A Middy in Command Part 6

"Of course not," I answered. "I thought I had made it clear to you, Tonkin," turning to the boatswain, "that I do not wish any of my wounded men to be sent aloft. That man is in no fit condition to go up on to the topsail-yard."

"Ain't he?" retorted the boatswain in a very offensive manner. "While he's in my watch I'm goin' to be the judge of what he's fit to do, and what he's not fit to do; and I say he's quite fit to do the job that I've ordered him to do. And he's goin' to do it too, or I'll know the reason why. And, what's more, I won't have no bra.s.s-bound young whipper-snappers comin' for'ard here to interfere with me and tell me what I'm to do and what I'm not to do; and I hope that's speakin' plain enough for to be understood, Mr Midshipman What's-your-name. Now then," he continued, turning to Martin again, "will you obey my orders, or must I make yer?" And he took a fresh grip upon the rope's-end with which he was threatening the man.

"Drop that rope's-end at once, you scoundrel!" I exclaimed angrily; for I saw by the man's manner, and by the approving sn.i.g.g.e.rs of the men who surrounded us, that he had been deliberately and intentionally insulting to me, and that unless I took a firm stand at once the ship would speedily become untenable to my men and myself. "You must surely be drunk, Tonkin, or you would never dream of--"

"Drunk am I?" he exclaimed savagely, wheeling suddenly round upon me.

"I'll soon show you whether I'm drunk or not," and he raised the rope's- end with the manifest intention of striking me across the face with it.

But before the blow could fall there was a sudden rush of feet; the sn.i.g.g.e.ring loafers who hemmed us in were knocked right and left like so many ninepins, and, with a cry of "Take that, you dirty blackguard, as a lesson not to lift your filthy paws again against a king's officer,"

Simpson, our carpenter's mate, an immensely strong fellow, dashed in and caught the boatswain a terrific blow square on the chin, felling him to the deck, where he lay senseless, and bleeding profusely at the mouth.

"Put that man in irons!" bellowed a furious voice behind me; and, turning round, I beheld the skipper glaring like an infuriated animal past me at the carpenter's mate, who was standing with clenched fists across the prostrate body of the boatswain.

"For what reason, pray, Captain Williams?" demanded I indignantly. "I do not know how long you have been here, for I did not hear you approach, but unless you have but this instant come upon the scene you must be fully aware that it was your boatswain who started this disgraceful brawl. His behaviour was absolutely brutal, and--"

I got no further; for while I was still speaking the villain suddenly seized me round the waist, and, being much more powerful than myself, pinned my arms close to my sides. "Here," he exclaimed to one of his own people standing by, "just lash this young bantam's arms behind him, and seize him to the rail, while I attend to the other." And before I well knew where I was I found myself securely trussed up, and saw Simpson, Martin, and another of my men, fighting like lions at bay, finally overborne by numbers and beaten senseless to the deck.

"You will be very sorry for this outrage before you are many days older, Captain Williams," I said as the fellow presently came and planted himself square in front of me.

"Shall I, indeed?" he sneered, thrusting his hands deep in his trousers pockets, and balancing himself on the heaving deck with his legs wide apart. "What makes you think so?"

"Because I will report your conduct to the captain of the first man-o'- war that we fall in with on the coast, and you will be called upon to give an account of yourself and your behaviour."

"And supposing that we don't happen to fall in with any of your precious men-o'-war, what then?" he demanded.

"Why," said I, "it will merely mean that your punishment will be deferred a few days longer until we arrive at Capetown; that is all."

"Ah!" he retorted, drawing in his breath sharply. "But supposing you should happen to go overboard quietly some dark night--"

"Like poor Mowbray, for instance," I cut in.

"Mowbray," he hissed, turning deathly white. "Mowbray! Who has been talking to you about Mowbray? Tell me, and I'll cut his lying tongue out of his mouth!"

"Brave words," I said, "very brave words, but they would not frighten the individual who told me the history of poor Mr Mowbray's mysterious disappearance through the stern window."

"Tell me who it was, and what he said?" he demanded hoa.r.s.ely.

