, as he often had before, bathed with
perspiration, and shivering with dread.
At last he tried to close his starting eyes, and hide from his distorted
vision the horrible resemblance of the davit above him to the gallows,
as he swung to and fro by the rope. But even this relief was denied
him, for it seemed as if the whole muscular strength of his body was
condensed in his arms, by which he clung to the fall, and power had left
him to perform any other act than that of clinging for life. The deadly
sense of terror increased, and with men at either end of the vessel
ready to come to his help--men who, by the slightest effort of will,
could have saved him--he felt he must die. He would have called them to
his help now regardless of the exposure of his plans, but it was too
late: he could do no more than hold on, and wait till he fell.
No torture could possibly have been greater than that felt by this
wretch as he softly swung to and fro within a few inches of the safety
he had provided, and yet unable to reach it. A thousand thoughts rushed
through his brain, but they were mostly regrets that he had been unable
to compass his revenge; that he had neglected his opportunities when he
might have made himself the master of Hester, seeing how thoroughly he
had her in his power, and his bared teeth glistened in the darkness as a
wave curled and, splashing against the side of the schooner, sent forth
a phosphorescent flash.
And now he told himself that it was all over; he must die unrevenged,
unable to make a single struggle, for the last moments had come, his
muscles were relaxing, the sense of terror was growing more dull, and he
must fall. His eyes were staring straight up at the davit, now black
above his head, just faintly seen through the darkness, and it seemed
more than ever the instrument of his death as the slipping rope for a
moment scorched his hands, his eyes convulsively closed as the strain on
the muscles of his arms ceased, and he fell.
But not to plunge into the black waters beneath him, and only a few feet
from where he had hung, for the wave that curled against the side, and
with its phosphorescent glare shewn his distorted features, swept the
boat beneath his feet, and he sank all of a heap in the bows, to lie
there motionless as the boat rose and fell. For he was utterly
prostrate, and it was some minutes before he could realise that he was
still alive.
When, however, by slow degrees the feeling came upon him that he was
safe, no thanks rose to his cracked, dry lips, but a smile of malignant
satisfaction, for revenge was still open to him, and as soon as he could
recover himself somewhat, he might put his plan into execution.
For fully half-an-hour Laure lay there crouching in the bows of the boat
waiting for the strength that would enable him to achieve his nefarious
ends, while the watch hung drowsily over the bulwarks, and those below
slept peacefully, in ignorance of the horrible fate that was in store.
At last, like some deadly monster uncoiling its folds, the Cuban began
to move, and his first attempt was to reach a bottle of spirits, from
whose gurgling throat he drank with avidity, the potent fluid giving him
the restoration he sought. Then as the blood began to tingle in his
veins, he sat up, looked round, and gently chafed his benumbed arms.
A slight motion in the fore part of the ship roused him to the necessity
for immediate action, and now with eager haste he cautiously felt about,
and placed the galvanic battery in a convenient spot, took hold of the
reel of fine silk-covered wire, arranged it so that it was not
entangled, and then, having assured himself that all was right, he took
out his knife and cut the boat's painter, floating now gently away in
the wake of the schooner, while as he did so he let the wire run rapidly
out so that a connection was kept up.
There must have been at least a hundred yards of wire, and the schooner
glided away so gently that there was never any stress on the frail metal
cord, till the last rings ran off the reel, when Laure, with a cry of
exultation, checked the progress softly and felt for the wire's end.
The schooner could hardly be distinguished now, and there was not a
moment to lose, for if the wire were tightened till it dragged on the
boat it must part, so with trembling eagerness the Cuban twisted the
slight metal strand twice round his left hand, while with his right he
placed the end against the brass connection of the plates in the
battery.
The work was instantaneous.
As he touched the connection with the tiny point of copper there was a
hissing noise in the jar, a little point of light darted at the end of
the wire, and simultaneously a hundred yards away in the darkness there
was a tremendous flash, the darkness was illuminated by a fountain of
sparks, which rose high in air, driven by a fan-like wave of flame; the
fire curved over, and the sparks fell hissing into the sea.
As the flame rose, spreading wider and wider, there was a roar as of
thunder, a rush as of the wind in a tempest struck Laure, the boat
rocked to and fro, shipping no small amount of water, and the wire
twisted round the Cuban's hand cut and bit into the flesh ere it snapped
short off.
But he did not feel the pain, and saw not the danger to which he was
exposed as he gazed straight beyond him at the doomed ship, and exulted
in the wild shriek of horror that he had heard as the noise of the
explosion died away.
He heard no more, for an awful silence fell upon the ocean, now blacker
than ever, and rising up in the boat he held out one hand, shaking his
fist in the direction where a faint glow told him of burning fragments
of the wreck, and then with a shriek of exultation he cried--
"Sink, sink, with your accursed freight. Who wins now?"
He tottered as he spoke, and though straining his voice to hurl out his
curse at the schooner and those on board, it was but a feeble cry, and
he fell back senseless over the thwarts to lie in the bottom of the
boat, with the water that had been shipped washing over him.