A Middy in Command Part 10

There is no reason, so far as I can see, why you should not; but we must none of us forget that, so long as the ship remains where she now is, she is exposed to the possibility of attack by the savages. Therefore, while I do not ask you to keep a watch, or even to remain awake, I strongly urge you to keep your weapons beside you, ready loaded, so that if, by any unfortunate chance, it should be necessary for us to call upon you to a.s.sist in defending the ship, you may be able to respond without delay."

"Umph!" grunted the general. "Better tell us exactly what you mean, Grenvile. We are all men here, so you can speak quite plainly. Have you observed anything to-day indicative of a disposition on the part of the natives to attack us?"

"No, general, I have not," said I, "and I know of no reason why we should not have a perfectly quiet and undisturbed night's rest as we did last night. I merely thought it advisable to give you a word of warning, because I know the natives all along this coast to be treacherous in the extreme, and very much given to doing precisely what you least expect them to do. Beyond that I see no cause whatever for uneasiness, believe me. Good-night, gentlemen, sound sleep and pleasant dreams to you."

When I stepped out on deck I found that the character of the weather had changed during the three hours or so that I had spent in the cuddy. The young moon had, of course, set some time before; the sky had grown overcast and seemed to be threatening rain; the clouds were sweeping up from about south-south-west, and a light breeze, that seemed likely to freshen, was blowing from that direction, driving great ma.s.ses of chill, wet fog along before it of so dense a character that it was scarcely possible to make out the foremast from the head of the p.o.o.p-ladder.

Altogether it threatened to be a distinctly unpleasant night for the unfortunate men whose duty it would be to keep a look-out through the hours of darkness. Carter, in a thick pilot-cloth jacket, was walking to and fro on the p.o.o.p, with a short pipe stuck in the corner of his mouth, when I joined him.

"Hullo, Carter," I said, "this is a change of weather with a vengeance!

When did it happen?"

"Why," answered Carter, "the fog closed in upon us just after sunset, the same as it has done every night since we've been here; but the breeze has only sprung up within the last half-hour. Looks as though 'twas going to freshen too."

"So I think," said I. "How is it coming? Broad off the starboard bow, isn't it?"

"Yes; about that," agreed Carter.

"And the tide is rising, is it not?" I continued, the freshening breeze having suggested an idea to me which I in turn wished to suggest to my companion.

"Ay, risin' fast," answered he. "It'll be high-water about midnight, I reckon."

"Just so," I agreed. The idea which I wished to suggest to him had clearly not yet dawned upon him--although it ought to have done so without any need of a hint from me,--so, without further beating about the bush, I said:

"Now, don't you think, Carter, that, with this nice little breeze blowing from precisely the right direction, it would be quite worth while to loose and set the square canvas and--"

"Throw it all aback," he cut in as at last he caught my idea. "Why, of course I do, Mr Grenvile, and thank'e for the hint. It'd be a precious sight more helpful than the kedge, and I'll have it done at once." And he started to go forward to call the men.

"What about your cables?" said I. "Have you got them bent and an anchor ready to let go if she should happen to back off the bank?"

"No," said he, coming to a halt again. "We've been so busy with one thing and another, you know. But I'll have it done as soon as we've got the canvas on her."

"Better do that first, hadn't you?" I suggested. "I wouldn't trust the kedge to hold her in a breeze with all her square canvas set."

"N-o, perhaps not," he agreed dubiously. "Well, then, I'll get the port cable bent and the anchor a-c.o.c.kbill ready for lettin' go before touchin' the canvas. How would that be?"

"Much the safest, I think," said I. "But let us both go for'ard and see what is the exact state of affairs there. And what is the state of the hawser? Ah, still quite taut!" as I tested its tension with my foot.

Arrived upon the forecastle we found both anchors stowed inboard and the cables below; but, all hands being called, including the _Shark's_, we made short work of the business, for while one gang went below and cleared away the cable, another roused it up on deck and rove it through the hawse-pipe, ready for bending, and a third got the anchor outboard.

Then, while Jones, the _Shark's_ boatswain's mate, and his party bent the cable and got everything ready for letting go, in case of need, Carter's men climbed into the rigging, and, beginning at the topgallant- sails, loosed all the square canvas, overhauled the gear, and saw everything clear for sheeting home and hoisting away. To set the canvas and trim the yards aback was now the work of but a few minutes, and it was soon done, with the immediate result that the ship, from having a slight list to starboard, came upright, with just the slightest possible tendency to heel to port.

