Читать книгу The Greatest Sea Adventure Novels: 30+ Maritime Novels, Pirate Tales & Seafaring Stories - R. M. Ballantyne - Страница 53

Table of Contents

Rencontre with Slave-Traders—On Board again—A Start, a Misfortune, a Ghost Story, a Mistake, and an Invitation to Dinner.

On the evening of the second day after the capture of Jacko, as the canoe was descending the river and drawing near to the sea-coast, much to the delight of everyone—for the heat of the interior had begun to grow unbearable—a ship’s boat was observed moored to the wharf near the slave-station which they had passed on the way up. At first it was supposed to be one of the boats of the Red Eric, but on a nearer approach this proved to be an erroneous opinion.

“Wot can it be a-doin’ of here?” inquired Tim Rokens, in an abstracted tone of voice, as if he put the question to himself, and therefore did not expect an answer.

“No doubt it’s a slaver’s boat,” replied the trader; “they often come up here for cargoes of niggers.”

“Och! the blackguards!” exclaimed Phil Briant, all his blood rising at the mere mention of the horrible traffic; “couldn’t we land, capting, and give them a lickin’? I’ll engage meself to put six at laste o’ the spalpeens on their beam-ends.”

“No, Phil, we shan’t land for that purpose; but we’ll land for some gunpowder an’ a barrel or two of plantains; so give way, lads.”

In another moment the bow of the canoe slid upon the mud-bank of the river close to the slaver’s boat, which was watched by a couple of the most villainous-looking men that ever took part in that disgraceful traffic. They were evidently Portuguese sailors, and the scowl of their bronzed faces, when they saw the canoe approach the landing-place, showed that they had no desire to enter into amicable converse with the strangers.

At this moment the attention of the travellers was drawn to a gang of slaves who approached the wharf, chained together by the neck, and guarded by the crew of the Portuguese boat. Ailie looked on with a feeling of dread that induced her to cling to her father’s hand, while the men stood with folded arms, compressed lips, and knitted brows.

On the voyage up they had landed at this station, and had seen the slaves in their places of confinement. The poor creatures were apparently happy at that time, and seemed totally indifferent to their sad fate; but their aspect was very different now. They were being hurried away, they knew not whither, by strangers whom they had been taught to believe were monsters of cruelty besides being cannibals, and who had purchased them for the purpose of killing them and eating their bodies. The wild, terrified looks of the men, and the subdued looks and trembling gait of the women showed that they expected no mercy at the hands of their captors.

They hung back a little as they drew near to the boat, whereupon one of their conductors, who seemed to be in command of the party, uttered a fierce exclamation in Portuguese, and struck several of the men and women indiscriminately severe blows with his fists. In a few minutes they were all placed in the boat, and the crew had partly embarked, when Phil Briant, unable to restrain himself, muttered between his teeth to the Portuguese commander as he passed—

“Ye imp o’ darkness, av I only had ye in the ring for tshwo minits—jist tshwo—ah thin, wouldn’t I polish ye off.”

“Fat you say, sare?” cried the man, turning fiercely towards Briant, and swearing at him in bad English.

“Say, is it? Oh, then there’s a translation for ye, that’s understood in all lingos.”

Phil shook his clenched fist as close as possible to the nose of the Portuguese commander without actually coming into contact with that hooked and prominent organ.

The man started back and drew his knife, at the same time calling to several of his men, who advanced with their drawn knives.

“Ho!” cried Briant, and a jovial smile overspread his rough countenance as he sprang to a clear spot of ground and rolled up both sleeves of his shirt to the shoulders, thereby displaying a pair of arms that might, at a rapid glance, have been mistaken for a pair of legs—“that’s yer game, is it? won’t I stave in yer planks! won’t I shiver yer timbers, and knock out yer daylights, bless yer purty faces! I didn’t think ye had it in ye; come on darlints—toothpicks and all—as many as ye like; the more the better—wan at a time, or all at wance, it don’t matter, not the laste, be no manes!”