"No," I answered him. "I will reserve that story for other ears than yours."

"Very well," he said. "Then I promise you that you shall not live to tell that story." And turning to one of the men who were standing by, he said:

"Cast this young c.o.c.kerel loose, take him down to his cabin, lock him in, and bring the key to me."

And two minutes later I found myself below in a very comfortable cabin that had been cleared out and prepared for me, locked in, and with no company but my own rather disagreeable thoughts.

CHAPTER SIX.

STRANDED!

What were Williams's ultimate intentions toward me I found it quite impossible to guess, for, beyond the fact that he kept me carefully locked up in the cabin that he had a.s.signed to me, I suffered no further violence at his hands, a steward bringing me an ample supply of food when the meal hours came round. I tried to ascertain from this fellow how my men were faring in the forecastle; but my attempt to question him caused him so much distress and terror that, at his earnest request, I forebore to press my enquiries. And as soon as the man had taken away the empty plates and dishes that had contained my dinner, I stretched myself out on the very inviting-looking bed that had been made up in the bunk, and, being exceedingly tired, soon fell asleep. I slept all night, and did not awake until the steward entered next morning with my breakfast.

I rather expected that, after a night's calm consideration of his exploit, Williams would have come to the conclusion that discretion was the better part of valour, and would have taken some steps toward the patching up of a truce; but he did not, and I spent the whole of that day also locked up in the cabin, and seeing no soul but the steward who brought my meals to me.

It was somewhat late that night when I turned in, as I had slept well all through the previous night and did not feel tired; and even when I had bestowed myself for the night I did not get to sleep for some time, for I felt that we must by this time be drawing close in to the coast; and supposing we should fall in with a man-o'-war, how was I to communicate with her if this man was going to keep me cooped up down below? True, I might succeed in attracting the attention of those on board such a ship by waving my handkerchief out of my cabin port if we happened to pa.s.s her closely enough for such a signal to be seen, and if she happened also to be on the starboard side, which was the side on which my berth was situated; but I was very strongly of opinion that, after what had happened, Williams would take especial care to give an exceedingly wide berth to any men-o'-war that he might happen to sight.

At length, however, I fell into a somewhat restless sleep, from which I was awakened some time later by sounds of confusion on deck--the shouting of orders, the trampling of feet, the violent casting of ropes upon the deck, the flapping of loose canvas in the wind, the creaking of yards, and the various other sounds that usually follow upon the happening of anything amiss on board a ship; and at the same time I became conscious of something unusual in the "feel" of the ship. For a moment I was puzzled to decide what it was; but by the time that I had jumped out of my berth and was broad awake I knew what had happened.

The ship was ash.o.r.e! Yet she must have taken the ground very easily, for I had been conscious of no shock; and even as I stood there I was unable to detect the least motion of the hull. She was as firmly fixed, apparently, and as steady, as though she had been lying in a dry dock.

I went to the side and put my face to the open porthole. I saw that the night was clear, and that the sky overhead was brilliant with stars; and by twisting myself in such a way as to get a raking view forward I fancied I could see in the distance something having the appearance of a low, tree-clad sh.o.r.e. I also heard the heavy thunder of distant surf; but alongside the ship the water was quite still and silent, save for a soft, seething sound as of water gently swelling and receding upon a sheltered beach.

I seated myself upon the sofa locker, and strove to recall mentally the features of the several rivers that we had visited, but could fit none of them to the dimly-seen surroundings that were visible from the port out of which I had looked. The one thing which was certain was that we were in perfectly smooth water, and the entire absence of shock with which the ship had taken the ground was an indication that she was certainly in no immediate danger; but beyond that the situation was puzzling in the extreme. The snug and sheltered position of the ship pointed strongly to the a.s.sumption that we had blundered into some river in the darkness; yet when I again looked out through the port the little that I was able to see was suggestive of beach rather than river, and that we were not very far from a beach was evidenced by the loud, unbroken roar of the surf. Then there was the puzzling question: How did we get where we were? What were the look-outs doing? What was everybody doing that no one saw the land or heard the roar of the surf in time to avoid running the ship ash.o.r.e?

