The Cruise of the Frolic Part 17

THE CAPTURE.

The work for the day was nearly concluded, and the captain of the slaver was walking by himself beneath the awning spread over the after-part of the deck, when he observed a canoe suddenly dart out of the main stream into the bay where the schooner lay concealed. It was soon alongside, when a black jumped on board.

"Senor capitan, you must be p.r.o.nto," he said. "Big man-of-war come, big canoe, mucho hombres, come up river."

"Ah, have they found me out?" muttered the captain to himself. "I'll give them a warm reception if they do come. Very well, Queebo," he said aloud, "now pull back and watch them narrowly. Take care they don't see you, and come and report their movements to me."

At a signal all the crew were summoned on board, the awning was handed, boarding-nettings were triced up, the guns were double-shotted and run out, and a thick screen of boughs was carried across the part of the bay so as still further to conceal the schooner from the eye of any stranger. Two guns were also sent on sh.o.r.e and planted in battery, so as to command the entrance of the bay. Every other precaution was likewise taken to avoid discovery; all fires were extinguished, and the blacks were ordered to remove from the neighbourhood.

By the time these arrangements had been made, the scout returned to give notice that two boats had entered the river, and were exploring one of the numerous pa.s.sages of the stream. The captain on this ordered the scout to remain on board, lest he might betray their whereabouts to the enemy. He had no wish to destroy the boats, as so doing would not benefit him; concealment, not fighting, was his object. When night, however, came on, he sent out the scout to gain further intelligence.

Scarcely had the man gone, when he returned, and noiselessly stepped on deck.

"Hist, senor, hist!" he whispered. "They are close at hand, little dreaming we are near them."

"Whereabouts?" inquired the captain.

"On the other side of the long island which divides the middle from the southern stream," was the substance of the reply.

"We'll attack them then, and either kill or make them all prisoners.

They may be useful as hostages," muttered the captain, and calling Antonio to him, he ordered him to man two boats with the most trustworthy of their people, and carefully to m.u.f.fle the oars. This done, both boats left the schooner, under his command, in the direction indicated by the scout.

They pulled across the channel to a thickly-wooded island indicated by the scout. The negro landed, and in a few minutes came back.

"Dere dey are, senor," he whispered; "you may kill all fast asleep; berry good time now; no make noise."

On hearing this, the slavers, all of whom were armed to the teeth, advanced cautiously across the island, by a path with which Queebo seemed well acquainted. The black pointed between the trees, and there was seen the head of a man, fast asleep in the stern-sheets of a boat.

Just then a light rustling noise was heard, and a figure was seen advancing close up to where the slavers were crouching down, ready for the command of their officer to fire.

He advanced slowly, looking out for the very path apparently by which they had gained the spot. He reached within almost an arm's length of the captain. The impulse was irresistible; and before the stranger was aware any one was near him, he was felled to the ground, and a handkerchief was pa.s.sed over his mouth, so that he could not utter a cry for help. Two other men, who were doing duty as sentinels on sh.o.r.e, were in like manner surprised and gagged, without uttering a sound to alarm the rest. The slavers then advanced close up to the nearest boat, and pouring a volley from their deadly trabucos into her, killed or wounded nearly all her crew. A larger boat was moored at some little distance farther on, and her people being aroused by the firing, they at once shoved off into the stream, which the survivors of the other also succeeded in doing. They then opened a fire on the slavers, but sheltered as they were among the trees, it was ineffectual.

The contest was kept up for some time; but reduced in strength as the crews of the boats were, they were at last obliged to retreat, while the slavers returned with their prisoners to the schooner. As the slavers'

boats were left on the other side of the island, which extended for more than a mile towards the sea, they were unable to follow their retreating enemy had they been so inclined; but in fact they did not relish the thought of coming in actual contact with British seamen, as they had good reason in believing the enemy to be, although weakened and dispirited by defeat.

When the prisoners, who had not uttered a word, were handed up on deck, the captain ordered lights to be brought, for he had no longer any fear of being discovered. One evidently, by his uniform, was an officer; the other two were seamen. The captain paced the deck in the interval before lights were brought, grinding his teeth and clinching his fists with rage, as he muttered to himself,--

"He shall die--he wears that hated uniform: it reminds me of what I once was. Oh, this h.e.l.l within me! blood must quench its fire."

A seaman now brought aft a lantern; its glare fell as well on the features of the prisoner as on that of the slave captain. Both started.

"Staunton!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the latter.

"Daggerfeldt!" exclaimed the prisoner.

"You know me, then?" said the captain of the slaver, bitterly; "it will avail you little, though. I had wished it had been another man; but no matter--you must take your chance."

The slaver's crew were now thronging aft.

"Well, meos amigos," he continued, in a fierce tone, "what is to be done with these spies? You are the judges, and must decide the case."

"Enforca-los--hang them, hang them--at least the officer. The other two may possibly enter, and they may be of service: we want good seamen to work the vessel, and these English generally are so."

