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Hunting the Skipper: The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop

by George Manville Fenn · English · Gutenberg #27907 · 801,801 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: Hunting the Skipper: The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop

Author: George Manville Fenn

Illustrator: Harold Piffard


        
Release date: January 27, 2009 [eBook #27907]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/27907

Credits: Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HUNTING THE SKIPPER: THE CRUISE OF THE "SEAFOWL" SLOOP ***




Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England




Hunting the Skipper, by George Manville Fenn.



CHAPTER ONE.

H.M.S. "SEAFOWL."

"Dicky, dear boy, it's my impression that we shall see no blackbird's
cage to-day."

"And it's my impression, Frank Murray, that if you call me Dicky again I
shall punch your head."

"Poor fellow!  Liver, decidedly," said the first speaker, in a mock
sympathetic tone.  "Look here, old chap, if I were you, I'd go and ask
Jones to give me a blue pill, to be followed eight hours later by one of
his delicious liqueurs, all syrup of senna."

"Ugh!" came in a grunt of disgust, followed by a shudder.  "Look here,
Frank, if you can't speak sense, have the goodness to hold your tongue."

The speakers were two manly looking lads in the uniform of midshipmen of
the Royal Navy, each furnished with a telescope, through which he had
been trying to pierce the hot thick haze which pretty well shut them in,
while as they leaned over the side of Her Majesty's ship _Seafowl_, her
sails seemed to be as sleepy as the generally smart-looking crew, the
light wind which filled them one minute gliding off the next, and
leaving them to flap idly as they apparently dozed off into a heavy
sleep.

"There, don't be rusty, old fellow," said the first speaker.

"Then don't call me by that absurd name--_Dicky_--as if I were a bird!"

"Ha, ha!  Why not?" said Frank merrily.  "You wouldn't have minded if I
had said `old cock.'"

"Humph!  Perhaps not," said the young man sourly.

"There, I don't wonder at your being upset; this heat somehow seems to
soak into a fellow and melt all the go out of one.  I'm as soft as one
of those medusae--jellyfish--what do you call them?--that float by
opening and shutting themselves, all of a wet gasp, as one might say."

"It's horrible," said the other, speaking now more sociably.

"Horrible it is, sir, as our fellows say.  Well, live and learn, and
I've learned one thing, and that is if I retire from the service as
Captain--no, I'll be modest--Commander Murray, R.N., I shall not come
and settle on the West Coast of Africa."

"Settle on the West Coast of Africa, with its fevers and horrors?  I
should think not!" said the other.  "Phew!  How hot it is!  Bah!" he
half snorted angrily.

"What's the matter now?"

"That brass rail.  I placed my hand upon it--regularly burned me."

"Mem for you, old chap--don't do it again.  But, I say, what is the good
of our hanging about here?  We shall do no good, and it's completely
spoiling the skipper's temper."

"Nonsense!  Can't be done."

"Oh, can't it, Ricardo!"

"There you go again."

"_Pardon, mon ami_!  Forgot myself.  Plain Richard--there.  But that's
wrong.  One can't call you plain Richard, because you're such a
good-looking chap."

"Bah!" in a deep angry growl.

"What's that wrong too?  Oh, what an unlucky beggar I am!  But I say,
didn't you see the skipper?"

"I saw him, of course.  But what about him?  I saw nothing particular."

"Old Anderson went up to him as politely as a first lieutenant could--"

"I say, Frank, look here," cried the other; "can't you say downright
what you have to say, without prosing about like the jolly old preface
to an uninteresting book?"

"No, dear boy," replied the young fellow addressed; "I can't really.
It's the weather."

"Hang the weather!" cried the other petulantly.

"Not to be done, dear boy.  To hang calls for a rope and the yard-arm,
and there's nothing tangible about the weather.  You should say--that
is, if you wish to be ungentlemanly and use language unbecoming to an
officer in His Majesty's service--Blow the weather!"

"Oh, bosh, bosh, bosh!  You will not be satisfied till I've kicked you,
Frank."

"Oh, don't--pray don't, my dear fellow, because you will force me to
kick you again, and it would make me so hot.  But I say, wasn't I going
to tell you something about old Anderson and the skipper?"

"No--yes!--There, I don't know.  Well, what was it?"

"Nothing," said Frank Murray, yawning.  "Oh, dear me, how sleepy I am!"

"Well, of all the aggravating--"

"That's right: go on.  Say it," said Murray.  "I don't know what you
were going to call me, dear boy, but I'm sure it would be correct.
That's just what I am.  Pray go on.  I'm too hot to hit back."

"You're not too hot to talk back, Franky."