While Briant gave utterance to these liberal invitations, he performed a species of revolving dance, and flourished his enormous fists in so ludicrous a manner, that despite the serious nature of the fray the two parties were likely to be speedily engaged in, his comrades could not restrain their laughter.

“Go it, Pat!” cried one.

“True blue!” shouted another.

“Silence!” cried Captain Dunning, in a voice that enforced obedience. “Get into the canoe, Briant.”

“Och! capting,” exclaimed the wrathful Irishman, reproachfully, “sure ye wouldn’t spile the fun?”

“Go to the canoe, sir.”

“Ah! capting dear, jist wan round!”

“Go to the canoe, I say.”

“I’ll do it all in four minits an’ wan quarter, av ye’ll only shut yer eyes,” pleaded Phil.

“Obey orders, will you?” cried the captain, in a voice there was no mistaking.

Briant indignantly thrust his fists into his breeches pockets, and rolled slowly down towards the canoe, as—to use one of his own favourite expressions—sulky as a bear with a broken head.

Meanwhile the captain stepped up to the Portuguese sailors and told them to mind their own business, and let honest men alone; adding, that if they did not take his advice, he would first give them a licking and then pitch them all into the river.

This last remark caused Briant to prick up his ears and withdraw his fists from their inglorious retirement, in the fond hope that there might still be work for them to do; but on observing that the Portuguese, acting on the principle that discretion is the better part of valour, had taken the advice and were returning to their own boat, he relapsed into the sulks, and seated himself doggedly in his place in the canoe.

During all this little scene, which was enacted much more rapidly than it had been described, master Jacko, having escaped from the canoe, had been seated near the edge of the wharf, looking on, apparently, with deep interest. Just as the Portuguese turned away to embark in their boat, Ailie’s eye alighted on her pet; at the same moment the foot of the Portuguese commander alighted on her pet’s tail. Now the tails of all animals seem to be peculiarly sensitive. Jacko’s certainly was so, for he instantly uttered a shriek of agony, which was as quickly responded to by its adopted mother in a scream of alarm as she sprang forward to the rescue. When one unintentionally treads on the tail of any animal and thereby evokes a yell, he is apt to start and trip—in nine cases out of ten he does trip. The Portuguese commander tripped upon this occasion. In staggering out of the monkey’s way he well-nigh tumbled over Ailie, and in seeking to avoid her, he tumbled over the edge of the wharf into the river.

The difference between the appearance of this redoubtable slave-buying hero before and after his involuntary immersion was so remarkable and great that his most intimate friend would have failed to recognise him. He went down into the slimy liquid an ill-favoured Portuguese, clad in white duck; he came up a worse-favoured monstrosity, clothed in mud! Even his own rascally comrades grinned at him for a moment, but their grins changed into a scowl of anger when they heard the peals of laughter that burst from the throats of their enemies. As for Briant, he absolutely hugged himself with delight.

“Och! ye’ve got it, ye have,” he exclaimed, at intervals. “Happy day! who’d ha’ thought it? to see him tumbled in the mud after all by purty little Ailie and Jacko. Come here to me Jacko, owld coon. Oh, ye swate cratur!”

Briant seized the monkey, and squeezed it to his breast, and kissed it—yes, he actually kissed its nose in the height of his glee, and continued to utter incoherent exclamations, and to perpetrate incongruous absurdities, until long after they had descended the river and left the muddy Portuguese and his comrades far behind them.

Towards evening the party were once more safe and sound on board the Red Eric, where they found everything repaired, and the ship in a fit state to proceed to sea immediately.

His Majesty King Bumble was introduced to the steward, then to the cook, and then to the caboose. Master Jacko was introduced to the ship’s crew and to his quarters, which consisted of a small box filled with straw, and was lashed near the foot of the mizzen-mast. These introductions having been made, the men who had accompanied their commander on his late excursion into the interior, went forward and regaled their messmates for hours with anecdotes of their travels in the wilds of Africa.

