The Castaways Part 15

"Well, fire away then, my lad," said I. "No time like the present. I am looking to see whether we are going to have a breeze to-night."

The fellow remained silent for a full minute, chewing vigorously at the plug of tobacco in his cheek, and then said, still gazing intently aloft:

"The long and the short of it's this, sir. Them two swines, O'Gorman and Price, have been s'yin' that after that business with the French barque, and the shootin' of Karl and Fritz, it won't never do to let you and the young lidy ever get ash.o.r.e again."

So Miss Onslow's foreboding had come true, then! We knew too much, and were no doubt to be sacrificed in cold blood to ensure the safety of this piratical gang. But "fore-warned is fore-armed"; moreover, there was this man Harry clearly disposed to be friendly to us, or why should he take the risk of acquainting me with this terrible news? As I realised all the fresh anxiety and watchfulness that this information would entail upon me, I faltered for a moment under a feeling of overwhelming despair; but it was gone instantly; and within the next second or two I had pulled myself together, the fighting instinct had leapt up, alert and eager, and I was once more ready to do battle against the whole ruffianly mob of them for the life and honour of the girl that I now loved beyond any other earthly thing.

"And what do the men say to it?"

I asked, stepping up on the grating and, hands in pocket, balancing myself jauntily to the heave and roll of the plunging hull as I continued to gaze contemplatively at the windy sky away on our starboard quarter.

"Why," answered, Harry, "it's no use denyin' that they're all of the same mind as t'other two. They s'ys that you knows enough to hang all hands of us, and that you'd be certain sure to do it, too, if we was only to give yer half a chaunce."

"And what is _your_ opinion upon the matter, my man?" demanded I.

"Well," said he, "I thinks as p'rhaps they're right, so far as that goes. But I don't hold with murder; and I said as I thought we might be able to plan out a way of makin' ourselves safe without doin' no hurt to you and the young lidy. But they wouldn't listen to me; they're all for makin' theirselves _safe_, as they calls it."

"And what is their scheme?" asked I.

"Why, accordin' to their present way of thinking they intends to ast you to make the Brazilian coast, somewheres about twenty mile or so from some big port; and they're goin' to tell you as when we've made the land the brig is to be scuttled, and all hands--you and the lidy included--is to take to the boats and land, givin' ourselves out to be a shipwrecked crew. But, at the last minute, when all is ready for leaving you and the lidy is to be seized, lashed hand and foot, and locked up below, to go down with the brig."

"A very pretty, diabolical, cold-blooded scheme," commented I, "and one that would have been very likely to prove successful, had you not warned me. I am infinitely obliged to you, my man, and you may rest a.s.sured that I will not forget, the good turn you have done me in making me acquainted with the plan. I shall endeavour to frustrate it, of course.

May I depend upon you to help me?"

"Why, as to that, sir," answered the fellow, "everything'll depend upon what you makes up your mind to do. I won't have nothin' to do wi'

murderin' of you, that's certain. But, on t'other hand, I don't mean to mix myself up with no job that means havin' my throat cut if the thing don't happen to turn out all right."

"Just so," said I; "I see your position exactly. I will think the matter over, and see if I cannot devise some practicable scheme to get to windward of those scoundrels, and will then have another talk with you. Meanwhile, kindly keep your ears open; appear to fall in with the plans of the others, and let me know if any alterations are made--you will find it greatly to your advantage to do so."

"Thank'ee, sir; I will," answered the man as I wheeled round, directed a long, scrutinising glance at the canvas, stepped off the grating and squinted into the binnacle, and finally resumed my perambulation of the deck.

