But hardly had the colonel given vent to his despairing exclamation,
expressive alike of his own dismay and ours also, when the bitter
feeling of disappointment at being too late, that had for the moment
weighed down upon us, crushing our enthusiasm, was suddenly banished and
the hearts of all filled with renewed hope and fierce determination.
We were not too late after all!
No.
For as we gazed in blank surprise at the howling mob of Haytians, who
appeared to have gained complete possession of the _Saint Pierre_, and
were dancing about and gesticulating in their wild, devilish fashion,
calling out to us with wild derisive cries, as if mocking at our efforts
to save those whom they had already butchered, a bright flame of fire
flashed out from the skylight hatch of the doomed ship, followed by the
sharp crack of a revolver; and at the same instant one of the half-naked
devils massed on the poop leaped into the air and then fell on his face
flat on the deck, uttering a yell of agony as he writhed his limbs in
the throes of death.
An exulting cheer broke from all of us in the _Star of the North_ on
seeing this, every man gripping his weapon tightly, and setting his
teeth hard, ready for action, as the two vessels sidled up nearer and
nearer.
Then if word were wanted to spur us on, the skipper gave that word with
a vengeance!
"By George! my lads, we're in time yet to save the child and our other
white comrades!" he cried out loudly, at the same time jumping into the
mizzen rigging, where he hung on the shrouds with one hand, while in the
other he held a cutlass which he had hastily clutched up, whirling it
round his lionlike old grey head. "See, men, they've retreated to the
cabin below, where they're fighting for their lives to the last. Tumble
up, my lads, and save them, like the British sailors that you are!
Boarders, away!"
As he said this, Mr Fosset, who was still on the bridge conning the old
barquey, having at once ported our helm, on the skipper holding up his
cutlass, taking this for a signal, we came broadside-on, slap against
the hull of the other ship with a jolt that shook her down to her very
kelson, rolling a lot of the darkies, who were grouped aft, off their
legs like so many ninepins. At the same moment, before the two craft
had time to glide apart, both having way upon them, old Masters forward,
and Parrell, the quartermaster, who was stationed in the waist of our
vessel, just under the break of the poop, hooked on grapnels, with
hawsers attached, to the weather rigging of the _Saint Pierre_; and ere
the skipper's rallying cry and our answering cheer had died away,
drowned by the voice of our escaping steam rushing up the funnels on the
engines coming to a stop, now that their duty for the nonce was done,
there we were moored hard and fast together, alongside the whilom
dreaded "ghost-ship!"
Then with another wild hurrah that made the ringbolts in the deck
jingle, and swamped the sound of the rushing steam and everything, the
men, closing up behind the skipper, who led us so gallantly over the
side, far in advance, brave-hearted old sea dog that he was, bounded
across the intervening bulwarks, and were the next instant engaged in
all the maddening excitement of a hand-to-hand tussle with the black
villains, pistol shot, sword cut and pike thrust coming in turn into
play, amid a babel of hoarse shouts of rage and cheers and savage
yells--mingled with the swish of blows from capstan bars, the loud
reports of revolvers fired off at close range and the heavy thud of
falling bodies as they tumbled headlong on the deck ever and anon,
accompanied by some cry of agony or groan of pain too deep for
utterance.
Aye, it was a discord of devilry that must have appeared a veritable
pandemonium to the spirits of the air, were any such looking down on the
wrathful, sanguinary scene from the clear blue heavens above, all
radiant now with a golden glow that came from the west, where the
declining sun was just beginning to sink below the horizon!
"Fuaghaballah, may the divvle take the hindmost!" cried Garry O'Neil,
leaping after the skipper on to the poop of the _Saint Pierre_, a
revolver in his right fist and a cutlass in his left, laying about him
with a will amongst the mass of infuriated negroes who tried to resist
his rush, clutching at his legs and arms in vain, for he seemed
bewitched. "Come on wid ye, me darlints, an' let us make mincemate of
'em, faith!"
I followed in his wake, but a crowd of our men, some of whom had served
in the navy and were accustomed to the work, pushed me on one side,
going into the thick of the fight themselves, and all was such a jumble
of confusion that I hardly knew where I was until "a pretty tidy tap on
the top of my head," as Garry would have said, brought back my
recollection in a very effective manner, when I found myself right in
front of an extremely ugly-looking negro, whose appearance was not
improved by a slice having been taken off the side of his face, and from
which blood was streaming down all over his black body, and that
destitute of clothing.
