When I came to again, my head was aching awfully, and I found myself
lying upon the deck, with old Sam Brown dabbing my forehead with a wet
swab. Close beside me was Bill Smith, and the sight of him alive did me
so much good that I jumped up into a sitting position, and gave his hand
a good shake. But, there, it was for all the world like having boiling
lead poured from one side to the other of your head, and I was glad to
lean against the bulkhead again.
There were half-a-dozen of the crew keeping watch over us, while Sam
whispered to me that six bodies had been shoved out of the port--three
being passengers; as to the rest on our side, Mr Ward's seemed the
worst wound, but he, poor fellow, was sitting up pale and anxious, with
his handkerchief tied round his head, and evidently, like me, wondering
what was to happen next.
I could not help noticing soon after how well the women bore it all;
hushing and chattering to the children to keep them quiet, and doing all
they could to keep them from noticing our wild and wounded faces. They
were all huddled together in the big cabin, while, with the exception of
the men on guard, the mutineers were on deck. From the slight rolling
of the ship, it seemed that they had altered her course; but my head was
too much worried and confused for me to notice much, and that day
slipped by, and the night came--such a night as, I pray God, I may never
again pass; for the cabin-hatches were closed upon us, and none of the
men stayed down, but after serving round some biscuit and water, and
some rank bad butter at the bottom of one of the little tubs, they went
on deck, though we soon found that a couple of them kept watch.
It was a sad night and a bitter, for as soon as darkness came down upon
us, the poor women, who had held up so well all day, broke down, and you
could hear the smothered sobbing and wailing, till it went through you
like a knife. I believe they tried all they could to keep it in, poor
things; but then 'tain't in 'em, you know, to keep up long; and then
when the children broke out too, and wanted all sorts of things that
they couldn't have, why, it was awful. We had no lights, for they
wouldn't give us any, so we all had to set to, to try and make the best
of everything; but we couldn't, you see, not even second best, try how
we would.
"Only a bit of a cut, sir," I says to Mr Ward, who was going round and
doing what he could in the dark for we chaps as had got knocked about.
"I sha'n't hurt. See to Bill Smith here. Tell you what it is though,
sir--you won't catch me at sea again in such a Noah's Ark as this here."
"Hush, my man," he says, "and try all you can to help." "In course I
will, sir," I says; and then, hearing a growl on my right, I says: "That
ain't Bill, sir, that's Sam. He's all right: nobody can't hurt him, his
blessed head's too thick." Directly after the doctor felt his way to
Bill Smith, and tied up his head a bit, while I was wondering what to do
for the best, listening all the time to women wailing, and little ones
letting go, as if with the full belief that they'd got the whole of the
trouble in the ship on their precious little heads. What seemed the
best thing to do was to quiet some of them; and if it had been daylight,
a sight or two of my phiz would have frightened 'em into peace; but how
to do it now, I didn't know. "Howsoever, here goes for a try," I says;
and I groped my way along as well as I could, expecting every moment to
be deafened, when I turned half mad with rage, for some one yells down
the skylight: "Stop that noise!" and at the same moment there was a
pistol fired right into the wailing crowd; then there was a sharp clear
shriek, and directly after a stillness that was awful.
"It was a cruel cowardly act," I heard some one say then close to me;
"but, Miss Bell,"--And then directly came the young lady's voice saying:
"It is almost as cowardly, sir, to speak to me in this way, when I am so
unprotected."
"By your leave," I says gruffly, and I felt a little hand laid on my
arm.
"Is that you, Mr Roberts?" says Miss Bell, and I could feel her soft
breath on my cheek.
"It's old Tom Roberts, without the Mister, ma'am," I says, "and at your
sarvice. What shall I do?"
What could I do? Rum question, wasn't it? When, if she didn't put a
little toddling thing into my arms--a bit of a two-year-older, as was
just beginning to cry again, after the fright of the pistol; but I
turned myself into a sort of cradle, got rocking about, and if the soft
round little thing didn't go off fast asleep, and breathe as reg'lar as
so much clockwork!
"Well done you, Tom Roberts," I says, after listening to it for about
half an hour; and do you know, I did feel a bit proud of what I'd done,
being the first time, you see, that I'd ever tried to do such a thing;
and so through the night I sat there with my back to the bulkhead, and
with my head all worried like, for now it was me groaning, and now it
seemed that I was crying like a child, and then people were telling me
to be quiet, only I wouldn't, for I had mutinied, and was going to kill
Mr Ward, and marry Miss Bell, and things were all mixed together, and
strange and misty, and then thicker still, and at last all was blank,
and I must have gone off to sleep, in spite of my trouble, for when I
opened my eyes, it was broad daylight again, and then the first thing
they lit on was a little chubby, curly-headed thing in my lap, watching
me as serious as could be, and twisting its little hand in my beard.
I hadn't eyes for anything else for a little while, but as soon as I did
take a look round, all the troubles seemed to come back with a jump, for
most of the party were asleep; there they all were, first-class
passengers and steerage passengers, all huddled together, no
distinctions now. Old Sam was snoring away close alongside of the
skipper and Mr Wallace, and strange and bad they looked, poor fellows;
while up at the far end sat Miss Bell, bending over her brother, who lay
on a locker; but whether she was asleep or not, I couldn't tell.