As I continued to stare abstractedly out through the port it struck me that the various objects within sight were growing more clearly visible, and presently I felt convinced that the dawn was approaching. And at the same moment I became aware that a broad dark shadow that lay some fifty yards from the ship's starboard side, and which had been puzzling me greatly, was a sandbank of very considerable extent, so considerable, indeed, that, for the moment, I could not make out where it terminated.

Meanwhile the hubbub on deck gradually ceased, and I surmised that the canvas had been taken in.

The transition from the first pallor of dawn to full daylight is very rapid in those low lat.i.tudes, and within ten minutes of the first faint heralding of day a level shaft of sunlight shot athwart the scene, which became in a moment transfigured, and all that had before been vague and illusory stood frankly revealed to the eye. The sandbank now showed as an isolated patch about two hundred yards wide and perhaps half a mile long, with what looked like a by-wash channel of about one hundred yards wide flowing between it and the mainland, the latter being a sandy beach backed by sand dunes clothed with a rank creeper-like vegetation, and a few stunted tree tops showing behind them. As the ship then lay with her head pointing toward the south-east, I was able, with some effort, to get a glimpse of a mile or two of the sh.o.r.e; and now that daylight had come I could see the surf breaking heavily all along it, and also upon the seaward side of the sandbank upon which we appeared to have grounded.

Feeling quite rea.s.sured as to the safety of the ship, I sat down on the sofa locker and endeavoured, by recalling the courses steered and the distances run since we had been picked up, to identify the particular spot on the coast where we now were. But it was no use; my memory of the charts was not clear enough, and I had to give up the task. But I felt convinced that we were somewhere in the Gulf of Guinea.

As I sat there on the locker, thinking matters over, and wondering what would be the outcome of this adventure, I became so absorbed in my own thoughts that I gradually lost all consciousness of my surroundings, and was only brought back to myself by the sounds of a sudden commotion on deck, loud outcries--in which I thought I recognised the voice of the skipper,--a great and violent stamping of feet, and finally an irregular popping of pistols, followed by a sudden subsidence of the disturbance.

This, in turn, was followed by sounds of excitement in the cabins on either side of the one which I occupied, and in the distance I could hear the general shouting at the top of his voice. I gathered that the pa.s.sengers were only now beginning to realise that something was wrong with the ship, and were turning out and dressing hastily. A few minutes later I heard the sounds of cabin doors being flung open, and hurried footsteps went speeding past my cabin toward the companion way which led up to the main-deck. Then the general's voice breezed up again, from the saloon above, in tones of angry remonstrance, followed by a tremendous amount of excited talk, amid which I thought I once or twice caught the sounds of women's sobs. It was evident that something very much out of the common had happened, and I came to the conclusion that it was high time for me to be at large again and taking a hand in the proceedings; I therefore whipped out my pocketknife, and without further ado proceeded to withdraw the screws that fastened the lock to the door.

Five minutes later I found myself in the main saloon, and the centre of an excited and somewhat terrified group of pa.s.sengers.

"Ah!" exclaimed the general, as I made my appearance. "Now, perhaps, we shall get at something practical. Here is young Grenvile, who, being a navy man, may be supposed to know how to deal with an awkward situation.

Here is a pretty kettle of fish, sir," he continued, turning to me.

"The ship is ash.o.r.e! The captain has blown his brains out--so they say!

And, last but not least, the crew, headed by the boatswain, has mutinied against the authority of Mr Carter--whom they have thrust in here among us--and absolutely refuse to listen to reason in any shape or form! Now I ask you, as an officer in his Most Gracious Majesty's navy, what is to be done, sir; what are the proper steps to be taken to extricate ourselves from this infernal predicament?"

"The first thing, general," said I, "is to let me hear Carter's story, which will probably give me a fairly accurate idea of the precise situation of affairs. Where is he?"

"Here I am, Mr Grenvile," replied the man himself, edging his way toward me through the crowd.

"Now," said I, "please tell us precisely what you know about this very extraordinary affair."