Now, here was a nice plot to face, and countermine! A plot that was only to be defeated by subtlety and strategy; for, at the most, there were but three of us, all told, against thirteen ruthless, treacherous men; and it was not to be forgotten that no dependence whatever was to be placed upon the man Harry; his scruples apparently drew the line at cold-blooded murder, but on the hither side of that, consideration for his own safety might tempt him to any conceivable lengths; in short, it needed but very little consideration to demonstrate that if I was to secure his active co-operation, I must make it perfectly clear to him that it would be distinctly to his interest to give it me. Then there was Miss Onslow. She was a woman of a delicate and refined nature, of a magnificent courage certainly, clever, and resourceful; and thus far capable, perhaps, of affording valuable suggestions, but by no means to be involved so tangibly in any scheme against the men as to expose her to their vengeful fury in the event of failure. The question whether I should mention this latest development to her at all was one of long and anxious mental debate with me; on the one hand I was intensely desirous to spare this poor girl any further terror and anxiety; while, on the other, I felt doubtful whether, in a matter that so vitally interested her, I ought not to afford her the opportunity of bringing her keen and clever woman's wit to bear upon the problem that had now thrust itself upon us. I spent an anxious, sleepless night, revolving countless schemes in my head, and abandoning them, one after the other, either as impracticable, or else too dependent upon chance. The whole of the next day and the succeeding night was similarly spent by me; and when I sprang feverishly from my bunk, haggard and hollow-eyed with sleeplessness and worry, on the second morning after my conversation with the man Harry, I had come to the resolution that it was my duty to inform Miss Onslow how matters stood with us, and to afford her the opportunity to a.s.sist me with any suggestions that might occur to her.

An opportunity occurred shortly after breakfast. I had taken my sights for the brig's longitude, worked them out, laid down the result upon the chart, and was abstractedly gazing at the latter as it lay spread out before me upon the cabin table, anxiously seeking inspiration from a study of the coasts, islands, and harbours delineated in miniature upon the white paper, when the young lady stepped out of her cabin and--first a.s.suring herself that the steward was not within hearing--came to my side, and, laying her hand upon my shoulder, said:

"I want you to tell me what is the matter. There _is_ something very seriously wrong, I know, for I was watching you all day yesterday, and it was impossible for me to avoid noticing that while, when in presence of the men you did your best to wear an unconcerned manner, the moment that you deemed yourself free from their observation you sank into a mood of gloomy abstraction and reverie, the meaning of which was not to be mistaken. And this morning you look absolutely _ill_ with worry, your forehead is seamed with wrinkles of care and anxiety, and-- positively you are turning grey about the temples."

And as she spoke these last words her fingers lightly and--as it seemed to me--caressingly touched me on the temples. It was the first time that she had ever done such a thing, and her touch thrilled me through as with an electric shock, moving me to such an extent that I lost my self-control, and forthwith behaved with the recklessness of a madman.

I seized her hand, threw my arm about her waist, and, drawing her to me, kissed her on the lips.

"It is your own fault," I exclaimed wildly; "you should not have touched me so tenderly and caressingly. I love you, I tell you; I love you beyond all power of speech to describe, and I have been upon the point of telling you so over and over again, but have been deterred by the knowledge that, unless you can return my love--which you have never given me any reason to suppose is the case--such a confession on my part must necessarily render your situation infinitely more embarra.s.sing than it is now. And hitherto I have contrived to remain master of myself; but when you touched my temples just now--"

"Poor fellow," she interrupted, astounding me by nestling in my embrace, with flaming cheeks, but looking up at me with smiling eyes that shone like stars, as her arm stole up and twined itself about my neck--"is it indeed so bad as that with you? I knew, of course, that you loved me-- the symptoms were quite unmistakable--but I scarcely dreamed of your pa.s.sion being so violent as it appears to be. Well, never mind, Charlie dear; your very startling, unexpected, and vehement declaration will not produce the effect you seem to have feared, because, you see, it so happens that _I return your love_--how could it possibly be otherwise?"--her tone changing from tenderness to pride--"what woman whose heart is free could possibly fail to love a man whose devotion is what yours is, and has been, to me? Yes, dearest, I love you with my whole heart; and I am proud to think that, despite all my waywardness and shortcomings, you have contrived to discover in me something worth loving. But _this_ is not what has been worrying you so terribly this last few days--tell me what it is; I have a _right_ to know, now!"