It is well-known, and generally acknowledged, that all sublunary things, pleasant as well as unpleasant, must come to an end. In the course of two days more the sojourn of the crew of the Red Eric on the coast of Africa came to a termination. Having taken in supplies of fresh provisions, the anchor was weighed, and the ship stood out to sea with the first of the ebb tide. It was near sunset when the sails were hoisted and filled by a gentle land breeze, and the captain had just promised Ailie that he would show her blue water again by breakfast-time next morning, when a slight tremor passed through the vessel’s hull, causing the captain to shout, with a degree of vigour that startled everyone on board, “All hands ahoy! lower away the boats, Mr Millons, we’re hard and fast aground on a mud-bank!”

The boats were lowered away with all speed, and the sails dewed up instantly, but the Red Eric remained as immovable as the bank on which she had run aground; there was, therefore, no recourse but to wait patiently for the rising tide to float her off again. Fortunately the bank was soft and the wind light, else it might have gone ill with the good ship.

There is scarcely any conceivable condition so favourable to quiet confidential conversation and story-telling as the one in which the men of the whale-ship now found themselves. The night was calm and dark, but beautiful, for a host of stars sparkled in the sable sky, and twinkled up from the depths of the dark ocean. The land breeze had fallen, and there was scarcely any sound to break the surrounding stillness except the lipping water as it kissed the black hull of the ship. A dim, scarce perceptible light rendered every object on board mysterious and unaccountably large.

“Wot a night for a ghost story,” observed Jim Scroggles, who stood with a group of the men, who were seated on and around the windlass.

“I don’t b’lieve in ghosts,” said Dick Barnes stoutly, in a tone of voice that rendered the veracity of his assertion, to say the least of it, doubtful.

“Nother do I,” remarked Nikel Sling, who had just concluded his culinary operations for the day, and sought to employ his brief interval of relaxation in social intercourse with his fellows. Being engaged in ministering to the animal wants of his comrades all day, he felt himself entitled to enjoy a little of the “feast of reason and the flow of soul” at night:

“No more duv I,” added Phil Briant firmly, at the same time hitting his thigh a slap with his open hand that caused all round him to start.

“You don’t, don’t you?” said Tim Rokens, addressing the company generally, and looking round gravely, while he pushed the glowing tobacco into his pipe with the point of a marline-spike.

To this there was a chorus of “Noes,” but a close observer would have noticed that nearly the whole conversation was carried on in low tones, and that many a glance was cast behind, as if these bold sceptics more than half expected all the ghosts that did happen to exist to seize them then and there and carry them off as a punishment for their unbelief.

Tim Rokens drew a few whiffs of his pipe, and looked round gravely before he again spoke; then he put the following momentous question, with the air of a man who knew he could overturn his adversary whatever his reply should be—

“An’ why don’t ye b’lieve in ’em?”

We cannot say positively that Tim Rokens put the question to Jim Scroggles, but it is certain that Jim Scroggles accepted the question as addressed to him, and answered in reply—

“’Cause why? I never seed a ghost, an’ nobody never seed a ghost, an’ I don’t b’lieve in what I can’t see.”

Jim said this as if he thought the position incontestable. Tim regarded him with a prolonged stare, but for some time said nothing. At last he emitted several strong puffs of smoke, and said—

“Young man, did you ever see your own mind?”

“No, in course not.”

“Did anybody else ever see it?”

“Cer’nly not.”

“Then of course you don’t believe in it!” added Rokens, while a slight smile curled his upper lip.

The men chuckled a good deal at Jim’s confusion, while he in vain attempted to explain that the two ideas were not parallel by any means. At this juncture, Phil Briant came to the rescue.

“Ah now, git out,” said he. “I agree with Jim intirely; an’ Tim Rokens isn’t quite so cliver as he thinks. Now look here, lads, here’s how it stands, ’xactly. Jim says he never seed his own mind—very good; and he says as how nobody else niver seed it nother; well, and wot then? Don’t you observe it’s ’cause he han’t got none at all to see? He han’t got even the ghost of one, so how could ye expect anybody to see it?”

