Tom Cringle's Log Part 26

"Ah, tank you, Ma.s.sa Tom--de debil nearly get we all in a sc.r.a.pe just now. However, I see him is quite sound--de sentry dat is, for de oder never sleep, you know." He had again come under the window. "Now, Lieutenant, in two word, to-morrow night at two bells, in de middle watch, I will be here, and we shall make a start of it; will you venture, sir?"

"Will I?--to be sure I will; but why not now, Peter? why not now?"

"Ah, ma.s.sa, you no smell de daylight; near daybreak already, sir. Can't make try dis night, but to-morrow night I shall be here punctual."

"Very well, but the dog, man? If he be found in my quarters, we shall be blown, and I scarcely think he will leave me."

"Garamighty! true enough, ma.s.sa; what is to be done? De people know de dog was catch wid me, and if he be found wid you, den de will sospect we communication togidder. What is to be done?"

I was myself not a little perplexed, when Nancy whispered, "De dog have more sense den many Christian person. Tell him he must go wid us dis one night, no tell him dis night, else him won't; say dis one night, and dat if him don't, we shall all be deaded; try him, ma.s.sa."

I had benefited by more extraordinary hints before now, although, well as I knew the sagacity of the poor brute, I could not venture to hope it would come up to the expectations of Mrs Mangrove. But I'll try. "Here, Sneezer, here, my boy; you must go home with Peter tonight, or we shall all get into a deuced mess; so here, my boy, here is the bight of the handkerchief again, and through the window you must go; come, Sneezer, come."

To my great joy and surprise, the poor dumb beast rose from where he had coiled himself at my feet, and after having actually embraced me, by putting his forepaws on my shoulders, as he stood on his hind legs, and licked my face from ear to ear, uttering a low, fondling, nuzzling sort of whine, like a nurse caressing a child, he at once leapt on the window sill, put his forepaws through the handkerchief, and was dropped to the ground again. I could immediately perceive the two dark figures of the pilot and his wife, followed by the dog, glide away as noiselessly as if they had been spirits of the night, until they were lost under the shade of the thick jungle.

I turned in, and--what will not youth and fatigue do?--I fell once more fast asleep, and never opened my eyes until Obed shook me in my cot about eight o'clock in the morning.

"Good morning, Lieutenant. I have sent up your breakfast, but you don't seem inclined to eat it."

"Don't you believe it, my dear Obed. I have been sound asleep till this moment; only stop till I have slipped on my--those shoes, if you please thank you--waistcoat--that will do. Now--coffee, fish, yams, and plantains, and biscuit, white as snow, and short as--and eggs and zounds! claret to finish with?--Why, Obed, you surely don't desire that I should enjoy all these delicacies in solitary blessedness?"

"Why, I intend to breakfast with you, if my society be not disagreeable."

"Disagreeable! Not in the least, quite the contrary. That black grouper looks remarkably beautiful. Another piece of yam, if you please.--Shall I fill you a cup of coffee, Obed? For my own part, I always stow the ground tier of my cargo dry, and then take a topdressing. Write this down as an approved axiom with all thorough breakfast eaters. Why, man, you are off your feed; what are you turning up your ear for, in that incomprehensible fashion, like a duck in thunder? A little of the claret--thank you. The very best b.u.t.ter I have ever eaten out of Ireland--now, some of that avocado pear--and as for biscuit, Leman never came up to it. I say, man,--hillo, where are you?--rouse ye out of your brown study, man."

"Did you hear that, Mr Cringle?"

"Hear what?--I heard nothing," rejoined I; "but hand me over that land crab.--Thank you, and you may send the spawl of that creeping thing along with it; that guana. I had a dislike to eating a lizard at first, but I have got over it somehow;--and a slice of ham, a small taste of the unclean beast, Obed--peach-fed, I'll warrant."

There was a pause. The report of a great gun came booming along, reverberated from side to side of the lagoon, the echoes growing shorter and shorter, and weaker and weaker, until they growled themselves asleep in a hollow rumble like distant thunder.

"Ha, ha! d.i.c.k Casket for a thousand! Old Blowhard has stuck in your skirts, Master Obed--but Lord help me, man! let us finish our breakfast; he won't be here this half hour."

I expected to see mine host's forehead lowering like a thunder cloud from my ill-timed funning; but to my surprise, his countenance exhibited more amenity than I thought had been in the nature of the beast, as he replied,--

"Why, lieutenant, the felucca put to sea last night, to keep a bright look-out at the mouth of our cove here. I suppose that is him overhauling some vessel."

"It may be so;--hush! there's another gun--Two!"

Obed changed countenance at the double report.