"Eh?  Hullo!  Why, I ought to fly at you now for calling me by that
ridiculous name _Franky_."

"Bah!  Here, do talk sense.  What were you going to tell me about old
Anderson and the skipper?"

"I don't know, dear boy.  You've bullied it all out of me, or else the
weather has taken it out.  Oh, I know now: old Anderson went up to him
and said something--what it was I don't know--unless it was about
changing our course--and he snarled, turned his back and went below to
cool himself, I think.  I say, though, it is hot, Dick."

"Well, do you think I hadn't found that out?"

"No, it is all plain to see.  You are all in a state of trickle, old
chap.  I say, though, isn't it a sort of midsummer madness to expect to
catch one of these brutal craft on a day like this?"

There was an angry grunt.

"Quite right, old fellow.  Bother the slavers!  They're all shut up
snugly in the horrible muddy creeks waiting for night, I believe.  Then
they'll steal out and we shall go on sailing away north or south as it
pleases the skipper.  Here, Dicky--I mean, Dick--what will you give me
for my share of the prize money?"

"Bah!" ejaculated the youth addressed.  "Can't you be quiet, Frank?
_Buss, buss, buss_!  It's just for the sake of talking.  Can't you
realise the fact?"

"No, dear boy; it's too hot to realise anything?"

"Well, then, let me tell you a home truth."

"Ah, do!  Anything about home and the truth would be delicious here.
Wish I could have an ice!"

"There you go!  I say, can't you get tired of talking?"

"No, dear boy.  I suppose it is my nature to.  What is a fellow to do?
You won't."

"No, I'm too hot.  I wish every slaver that sails these muddy seas was
hung at the yard-arm of his own nasty rakish schooner."

"Hee-ah, hee-ah, hee-ah! as we say in Parliament."

"_Parliament!  Parler_, to talk!" grunted the other.  "That's where you
ought to be, Frank, and then you'd be in your element."

"Oh, I say!  I was only politely agreeing with you.  That was a splendid
wish.  The beasts!  The wretches!  But somehow they don't get their
deserts.  Here have we been two months on this station, and I haven't
had so much as a squint of a slaver.  I don't believe there are any.
All myths or fancies--bits of imagination."

"Oh, there are plenty of them, lad, but they know every in and out of
these mangrove-infested shores, and I'll be bound to say they are
watching us day by day, and as soon as we are lost in one of these foggy
hazes it's up with their lug sails, and they glide away like--like--
like--here, what do they glide away like?  I'm not as clever as you.
I'm at a loss for words.  Give me one--something poetic, Frank."

"Steam out of a copper."

"Bah!"

"What, won't that do?"

"Do?  No!  There--like a dream."

"Brayvo!  Werry pretty, as Sam Weller said.  Oh, here's Tommy May--Here,
Tom, what do you think of the weather?" said the lad, addressing a
bluff-looking seaman.

"Weather, sir?" said the man, screwing up his face till it was one maze
of wrinkles.  "Beg pardon, sir, but did you mean that as one of your
jokes, sir, or was it a conundydrum?"

"Oh, don't ask questions, Tom, but just tell us plainly what you think
of the weather."

"Nothing, sir; it's too hot to think," replied the man.

"Quite right, May," said the other midshipman.  "Don't bother the poor
fellow, Murray.  Here, May, what do you fellows before the mast think
about the slavers?"

"Slippery as the mud of the river banks, sir."

"Good," said Murray.  "Well spoken, Tom.  But do you think there are any
about here?"

"Oh yes, sir," said the man; "no doubt about it.  They on'y want
catching."

"No, no," cried Murray.  "That's just what they don't want."

"Right you are, sir; but you know what I mean."

"I suppose so," said Murray; "but do you chaps, when you are chewing it
all over along with your quids, believe that we shall come upon any of
them?"

"Oh yes, sir; but do you see, they sail in those long, low, swift
schooners that can come and go where they like, while we in the
_Seafowl_ seem to be thinking about it."

"Poor sluggish sloop of war!" said Roberts.

"Nay, nay, sir," said the man, "begging your pardon, she's as smart a
vessel as ever I sailed in, with as fine a captain and officers,
'specially the young gentlemen."

"Now, none of your flattering gammon, Tom."

"Begging your pardon, gentlemen," said the man sturdily, "that it arn't.
I says what I says, and I sticks to it, and if we only get these here
blackbird catchers on the hop we'll let 'em see what the _Seafowl_ can
do."

"If!" said Roberts bitterly.

"Yes, sir, _if_.  That's it, sir, and one of these days we shall drop
upon them and make them stare.  We shall do it, gentlemen, you see if we
shan't."

