A STRANGE VISITOR
But the mutineers took good care not to show themselves just then; and
the captain, deeming such a course prudent, tugged at the anchor until
it was lifted, when he managed to shove the craft off, and reaching
the middle of the lagoon, the anchor was dropped.
"Now they won't be likely to approach without my seeing them," was his
conclusion; "and so long as I can keep awake, I can hold them at bay.
I hate to shoot a man, but if ever a person had justification for
doing so, I have. I am rather inclined to think that if either
Brazzier or Redvignez should wander into range, one of these rifles
would be likely to go off!"
Seeing no immediate danger, Captain Bergen descended into the cabin
for a few minutes. Poor, tired Inez had thrown herself on the hammock
and was sound asleep.
"Sleep, little one," murmured the captain, as he lingered for a minute
to look at the sweet, infantile face, in the gathering twilight. "It
is a sad fate which orders you to witness so much violence, and sorry
I am that it is so; but where would I have been excepting for you?"
Then he softly left the cabin and took his position on deck. The moon
was full, which was gratefully noticed by the captain, for he could
easily keep awake all night, and thus detect the approach of his
enemies. In fact, his nerves were so unstrung that he would not be
able to sleep for many hours to come.
"But what is to be done hereafter?"
This was the question he put to himself, and which had to be
answered.
The mutineers kept carefully out of sight, and, as night settled over
the scene, the captain remained wide awake and vigilant. There was
ample food for thought and reflection--the cutting of the hose-pipes
of the diving apparatus, the attack by the mutineers, the terrible
flight and pursuit, the interference of Inez--all these and more
surged through the brain of the captain, while he slowly paced back
and forth, with eyes and ears wide open. Inez still slumbered, and all
was silent, excepting the boom of the ocean against the coral-reef;
while, as the night wore on, the captain maintained his lonely watch.
Captain Bergen scanned the fringe of shore which circled about him,
like a great wall thrown up between the lagoon and the Pacific, that
steadily broke on the outside. But turn his keen eyes wheresoever he
chose, he could detect not the slightest sign of the mutineers. He
thought it likely they would start a fire somewhere, but no starlike
point of light twinkled from beneath the palm-trees, and he was left
to conjecture where they were and what they were doing.
"They will probably wait till they think I am asleep," was his
thought, "and then they will swim quietly out and try to board."
He believed it would be either that way or they would construct a raft
and paddle themselves out to the schooner. Knowing the captain was on
the Coral, and knowing how important it was that he should not be
allowed to run away and leave them there, they would neglect no
precaution to prevent his going off. They, too, would understand what
it was he was waiting for, and they were seamen enough to know the
hour when he would be able to sail, and, consequently, what they were
to do to prevent it.
"They have no way of closing the channel, or they would do so, and it
remains----Hello!"
He was standing at the prow, looking carefully about him, and with all
his senses alert, and he stood thus fully twenty minutes, expecting
something whose precise nature he had already conjectured.
"That splash meant something, and I think----"
Just then he heard a commotion in the water directly under the prow,
and, looking over, he saw a strange-looking object, like one of the
uncouth monsters of the deep, come to the surface and begin climbing
up by aid of the fore-chains.
"I say, cap'n, can't you give a fellow a lift?"
It was the mate, Abe Storms, who asked the question, and, as the
captain extended his hand, he said, in a low, fervent voice:
"Thank heaven! I was about giving you up for lost!"