"Yes," I a.s.sented, "you certainly have; but it is terrible news, Florence, and I scarcely know in what words to communicate it to you.

Yet, be a.s.sured of this, my sweet, that, with the new courage that you have just imparted to me, I will overcome this peril that looms ahead of us, deadly though it be!"

And therewith I related to my sweetheart all that had pa.s.sed between Harry and myself, at the same time directing her attention to the fact that this grisly peril was still a long way ahead of us; that it was a far cry from where we were to the Horn; and that even after we had rounded that wild headland, practically the whole stretch of the eastern coast of South America would have to be traversed before the time would be ripe for the villains to carry out their devilish scheme of murder and destruction. And then I strove to comfort her by directing her attention to the chances of escape that might befall us, the ships we should be certain to encounter--with the possibility of being able to surrept.i.tiously communicate with one or more of them, craving a.s.sistance--and of my determination--as a last resource--to cast away the ship and take our chance of being able to escape in one of the boats during the confusion, rather than tamely navigate her to the spot that should be selected by those fiends for the deed of destruction.

As I told her of the fate that had been planned for us, I saw her blanch to the lips, and her eyes grow wide and gla.s.sy with horror; but presently her colour returned and her mouth set in firm, resolute lines; and when at length I ceased to speak, she said:

"My poor Charlie, no wonder that you look worn and worried! But take courage, dear; I cannot believe that G.o.d will permit those wretches to murder us in cold blood. He will surely inspire you with an idea that will enable you to defeat and prevent an act of such atrocious wickedness; and I have a sure conviction that in His own good time we shall be accorded a happy deliverance out of all our troubles, and that you will by and by enjoy the satisfaction of happily reuniting me to my dear father--and receiving the usual reward accorded to the all-conquering prince in the fairy tale."

"G.o.d grant it, my dearest!" I exclaimed fervently, as I kissed her.

"And now," said I, "I must go on deck, I suppose, and endeavour to appear as though I had not a care in the world; for if those fellows notice that I am looking gloomy and preoccupied, they will at once guess that I suspect something, and may in that case so precipitate their plans as to render our case more desperate than ever."

"We will go together," said the brave girl, "and you shall have an example of the deep duplicity of which I am capable. I will defy any one of them to detect the faintest shadow of care on my brow!"

And therewith she retired to her cabin, and presently emerged again, attired for the deck.

It was a glorious morning of true Pacific weather, with the wind blowing a merry breeze from about west-north-west; the sky, an exquisitely pure and delicate turquoise blue, flecked with patches of fleecy, prismatic-tinted cloud that here and there darkened the sapphire of the sparkling, foam-flecked ocean with broad s.p.a.ces of deep, rich, violet shadow. As for the brig, she was swarming along at a nine-knot pace under all plain sail supplemented by her starboard studding-sail, with her mast-heads sweeping in wide arcs athwart the blue as she swayed and rose and sank in long, floating rushes over the rugged ridges of the pursuing swell, while dazzling sunshine and purple shadow chased each other in and out of the hollows of her canvas and athwart her grimy decks. There was a thin, eddying coil of bluish smoke hurrying from the galley chimney under the high-arching foot of the fore-course and out over the port cat-head; and the watch, having no sail-tr.i.m.m.i.n.g to attend to, were squatted upon their hams on the fore deck, playing cards. The hooker needed no looking after in such weather as this, and the only individual, beside ourselves, abaft the mainmast was the helmsman.

Miss Onslow's appearance on deck never failed to attract the notice of the men, although she had made a point of being up and down every day, and all day long, and I soon discovered that we were the objects of the stealthy regard not only of the group on the forecastle but also of the man at the wheel. But no child could have appeared more completely free from care than she was; she chatted with me about Calcutta, and Simla, described the characteristics of the several castes and cla.s.ses of natives, ill.u.s.trating her description with amusing anecdotes that even coaxed a smile upon the sullen, wooden visage of the fellow at the wheel, and spoke of being reunited to her father with an absolute confidence that left no room for even a shadow of suspicion that she entertained the slightest doubt upon that subject.