"Now, Mr Carter," said I, "the ship's bilge is no longer bearing upon the sand. I think, therefore, that if I were you I would send all hands to the windla.s.s, and let them endeavour to get another pawl or two.

That canvas is doing good work up there, and it may be that if we helped it a bit with a pull on the hawser she would come off."

"Ay," agreed Carter; "so she might, and we'll try it. Man the windla.s.s, lads, and see if you can move her at all. Half an hour's work now may get the ship afloat, and so save ye a good many hours breakin' out cargo to-morrow."

"Ay, ay, sir!" answered the men, cheerfully enough, considering that they had been awakened out of a sound sleep and dragged out of their warm bunks to come up and work in the chill, pestilential fog after having worked hard all day. "Tail on to the handles, my bullies, tail on and heave. Heave, and raise the dead!" shouted the man Mike, who had been one of the lucky five to escape capture by the savages.

They got their first pawl easily enough, then another, and another, by which time the hawser was once more as taut as a bar. But, as I lightly rested my foot upon it, to test its tautness, I felt it very gradually slackening, which meant one of two things, either that the kedge was coming home--which I thought improbable--or that the ship was very slowly sliding off the bank. So I cried to the men, who had desisted from their efforts for fear of parting the hawser:

"There she gives! Heave away again, lads, and keep a steady strain on the hawser. It wants half an hour yet to high-water."

The men again threw their weight alternately upon the levers, and once more the great pawl clanked once, twice, thrice; then a long pause and another clank, then a further pause. But my foot was still on the hawser, and I felt that it was steadily, although very slowly, yielding, and there was a moment when I could almost have sworn that I felt the ship jerk ever so slightly sternward. So I ventured to stimulate the men a little further.

"Hurrah, lads," I cried, "there she moves! Hang to her! One complete turn of the windla.s.s and she's all your own! Heave again."

"Heave!" responded the men hoa.r.s.ely, flinging their whole weight upon the elevated lever, while those opposite grasped the corresponding depressed handle, and, gripping the deck with their naked toes, bent their backs and bore upward until every muscle in their straining bodies cracked again; and "clank-clank" spoke the pawl again, and yet again "clank". Then, after another long, heaving and straining pause, "clank"

again, a shorter pause and again "clank--clank--clank"; and then, as the men struggled and fought desperately with the stubborn windla.s.s, the ship jerked perceptibly twice, the pawls spoke in quicker succession, the ship surged again, and with a wild hurrah from the men, as the levers suddenly yielded to them and began to leap rapidly up and down, the _Indian Queen_ gathered way and slid off into deep-water.

"Well there with the windla.s.s!" cried Carter delightedly. "Let go your to'gallant and topsail halyards and sheets; man your clewlines; fore and main clew-garnets. Stand by to let go the anchor!"

"Ay, ay, sir!" was the response from the topgallant forecastle. "All ready with the anchor. Stand clear of the cable!"

Meanwhile the merchant crew were clewing up and hauling down to the accompaniment of the usual cries. What, therefore, with Carter's commands, the seaman's calls, and the violent flinging down of ropes upon the deck, there was a very considerable uproar going on upon deck, and I was not at all surprised when the general, clad in a dressing- gown, emerged from below with his sword in one hand and his pistol in the other, to enquire what all the racket was about.

I explained the situation to him, and he was expressing his great gratification at the fact that the ship had been got afloat again, when Carter gave the order to let go the anchor.

"All gone, sir," answered Jones as a heavy splash sounded under the ship's bows, instantly followed by a yell of:

"A large canoe--two of 'em--three--four--there's a whole fleet of canoes closing in round us, sir."

"Where away?" demanded I, unceremoniously breaking away from the general and dashing forward to the topgallant forecastle, up the ladder of which I scrambled with considerable loss of shin-leather.

"There, sir, d'ye see 'em?" responded Jones, sweeping his arm in a wide circle as he pointed into the fog wreaths that were whirling round us.