"That's what we want to see, Tom," said Murray.

"Course you do, gentlemen, and all we lads forrard are itching for it,
that we are--just about half mad."

"For prize money?" said Roberts sourly.

"Prize money, sir?" replied the man.  "Why, of course, sir.  It's a
Bri'sh sailor's nature to like a bit of prize money at the end of a
v'y'ge; but, begging your pardon, sir, don't you make no mistake.  There
arn't a messmate o' mine as wouldn't give up his prize money for the
sake of overhauling a slaver and reskying a load o' them poor black
beggars.  It's horrid; that's what it just is."

"Quite right, May," said Roberts.

"Thankye, sir," said the man; "and as we was a-saying on'y last night--
talking together we was as we lay out on the deck because it was too
stuffycatin' to sleep."

"So it was, May," said Roberts.

"Yes, sir; reg'lar stifler.  Well, what we all agreed was that what we
should like to do was to set the tables upside down."

"What for?" said Murray, giving his comrade a peculiar glance from the
corner of his eye.

"Why, to give the poor niggers a chance to have a pop at some of the
slavers' crews, sir, to drive 'em with the whip and make 'em work in the
plantations, sir, like dumb beasts.  I should like to see it, sir."

"Well said, Tom!" cried Murray.

"Thankye, sir.  But it's slow work ketching, sir, for you see it's their
swift craft."

"Which makes them so crafty, eh, Tom?" cried Murray.

"Yes, sir.  I don't quite understand what you mean, sir, but I suppose
it's all right, and--"

"Sail on the lee bow!" sang out a voice from the main-top.



CHAPTER TWO.

BOTHER THE FOG.

A minute before those words were shouted from the main-top, the
low-toned conversation carried on by the two young officers, with an
occasional creak or rattle from a swinging sail was all that broke the
silence of the drowsy vessel; now from everywhere came the buzz of
voices and the hurrying trample of feet.

"It's just as if some one had thrust a stick into a wasp's nest,"
whispered Frank Murray to his companion, as they saw that the captain
and officers had hurried up on deck to follow the two lads' example of
bringing their spy-glasses to bear upon a faintly seen sail upon the
horizon, where it was plainly marked for a few minutes--long enough to
be made out as a low schooner with raking masts, carrying a heavy spread
of canvas, which gradually grew fainter and fainter before it died away
in the silvery haze.  The time was short, but quite long enough for
orders to be sharply given, men to spring up aloft, and the sloop's
course to be altered, when shuddering sails began to fill out, making
the _Seafowl_ careen over lightly, and a slight foam formed on either
side of the cut-water.

"That's woke us up, Richard, my son," said Murray.

"Yes, and it means a chance at last."

"If."

"Only this; we just managed to sight that schooner before she died away
again in the haze."

"Well, that gave us long enough to notice her and send the _Seafowl_
gliding along upon her course.  Isn't that enough?"

"Not quite, old fellow."

"Bah!  What a fellow you are, Frank!  You're never satisfied," cried
Roberts.  "What have you got in your head now?"

"Only this; we had long enough before the haze closed in to sight the
schooner well."

"Of course.  We agreed to that."

"Well, suppose it gave them time enough to see us?"

"Doubtful.  A vessel like that is not likely to have a man aloft on the
lookout."

"There I don't agree with you, Dick.  It strikes me that they must keep
a very sharp lookout on board these schooners, or else we must have
overhauled one of them before now."

"Humph!" said Roberts shortly.  "Well, we shall see.  According to my
ideas it won't be very long before we shall be sending a shot across
that schooner's bows, and then a boat aboard.  Hurrah!  Our bad luck is
broken at last."

"Doesn't look like it," said Murray, who had dropped all light flippancy
and banter, to speak now as the eager young officer deeply interested in
everything connected with his profession.

"Oh, get out!" cried Roberts.  "What do you mean by your croaking?  Look
at the way in which our duck has spread her wings and is following in
the schooner's wake.  It's glorious, and the very air seems in our
favour, for it isn't half so hot."

"I mean," said Murray quietly, "that the mist is growing more dense."

"So much in our favour."

"Yes," said Murray, "if the schooner's skipper did not sight us first."

"Oh, bother!  I don't believe he would."

"What's that?" said a gruff voice.

"Only this, sir," said Roberts to the first lieutenant, who had drawn
near unobserved; "only Murray croaking, sir."

"What about, Murray?" asked the elderly officer.

"I was only saying, sir, that we shall not overhaul the schooner if her
people sighted us first."