But there was something else took my attention, and that was, that
though all the other berths seemed empty, one had some one lying in it,
and that berth I could not keep my eyes off, for it got to be somehow
mixed up with the firing of that pistol down the skylight and the sharp
cry I had heard; and so from thinking about it all, I got it put
together in a shape which Mr Ward afterwards told me was quite right,
for a little lad of nine years old was killed by that cowardly bullet,
and it was him as I saw lying there so still.
By degrees, first one and then another of our miserable party roused up
with a sigh, and then sat staring about in a most hopeless way; all but
Mr Ward, who went round to those who had been wounded, saying a
cheering word or two, as well as seeing to their bandages; but it was
quite by force that he had to do the skipper's, for his wound had made
him light-headed, and he took it into his poor cloudy brain that Mr
Ward was Van, and wanted to make an end of him.
People soon got whispering together and wondering what was to be done
next, for they seemed to be busy on deck, and of course we were all very
anxious to know; but when Sam Brown got a tub on one of the tables, and
then hauled himself up, to have a look through the skylight, he came
down again rubbing his knuckles and swearing, for one of the watch had
given him a tap with a marlinespike; and after that, of course no one
tried to look out.
I, for one, expected that they would have taken advantage of having
their own way to have a reg'lar turn at the spirits; but no: they
certainly got some up, but Van seemed to be driving them all with a
tightish hand, so that they were going on very quietly and reg'larly, as
we found, for by and by they serves out biscuit and butter and fresh
water again; and not very long after, Van sung out down the hatchway for
me to come up; and knowing that if I didn't go he'd send and fetch me, I
went up, and sat down on the deck, where he pointed to with a pistol.
Then he ordered up Sam and Bill, and four sailors who were on our side
(lads only), and the skipper and Mr Wallace, one at a time, till we
were all set in a row, with them guarding us; when, with his teeth
glistening, Van walks up to the skipper, and hits him on the head with
the butt-end of his pistol, so that the poor fellow fell back on the
deck.
"Set him up again," says Van savagely; and a couple of the mutineers did
so, but only for Van to knock him down once more; and he did that four
times over, till, when they set the poor captain up again the last time,
he fell back upon the deck of himself, being stunned like. It was
enough to make any fellow burst with rage; but what can you do when
there's half a score standing over you with loaded pistols? and,
besides, trouble makes people very selfish, while we all knew how Van
was having his bit of revenge, cowardly as it was, for the way the
captain had treated him.
Last of all, Van goes and puts his foot on the skipper's neck, and I
made as though to get up, for I thought he was going to blow his brains
out; and bad and cowardly as the captain had been, I couldn't a-bear to
see him hit when he was down without trying to help him; but it was of
no use, for I was pulled back directly, and all I could do was to sit
and look on.
All at once, Van turns a breaker on its end, jumps on it, and, sticking
his arms a-kimbo like a fishwoman, he begins to spout at us; and fine
and fierce no doubt he thought he looked in his red nightcap, and belt
stuck full of pistols. "Now, my lads," he says, "we're going to have
some of the good old times over again: take possession of one of the
beautiful isles in the Pacific, and sail where we like under the black
flag, free as the day, with none of your cursed tyrants to make men
sweat blood and work like dogs, but all free and equal. We've done the
work, and captured the ship, and you've acted like thieves and curs, and
sided with them as will be ready to kick you for your pains. As for
you, Wallace, curse you! you have always been a cur and a tool; but we
shall want help, and you can come if you like; while, you others, we'll
look over what's gone by, for you did fight like men. So, what do you
say?--will you join us, or take your chance to reach land in one of the
boats with the lot below?"
The young lads all looked at me, to see what I'd say, for no one took
much notice of Mr Wallace. Bill Smith, too, who was much better, he
looks at me; and I s'pose old Sam meant to do the same, but when I
turned to him, all I could make out was the whites of his eyes, till he
turned his head on one side, and I got a sight of one eye, when he
turned his head t'other way, and then I see t'other.
It was very plain that they meant me to be spokesman; and seeing that
was to be the case, and that, after a fashion, they left me to decide, I
just turns it over in my own mind for a hit, and seeing as I should be
wanted in the boats to help make the land somewhere, as they was to be
loaded with a set of the helplessest beings as ever breathed--why, I
says: "T'others can do as they like; as for me, you never asked me at
first; and as you've done without me so far, why, you can do without me
now--till you gets to the gallows," I added, but so as they couldn't
hear me. And, though I hardly expected it from the lads, they said
they'd do as I did; while, as for Bill and Sam, they always was a pair
of the helplessest babbies as ever breathed, and left me to think for
'em ever since we first sailed together--indeed, I don't fancy as Sam
ever had any thinking machinery at all. Howsoever, they said as they'd
stick by me; and Van gave a curse and a swear, and a blow or two at us;
and then, after a bit of 'scussion, in which women was named two or
three times, and Van and another party was quite at loggerheads for a
time, he gave his orders, big and bounceable like, and telling us to
lend a hand, he made ready to lower down one of the boats.
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