“Oh, hold yer noise, Paddy,” exclaimed Dick Barnes, “an’ let’s have a ghost story from Tim Rokens. He b’lieves in ghosts, anyhow, an’ could give us a yarn about ’em, I knows, if he likes. Come along now, Tim, like a good fellow.”

“Ay, that’s it,” cried Briant; “give us a stiff ’un now. Don’t be afeard to skear us, old boy.”

“Oh, I can give ye a yarn about ghosts, cer’nly,” said Tim Rokens, looking into the bowl of his pipe in order to make sure that it was sufficiently charged to last out the story. “I’ll tell ye of a ghost I once seed and knocked down.”

“Knocked down!” cried Nikel Sling in surprise; “why, I allers thought as how ghosts was spirits, an’ couldn’t be knocked down or cotched neither.”

“Not at all,” replied Rokens; “ghosts is made of all sorts o’ things—brass, and iron, and linen, and buntin’, and timber; it wos a brass ghost the feller that I’m goin’ to tell ye about—”

“I say, Sling,” interrupted Briant, “av ghosts wos spirits, as you thought they wos, would they be allowed into the State of Maine?”

“Oh, Phil, shut up, do! Now then, Tim, fire away.”

“Well, then,” began Rokens, with great deliberation, “it was on a Vednesday night as it happened. I had bin out at supper with a friend that night, and we’d had a glass or two o’ grog; for ye see, lads, it was some years ago, afore I tuk to temp’rance. I had a long way to go over a great dark moor afore I could git to the place where I lodged, so I clapped on all sail to git over the moor, seein’ the moon would go down soon; but it wouldn’t do: the moon set when I wos in the very middle of the moor, and as the road wasn’t over good, I wos in a state o’ confumble lest I should lose it altogether. I looks round in all directions, but I couldn’t see nothin’—cause why? there wasn’t nothin’ to be seen. It was ’orrid dark, I can tell ye. Jist one or two stars a-shinin’, like half-a-dozen farden dips in a great church; they only made darkness wisible. I began to feel all over a cur’ous sort o’ peculiar unaccountableness, which it ain’t easy to explain, but is most oncommon disagreeable to feel. It wos very still, too—desperate still. The beatin’ o’ my own heart sounded quite loud, and I heer’d the tickin’ o’ my watch goin’ like the click of a church clock. Oh, it was awful!”

At this point in the story the men crept closer together, and listened with intense earnestness.

“Suddently,” continued Rokens—“for things in sich circumstances always comes suddently—suddently I seed somethin’ black jump up right ahead o’ me.”

Here Rokens paused.

“Wot was it?” inquired Gurney, in a solemn whisper.

“It was,” resumed Rokens slowly, “the stump of a old tree.”

“Oh, I thought it had been the ghost,” said Gurney, somewhat relieved, for that fat little Jack-tar fully believed in apparitions, and always listened to a ghost story in fear and trembling.

“No it wasn’t the ghost; it was the stump of a tree. Well, I set sail again, an’ presently I sees a great white thing risin’ up ahead o’ me.”

“Hah! that was it,” whispered Gurney.

“No, that wasn’t it,” retorted Rokens; “that was a hinn, a white-painted hinn, as stood by the roadside, and right glad wos I to see it, I can tell ye, shipmates, for I wos gittin’ tired as well as frightened. I soon roused the landlord by kickin’ at the door till it nearly comed off its hinges; and arter gettin’ another glass o’ grog, I axed the landlord to show me my bunk, as I wanted to turn in.

“It was a queer old house that hinn wos. A great ramblin’ place, with no end o’ staircases and passages. A dreadful gloomy sort o’ place. No one lived in it except the landlord, a dark-faced surly fellow as one would like to kick out of his own door, and his wife, who wos little better than his-self. They also had a hostler, but he slept with the cattle in a hout-house.