"That's what I'm afraid of, my lads," said the old officer.  "This haze
may be very good for us, but it may be very good for them and give their
skipper a chance to double and run for one or other of the wretched
muddy creeks or rivers which they know by heart.  There must be one
somewhere near, or she would not have ventured out by daylight, and when
we get within striking distance we may find her gone."

The lieutenant passed the two lads and went forward, where he was heard
to give an order or two which resulted in a man being stationed in the
fore chains ready to take soundings; and soon after he was in eager
conversation with the captain.

"Feeling our way," said Murray, almost in a whisper, as he and his
companion stood together where the man in the chains heaved the lead,
singing out the soundings cheerily till he was checked by an order which
resulted in his marking off the number of fathoms in a speaking voice,
and later on in quite a subdued tone, for the haze had thickened into a
sea fog, and the distance sailed ought to have brought the _Seafowl_
pretty near to the schooner, whose commander might possibly take alarm
at the announcement of a strange vessel's approach.

"I'm afraid they must have heard us before now," said Roberts softly.
"Ah, hark at that!"

For as the man in the chains gave out the soundings it was evident that
the depth was rapidly shoaling, when, in obedience to an order to the
helmsman a turn or two was given to the wheel, the sloop of war was
thrown up into the wind, the sails began to shiver, and the _Seafowl_
lay rocking gently upon the swell.

"Bother the fog!" said Murray fretfully.  "It's growing worse."

"No, sir," said the seaman who was close at hand.  "Seems to me that
it's on the move, and afore long we shall be in the clear, sir, and see
where we are."

The man's words proved to be correct sooner than could have been
expected, for before many minutes had passed, and just when the mist
which shut them in was at its worst, the solid-looking bank of cloud
began to open, and passed away aft; the sun shot out torrid rays, and
those on board the _Seafowl_ were seeing the need there had been for
care, for they were gazing across the clear sea at the wide-spreading
mangrove-covered shore, which, monotonous and of a dingy green,
stretched away to north and south as far as eye could reach.

"Where's the schooner?" exclaimed Murray excitedly, for the _Seafowl_
seemed to be alone upon the dazzling waters.

"In the fog behind us," said Roberts, in a disappointed tone.  "We've
overdone it.  I expected we should; the skipper was in such a jolly
hurry."

Frank Murray took his companion's words as being the correct explanation
of the state of affairs; but they soon proved to be wrong, for the soft
breeze that had sprung up from the shore rapidly swept the fog away
seaward, and though all on board the sloop watched eagerly for the
moment when the smart schooner should emerge, it at last became plain
that she had eluded them--how, no one on board could say.

"It's plain enough that she can't have gone seaward," said Roberts
thoughtfully.  "She must have sailed right away to the east."

"Yes," said Murray thoughtfully.

"Of course!  Right over the tops of the mangroves," said Roberts
mockingly.  "They hang very close, and there's a heavy dew lying upon
them, I'll be bound."

"Oh, yes, of course," said Murray.  "She couldn't have passed in through
some opening, I suppose?"

"Where is the opening, then?" cried Roberts shortly.

"I don't know," replied his companion coolly; "but there must be one,
and the captain of the schooner must be quite at home here and know his
way."

"I wish my young officers would learn to know their way about this
horrible shore instead of spending their time in talking," cried an
angry voice, and the two midshipmen started apart as they awoke to the
fact that the captain had approached them unheard while they were
intently sweeping the shore.

"Higher, my lad--higher up," cried the captain.  "The cross-trees, and
be smart about it.--Yes, Mr Murray, you're right; there's a narrow
river somewhere about, or perhaps it's a wide one.  Take your glass,
sir--the opening is waiting to be found.  What do you think of it, Mr
Anderson?"

"I don't think, sir.  I feel sure the schooner has come out of some
river along here, caught sight of us, and taken advantage of the mist to
make her way back, and for aught we know she is lying snugly enough,
waiting till we are gone."

"Thank you, Mr Anderson," said the captain, with studied politeness,
"but unfortunately I knew all this before you spoke.  What I want to
know is where our friend is lying so snugly.  What do you say to that?"

"Only this, sir--that we must run in as far as we can and sail along
close inshore till we come to the opening of the river."

"And while we sail south we shall be leaving the mouth behind, Mr
Anderson, eh?"

"If it proves to be so, sir," replied the first lieutenant gravely, "we
must sail north again and again too, until we find the entrance."

"Humph!  Yes, sir; but hang it all, are my officers asleep, that we are
sailing up and down here month after month without doing anything?
Here, Mr Murray, what are you thinking about, sir?"

The lad started, for his chief had suddenly fired his question at him
like a shot.