I noticed that this gentleman had a long piece of wood like a boat
stretcher in his hands, with which he had evidently given me the gentle
reminder I have mentioned, being brought to this conclusion by the fact
that the rascal had it raised ready to deal another blow.
Putting up my arm instinctively to ward off the impending stroke that I
saw coming, I cocked and levelled my revolver at him in an instant.
Before I could fire, however, some one behind me shoved me aside again,
and crash came a heavy capstan bar down upon the negro's skull, which I
heard crack like a walnut shell as he dropped dead on his face.
"Golly, Mass' Hald'n," exclaimed Accra Prout, our stalwart mulatto cook,
whose sinuous arm had thus incontinently settled the dispute between my
sable opponent and myself. "I'se guess dis chile gib dat black debble
goss, noh ow!"
But ere I could say a word to him for his timely aid, Accra Prout had
bounded onward in front, and I then saw he was following Colonel
Vereker, who had managed somehow or other, in spite of his lameness, to
gain the deck of his old ship along with the rest of us.
Crack, crack, crack, went his revolver with venomous iteration from the
other side of the vessel, where he was standing by the bulwarks, close
to the hatchway of the companion-ladder leading to the cabin below,
which he was apparently endeavouring to reach, while a crowd of Haytians
barred his further progress towards those imprisoned in the cabin, whom
they thus prevented his releasing, a fresh foe starting up for every one
he disposed of, and a rough and terrible fight going on all round him
all the time.
"'Top a minnit, Mass' V'reker!" shouted Accra Prout, darting into the
middle of the throng, clearing a pathway for himself with the capstan
bar. "I'se here; I'se come help you soon!"
"A thousand devils!" hissed a tall black near by--a man with a large,
crinkly, ink-black moustache, and certainly with the most satanic visage
I had ever beheld before. "A thousand devils!" repeated he, giving him
a thrust with a large knife that pierced poor Accra's arm, and making
him drop the capstan bar. "Take care of yourself--beast!"
A cry from the colonel told me who this was.
"Ah, villain, villain!" he sang out, looking him full in the face and
grinding his teeth and trying with all his might, but vainly, to get at
him through the press of struggling figures by whom he was surrounded.
"I've been looking for you, _Marquis des Coupgorges_!"
The black scoundrel gave out a shrill laugh like that of a hyena, as
Colonel Vereker had described it to us when telling his yarn.
"Pardon me, sir, I am here," he yelled out mockingly. "I am here. I do
not run away like your white trash! Why don't you come and fight me?
Bah! I spit on you, my fine plantation colonel. When I get at you I
will serve you just as I did your sly slave the other day, whom you sent
to betray us, though you, yourself, were too great a coward to come
amongst us, yes, to come amongst us yourself. Aha! colonel."
He said this in plain English, which language he spoke as fluently as he
did French, the native language of Hayti, uttering his abusive threats
loud enough for us to hear every syllable; but though I aimed at him
while he was speaking twice point blank, and my revolver spoke out quite
as loudly as he, while the colonel likewise shot at him and the skipper
made a slash in his direction with his cutlass, the miscreant escaped
all our attacks without a single wound, dodging away from us amongst his
dusky compatriots, who were now pretty thickly mixed up with our men in
a fierce _melee_, at the further end of the poop, overlooking the waist
below.
In the midst of this awful scrimmage there came a wild rush aft of all
the remaining blacks who had been engaged with some of the hands
amidships, pursued by our second boarding party, led by Mr Fosset and
Stoddart, who had made their way over the bows and cleared the
fo'c's'le, fighting onward step by step along the upper deck; and hemmed
in fast thus, between two fires, the black desperadoes made a last
stand, refusing to surrender, or throw down their arms in spite of all
promises of quarter on our part.
All of them could see for themselves how completely overmatched they
were, and must have known the utter uselessness of attempting any
further resistance to us; but the mutineers of the negro portion of the
_Saint Pierre's_ crew, who were now in the majority, feared to give in
owing to the fact of their believing they would be ultimately hanged if
taken alive after the atrocities they had committed; so being of the
opinion they were bound to be killed in any case, they determined
apparently, if die they must, they would die fighting.