"Well, sir," was the answer, "I really don't know so very much about it, when all's told; but I'm not very greatly surprised. The way that things have been going aboard this ship, ever since poor Cap'n Matthews died, has been enough to prepare a man for anything, mutiny included. I had the middle watch last night, and, as you know--or perhaps you don't know--it was very overcast and dark all through the watch, so it's not very surprisin' that I saw nothing of the land, even if it was in sight--which I doubt, seein' that it's low--and Cap'n Williams, who ought to have known that we was drawin' in close upon the coast, never gave me any warning of the ship's position, or said anything about keepin' an extra good look-out, or anything of that sort. Consequently, when the bo's'un relieved me at four o'clock this mornin', I didn't pa.s.s on any particular caution to him. As a matter of fact I hadn't a notion that we were anywhere near the land! Consequently, when the commotion of haulin' down and clewin' up awoke me, and when, upon rushin' out on deck to see what was the matter, I found that the ship was ash.o.r.e, I was regularly flabbergasted! But I hadn't much time for surprise, or anything else either, for the skipper was on deck and in charge; and I must confess that the cool way in which he took everything made me think that he wasn't nearly so surprised at what had happened as by rights he ought to have been.

"Well, we hauled down, clewed up, and furled everything, by which time the daylight had come, and we were able to get a view of our whereabouts. So far as I could make out we seemed to have blundered slap into the mouth of some river, and to have grounded on the inner side of a big sandbank that had formed right athwart it at a distance of about a quarter of a mile to seaward of the general trend of the sh.o.r.e line. We couldn't have managed better if we'd picked the berth for ourselves; for we're lyin' in perfectly smooth water, completely sheltered from the run of the surf; and nothin' short of a stiff on- sh.o.r.e gale would be at all likely to hurt us.

"The skipper said something about lightening the ship, and ordered the bo's'un to clear away the boats and see all ready for hoistin' 'em out, and directed me to go down into the fore-peak and rouse out all the hawsers I could find down there, and send 'em up on deck. I was busy upon this job, with half a dozen hands to help me, when suddenly we heard a terrific rumpus on deck, and the sounds of pistol firing; and when I jumped up on deck to see what all the row was about, there was that villain Tonkin, with a pistol still smokin' in his hand, talkin' to the men and tellin' 'em that as the ship was ash.o.r.e, and the cap'n gone, all hands were free to please themselves as to whether they'd stick to the hooker or not, and that, for his part, he meant to have a spell ash.o.r.e for a day or two before decidin' what next to do.

"Just at that point I interrupted him by askin' what he meant by sayin'

that the cap'n was 'gone'; to which he replied that the skipper had shot himself and then jumped overboard--which I don't believe, Mr Grenvile, not for a moment, for if I'm not very greatly mistaken I saw the scoundrel wink at the men as he told me the yarn. And he added that, that bein' the case, every man aboard was his own master, and free to do as he pleased; and if I had anything to say against that, I'd better say it then.

"And I did say it; I told him and all hands that, as to everybody now bein' his own master, that was all nonsense; for if the skipper was indeed dead--and it would be my business to find out just exactly how he died--the command of the ship devolved upon me, and I intended to take all the necessary steps to get her afloat again and to carry her to her destination. I thought that that would settle it; but it didn't, by a long chalk, for Tonkin turned to the men and says:--

"'Look here, shipmates all, I for one have had quite enough choppin' and changin' about of skippers in this hooker,' he says; 'and,' says he, 'so far as I'm concerned I don't want no more. I've nothin' to say again'

Carter there, but I'm not goin' to acknowledge him as skipper of this packet, and I don't fancy as how any of you will, either. Of course,'

he says, 'if there's any of you as is anxious to have him for skipper, and wants to go heavin' out cargo and runnin' away kedges, and what not, under his orders, instead of goin' ash.o.r.e with me into them woods, huntin' for fruit, he's quite at liberty to do so, I won't say him nay; but you may as well make up your minds now as any other time whether you'll stick to him or to me; so now what d'ye say, shipmates--who's for Carter, and who's for Tonkin?'