"Now then, out you come."
Mark Vandean did come out of the bunk in remarkably quick time, but he
was still confused, and his brain refused to solve the puzzle before
him, so he, to use a familiar expression, pulled himself together. The
young officer resented being spoken to in this rough manner and
threatened by a stranger with an American accent, and in as haughty a
tone as he could assume he cried,--
"Who are you? What are you doing here?"
"Come, I like that. Hear him. Oh, all right," cried the man, as there
was a hoarse chorus of laughter. "Who'm I, eh, my bantam cock? Waal,
I'm Cap'n Ephrum Bynes, o' Charleston, South Car'lina. That's who I am.
And what am I doing here? I'm kicking a set o' sarcy Britishers out o'
my ship. Now you know that."
"Where's Lieutenant Russell?"
"Down in the boat, my sarcy Tom chicken; and that's all you've got to
know. Say another word, and I'll have you pitched into the sea among
the sharks instead of into the boat. So mind that. Bring him on deck."
Rough hands seized Mark on the instant, and as a man carrying the
lanthorn stepped back, Mark saw the legs of the Yankee skipper ascending
the companion ladder, and a minute later he was rudely dragged on deck,
his heart beating wildly as he tried to pierce the darkness around in
search of his companions. But all was pitchy black, and though his eyes
wandered in search of the bright star-like lamp of the _Nautilus_, it
was not to be seen. The next moment he knew why; a pleasant breeze was
blowing off shore, hot but powerful enough to be acted upon, and in
those brief moments he knew that the vessel must have sailed.
He had little time for thought. He was suddenly lifted from the deck,
and he began to struggle wildly, striking out with his fists, but all in
vain.
"Over with him!" cried the Yankee skipper, and a cry escaped from Mark's
lips as he felt himself swung out over the side of the schooner, to
fall, he expected, splash into the sea. He had time to think all this,
for thought flies fast in emergencies, but his fall was partly upon
someone below, partly upon the thwart of a boat, and a deep groan came
from close to his ear as he looked up and saw the lanthorn resting on
the schooner's bulwark, and several faces staring down.
"My compliments to your skipper," said a mocking voice, "if you ever
ketch him, and tell him he's welkim to my boat. I'll take a glass o'
liquor with him if ever he comes our way.--Now then, shove off, you
there forward. If you stop another minute, I'll send a pig o' ballast
through your bottom."
This was said with a savage snarl, and as Mark struggled up into a
sitting position, he felt the boat begin to move.
"Here, ahoy, below there! You'd best lay your head to the north," came
the voice again, as the light was suddenly hidden or put out. "Your
skipper made signals when the wind rose, and we answered 'em for you.
Get your oars out sharp, or you won't overtake them this year."
Then all was silence and darkness save where the movement of an oar
sculling over the stern made the water flash and gleam with
phosphorescence, and raised up ripples of pale lambent, golden light.
"Who's that?" said Mark, in a whisper.
"On'y me, sir," replied a familiar voice, in company with a smothered
groan.
"Tom Fillot?"
"Ay, ay, sir," came back dismally. "I've got us out o' reach o' that
pig o' ballast."
"But, Tom," cried Mark, excitedly, "what does it mean? Where's Mr
Russell?"
"Somewheres underneath you, sir. I think you're a-sitting on him."
"There's someone lying here," cried Mark.
"Yes, sir, several someuns," said Tom Fillot. "Oh, my poor head!"
"But you don't tell me what it all means," cried Mark, angrily.
"Didn't know as it wanted no telling on, sir. Thought you knowed."
"But I know nothing. I was roused up, dragged out of the cabin, and
thrown down into the boat."
"Yes, sir; so was we, and not very gently, nayther."
"Then the--" began Mark, but he did not finish. "That's it, sir.
You've hit it. The Yankee captain come back from up the river somewhere
in his boat as quiet as you please, and the first I knowed on it was
that it was dark as pitch as I leaned my back against the bulwarks, and
stood whistling softly, when--_bang_, I got it on the head, and as I
went down three or four of 'em climbed aboard. `What's that? You
there, Fillot?' I heered in a dull sort o' way, and then the poor
lufftenant went down with a groan, and same moment I hears a scrufflin'
forrard and aft, cracks o' the head, and falls. Minute arter there was
a row going on in the fo'c's'le. I heered that plain, sir, and wanted
to go and help my mates, but when I was half up, seemed as if my head
begun to spin like a top, and down I went again, and lay listening to
the row below. There was some fighting, and I heered Joe Dance letting
go awful. My, he did swear for a minute, and then he was quiet, and
there was a bit o' rustling, and I hears a voice say, `Guess that's all.