"Well, sir, why don't you answer my question?"

"I beg your pardon, sir," replied Murray now.  "I was thinking."

"Yes, sir, you were thinking," cried the captain passionately.  "I know
you were thinking, and saying to yourself that you had a most
unreasonable captain."

Murray was silent, and the first lieutenant and the other midshipman,
after exchanging a glance, fixed their eyes upon the monotonous shore.

"Do you hear me, sir?" thundered the captain, as if he were speaking to
the lookout at the mast-head instead of the lad close to him.  "That was
what you were thinking, was it not?  Come: the truth."

He bent forward to gaze straight into the boy's eyes as if determined to
get an answer.

"Yes, sir," said the lad desperately, "something of that sort;" and then
to himself, "Oh, murder!  I'm in for it now!"

"Yes, I knew you were, Mr Murray," cried the captain.  "Thank you.  I
like my junior officers to speak out truthfully and well.  Makes us
place confidence in them, Mr Anderson, eh?"

"Yes, sir," growled the chief officer, "but it isn't always pleasant."

"Quite right, Mr Anderson, and it sounds like confounded impudence,
too.  But we're wasting time, and it is valuable.  I'm going to have
that schooner found.  The sea's as smooth as an inland lake, so man and
lower down the cutters.  You take the first cutter, Mr Anderson, Munday
the second.  Row or sail to north and south as the wind serves, and I'll
stand out a bit to see that you don't start the game so that it escapes.
You young gentlemen had better go with the boats."

Murray glanced at the old officer, and to the question in his eyes there
came a nod by way of answer.

"You always have the luck, Franky," grumbled Roberts, as soon as they
were alone.

"Nonsense!  You have as good a chance as I have of finding the
schooner."

"What, with prosy old Munday!  Why, he'll most likely go to sleep."

"So much the better for you.  You can take command of the boat and
discover the schooner's hiding-place."

"Of course.  Board her, capture the Spanish--"

"Or Yankee," said Murray.

"Captain!" snapped out Roberts.  "Oh yes, I know.  Bother!  I do get so
tired of all this."

Tired or no, the young man seemed well on the alert as he stepped into
the second cutter, and soon after each of the boats had run up their
little sail, for a light breeze was blowing, and, leaving the sloop
behind, all the men full of excitement as every eye was fixed upon the
long stretches of mangrove north and south in search of the hidden
opening which might mean the way into some creek, or perhaps the
half-choked-up entrance into one of the muddy rivers of the vast African
shore.



CHAPTER THREE.

THE CUTE VISITOR.

The first cutter had the wind in her favour and glided northward mile
after mile along a shore thickly covered with the peculiar growth of the
mangrove, those dense bird-affecting, reptile-haunted coverts, whose
sole use seems to be that of keeping the muddy soil of the West Afric
shores from being washed away.

The heat was terrible, and the men were congratulating themselves on the
fact that the wind held out and saved them from the painful task of
rowing hard in the blistering sunshine.

Murray's duty was to handle the tiller lines as he sat in the stern
sheets beside the first lieutenant, and after being out close upon three
hours he began to feel that he could keep awake no longer--for his
companion sat silent and stern, his gaze bent upon the dark green shore,
searching vainly for the hidden opening--and in a half torpid state the
midshipman was about to turn to his silent companion and ask to be
relieved of the lines, when he uttered a gasp of thankfulness, and,
forgetting discipline, gripped the officer by the knee.

"What the something, Mr Murray, do you mean by that?" cried the
lieutenant angrily.

"Look!" was the reply, accompanied by a hand stretched out with pointing
index finger.

"Stand by, my lads, ready to pull for all you know," cried the
lieutenant.  "The wind may drop at any moment.  You, Tom May, take a
pull at that sheet; Mr Murray, tighten that port line.  That's better;
we must cut that lugger off.  Did you see where she came out?"

"Not quite, sir," said Murray, as he altered the boat's course a trifle,
"but it must have been close hereabouts.  What are you going to do,
sir?"

"Do, my lad?  Why, take her and make the master or whatever he is, act
as guide."

"I see, sir.  Then you think he must have come out of the river where
the schooner has taken refuge?"

"That's what I think," said the lieutenant grimly; "and if I am right I
fancy the captain will not be quite so hard upon us as he has been of
late."

"It will be a glorious triumph for us--I mean for you, sir," said Murray
hurriedly.

"Quite right, Mr Murray," said his companion, smiling.  "I can well
afford to share the honours with you, for I shall have owed it to your
sharp eyes.  But there, don't let's talk.  We must act and strain every
nerve, for I'm doubtful about that lugger; she sails well and may escape
us after all."