“‘Ye won’t be fear’d,’ says the landlord, as he hove ahead through the long passages holdin’ the candle high above his head to show the way, ‘to sleep in the far end o’ the house. It’s the old bit; the new bit’s undergoin’ repairs. You’ll find it comfortable enough, though it’s raither gusty, bein’ old, ye see; but the weather ain’t cold, so ye won’t mind it.’

“‘Oh! niver a bit,’ says I, quite bold like; ‘I don’t care a rap for nothin’. There ain’t no ghosts, is there?’

“‘Well, I’m not sure; many travellers wot has stayed here has said to me they’ve seed ’em, particklerly in the old part o’ the buildin’, but they seems to be quite harmless, and never hurts any one as lets ’em alone. I never seed ’em myself, an’ there’s cer’nly not more nor half-a-dozen on ’em—hallo!—’

“At that moment, shipmates, a strong gust o’ cold air came rushin’ down the passage we was in, and blow’d out the candle. ‘Ah! it’s gone out,’ said the landlord; ‘just wait here a moment, and I’ll light it;’ and with that he shuffled off, and left me in the blackest and most thickest darkness I ever wos in in all my life. I didn’t dare to move, for I didn’t know the channels, d’ye see, and might ha’ run myself aground or against the rocks in no time. The wind came moanin’ down the passage; as if all the six ghosts the landlord mentioned, and a dozen or two o’ their friends besides, was a-dyin’ of stommick-complaint. I’m not easy frightened, lads, but my knees did feel as if the bones in ’em had turned to water, and my hair began to git up on end, for I felt it risin’. Suddenly I saw somethin’ comin’ along the passage towards me—”

“That’s the ghost, now,” interrupted Gurney, in a tremulous whisper.

Rokens paused, and regarded his fat shipmate with a look of contemptuous pity; then turning to the others, he said—

“It wos the landlord, a-comin’ back with the candle. He begged pardon for leavin’ me in the dark so long, and led the way to a room at the far end o’ the passage. It was a big, old-fashioned room, with a treemendius high ceiling, and no furniture, ’cept one chair, one small table, and a low camp-bed in a corner. ‘Here’s your room,’ says the landlord; ‘it’s well-aired. I may as well mention that the latch of the door ain’t just the thing. It sometimes blows open with a bang, but when you know it may happen, you can be on the look-out for it, you know, and so you’ll not be taken by surprise. Good-night.’ With that the fellow set the candle down on the small table at the bedside, and left me to my cogitations. I heerd his footsteps echoin’ as he went clankin’ along the passages; then they died away, an’ I was alone.

“Now, I tell ye wot it is, shipmates; I’ve bin in miny a fix, but I niver wos in sich a fix as that. The room was empty and big; so big that the candle could only light up about a quarter of it, leavin’ the rest in gloom. There was one or two old picturs on the walls; one on ’em a portrait of a old admiral, with a blue coat and brass buttons and white veskit. It hung just opposite the fut o’ my bunk, an’ I could hardly make it out, but I saw that the admiral kep his eye on me wheriver I turned or moved about the room, an’ twice or thrice, if not more, I saw him wink with his weather eye. Yes, he winked as plain as I do myself. Says I to myself, says I, ‘Tim Rokens, you’re a British tar, an’ a whaler, an’ a harpooner; so, Tim, my boy, don’t you go for to be a babby.’

“With that I smoked a pipe, and took off my clo’s, and tumbled in, and feeling a little bolder by this time, I blew out the candle. In gittin’ into bed I knocked over the snuffers, w’ich fell with an awful clatter, and my heart lep’ into my mouth as I lep’ under the blankets, and kivered up my head. Howsever, I was uncommon tired, so before my head was well on the pillow, I went off to sleep.

“How long I slep’ I can’t go for to say, but w’en I wakened it wos pitch-dark. I could only just make out the winder by the pale starlight that shone through it, but the moment I set my two eyes on it, wot does I see? I seed a sight that made the hair on my head stand on end, and my flesh creep up like a muffin. It was a—”

“A ghost!” whispered Gurney, while his eyes almost started out of his head.

