"_Virgen Santissima_! Mother of God, have mercy!"
The cry is heard in the cabin of the _Condor_--Don Gregorio Montijo
giving utterance to it.
Several days have elapsed since the desertion of her crew, and she is
still afloat, drifting in a south-westerly direction, with all sail set,
just as when the pirates put away from her.
Why she has not gone to the bottom is known but to two men--they
entrusted with the scuttling.
And just as when left, are the three unfortunate beings aboard: the
black cook on his galley bench, the captain and his passenger
_vis-a-vis_ at the cabin-table, bound to and bolt upright in their
chairs.
But though the attitudes of all three are unchanged, there is a marked
change in their appearance, especially of those in the cabin. For the
white man shown the effects of physical suffering sooner than the
Ethiopian.
For over five days Don Gregorio and Lantanas have been enduring agony
great as ever tortured Tantalus. It has made fearful inroad on their
strength--on their frames. Both are reduced almost to skeletons;
cheekbones protruding, eyes sunken in their sockets. Were the cords
that confine them suddenly taken off, they would sink helpless on the
floor!
Not all this time have they been silent. At intervals they had
conversed upon their desperate situation. For the first day, with some
lingering hope of being released; but afterwards despairingly, as the
hours passed and nothing occurred to change it.
Now and then they have heard cries on deck; knowing they are from the
cook; whom they now believe to be, as themselves, bound up somewhere in
the forward part of the vessel.
At first they made some attempt to communicate with him, by answering
them; but found it an idle effort. He may have heard, but could not
help them. And now their feeble strength forbids even such exertion of
their voices.
Long since have the two men given up all hope of being able to untie the
cords keeping them to their chairs. The knots made by the hands of a
sailor would defy the efforts of the most skilled _presti-digitateur_.
And at length also have they ceased to converse, or only at periods long
apart. Lantanas, after his first throes of fierce rage, has sunk into a
sort of stupor, and, with head drooping down to his breast, appears as
if life had left him.
Don Gregorio, on the contrary, holds his erect--at least during most
part of the day. For before him is something to be seen--the sea
through the stern windows, still open.
On this he keeps his eyes bent habitually; though not with much hope of
their seeing aught to cheer him. On its blue expanse he beholds but a
streak of white, the frothing water in the vessel's wake, now and then a
"school" of tumbling porpoises, or the "spout" of a cachalot whale.
Once, however, an object came within his field of vision, which caused
him to start, writhe in his ropes, and cry out to the utmost of his
strength. For it was a ship in full sail crossing the _Condor's_ track,
and scarce a cable's length astern!
He heard a hail and called out in response, Lantanas joining him.
And the two kept on shouting for hours after, till their feeble voices
failed them; and they again resigned themselves to a despondency,
hopeless as ever.
All their shouts have ever brought them were the Bornean apes, that they
often hear scampering up and down the cabin-stair, dashing their uncouth
bodies against the closed door.
The Chilian has now quite surrendered to despair; while Don Gregorio,
who had also lost hope of help from man, still has faith in Heaven.
Hence the prayerful appeal; which with unabated fervour he once more
sends up:--
"_Virgen Santissima_! Mother of God, have mercy!"
All at once Lantanas, catching the words, and raising his head, cries
out:
"Virgin! Hach! There's no virgin!--No mother of God, nor God neither!"
"Captain Lantanas!"
"Don't captain me! I'm not a captain. I'm a poor miserable creature--
starving with hunger--dying of thirst. Merciful Virgin, indeed!
Where's her mercy? If she has it, let her show. Let her find me food
and drink. Cakes and fruit there! Nothing of the sort. Stones,
painted stones! And those other things! Bottles they call them--
bottles and decanters. All a deception. They're imps--some demigods!
See how they dance. Let's join them! Come, old Zanzibar! Bring your
fiddle! And my Bornean beauties, come you. We'll have a grand
_fandango_. We'll make a dancing room of the _Condor's_ deck, and kick
up our heels high as the cuddy head. That's the way we'll do it. Ha--
ha--ha! Ha--ha--ha!"
"O God!" groans Don Gregorio, "Lantanas has lost his reason!"