Murray set his teeth as he steered so as to get every foot of speed
possible out of the cutter, while, sheet in hand, Tom May sat eagerly
watching the steersman, ready to obey the slightest sign as the boat's
crew sat fast with the oars in the rowlocks ready to dip together and
pull for all they were worth, should the wind fail.

"That's good, my lads," said the lieutenant--"most seamanlike.  It's a
pleasure to command such a crew."

There was a low hissing sound as of men drawing their breath hard, and
the old officer went on.

"We're not losing ground, Mr Murray," he said.

"No, sir; gaining upon her, I think."

"So do I--think, Mr Murray," said the lieutenant shortly, "but I'm not
sure.  Ah, she's changing her course," he added excitedly, "and we shall
lose her.  Oh, these luggers, these luggers!  How they can skim over the
waves!  Here, marines," he said sharply, as he turned to a couple of the
rifle-armed men who sat in the stern sheets, "be ready to send a shot
through the lugger's foresail if I give the order; the skipper may
understand what I mean."  And the speaker, sat frowning heavily at the
lightly-built lugger they were following.  "I don't see what more I can
do, Mr Murray."

"No, sir," said the midshipman hoarsely.  "Oh, give the order, sir--pray
do!  We mustn't lose that boat."

"Fire!" said the lieutenant sharply; and one marine's rifle cracked,
while as the smoke rose lightly in the air Murray uttered a low cry of
exultation.

"Right through the foresail, sir, and the skipper knows what we mean."

"Yes, capital!  Good shot, marine."

The man's face shone with pleasure as he thrust in a fresh cartridge
before ramming it down, and the crew looked as if they were panting to
give out a loud cheer at the success of the lieutenant's manoeuvre, for
the little lugger, which was just beginning to creep away from them
after a change in her course, now obeyed a touch of her helm and bore
round into the wind till the big lug sails shivered and she gradually
settled down to rock softly upon the long heaving swell that swept in
landward.

As the cutter neared, Murray noted that the strange boat was manned by a
little crew of keen-looking blacks, not the heavy, protuberant-lipped,
flat-nosed, West Coast "niggers," but men of the fierce-looking tribes
who seem to have come from the east in the course of ages and have
preserved somewhat of the Arabic type and its keen, sharp intelligence
of expression.

But the midshipman had not much time for observation of the little crew,
his attention being taken up directly by the dramatic-looking entrance
upon the scene of one who was apparently the skipper or owner of the
lugger, and who had evidently been having a nap in the shade cast by the
aft lugsail, and been awakened by the shot to give the order which had
thrown the lugger up into the wind.

He surprised both the lieutenant and Murray as he popped into sight to
seize the side of his swift little vessel and lean over towards the
approaching cutter, as, snatching off his wide white Panama hat, he
passed one duck-covered white arm across his yellowish-looking hairless
face and shouted fiercely and in a peculiar twang--

"Here, I say, you, whoever you are, do you know you have sent a bullet
through my fores'l?"

"Yes, sir.  Heave to," said the lieutenant angrily.

"Wal, I have hev to, hevn't I, sirr?  But just you look here; I don't
know what you thought you was shooting at, but I suppose you are a
Britisher, and I'm sure your laws don't give you leave to shoot peaceful
traders to fill your bags."

"That will do," said the lieutenant sternly.  "What boat's that?"

"I guess it's mine, for I had it built to my order, and paid for it.
Perhaps you wouldn't mind telling me what your boat is and what you was
shooting at?"

"This is the first cutter of Her Majesty's sloop of war _Seafowl_," said
the lieutenant sternly, "and--"

But the American cut what was about to be said in two by crying in his
sharp nasal twang--

"Then just you look here, stranger; yew've got hold of a boat as is just
about as wrong as it can be for these waters.  I've studied it and
ciphered it out, and I tell yew that if yew don't look out yew'll be
took by one of the waves we have off this here coast, and down yew'll
go.  I don't want to offend yew, mister, for I can see that yew're an
officer, but I tell yew that yew ought to be ashamed of yewrself to
bring your men along here in such a hen cock-shell as that boat of
yourn."

"Why, it's as seaworthy as yours, sir," said the lieutenant
good-humouredly.

"Not it, mister; and besides, I never go far from home in mine."

"From home!" said the lieutenant keenly.  "Where do you call home?"

"Yonder," said the American, with a jerk of his head.  "You ain't got no
home here, and it's a mercy that you haven't been swamped before now.
Where have you come from?--the Cape?"