The fog and the darkness together rendered it extremely difficult to see anything, but by dint of peering I at length distinguished several shapeless dark blotches at a distance of about fifty fathoms from the ship, arranged apparently in the form of a wide semicircle on the side of her opposite to that on which lay the sandbank. Jones, however, was not quite right in his statement that they were closing in upon us, for they appeared to be lying quite stationary, or at least were only paddling just sufficiently to avoid being swept away by the sluggish tide that was running. But there was very little doubt in my mind that we had very narrowly escaped an ugly surprise, and I was by no means certain that we might not yet look to be attacked. My view of the situation was that the natives had gathered about us in the hope that, in the fog and darkness, they might be able to steal alongside and climb aboard in such overwhelming numbers as to secure possession of the deck and overpower us by taking us by surprise, and that they had been restrained from making the attempt only by the sounds of bustle and activity that had accompanied our endeavours to get the ship afloat.

"Lay down from aloft all hands at once!" shouted I, sending my voice pealing up through the fog to the figures that were to be dimly-seen sprawling on the yards and dragging at the heavy festoons of canvas.

"And you, Jones, find me a musket as smartly as you can."

"Musket, sir? Ay, ay, sir! here's one," answered the man, fishing one out from some hiding place and thrusting it into my hand. Lifting the piece to my shoulder I levelled it in the direction where the canoes seemed to be congregated most thickly, and, aiming so as to send the bullet flying pretty close over the heads of the savages, pulled the trigger. I distinctly heard the "plop" of the bullet as it struck the water, but beyond that all was as still as death. Meanwhile, at my call, the men aloft had come sliding down the backstays and were now mustering on the fore-deck awaiting further instructions. And at the same moment the general came forward to announce that he had quietly called the men pa.s.sengers, who would be on deck in a moment, bringing their firearms with them.

"I will place myself at their head, Grenvile," he said, "and if you will tell me how we can most helpfully a.s.sist you I will see to the details of any task that you may a.s.sign to us."

"A thousand thanks, general," answered I. "You, perhaps, cannot do better than muster your men on the p.o.o.p, and if you detect any disposition on the part of the canoes to close in upon the ship, fire into them without hesitation. This is no time for half-measures; we must deal decisively and firmly with those fellows, or we shall find ourselves in a very awkward predicament."

"Right; I agree with you there, and you will not find us wanting, I hope," responded Sir Thomas, as he turned to walk away aft.

"Simpson, San Domingo, and Beardmore, come up here on the topgallant forecastle," called I; and at the call up came the men, with the inevitable answer of "Ay, ay, sir!"

"Simpson," said I, "I want you and San Domingo to take charge of this port carronade, while you, Jones and Beardmore, attend to the starboard one. The ship has now swung to her anchor, and is lying fairly steady; so when once you have trained the pieces they will not need much alteration. Run them both close up to the rail, and depress the muzzles so that the discharge will strike the water at a distance of about fifty yards, which will afford room for the charge to spread nicely. If a canoe approaches within that distance, fire upon her. I will arrange for more ammunition to be sent to you at once."

I then descended to the main-deck, and, finding Carter, arranged with him that he should descend to the magazine with one of my men, who could be trusted to be careful, and send up an ample supply of ammunition.

This done, my next act was to range the crew of the ship along the main- deck, port and starboard sides, with muskets in their hands, giving them strict injunctions to fire upon any canoe that they might see attempting to approach the ship.

All these arrangements, which have taken a considerable time to describe, really occupied but two or three minutes, during which not a sound of any description had come from the canoes, which, however, could occasionally be caught sight of, dimly showing when the mist wreaths thinned for a moment. Meanwhile, our own dispositions being complete, a tense silence reigned throughout the ship, broken only by an occasional low muttered word from one man to another.

Suddenly a shrill whistle pealed out from somewhere in the fog away on our port hand, followed, the next instant, by a thin, whirring sound in the air all about the ship, accompanied by sharp, crisp thuds here and there along the bulwarks, and a thin, reedy pattering on the decks. An object of some sort fell close to my feet, and, upon groping for it, I found that it was an arrow. At the same moment a loud, fierce, discordant yell burst out all round the ship, and the rattling splash of innumerable paddles dashed into the water, reached our ears.

"Here they come; here they come!" cried the men, and a musket flashed out of the darkness down in the waist of the ship.