Before Tim Rokens could reply, something fell with a heavy flop from the yard over their heads right in among the men, and vanished with a shriek. It was Jacko, who, in his nocturnal rambles in the rigging, had been shaken off the yard on which he was perched, by a sudden lurch of the vessel as the tide began to move her about. At any time such an event would have been startling, but at such a time as this it was horrifying. The men recoiled with sharp cries of terror, and then burst into laughter as they observed what it was that had fallen amongst them. But the laughter was subdued, and by no means hearty.

“I’ll be the death o’ that brute yet,” said Gurney, wiping the perspiration from his forehead; “but go on, Rokens; what was it you saw?”

“It was the ghost,” replied Rokens, as the men gathered round him again—“a long, thin ghost, standin’ at my bedside. The light was so dim that I couldn’t well make it out, but I saw that it was white, or pale-like, and that it had on a pointed cap, like the cap o’ an old witch. I thought I should ha’ died outright, and I lay for full five minits tremblin’ like a leaf and starin’ full in its face. At last I started up in despair, not knowin’ well wot to do; and the moment I did so the ghost disappeared.

“I thought this was very odd, but you may be sure I didn’t find fault with it; so after lookin’ all round very careful to make quite sure that it was gone, I lay down again on my back. Well, would ye b’lieve it, shipmates, at that same moment up starts the ghost again as bold as iver? And up starts I in a fright; but the moment I was up the ghost was gone. ‘Now, Tim Rokens,’ says I to myself, always keepin’ my eye on the spot where I’d last seed the ghost, ‘this is queer; this is quite remarkable. You’re dreamin’, my lad, an’ the sooner ye put a stop to that ’ere sort o’ dreamin’ the better.’

“Havin’ said this, I tried to feel reckless, and lay down again, and up started the ghost again with its long thin white body, an’ the pointed cap on its head. I noticed, too, that it wore its cap a little on one side quite jaunty like. So, wheniver I sot up that ’ere ghost disappeared, and wheniver I lay down it bolted up again close beside me. At last I lost my temper, and I shouts out quite loud, ‘Shiver my timbers,’ says I, ‘ghost or no ghost, I’ll knock in your daylights if ye carry on like that any longer;’ and with that I up fist and let drive straight out at the spot where its bread-basket should ha’ bin. Down it went, that ghost did, with a clatter that made the old room echo like an empty church. I guv it a rap, I did, sich as it hadn’t had since it was born—if ghosts be born at all—an’ my knuckles paid for it, too, for they was skinned all up; then I lay down tremblin’, and then, I dun know how it was, I went to sleep.

“Next mornin’ I got up to look for the ghost, and, sure enough, I found his remains! His pale body lay in a far corner o’ the room doubled up and smashed to bits, and his pointed cap lay in another corner almost flat. That ghost,” concluded Rokens, with slow emphasis—“that ghost was the candle, it wos!”

“The candle!” exclaimed several of the men in surprise.

“Yes, the candle, and brass candlestick with the stinguisher a-top o’t. Ye see, lads, the candle stood close to the side o’ my bed on the table, an’ when I woke up and I saw it there, it seemed to me like a big thing in the middle o’ the room, instead o’ a little thing close to my nose; an’ when I sot up in my bed, of coorse I looked right over the top of it and saw nothin’; an’ when I lay down, of coorse it rose up in the very same place. An’, let me tell you, shipmates,” added Tim, in conclusion, with the air of a philosopher, “all ghosts is o’ the same sort. They’re most of ’em made o’ wood or brass, or some sich stuff, as I’ve good cause to remimber, for I had to pay the price o’ that ’ere ghost before I left that there hinn on the lonesome moor, and for the washin’ of the blankets, too, as wos all kivered with blood nixt mornin’ from my smashed knuckles. There’s a morial contained in most things, lads, if ye only try for to find it out; an’ the morial of my story is this—don’t ye go for to b’lieve that everything ye don’t ’xactly understand is a ghost until ye’ve got to know more about it.”