Show the light.' Then there seemed to me to be a light walking about
the deck with a lot o' legs, and I knowed that they were coming round
picking up the pieces. Sure enough they was, sir, and they pitched all
the bits of us overboard into a boat alongside; and I knowed we hadn't
half kept our watch, and the Yankee skipper had come back and took his
schooner."
"Oh, Tom Fillot!" groaned Mark. "And was that all?"
"No, sir; for I heered the skipper say, `Anyone been in the cabin?' And
when no one spoke he began to cuss 'em for a set o' idgits, and they all
went below with the lanthorn, and come up again along o' you. My word,
Mr Vandean, sir, how you must have slep'!"
"Oh, Tom Fillot!" cried Mark again.
"Yes, and it is `Oh, Tom Fillot,' sir," groaned the poor fellow. "My
skull's cracked in three or four places sure as a gun."
"And the others. Oh! the others. Are they killed?"
"I dunno, sir. I ain't--not quite. Sims to me that they'd got bats,
and they hit us with 'em like they do the pigs in the north country, or
the cod-fish aboard the fishing smacks. My poor head feels as if it's
opening and shutting like a fish's gills every time I moves my mouth."
"Are all the men here, Tom?"
"Yes, sir; I think so. If they're not, it's 'cause they're dead."
"This is Mr Russell; I can feel his uniform," whispered Mark; "and he's
dead--no, I can feel his heart beating. Come here, Tom, and help me."
"I'll come, sir; but I can't help you, and it don't seem no use for me
to be waggling this 'ere oar about. Just as well let the tide send us
along."
There was the sound of the oar being laid along the thwart, and then of
someone stumbling.
"That was most nigh overboard, sir. Wish it warn't so dark. Why, it's
black. What's that?"
There was a creaking sound from a little distance, and the man
whispered,--
"They're making sail, sir, and they'll creep out afore morning, and get
right away."
"With those poor creatures on board."
"Just as we'd made 'em clean and comf'able, sir. Oh, my poor head!"
"Let's see to Mr Russell first, and then I'll bind up your head as well
as I can."
"How's one to see to Mr Russell, sir? Why, plagues o' Egypt's nothing
to darkness like this."
Mark bent over his brother officer, and passed his hand over his face
and head.
"He's not bleeding," he whispered, impressed as he was by the darkness
and their terrible position.
"More am I, sir, but I'm precious bad all the same. Don't s'pose any
one's bleeding, but they got it hard same as I did. Wood out here ain't
like wood at home. Oak's hard enough, but iron-wood's like what they
call it."
"Who is this?" said Mark, as, after gently letting Mr Russell's head
sink back, his hands encountered another face.
"I dunno, sir. It was every man for hisself, and I was thinking about
Tom Fillot, AB, and no one else. What's he feel like?"
"Like one of our men."
"But is it a hugly one with very stiff whiskers? If so be it is, you
may take your davy it's Joe Dance."
"How am I to know whether he's ugly?" cried Mark, petulantly.
"By the feel, sir. Try his nose. Joe Dance's nose hangs a bit over to
starboard, and there's a dent in it just about the end where he chipped
it agin a shot case."
"Oh, I can't tell all that," cried Mark--"Yes, his nose has a little
dent in it, and his whiskers are stiff."
"Then that's Joe Dance, sir."
"Avast there! Let my head alone, will yer?" came in a low, deep growl.
"That's Joe, sir, safe enough. Harkee there! Hear 'em?"
Sundry creaking sounds came out of the darkness some distance away now,
and Tom Fillot continued in a whisper,--
"They're hysting all the sail they can, sir. Look! you can see the
water briming as she sails. They're going same way as we. Tide's
taking us."
"Oh, Tom Fillot, I oughtn't to have gone to sleep. I ought to have
stopped on deck."
"No yer oughtn't, sir. Your orders was to take your watch below, and
that was enough for you. Dooty is dooty, sir, be it never so dootiful,
as the proverb says."
"But if I had been on deck I might have heard them coming, Tom."
"And got a rap o' the head like the pore fellows did, sir."
"Well, perhaps so, Tom. I wonder why they didn't strike me as they did
you."
"'Cause you're a boy, sir, though you are a young gentleman, and a
orficer. Fine thing to be a boy, sir. I was one once upon a time.
Wish I was a boy at home now, instead o' having a head like this here."
"I'm thinking of what the captain will say," muttered Mark,
despondently, as he ignored the man's remark.
"Say, sir? Why, what such a British officer as Cap'n Maitland's sure to
say, sir, as he won't rest till he's blown that there schooner right out
of the water."
"And those poor blacks," sighed Mark.
"Ah, it's hard lines for them poor chaps, and the women and bairns too,
even if they are niggers. Oh, if I'd only got that there skipper by the
scruff of his neck and the waistband of his breeches! Sharks might have
him for all I should care. In he'd go. Hookey Walker, how my head do
ache all round!"
"I'm very sorry, Tom Fillot."