"No," said the lieutenant; "but look here, sir, what are you, and what
are you doing out here?"

"Sailing now," said the American.

"But when you are ashore?"

"Rubber," said the man.

"What, trading in indiarubber?"

"Shall be bimeby.  Growing it now--plantation."

"Oh," said the lieutenant, looking at the speaker dubiously.  "Where is
your plantation?"

"Up the creek yonder," replied the American, with another nod of his
head towards the coast.

"Oh," said the lieutenant quietly; "you have a plantation, have you, for
the production of rubber, and you work that with slaves?"

"Ha, ha, ha, ha!" laughed the American, showing a set of very yellow
teeth.  "That's what you're after, then?  I see through you now,
cyaptain.  You're after slave-traders."

"Perhaps so; and you confess yourself to be one," said the lieutenant.

"Me?" said the American, laughing boisterously again.  "Hev another try,
cyaptain.  Yew're out this time.  Ketch me trying to work a plantation
with West Coast niggers!  See those boys o' mine?"

"Yes; I see your men," replied the lieutenant.

"Them's the stuff I work with.  Pay 'em well and they work well.  No
work, no pay.  Why, one of those fellows'd do more work for me in a day
than one of the blacks they come here to buy up could do in a week."

"Then slave-traders come here to buy, eh?"

"Yes, they do," replied the man, "but 'tain't none of my business.  They
don't interfere with me, and I don't interfere with them.  Plenty of
room here for both.  Yew're after them, then?"

"Yes," said the lieutenant frankly.

"Phew!" whistled the man, giving his knees a slap.  "Why, you'll be
after the schooner that came into this river this morning?"

"Possibly," said the lieutenant, while Murray felt his blood thrill in
his veins with the excitement of the position.  "What schooner was it?"

"Smart sailing craft, with long rakish masts?"

"Yes, yes," said the lieutenant; "I know all about that.  A slaver, eh?"

The American half shut his eyes as he peered out of their corners at the
British officer, and a queer smile puckered up his countenance.

"Slaving ain't lawful, is it, mister?" he said.

"You answer my question," said the lieutenant testily.

"Means confiscation, don't it?"

"And that is not an answer," cried the lieutenant angrily.

"Yew making a prize of that theer smart schooner from her top-masts down
to her keel, eh?"

"Will you reply to what I say?" cried the lieutenant.  "Is she a
slaver?"

"Lookye here, mister," said the American, grinning.  "S'pose I say
_yes_, you'll jest confiscate that there schooner when her skipper and
her crew slips over the side into the boats and pulls ashore."

"Perhaps I may," said the lieutenant shortly.

"Exackly so, mister.  Then you sails away with her for a prize, eh?"

"Possibly," said the lieutenant coldly.

"And what about me?"

"Well, what about you?"

"I can't pull back to my rubber plantations and sail them away, can I?"

"I do not understand you, sir," said the lieutenant sharply.

"No, and you don't care to understand me, mister.  `No,' says you, `it's
no business of mine about his pesky injyrubby fields.'"

"Why should it be, sir?" said the lieutenant shortly.

"Exackly so, mister; but it means a deal to me.  How shall I look after
you're gone when the slaver's skipper--"

"Ah!" cried Murray excitedly.  "Then she is a slaver!"

The American's eyes twinkled as he turned upon the young man.

"Yew're a sharp 'un, yew are," he said, showing his yellow teeth.  "Did
I say she was a slaver?"

"Yes, you did," cried Murray.

"Slipped out then because your boss began saying slaver, I suppose.
That was your word and I give it to yew back again.  I want to live
peaceable like on my plantation and make my dollahs out of that there
elastic and far-stretching projuice of the injyrubbery trees.  That's my
business, misters, and I'm not going to take away any man's crackter."

"You have given me the clue I want, sir," said the lieutenant, "and it
is of no use for you to shirk any longer from telling me the plain truth
about what is going on up this river or creek."