Whatever might be their motive or conviction, I will give them the
credit of being plucky, and must say that they fought bravely, though
with a ferocity that was more than savage, to the bitter end, their last
rally on the break of the poop being the fiercest episode of the fray,
several hand-to-hand combats going on at one and the same time with hand
pikes and capstan bars whirling about over the heads of those engaged,
where cutlass cuts were met with knife-thrusts from the formidable long-
bladed weapons the negroes carried in their hands only to sheathe them
in the bodies of their white antagonists.
My brain got dizzy as I watched the mad turmoil and my blood was at
fever heat, taking part in the fight too, you may be sure, whenever I
saw an opening, and dealing a blow here or parrying one there, as chance
arose, with the best of them, young though I was, and totally
inexperienced in such matters!
It was coming near to the finish, being too warm work to continue much
longer, and I think all of us had had pretty well enough of it, when,
looking round for Colonel Vereker, whom I suddenly missed from among the
combatants, I saw him struggling with one of the blacks in a regular
rough and tumble tussle on the deck.
The two were rolling about close to the after skylight from whence we
had observed the flash of the pistol shot as we approached the ship, and
which the colonel had been trying to get near to ever since he boarded
her, but had been prevented from reaching by one obstacle or another
until now, when this negro clutched hold of him and forced him back
again.
He and the Haytian were tightly locked in a deadly embrace, the negro
gripping him with both arms round the body, and the colonel endeavouring
to release his revolver hand, the two rolling over and over on the deck
towards the rail forward.
"Ha!" muttered the colonel, who was hard pressed, through his set teeth.
"Only let me get free."
Strangely enough, the glass of the skylight above the spot where the
pair were struggling was instantly shattered from within, as if in
response to his muttered cry; and with a loud bark that could have been
heard a mile off, a big dog burst forth from the opening, making
straight for the colonel and his relentless foe.
Then there came a startled yell from the negro, who, releasing his late
antagonist, staggered to his feet.
"Holy name of--" he screamed out in wild affright, but he had not time
to reach the concluding word of his sentence--the name of his patron
saint, no doubt--"the devil!"
For before he could get so far, giving a fierce growl, the dog at once
sprang up at him, his fangs meeting in the Haytian's throat, whereupon
the latter, toppling backwards over the poop-rail, fell into the waist
below, with the dog hanging on to him; and I noticed presently that both
were dead, the brave animal who had come so opportunely to the rescue of
the colonel, his master, being stabbed to the heart by a knife which the
negro still held in his lifeless hand, while his own neck had been torn
to pieces by the dog whom death could not force to relinquish his grip!
Immediately running up to the colonel, who was feebly trying to rise,
his wrestle with the black having crippled his wounded leg and arm, I
helped him to his feet as quickly as I could, while others clustered
round to shelter us.
"Poor Ivan, true as steel in death as in life!" he faintly muttered,
glancing from the break of the poop on the two bodies huddled together
below, the blood of the faithful dog flowing with that of his ruthless
foe into a crimson pool that was gradually extending its borders from
the middle of the deck to the lee scuppers. "He has defended my little
Elsie, I am sure, to the last, likewise, even as he defended me. I hope
and trust my child is still safe in the cabin. Help me aft, my lad, to
see; quick, quick!"
Of course I assisted him as well as I could under the circumstances, but
as he limped along towards the companion-hatchway, the leader of the
desperadoes, that villainous "marquis," who I thought had met with his
just deserts long since, not having seen him for some little time among
the other fighters, most unexpectedly jumped from the rigging in front
of the colonel and aimed a vindictive blow at him with a marline-spike.
This must have settled the colonel if it had fallen on his uncovered
head. Fortunately though, dropping quickly the colonel's arm, I fended
off the blow with the revolver I held in my hand, while at the same time
I gave the scoundrel a drive in the face that must have astonished his
black lordship a good deal, for my clenched fist met him square on the
mouth and shook his teeth, making them rattle, as well as disarranging
the twist of his crinkly moustache!
He came at me with a snarl like an angry tiger, and then, hugging me
tight, with his hideous black face thrust close against mine, and his
muscular arms pressed tightly around my ribs, he squeezed every ounce of
breath out of my body.