A considerable period now elapsed without the occurrence of any incident worthy of mention, except that I observed in the men a quite extraordinary devotion to card-playing; they did no work of any kind whatsoever beyond such necessary duties as making, shortening, or tr.i.m.m.i.n.g sale, as occasion demanded; and when they were not doing this they were playing cards. I was at first somewhat puzzled to account for the feverish and unflagging zeal with which this particular form of amus.e.m.e.nt was pursued by all hands; for although sailors are fond of an occasional quiet game of cards, they are, as a rule, by no means devotees of the pasteboards. But at length I obtained enlightenment from the man Harry: they were gambling with the gems for stakes! This intelligence disquieted me greatly, for I foresaw possibilities of trouble in it; and by and by it came. Meanwhile, however, I neglected no opportunity to seek intelligence as to any change in the views of these men with regard to the ultimate disposal of myself and Miss Onslow, and learned from time to time--my informant, of course, being Harry--that, so far, nothing had transpired justifying the suspicion that any departure from the original plan was contemplated. This was, in a measure, gratifying, in so far at least as that it still left me a fair amount of time to evolve some satisfactory scheme for our salvation--a task in which I had not yet succeeded, although I had considered I might almost say hundreds of ideas, only to discard them as either impracticable or unreliable.

At the moment of which I am now about to speak--we were drawing close on toward the meridian of the Horn, but well to the south of it; and the weather was what sailors call "dirty"--a dark, scowling sky overhead, charged with sleet and rain squalls that, when we ran into them, lashed us and stung the skin like whips; the atmosphere was nippingly raw, and thick enough to veil and blot out everything at a distance of more than four miles; and the wind was blowing so fresh from the southward that the men had at length been compelled to unwillingly turn out and snug the brig down to double-reefed topsails, with the mainsail stowed.

There was a very steep and ugly beam sea running, and the brig was rolling to it as though bent on rolling the masts out of her; while the decks were mid-leg deep with the water that she dished in over the rail at every roll with a regularity that I was very far from appreciating.

Worst of all, there was no pretence whatever on the part of the men to watch the ship or keep a lookout--the scoundrels were well aware that I might be depended on for that; the only man on deck was the helmsman; and from the condition of those who came staggering aft from time to time at the stroke of the bell to relieve the wheel, I more than suspected that a drinking bout was under way in the forecastle. Such a condition of affairs was amply sufficient at any time to create within me a sense of profound uneasiness, much more so at that especial time; for we were then in a part of the ocean notorious for sudden, savage gales, thick weather, and floating ice as deadly as any reef that ever trapped a ship; and the safety of the brig, and of all hands, might at any moment be fatally imperilled by the slightest lack of alertness, or the briefest powerlessness on the part of the crew. It was this conviction alone that restrained me from an immediate endeavour to recapture the brig; the conditions were propitious, for as I have said all hands were below with the exception of the helmsman. The cook, it is true, was in his galley; but if I chose to arm myself with the pistols that had been presented to me by the Frenchman aboard the _Marie Renaud_, it would be no such desperate matter to slip for'ard and clap the hatch over the fore-scuttle, secure the cook in his galley, and then compel the half-drunken helmsman to surrender. But to resort to such measures as those where we then were would have been sheer madness; and the idea no sooner occurred to me than it was dismissed as impracticable. But although impracticable just then, it might not be so later on, when we should have arrived in less perilous lat.i.tudes; and I there and then resolved to do everything that in me lay to facilitate such a _coup_ on the first suitable occasion.

Meanwhile, it was little short of madness for the men to drink to excess under the then prevailing conditions of weather and situation; and I determined to remonstrate with O'Gorman for permitting such perilous indulgence. So I went aft and took the wheel, directing the man whom I relieved to ask O'Gorman to come aft, as I wished to speak to him.