"I say, Obed, the felucca did not carry more than one gun when I saw her, and she has had no time to load and fire again."

He did not answer a word, but continued, with a piece of guana on the end of, his fork in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other, as if he had been touched by the wand of a magician. Presently we heard one or two dropping shots, quickly thickening into a rattle of musketry. He threw down his food, picked up his hat, and trundled down stairs, as if the devil had kicked him. "Pedro, que hay?" I could hear him say to some one below, who appeared to have arrived in great haste, for he gasped for breath.

"Aqui viene la feluca," answered Pedro; "perseguido por dos Lanchas Canoneras llenas de Gente."

"Abordo entonces, abordo todo el mundo; arma arma, aqui vienen los Engleses; arma, arma!"

And all from that instant was a regular hillabaloo. The drums on board the schooners beat to quarters, a great bell, formerly the ornament of some goodly ship, no doubt, which had been slung in the fork of a tree, clanged away at a furious rate, the crews were hurrying to and fro, shouting to each other in Creole Spanish, and Yankee English, while every cannon-shot from the felucca or the boat guns came louder and louder, and the small arms peppered away sharper and sharper. The shouts of the men engaged, both friends and foes, were now heard, and I could hear Obed's voice on board the largest schooner, which lay full in view from my window, giving orders, not only to his own crew, but to those of the others. I heard him distinctly sing out, after ordering them to haul upon the spring on his cable, "Now, men, I need not tell you to fight bravely, for if you are taken every devil of you will be hanged, so hoist away the signal," and a small black ball flew up through the rigging, until it reached the main topgallant-masthead of the schooner, where it hung a moment, and in the next blew out in a large black swallow-tailed flag, like a commodore's broad pennant.

"Now," shrieked he, "let me see who dares give in with this voucher for his honesty flying aloft!" I twisted and craned myself out of the window, to get a view of what--was going on elsewhere; however, I could see nothing but Obed's large schooner from it, all the other craft were out of the range of my eye, being hid by the projecting roof of the shed. The noise continued--the shouting rose higher than ever--the other schooners opened their fire, both cannon and musketry; and from the increasing vehemence of the Spanish exclamations, and the cheering on board Obed's vessels, I concluded the attacking party were having the worst of it. My dog Sneezer now came jumping and scrambling up the trap stair, his paws slipping between the bars at every step, his mouth wide open, and his tongue hanging out, while he barked, and yelled, and gasped to get at me, as if his life depended on it. After him I could see the round woolly pate of Peter Mangrove, Esquire, as excited apparently as the dog, and as anxious to get up; but they got jammed together in the small hatch, and stuck there, man and beast. At length Peter spoke--

"Now, sir, now! Nancy has run on before to the beach wid two paddles; now for it, now for it."

Down trundled master, and dog, and pilot. By this time there was no one in the lower part of the shed, which was full of smoke, while the infernal tumult on the water still raged as furiously as ever, the shot of all sorts and sizes hissing, and splashing, and ricochetting along the smooth surface of the harbour, as if there had been a sleet of musket and cannonb.a.l.l.s and grape. Peter struck out at the top of his speed, Sneezer and I followed: we soon reached the jungle, dashed through a path that had been recently cleared with a cutla.s.s or billhook, for the twigs were freshly shred, and in about ten minutes reached the high wood. However, no rest for the wicked, although the row seemed lessening now.

"Some one has got the worst of it," said I.

"Never mind, ma.s.sa," quoth Peter, "or we shan't get de betterest ourshef."

And away we galloped again, until I had scarcely a rag an inch square on my back, or anywhere else, and my skin was tom in pieces by the p.r.i.c.kly bushes and spear gra.s.s. The sound of firing now ceased entirely, although there was still loud shouting now and then.

"Push on, ma.s.sa--dem will soon miss we."

"True enough, Peter--but what is that?" as we came to a bundle of clouts walloping about in the mora.s.s.

"De debil it must be, I tink," said the pilot. "No, my Nancy it is, sticking in the mud up to her waist; what shall us do? you fink, ma.s.sa, we hab time for can stop to pick she out?"

"Heaven have mercy, Peter--yes, unquestionably."

"Well, ma.s.sa, you know best."

