"Well, Millons, what news?" inquired the captain, as he stepped on deck.
"Bad news, sir, I fear" replied the first mate. "I found, on coming
aboard, that no one knew anything about Sling, so I went ashore at once
and 'urried up to the hospital, w'ere, sure enough, I found 'im lyin'
with his 'ead bandaged, and lookin' as if 'e were about gone. They
asked me if I knew what ship 'e belonged to, as the police wanted to
know. So I told 'em I knew well enough, but I wasn't going to tell if
it would get the poor fellow into a scrape.
"`Why don't you ask himself?' says I.
"They told me 'e was past speaking, so I tried to make 'im understand,
but 'e only mumbled in reply. W'en I was about to go 'e seemed to
mumble very 'ard, so I put down my ear to listen, and 'e w'ispered quite
distinct tho' very low--`All right, my 'eartie. I'm too cute for 'em by
a long way; go aboard an' say nothin'.' So I came away, and I've scarce
been five minutes aboard before you arrived. My own opinion is, that
'e's crazed, and don't know what 'e's sayin'."
"Oh!" ejaculated Captain Dunning. "He said that, did he? Then _my_
opinion is, that he's not so crazed as you think. Tell the watch, Mr
Millons, to keep a sharp look-out."
So saying, Captain Dunning descended to the cabin, and Rokens to the
forecastle (in sea phraseology the "fok-sail"), while Glynn Proctor
procured a basin and a piece of soap, and proceeded to rub the coat of
charcoal off his face and hands.
Half-an-hour had not elapsed when the watch on deck heard a loud splash
near the wharf, as if some one had fallen into the water. Immediately
after, a confused sound of voices and rapid footsteps was heard in the
street that opened out upon the quay, and in a few seconds the end of
the wharf was crowded with men who shouted to each other, and were seen
in the dim starlight to move rapidly about as if in search of something.
"Wot can it be?" said Tim Rokens in a low voice, to a seaman who leaned
on the ship's bulwarks close to him.
"Deserter, mayhap," suggested the man.
While Rokens pondered the suggestion, a light plash was heard close to
the ship's side, and a voice said, in a hoarse whisper, "Heave us a
rope, will ye. Look alive, now. Guess I'll go under in two minits if
ye don't."
"Oho!" exclaimed Rokens, in a low, impressive voice, as he threw over
the end of a rope, and, with the aid of the other members of the watch,
hauled Nikel Sling up the side, and landed him dripping and panting on
the deck.
"W'y--Sling! what on airth--?" exclaimed one of the men.
"It's lucky--I am--on airth--" panted the tall cook, seating himself on
the breech of one of the main-deck carronades, and wringing the water
from his garments. "An' it's well I'm not at the bottom o' this 'ere
'arbour."
"But where did ye come from, an' why are they arter ye, lad?" inquired
Rokens.
"W'y? 'cause they don't want to part with me, and I've gi'n them the
slip, I guess."
When Nikel Sling had recovered himself so as to talk connectedly, he
explained to his wondering shipmates how that, after being floored in
the street, he had been carried up to the hospital, and on recovering
his senses, found Mr Millons standing by the bedside, conversing with
the young surgeons. The first words of their conversation showed him
that something was wrong, so, with remarkable self-possession, he
resolved to counterfeit partial delirium, by which means he contrived to
give the first mate a hint that all was right, and declined, without
creating suspicion, to give any intelligible answers as to who he was or
where he had come from.
The blow on his head caused him considerable pain, but his mind was
relieved by one of the young surgeons, who remarked to another, in going
round the wards, that the "skull of that long chap wasn't fractured
after all, and he had no doubt he would be dismissed cured in a day or
two." So the cook lay quiet until it was dark.