The fellow slouched away forward, lurching and slipping along the wet decks, and disappeared down the fore-scuttle. I deemed it not improbable that he would avail himself of the opportunity to help himself to another drink, and that it might possibly be quite five minutes, or even ten, before he returned aft to resume his duty; but a full half-hour elapsed, and still the fellow remained invisible. I had by this time very nearly come to the end of my stock of patience, and was on the point of yelling to the cook--who kept close as a limpet to the shelter of his galley, with the weather-door fast shut--to run to the forecastle and summon someone to relieve me, when I became aware of a din of excited shouts and yells arising from the fore-scuttle, that momentarily grew in intensity until the disturbance was violent enough to suggest that all pandemonium had broken adrift in that small forecastle. The cook, from his position, in the galley, heard the row much more distinctly than I did, and, forsaking his pots and pans, rushed forward, where he stood gaping down through the scuttle in an att.i.tude expressive of combined interest and consternation. I shouted to him to let me know what it all meant, but his attention was so completely absorbed by what was happening below that he had no ears for me; while, as for me, I had my hands quite full with the brig, and dared not release my grasp of the wheel for a single instant lest she should broach-to and get her decks swept, or possibly be dismasted.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

A DOUBLE TRAGEDY.

The rumpus continued for nearly ten minutes, and then quite suddenly ceased; and as it did so the cook flung his legs over the coamings of the fore-scuttle, and disappeared down the hatchway. Some five minutes or so later, O'Gorman appeared on deck, ghastly white, and with his cheek laid open in a gash that extended very nearly from his left ear to the corresponding corner of his mouth. The blood was trickling down upon the collar of his jacket and staining the whole of the left breast of the garment, and his hands and cuffs were smeared with blood. It was at once evident to me that there had been a serious scrimmage in the forecastle; a conjecture that was at once confirmed by the fellow himself--who, I may mention, was completely sobered by the occurrence, if indeed he had been the worse for drink at its outbreak.

"Hillo, Misther!" he exclaimed, as he arrived within speaking distance of me, "are ye left all alone to look afther the hooker? Be jabers, that's too bad! Where's the shpalpeen that ought to be doin' his thrick of grindin' wather?"

"I sent him for'ard about three-quarters of an hour ago," said I, "to tell you that I wished to speak to you; and the loafing blackguard never returned. But what has been the matter in the forecastle, and how came you with that wound in your cheek?"

"Oh, begorra, but it's a bad job, intoirely!" he answered. "We was all havin' a little game of cards together, and to make the game lively we was stakin' our gims. Dirk got claned out at last--lost every stone of his share--and then he jumped up and swore that Price had been chatin'

him. Price knocked him down for sayin' it; but he jumped up again--wid his mouth all bleedin' from Jack's blow--and, in a wink, before anny of us knew what he was afther, he'd whipped out his knife and drove it clean through poor Chips heart! That was the beginnin' of the row.

When we saw what had been done, two or three of us attimpted to seize Dirk and disarm him; but the murthering villain fought like all the furies, layin' my cheek open, stabbin' poor Tom in the throat so that he's bleedin' like a stuck pig, and pretty near cuttin' Mike's hand off.

And that's not the worst of it aither. Some of the other chaps took Dirk's side, swearin' that they'd seen Chips chatin', and in two two's, sir, all hands had their knives out, and we was cuttin' and slashin' at each other loike--loike--sodgers on a field of battle!"

"Are there any hurt beside Tom, Mike, and yourself?" I asked, too completely dazed with the sudden horror of the thing to look at more than one side of it for the moment.

"Ay, begorra," answered the Irishman; "Dirk's done for, I expect; and there's others of us that'll want plenty of watchin' if we're ever to see the other side of the Line again."

"Is that so?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed I. "Then for Heaven's sake send somebody to relieve me, that I may go for'ard and see what is to be done in the way of st.i.tching and bandaging."

"Ay!" exclaimed O'Gorman, "bad cess to me for forgittin' it; that was what I came aft to ye for."