Afloat at Last Part 25

"No, I don't fancy ye will," he said, sniffing and chuckling and twitching his nose. "I hope ye'll hurt some of those rascally pirates with it, though."

The captain then opened another chest, a smaller iron one, which he also dragged out from under his bunk, unlocking it with a heavy key he took off a bunch which was hanging up on a nail over his writing-desk and throwing back the lid.

This second receptacle, we soon discovered, contained a lot of cartridges for the rifles, there being a hundred or more of various sorts, some for the breech-loaders and some for the Enfields of the old- fashioned regulation size. There were also a variety of smaller cartridges for the revolvers, and "Old Jock" gave Tom and I each a package of these latter for our weapons.

In the chest, likewise, were two or three large flasks of powder and a lot of bullets loose, which the captain crammed into a leathern bag and told us to take on the p.o.o.p with the rifles, Tom and I carrying up a couple each with the bag of bullets and powder-flasks and then returning for the rest.

In our absence "Old Jock" had ferreted out from some other hiding-place of his a couple of swords and a number of cutla.s.ses, which he likewise directed us to take up the companion, he a.s.sisting us; until, presently, we had the whole armoury arranged on the top of the cabin skylight.

"Now, Mackay," said Captain Gillespie, blowing like a grampus after his exertions, "take y'r choice, but I think that the two best shots in the ship ought to have the Martini rifles; and if I were picking out the picked marksmen--he! he! that's a joke, 'picking' and 'picked,' didn't intend it though--I'd have chosen y'rself and the bosun!"

Of course we all laughed at his joke, as he had taken such pains to point it out; and he was so pleased with it himself that it was some time before he could speak again, he sniffed and snorted so much.

"Not bad that, Mackay," he said; "not bad--eh? But which of these things would ye like best--eh?"

"I think I'll take the breech-loader, sir," replied the other, suiting the action to the word and proceeding to examine the lock of one of the Martini-Henrys, which seemed to be an old acquaintance of his, for he loaded the chamber much quicker than I could manage my new acquisition; "and I don't believe you could do better than hand the other to Rooney, as you suggested. He's the best shot in the ship, I'm certain."

"Y'rself excepted," interposed the captain wonderfully politely for him; singing out loudly at the same time, "Bosun!"

"Here, sorr," cried Tim, who had been waiting below close to the p.o.o.p ladder, expecting the summons, and who was all agog at the prospect of a fight. "Here I am, sorr."

"Well, bosun," said Captain Gillespie, "it looks as if we'll have to fight those rascals coming up astern and making for us. The cowards!

They didn't dare attack the old barquey when she was all ataunto in the open sea; and only now rely on their numbers and the fact of our being in limbo here. However, if they do attack us, we shall have a fight for it."

"Bully for ye, sorr!" cried Tim enraptured. "It's mesilf as loikes a fight, sure. I'm niver at pace barrin' whin I'm in a row, sure, sorr!"

"Then you'll be soon in your element," retorted Jock grimly. "Call the hands aft."

"Aye, aye, sorr," answered Tim; and going up to the rail he shouted out in his ringing voice, "All ha-a-nds aft!"

"Now, my men," said "Old Jock," leaning over the p.o.o.p and addressing them as they stood below on the main-deck--"we've got a batch of rascally pirates coming up after us astern; and, as you know, we can't run away from 'em. What will ye do--cave in to 'em or fight 'em?"

The crew broke into a rousing cheer.

"Ye'll fight 'em, then?"

"Aye, aye, fight 'em till we make 'em sick!" shouted one of the hands speaking for the rest, who endorsed his answer on their behalf with a "Hip, hip, hooray!"

"And one for the skipper," shouted Joe Fergusson, who was a sailor of sailors by this time and had learnt all their ways and talk, dropping out of his old provincialisms. "Hip, hip, hooray!"

"And another for Mr Mackay," cried a voice that sounded like that of Adams, causing the hooraying to start again with fresh force, this cheer being much heartier than the first.

"Now, men," said Captain Gillespie, "as ye've let off all your gas, let me see what ye can do in action. Bosun, serve out the cutla.s.ses and distribute the rest of the guns."

This being done and all of the men armed in one way or another, the deficiencies of the captain's armoury being made good by the aid of handspikes which Mr Mackay had thoughtfully ordered to be brought aft while we were taking up the rifles and other things from the cabin.

Even Billy, the ship's boy, got hold of an old bayonet, which he brandished about near Pedro Carvalho the steward, who had come out of his pantry to see what all the noise was about, which gesture on his part almost frightening the Portuguese, who, as I've related before, was an innate coward, into a fit. At all events, it made him turn of a yellowish pallor that did not improve his complexion.

"Carramba!" he exclaimed, as he retreated back within his pantry.

"Fora, maldito!"

When offered a weapon, Ching w.a.n.g only smiled that innocent bland smile of his, producing his own long knife, that had a blade like an American bowie, being over a foot long and with a double edge.

"Me one piecee in tyfong tummee tummee, chop chop, pijjin!" he said, brandishing the awful blade in a way that I'm sure the "kyfongs," the Chinese term for pirates, would not relish, especially in such friendly relation with their "tummee tummees."

All the crew being now armed, the captain and Mr Mackay disposed them in parties about the deck and forecastle to windward, so as best to oppose the pirates' attack; while the men provided with the Enfield rifles were placed in the tops, with the bullets and powder for ammunition when their cartridges ran short. Tim Rooney took his station with Mr Mackay on the p.o.o.p, from which the advancing pirates could best be picked off, and where also were gathered the captain, as a matter of course; Mr Saunders, who carried an old single-barrel pistol with a heavy lock, which the second mate intended to make more use of as a club than to shoot with; and Tom Jerrold and Sam Weeks, as well as myself-- Sam being sadly jealous of Tom and I from the fact of our having revolvers, while he, coming too late after they'd all been distributed, had to be contented with a marlin-spike--poor Sammy!