When the house-surgeon had paid his last visit, and the nurses had gone
their rounds in the accident-ward, and no sound disturbed the quiet of
the dimly-lighted apartment save the heavy fitful breathing and
occasional moans and restless motions of the sufferers, Nikel Sling
raised himself on his elbow, and glanced stealthily round on the rows of
pain-worn and haggard countenances around him. It was a solemn sight to
look upon, especially at that silent hour of the night. There were men
there with almost every species of painful wound and fracture. Some had
been long there, wasting away from day to day, and now lay quiet, though
suffering, from sheer exhaustion. Others there were who had been
carried in that day, and fidgeted impatiently in their unreduced
strength, yet nervously in their agony; or, in some cases, where the
fear of death was on them, clasped their hands and prayed in whispers
for mercy to Him whose name perhaps they had almost never used before
except for the purpose of taking it in vain.
But such sights had little or no effect on the cook, who had rubbed hard
against the world's roughest sides too long to be easily affected by the
sight of human suffering, especially when exhibited in men. He paused
long enough to note that the nurses were out of the way or dozing, and
then slipping out of bed, he stalked across the room like a ghost, and
made for the outer gateway of the hospital. He knew the way, having
once before been a temporary inmate of the place. He reached the gate
undiscovered, tripped up the porter's heels, opened the wicket, and fled
towards the harbour, followed by the porter and a knot of chance
passers-by. The pursuers swelled into a crowd as he neared the harbour.
Besides being long-limbed, Nikel Sling was nimble. He distanced his
pursuers easily, and, as we have seen, swam off and reached his ship
almost as soon as they gained the end of the wharf.
The above narration was made much more abruptly and shortly than we have
presented it, for oars were soon heard in the water, and it behoved the
poor hunted cook to secrete himself in case they should take a fancy to
search the vessel. Just as the boat came within a few yards of the ship
he hastily went below.
"Boat ahoy!" shouted Tim Rokens; "wot boat's that?"
The men lay on their oars.
"Have you a madman on board your ship?" inquired the gatekeeper of the
hospital, whose wrath at the unceremonious treatment he had received had
not yet cooled down.
"No," answered Rokens, laying his arms on the bulwarks, and looking down
at his questioner with a sly leer; "no, we ha'n't, but you've got a
madman aboord that boat."
"Who's that?" inquired the warder, who did not at first understand the
sarcasm.
"Why, yourself, to be sure," replied Rokens, "an' the sooner you takes
yourself off, an' comes to an anchor in a loo-natick asylum, the better
for all parties consarned."
"No, but I'm in earnest, my man--"
"_As_ far as that goes," interrupted the imperturbable Rokens, "so am
I."
"The man," continued the gatekeeper, "has run out of the hospital with a
smashed head, I calc'late, stark starin' mad, and gone off the end o'
the w'arf into the water--"
"You don't mean it!" shouted Rokens, starting with affected surprise.
"Now you _are_ a fine fellow, ain't you, to be talkin' here an' wastin'
time while a poor feller-mortal is bein' drownded, or has gone and
swummed off to sea--p'r'aps without chart, compass, or rudder! Hallo,
lads! tumble up there! Man overboard! tumble up, tumble up!"
In less than three minutes half-a-dozen men sprang up the hatchway,
hauled up the gig which swung astern, tumbled into it, and began to pull
wildly about the harbour in search of the drowning man. The shouts and
commotion roused the crews of the nearest vessels, and ere long quite a
fleet of boats joined in the search.
"Wos he a big or a little feller?" inquired Rokens, panting from his
exertions, as he swept up to the boat containing the hospital warder,
round which several of the other boats began to congregate.
"A big fellow, I guess, with legs like steeples. He was sloping when
they floored him. A thief, I expect he must ha' bin."
"A thief!" echoed Rokens, in disgust; "why didn't ye say, so at first?
If he's a thief, he's born to be hanged, so he's safe and snug aboard
his ship long ago, I'll be bound. Good-night t'ye, friend, and better
luck next time."
A loud laugh greeted the ears of the discomfited warder as the crews of
the boats dipped their oars in the water and pulled towards, their
respective ships.
Next morning, about daybreak, little Alice Dunning came on board her
father's ship, accompanied by her two aunts, who, for once, became
utterly and publicly regardless of appearances and contemptuous of all
propriety, as they sobbed on the child's neck and positively refused to
be comforted.
Just as the sun rose, and edged the horizon with a gleam of liquid fire,
the _Red Eric_ spread her sails and stood out to sea.