So we tugged at the sable heroine, and first one leg came home out of the tenacious clay, with a plop, then the other was drawn out of the quagmire. We then relieved her of the paddles, and each taking hold of one of the poor half-dead creature's hands, we succeeded in getting down to the beach, about half a mile to leeward of the entrance to the cove. We found the canoe there, plumped Nancy stem foremost into the bottom of it for ballast, gathered all our remaining energies for a grand shove, and ran her like lightning into the surf, till the water flashed over and over us, reaching to our necks. Next moment we were both swimming, and the canoe, although full of water, beyond the surf, rising and falling on the long swell. We scrambled on board, set Nancy to bale with Peter's hat, seized our paddles, and skulled away like fury for ten minutes right out to sea, without looking once about us, until a musket-shot whistled over our heads, then another, and a third; and I had just time to hold up a white handkerchief, to prevent a whole platoon being let drive at us from the deck of his Britannic Majesty's schooner Gleam, lying-to about a cable's length to windward of us, with the Firebrand a mile astern of her out at sea. In five minutes we got on board of the former.

"Mercy on me, Tom Cringle, and is this the way we are to meet again?"

said old d.i.c.k Gasket, as he held out his large, bony, sunburnt hand to me. "You have led me a nice dance, in a vain attempt to redeem you from bondage, Tom; but I am delighted to see you although I have not had the credit of being your deliverer--very glad to see you, Tom; but come along man, come down with me, and let me rig you, not quite a Stultze's fit, you know, but a jury rig you shall have, as good as d.i.c.k Casket's kit can furnish forth, for really you are in a miserable plight, man."

"Bad enough indeed. Mr Casket--many thanks though--bad enough, as you say; but I would that your boats crew were in so good a plight."

Mr Gasket looked earnestly at me--"Why, I have my own misgivings, Cringle; this morning at day-break, the Firebrand in company, we fell in with an armed felucca. It was dead calm, and she was out of gun shot, close in with the land. The Firebrand immediately sent the cutter on board full armed, with instructions to me to man the launch, and arm her with the boat-gun, and then to send both boats to overhaul the felucca. I did so, standing in as quickly as the light air would take me, to support them; the felucca all this while sweeping in sh.o.r.e as fast as she could pull. But the boats were too nimble for her, and our launch had already saluted her twice from the six pounder in the bow, when the sea-breeze came thundering down in a white squall, that reefed our gaff-topsail in a trice, and blew away a whole lot of light sails, like so many paper-kites. When it cleared away, the devil a felucca, boat, or any thing else, was to be seen. Capsized they could not have been, for all three were not likely to have gone that way; and as to any creek they could have run into, why we could see none. That they had pulled in sh.o.r.e, however, was our conclusion; but here have we been, the whole morning, firing signal guns every five minutes without success."

"Did you hear no firing after the squall?" said I.

"Why, some of my people thought they did, but it was that hollow, tremulous, reverberating kind of sound, that it might have been thunder; and the breeze blew too strong to have allowed us to hear musketry a mile and a half to windward. I did think I saw some smoke rise, and blow off now and then, but" "But me no buts, Master Richard Casket; Peter Mangrove here, as well as myself, saw your people pursue the felucca into the lion's den, and I fear they have been crushed in his jaws." I briefly related what we had seen--Casket was in great distress.

"They must have been taken, Cringle. The fools! to allow themselves to be trepanned in this way. We must stand out and speak the corvette.

All hands make sail!"

I could not help smiling at the grandeur of d.i.c.k's emphasis on the all, when twenty hands, one-third of them boys, and the rest landsmen, scrambled up from below, and began to pull and haul in no very seamanlike fashion. He noticed it.

"A--h, Tom, I know what you are grinning at, but I fear it has been no laughing matter to my poor boats crew--all my best hands gone, G.o.d help me!"

Presently being under the Firebrand's lee quarter, we lowered down the boat and went on board, where, for the first time, the extreme ludicrousness of my appearance and following flashed on me. There we were all in a bunch, the dog, Mr and Mrs Mangrove, and Thomas Cringle, gentleman, such in appearance as I shall shortly describe them.

Old Richard Gasket, Esq., first clambered up the side and made his bow to the Hon. Captain Transom, who was standing near the gangway, on the snow-white deck, amidst a group of officers, where every thing was in the most apple-pie order, himself, both in mind and apparel, the most polished concern in the ship; while the whole crew, with the exception of the unfortunate absentees in the cutter, were scrambling, to get a good view of us.

I have already said, that my uniform was torn to pieces; trowsers ditto; my shoes had parted company in the quagmire; and as for hat, it was left in my cot. I had a dirty bandage tied round my neck, performing the twofold office of a cravat and a dressing to my wound; while the blood from the scratches had dried into black streaks adown and across my face and paws, and I was altogether so begrimed with mud that my mother would not have known me. d.i.c.k made his salaam, and then took up a position beside the sally-port, with an important face, like a showman exhibiting wild beastesses, a regular "stir-him-up-with-a-long pole" sort of look. I followed him "This is Lieutenant Cringle, Captain Transom."