"You hear what your fate is to be," said Daggerfeldt, turning to Captain Staunton. "You had better prepare for it. You may have some at home to regret your loss. If you have any messages, I will take care to transmit them. It is the only favour I can do you."

While he spoke, a bitter sneer curled his lip, and his voice a.s.sumed a taunting tone, which he could not repress.

The gallant officer, proud in his consciousness of virtue, confronted the villain boldly.

"I would receive no favour, even my life, from one whose very name is a disgrace to humanity. Even if the message I were to send was conveyed correctly, it would be polluted by the bearer. It would be little satisfaction for my friends to know that I was murdered in an African creek by the hands of a rascally slaver."

While Staunton was uttering these words, which he did in very bitterness of spirit, for, knowing the character of the wretch with whom he had to deal, he had not the remotest hope of saving either his own life or that of his people, the rage of Daggerfeldt was rising till it surpa.s.sed his control.

"Silence!" he thundered, "or I will brain you on the spot!"

But Staunton stood unmoved.

"Madman, would you thus repay me for the life I saved?" he asked, calmly.

"A curse on you for having saved it," answered the pirate, fiercely, returning his sword, which he had half drawn from its scabbard. "My hand, however, shall not do the deed. Here, Antonio Diogo, here are the spies who wish to interfere in our trade, and would send us all to prison, or to the gallows, if they could catch us."

"The end of a rope and a dance on nothing for the officer, say I,"

answered the mulatto mate. "See what his followers will do; speak to them in their own lingo, captain, and ask them whether they choose to walk overboard or join us."

While he was speaking, some of the crew brought aft the two British seamen, with their hands lashed behind them. Others, headed by Antonio, immediately seized Captain Staunton, and led him to the gangway, one of the men running aloft to reeve a rope through the studding-sail sheet-block on the main-yard. Staunton well knew what the preparations meant, but he trembled not; his whole anxiety was for the boats' crews he had led in the expedition which had ended so unfortunately, and for the two poor fellows whose lives, he feared, were about also to be sacrificed by the miscreants.

The British seamen watched what was going forward, and by the convulsive workings of their features, and the exertions they were making to free their arms, were evidently longing to strike a blow to rescue him.

Daggerfeldt was better able to confront them than he had been to face Staunton.

"You are seamen belonging to a man-of-war outside this river, and you came here to interfere with our affairs?"

"You've hit it to an affigraphy, my bo'," answered one of the men, glad, at all events, to get the use of his tongue. "We belongs to her Majesty's brig 'Sylph,' and we came into this here cursed hole to take you or any other slaver we could fall in with; and now you knows what I am, I'll just tell you what you are--a runaway scoundrel of a piccarooning villain, whom no honest man would consort with, or even speak to, for that matter, except to give him a bit of his mind; and if you're not drowned, or blown up sky high, you'll be hung, as you deserve, as sure as you're as big a rascal as ever breathed. Now, put that in your pipe, my bo', and smoke it."

While he was thus running on, to the evident satisfaction of his shipmate, who, indifferent to their danger, seemed mightily to enjoy the joke, Daggerfeldt in vain endeavoured to stop him.

"Silence!" he shouted, "or you go overboard this moment!"

"You must bawl louder than that, my bo', if you wants to frighten Jack Hopkins, let me tell you," answered the undaunted seaman. "What is it you want of us? Come, out with it; some villainy, I'll warrant."

The captain of the slaver ground his teeth with fury, but he dared not kill the man who was bearding him, for he could not explain to his crew the nature of the offence, a very venial one in their eyes, and he wanted some good seamen.

"I overlook your insolence," he answered, restraining his pa.s.sion. "My crew are your judges. You have been convicted of endeavouring to capture us, and they give you your choice of joining us, or of going overboard; the dark stream alongside swarms with alligators. That fate is too good for your captain: he is to be hung."

"Why, what a cursed idiot you must be to suppose we'd ship with such a pretty set of scoundrels as you and your men are," answered Jack Hopkins, with a laugh. "I speak for myself and for Bob Short, too.

It's all right, Bob, I suppose?" he said, turning to his companion.

"There's no use shilly-shallying with these blackguards."

"Ay, ay; I'm ready for what you are," replied Bob Short, who had gained his name from the succinctness of his observations apparently, rather than from his stature, for he was six feet high, while the name by which Jack Hopkins was generally known on board was Peter Palaver, from his inveterate habits of loquacity.

"Well, then, look ye here, Mr Daggerfeldt, I knowed you many years ago for an ill-begotten sp.a.w.n of you knows what, and I knows you now for the biggest scoundrel unhung, so you must just take the compliments I've got to give you. Now for the matter of dying, I'd rather die with a brave, n.o.ble fellow like our skipper than live in company with a man who has murdered his messmate, has seduced the girl who sheltered him from justice, and would now hang the man who saved his life. Your favours!