While Tim Rokens was thus recounting his ghostly experiences, and moralising thereon, for the benefit of his comrades, the silent tide was stealthily creeping up the sides of the Red Eric, and placing her gradually on an even keel. At the same time a British man-of-war was creeping down upon that innocent vessel with the murderous intention of blowing her out of the water, if possible.

In order to explain this latter fact, we must remind the reader of the boat and crew of the Portuguese slaver which was encountered by the party of excursionists on their trip down the river. The vessel to which that boat belonged had been for several weeks previous creeping about off the coast, watching her opportunity to ship a cargo of slaves, and at the same time to avoid falling into the hands of a British cruiser which was stationed on the African coast to prevent the villainous traffic. The Portuguese ship, which was very similar in size and shape to the Red Eric, had hitherto managed to elude the cruiser, and had succeeded in taking a number of slaves on board ere she was discovered. The cruiser gave chase to her on the same afternoon as that on which the Red Eric grounded on the mud-bank off the mouth of the river. Darkness, however, favoured the slaver, and when the land breeze failed, she was lost sight of in the intricacies of the navigation at that part of the coast.

Towards morning, while it was yet dark, the Red Eric floated, and Captain Dunning, who had paced the deck all night with a somewhat impatient tread, called to the mate— “Now, Mr Millons, man the boats, and let some of the hands stand-by to trim the sails to the first puff of wind.”

“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the mate, as he sprang to obey.

Now it is a curious fact, that at that identical moment the captain of the cruiser addressed his first lieutenant in precisely the same words, for he had caught a glimpse of the whaler’s topmasts against the dark sky, and mistook them, very naturally, for those of the slaver. In a few seconds the man-of-war was in full pursuit.

“I say, Dr Hopley,” remarked Captain Dunning, as he gazed intently into the gloom astern, “did you not hear voices? and, as I live, there’s a large ship bearing right down on us!”

“It must be a slaver,” replied the doctor; “probably the one that owned the boat we saw up the river.”

“Ship on the larboard bow!” shouted the look-out on the forecastle.

“Hallo! ships ahead and astern!” remarked the captain, in surprise. “There seems to be a ‘school’ of ’em in these waters.”

At this moment the oars of the boats belonging to the ship astern were heard distinctly, and a light puff of wind at the same time bulged out the sails of the Red Eric, which instantly forged ahead.

“Ship ahoy!” shouted a voice from the boats astern in a tone of authority; “heave-to, you rascal, or I’ll sink you!”

Captain Dunning turned to the doctor with a look of intense surprise.

“Why, doctor, that’s the usual hail of a pirate, or something like it. What it can be doing here is past my comprehension. I would as soon expect to find a whale in a wash-tub as a black flag in these waters! Port, port a little” (turning to the steersman)—“steady—so. We must run for it, anyhow, for we’re in no fightin’ trim. The best answer to give to such a hail is silence.”

Contrary to expectation the boats did not again hail, but in a few minutes the dark hull of the British cruiser became indistinctly visible as it slipped swiftly through the water before the freshening breeze, and neared the comparatively slow-going whaler rapidly. Soon it came within easy range, and while Captain Dunning looked over the taffrail with a troubled countenance, trying to make her out, the same voice came hoarsely down on the night breeze issuing the same peremptory command.

“Turn up the hands, Mr Millons, and serve out pistols and cutlasses. Get the carronades on the forecastle and quarterdeck loaded, Mr Markham, and look alive; we must show the enemy a bold front, whoever he is.”

As the captain issued these orders, the darkness was for an instant illuminated by a bright flash; the roar of a cannon reverberated over the sea; a round-shot whistled through the rigging of the Red Eric, and the next instant the foretopsail-yard came rattling down upon the deck.