"Which I knows you are, sir; and it ain't the first trouble as we two's
been in together, so cheer up, sir. Daylight'll come some time, and
then we'll heave to and repair damages."
Just then there was a low groan from forward.
"That's one of our blacky-toppers, sir. 'Tarn't a English groan. You
feel; you'll know him by his woolly head, and nose. If he's got a nose
hooked one way, it's Soup. If it's hooked t'other way--cocks up--it's
Taters."
"The hair is curly," said Mark, who was investigating.
"P'raps it's Dick Bannock, sir. There, I said it warn't an English
groan."
By this time some of the men were recovering from the stunning effect of
the blows they had all received, and there were sounds of rustling and
scuffles.
"Steady there, mate," growled one man. "What yer doing on?"
"Well, get off o' me, then," said another.
"Here, hi! What are you doing in my bunk? Hullo! Ahoy there! where
are we now?"
"Steady there, and don't shout, my lads."
"All right, sir," growled a voice. "I was a bit confoosed like! Oh, my
head!"
"Ay, mate," said Tom Fillot, "and it's oh, my, all our heads. Beg
pardon, sir, for the liberty, but if you'd do it for me, I should know
the worst, and I could get on then. I'm all nohow just now, and it
worries me."
"Do what, Tom?" said Mark.
"Just pass your finger round my head, and tell me for sartin whether
it's broke or no. It feels all opening and shutting like. Go it, sir;
don't you be feared. I won't holler."
Mark leaned forward and felt the man's head.
"It's not fractured, Tom," he said. "If it had been it would have made
you feel very different from this. You would have been insensible."
"Well, that what's I am, sir, and always have been. I never was a
sensible chap. But are you sure as it ain't broke, sir?"
"Certain, Tom."
"Then who cares? I don't mind a bit o' aching, and I'm ready for any
game you like. What do you say, sir, to trying to captivate the
schooner again?"
"You and I, Tom?"
"Well, it ain't a very strong force, sir, be it?"
"We must wait for daylight, Tom, and I hope by then some of the lads
will be able to pull an oar."
"Ay, ay, sir, o' course."
"I'm ready now," said Dick Bannock, with his voice sounding husky out of
the darkness; and there was silence, broken only by a groan or two for a
few minutes, during which Mark, feeling the terrible responsibility of
his position, tried to make some plan as to his future proceedings, but
only to be compelled to come back to the conclusion that there was
nothing to be done but wait for morning.
At one moment insane ideas as to the recapture of the schooner came to
trouble him, and this brought to mind what ought to have been his first
duty as the officer upon whom the command had suddenly fallen.
"Tom Fillot," he cried, excitedly, "go round the boat as carefully as
you can, and count the men, ourselves included. We ought to be eleven,
ought we not?"
"Let's see, sir. Two orficers is two; six AB's and coxswain seven, and
seven and two's nine; and the two nig--blacks, sir; nine and two's
'leven. That's right, sir 'leven."
"Go round then, and count."
"I think they could all answer to their names, sir, now, if I might be
so bold."
"Call them over, then."
"Ay, ay, sir. Here goes, then, lads. First orficer, Mr Russell, sir,
and you, sir's, two as we needn't count. Joe Dance, answer to your
name."
"Ay, ay," came in a growl.
"Dick Bannock."
"Here."
"Bill Billings."
"What's left on me, mate."
"Sam Grote."
"Here, but ain't got no head."
"Bob Stepney."
"Here; and wish I warn't," came surlily out of the darkness.
"Don't you be sarcy 'fore your orficers, Bob, or there may be a row,"
said Tom Fillot, sharply.
"I can't see no orficers, messmate," said the same voice.
"That'll do, Bob Stepney. That's cheek. Tim Dunning."
"That's me."
"All here, sir, and able to use their tongues. Fisties, too, I dessay."
"The two blacks!" said Mark, quickly, and with a feeling of thankfulness
to find matters so far well.
"Ay, ay, sir. Thought I'd give the white uns a chance first," said Tom
Fillot. "Now, you two, try and understand plain English. Answer to
your names. Soup."
There was no reply.
"Taters."
Still no reply.
"Not here?" said Mark, anxiously.
"Don't sabbee, p'raps, sir. I'll try again."
"Taters."
No answer.
"Soup."
No reply.
"Soup and Taters."
"Aren't aboard," growled several voices in chorus. "I'm 'fraid the Soup
and Taters is done, sir," said Tom Fillot in a low voice.
"Oh, man, man, how can you try to joke at a time like this!" cried Mark,
angrily.
"'Tarn't no joke, sir," cried Tom Fillot. "I'm sorry as you are, for
they were getting to be two good messmates. They'd on'y got minds like
a couple o' boys, but the way in which they took to their chew o' 'baccy
was wonderful to behold."