It was thus that we all awaited the attack, every man Jack of us being at his specially appointed post and on the alert; when the pirates-- after pounding away at us a long time at a distance, with the result of neither wounding a soul on board nor damaging the ship very materially, none of the shot penetrating her hull between wind and water, the only thing we had to fear--at length mustered up courage enough to give up their rather unremunerative game of "long bowls" and come to close quarters.

I had got quite accustomed now to the rushing sound of round shot in the air and the waspish phit phitting of rifle bullets past my head; and I was filled with a wild excitement that made my heart pant, as I stood on the p.o.o.p between Mr Mackay and Tim Rooney.

These two were peppering away at the leading proa and the junks, as they paddled in hastily towards the ship with their long double-banked sweeps, anxious to get in close alongside and so to be sheltered by our hull from the murderous and rapid fire which the wielders of the Martini-Henrys rained on them.

But every bullet found a billet in some pirate breast sooner or later, one of the villainous desperadoes falling over his oar here and another dropping down on the bamboo deck of a junk there; while, occasionally, some wretch would tumble overboard with a wild yell, in answer to the ping of the rifle, shot through the heart as dead as a herring, and going down to his grave amongst the fishes in Neptune's coral caverns below!

"There's that scoundrel of a fellow in the red sash again," cried Mr Mackay, when the Malay proa, which still led the van, was only about half a cable's length off. "There he is, Rooney,--do you see him?"

"Aye, bad cess to the black divil, I say him well enough, sorr,"

returned Tim, carefully putting a fresh cartridge into the chamber of his weapon. "Begorra, I thought I'd kilt the beggar a dozen toimes alriddy; but he's got the luck of ould Nick, an' sames to save his skin somehow or ither. Here goes for him ag'in--take that now, ye ould thaife!"

"Ping!"

But the pirate captain, as the tall dark man in the stern of the proa seemed to be, only let fall the long crease which he had held in his right hand brandishing at us, the bullet from Tim's rifle having broken his arm, that also dropped powerless by his side.

"You nearly had him there," cried Mr Mackay, now taking a shot. "I hope I'll have better luck though."

"I hope ye will, sorr," heartily echoed Tim. "I mint to riddle his carkiss an ownly winged him. The ugly black divil sames to kape a charmed loife, an' I dare say his ould frind below helps him, the nayghur!"

Mr Mackay, however, was equally unsuccessful; for, as luck would have it, another of the pirates jumping up in front of the chief received the bullet intended for him.

The scoundrel who got killed was, certainly, one off the list; still, the small fry did not count like their leader, the loss of whom all of us thought might have paralysed the enemy's advance.

It really seemed, however, as if the gigantic villain, who towered over his men, bore a charmed life; for, although our fellows in the tops with the Ennelds, as well the first mate and boatswain, aimed at him, while, now that the proa was within revolver range, the captain and Tom Jerrold, and even I, with my little weapon, pelted bullet after bullet in his direction, all of us missed hitting the swarthy scoundrel. We noticed, too, on seeing him closer, that he appeared to be more of Pedro Carvalho's nationality than belonging to the Malay race, his features and shape of head being altogether different; albeit, he was fully as ugly as his rascally comrades in the proa and following junks--a hybrid lot of Javanese and Chinese and all the vile scourings of the Straits Settlements; long-haired heavy-eyed and sullen-looking most of them, with narrow retreating foreheads, and evidently of the lowest type of humanity.

As they got closer and closer to the ship, too, we noticed that several had red sashes round their blue frocks, into which were stuck fearful curved knives and the b.u.t.t-ends of pistols; and so, with "so many Richmonds in the field," it was not to be wondered that Tim Rooney and Mr Mackay had previously missed their mark--albeit now that the proa was near, it was strange that they could not pick off the pirate leader, who, as the proa sheered up alongside the Silver Queen, looked up at us astern and grinned a horrible sardonic grin, drawing the while his solitary left hand across his bare tawny throat with a most unmistakable gesture.

"Ping!--ping!" came from Mr Mackay's and the boatswain's rifles again in quick succession.

And yet again, marvellous as it may seem, they both missed. There was no longer time, though, for any more pot shots; for, with a wild savage howl and the beating of drums and gongs again, mingled with a shower of jingal b.a.l.l.s over the ship, the proa struck against the fore-chains on our starboard bow, one of the junks steering to our port side at the same time, while another remained across our stern and raked us fore and aft with round shot, there being a couple of hundred at least of the bloodthirsty demons in the three craft a.s.sailing us. There were probably as many more, too, in the junks astern, which were coming up more leisurely, leaving their comrades in the van to bear the brunt of the fray.

"Now, men!" shouted "Old Jock," who I must say came out like a brave man and a hero on the occasion, losing all his peculiarities and littlenesses of manner and behaviour--at least we did not notice them.

"Now, men, we've got to fight for our lives! We must first try and prevent the pirates getting aboard; and, when we can't do that any longer and they gain the decks, we'll retreat into the cabin and barricade ourselves, and fight 'em again there."

"Hooray!" cried the men. "Hooray!"

"And when we can't hold the cabin any longer," continued Old Jock, who seemed to be in a punning vein this afternoon, "we'll go below to the hold, and hold that as long as we can!"

"Hooray!" shouted the hands again, full of the fire of battle now and spurred on by his words. "We'll fight, old man, never fear!"