Immediately after, the cruiser ranged up alongside, and the order to heave-to was repeated with a threat that was calculated to cause the hair of a man of peace to stand on end. The effect on Captain Dunning was to induce him to give the order—

“Point the guns there, lads, and aim high; I don’t like to draw first blood—even of a pirate.”

“Ship ahoy! Who are you, and where from?” inquired Captain Dunning, through the speaking-trumpet.

“Her British Majesty’s frigate Firebrand. If you don’t heave-to, sir, instantly, I’ll give you a broadside. Who are you, and where bound?”

“Whew!” whistled Captain Dunning, to vent his feelings of surprise ere he replied, “The Red Eric, South Sea whaler, outward bound.”

Having given this piece of information, he ordered the topsails to be backed, and the ship was hove-to. Meanwhile a boat was lowered from the cruiser, and the captain thereof speedily leaped upon the whaler’s quarterdeck.

The explanation that followed was not by any means calculated to allay the irritation of the British captain. He had made quite sure that the Red Eric was the slaver of which he was in search, and the discovery of his mistake induced him to make several rather severe remarks in reference to the crew of the Red Eric generally and her commander in particular.

“Why didn’t you heave-to when I ordered you,” he said, “and so save all this trouble and worry?”

“Because,” replied Captain Dunning drily, “I’m not in the habit of obeying orders until I know that he who gives ’em has a right to do so. But ’tis a pity to waste time talking about such trifles when the craft you are in search of is not very far away at this moment.”

“What mean you, sir?” inquired the captain of the cruiser quickly.

“I mean that yonder vessel, scarcely visible now on the lee bow, is the slaver, in all likelihood.”

The captain gave but one hasty glance in the direction pointed to by Captain Dunning, and next moment he was over the side of the ship, and the boat was flying swiftly towards his vessel. The rapid orders given on board the cruiser soon after, showed that her commander was eagerly in pursuit of the strange vessel ahead, and the flash and report of a couple of guns proved that he was again giving orders in his somewhat peremptory style.

When daylight appeared, Captain Dunning was still on deck, and Glynn Proctor stood by the wheel. The post of the latter, however, was a sinecure, as the wind had again fallen. When the sun rose it revealed the three vessels lying becalmed within a short distance of each other and several miles off shore.

“So, so,” exclaimed the captain, taking the glass and examining the other vessels. “I see it’s all up with the slaver. Serves him right; don’t it, Glynn?”

“It does,” replied Glynn emphatically. “I hope they will all be hanged. Isn’t that the usual way of serving these fellows out?”

“Well, not exactly, lad. They don’t go quite that length—more’s the pity; if they did, there would be less slave-trading; but the rascals will lose both ship and cargo.”

“I wonder,” said Glynn, “how they can afford to carry on the trade when they lose so many ships as I am told they do every year.”

“You wouldn’t wonder, boy, if you knew the enormous prices got for slaves. Why, the profits on one cargo, safely delivered, will more than cover the loss of several vessels and cargoes. You may depend on’t they would not carry it on if it did not pay.”

“Humph!” ejaculated Glynn, giving the wheel a savage turn, as if to express his thorough disapprobation of the slave-trade, and his extreme disgust at not being able, by the strength of his own right arm, at once to repress it. “And who’s to pay for our foretopsail-yard?” he inquired, abruptly, as if desirous of changing the subject.

“Ourselves, I fear,” replied the captain. “We must take it philosophically, and comfort ourselves with the fact that it is the foretopsail-yard, and not the bowsprit or the mainmast, that was carried away. It’s not likely the captain of the cruiser will pay for it, at any rate.”

Captain Dunning was wrong. That same morning he received a polite note from the commander of the said cruiser, requesting the pleasure of his company to dinner, in the event of the calm continuing, and assuring him that the carpenter and the sail-maker of the man-of-war should be sent on board his ship after breakfast to repair damages. Captain Dunning, therefore, like an honest, straightforward man as he was, admitted that he had been hasty in his judgment, and stated to Glynn Proctor, emphatically, that the commander of the Firebrand was “a trump.”