"The men must have overlooked them," cried Mark. "They were below
asleep."
"Nay, sir, they didn't care to go below. They was both asleep curled up
forrard under the bulwarks. They'd had so much being below, that they
shied at going down a hatchway."
"Then what do you think about them, Tom?" cried Mark, excitedly.
There was no reply.
"Why don't you answer, man?"
"Didn't like to tell you, sir," said Tom Fillot, quietly.
"Tell me what you are thinking at once."
"Well, sir, I thinks same as my mates do here. Them piratical sharks o'
slavers didn't dare to be too hard on us because they knowed if they was
ketched arterwards it meant a bit o' hemp round the neck, and a dance on
nothing at all in the air; but when it comes to blacks, they're no more
account to them than blackberries as grows on brambles. Strikes me they
give them poor chaps a crack o' the head apiece, and knocked 'em down,
same as they did we, but they wouldn't take the trouble to carry them
and pitch them into a boat. They just chucked them overboard at once."
"Oh, impossible!" cried Mark, excitedly. "They could not be such
brutes."
"What! not them, sir?" cried Tom Fillot, indignantly. "Harkye here,
messmates; I says as chaps as'd half kill such a orficer as Mr Russell,
who's as fine a gen'leman as ever stepped, 'd murder a King as soon as
look at him."
"Ay, ay," came in a low growl.
"And if any o' you thinks different to my sentiments, let him speak out
like a man."
"That's what we all think, messmet," came in another growl.
"And there you are, sir, and them's fax. They chucked them two pore
chaps overboard, and, speaking up for my messmates and self, I says we
don't hold with killing nobody 'cept in the name of dooty; but here's a
set o' miserable beggars as goes about buying and selling the pore
niggers, and treating 'em worse than they would a box o' worms to go
fishing with. Why, it's murder, sir, wholesale, retail, and for
exportation, as the man said over his shop door in our town o' Bristol,
and if we can only get at 'em--well, I won't say what we'll do, but if
there ain't some fatal accidents that day, my name ain't Tom."
"That's so, messmet--that's so," came in another deep growl.
"It's horrible, horrible," groaned Mark; and he bent over Mr Russell's
face, and tried to make out whether there was any sign of returning
consciousness.
"At a time like this, messmets," whispered Tom Fillot to those nearest
to him, "I'd be quiet. Mr Vandean's in a deal of trouble about the
lufftenant."
"Hi! all on you," came sharply from the forward part of the boat, which
rocked a little from some one changing his position; and as it rocked
tiny waves of light like liquid moonbeams flowed away to starboard and
port, while dull sparks of light appeared in the water down below.
"What's the matter there?" said Mark, rousing himself up to speak. "Be
silent, and keep the boat still."
"Ay, ay," growled Tom Fillot, but the boat still swayed.
"Do you hear there?" cried Mark, sharply. "Who's that?"
"Hi! all on you!" came again.
"Did you hear my order, Dance?" cried Mark. "Sit down, man. Do you
want to capsize the boat?"
"I want my hitcher," said the man, sharply. "Who's been a-meddling with
my boathook? it ain't in its place."
"Sit down, man. This is not the first cutter, but one of the schooner's
boats. Your boathook is not here."
"Do you hear, all on you? I want my hitcher. Some on you's been and
hidden it for a lark. Give it here."
"Are you deaf, Dance?" cried Mark, angrily. "How dare you, sir! Sit
down."
"I know," continued the man, who was tumbling about forward. "Some on
you's took it for a game, and Lufftenant Staples ain't the man to stand
no larks. `Where's that there boathook, Joe Dance?' he says. `Produce
it 'twonce, sir, or--' `Ay, ay, sir. Starn all it is. Where are you
coming? Pull. Starboard there--On Portsmouth hard in Portsmouth town.
Three cheers, my merry lads--Now then, pull--pull hard--Ay, ay, sir--Now
all together, my lads!'"
As the coxswain was speaking from out of the darkness, to the wonderment
of all, Tom Fillot whispered quickly to his young officer,--
"It's the crack he got, sir. He'll be overboard if we don't mind. Poor
chap, he has gone right off his nut."
Creeping forward past the men, Tom made for where Joe Dance was speaking
loudly, evidently under the belief that he was talking to a number of
people around. Then, stamping about in the boat, his words came forth
more rapidly, but in quite a confused gabble, of which hardly a single
word was comprehensible. Invisible though he was, it was evident that
he was growing more and more excited, for his words flowed strangely,
swiftly, and then became a mere babble, as, with a shout, he rushed aft
at the touch of Tom Fillot.
"Stop him, some on you; he's mad!" roared Tom Fillot; and as
instinctively Mark started up, it was to be seized by the poor wretch in
his delirium, and held back, in spite of his struggles, more and more
over the side of the boat toward the sea.