"Oh, isn't it, mister officer?  Perhaps I know my business better than
you can tell me.  I dessay yew're a very smart officer, but I could give
you fits over growing rubber, and I'm not going to interfere with my
neighbours who may carry on a elastic trade of their own in black rubber
or they may not.  'Tain't my business.  As I said afore, or was going to
say afore when this here young shaver as hain't begun to shave yet put
his oar in and stopped me, how should I look when yew'd gone and that
half-breed black and yaller Portygee schooner skipper comes back with
three or four boat-loads of his cut-throats and says to me in his bad
language that ain't nayther English, 'Murrican, nor nothing else but
hashed swearing, `Look here,' he says, `won't injyrubber burn like fire,
eh?'  `Yes,' I says, civil and smooth, `it is rayther rum-combustible.'
`So I thought,' he says.  `Well, you've been letting that tongue of
yours go running along and showing those cusses of Britishers where I
anchor my boat and load up with plantation stuff for the West Injies; so
jes' look here,' he sez, `I've lost thousands o' dollars threw yew, and
so I'm just going to make yew pay for it by burning up your plantations
and putting a stop to your trade, same as yew've put a stop to mine.  I
shan't hurt yew, because I'm a kind-hearted gentle sorter man, but I
can't answer for my crew.  I can't pay them, because yew've took my ship
and my marchandise, so I shall tell them they must take it outer yew.
And they will, stranger.  I don't say as they'll use their knives over
the job, and I don't say as they won't, but what I do say is that I
shouldn't like to be yew.'  There, Mister Officer, that's about what's
the matter with me, and now yew understand why I don't keer about
meddling with my neighbours' business."

"Yes, I understand perfectly," said the lieutenant, "but I want you to
see that it is your duty to help to put a stop to this horrible traffic
in human beings.  Have you no pity for the poor blacks who are made
prisoners, and are dragged away from their homes to be taken across the
sea and sold like so many cattle?"

"Me?  Pity!  Mister, I'm full of it.  I'm sorry as sorrow for the poor
niggers, and whenever I know that yon schooner is loading up with black
stuff I shuts my eyes and looks t'other way."

"Indeed!" cried Murray.  "And pray how do you manage to do that?"

"Why, ain't I telling on you, youngster?  I shuts my eyes so as I can't
see."

"Then how can you look another way?"

The American displayed every tooth in his head and winked at the
lieutenant.

"Yew've got a sharp 'un here, mister.  I should keep him covered up, or
shut him up somehow, 'fore he cuts anybody or himself.  But yew
understand what I mean, mister, and I dessay you can see now why I feel
it my business to be very sorry for the black niggers, but more sorry
for myself and my people.  I don't want to be knifed by a set o' hangdog
rubbish from all parts o' the world.  I'm a peaceable man, mister, but
you're a cap'en of a man-o'-war, I suppose?"

"Chief officer," said the lieutenant.

"And what's him?" said the American, jerking his thumb over his shoulder
in the direction of the midshipman.  "Young chief officer?"

"Junior officer."

"Oh, his he?  Well, I tell you what: yew both go and act like
men-o'-war.  Sail up close to that schooner, fire your big guns, and
send her to the bottom of the river."

"And what about the poor slaves?" said Murray excitedly.

"Eh, the black stuff?" said the American, scratching his chin with his
forefinger.  "Oh, I forgot all about them.  Rather bad for them, eh,
mister?"

"Of course," said the lieutenant.  "No, sir, that will not do.  I want
to take the schooner, and make her captain and crew prisoners."

"Yew'll have to look slippery then, mister.  But what about the
niggers?"

"I shall take them with the vessel to Lagos or some other port where a
prize court is held, and the judge will no doubt order the best to be
done with them."

"Which means put an end to the lot, eh?" said the American.

"Bah!  Nonsense!" cried Murray indignantly.

"Is it, young mister?  Well, I didn't know.  It ain't my business.  Yew
go on and do what's right.  It's your business.  I don't keer so long as
I'm not mixed up with it.  I've on'y got one life, and I want to take
keer on it.  Now we understand one another?"

"Not quite," said the lieutenant.

"Why, what is there as yew can't take in?"

"Nothing," said the lieutenant.  "I quite see your position, and that
you do not wish to run any risks with the slaver captain and his men."

"Not a cent's worth if I can help it."

"And quite right, sir," said the lieutenant; "but I take it that you
know this slaver skipper by sight?"

"Oh, yes, I know him, mister--quite as much as I want to."

"And you know where he trades to?"

"West Injies."

"No, no; I mean his place here."

"Oh, you mean his barracks and sheds where the chief stores up all the
black stuff for him to come and fetch away?"

"Yes, that's it," cried Murray excitedly.

"Have the goodness to let me conclude this important business, Mr
Murray," said the lieutenant coldly.

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Murray, turning scarlet; "I was so
excited."

"That's one for you, mister young chief officer," said the American,
grinning at the midshipman, and then turning to the lieutenant.  "These
young uns want sitting upon a bit sometimes, eh, mister?"

"Look here, sir," said the lieutenant, ignoring the remark; "just listen
to me.  I want you to guide me and my men to the foul nest of this
slave-trader and the town of the black chief."

The American shook his head.

"You need not shrink, for you will be under the protection of the
English Government."

"That's a long way off, mister."

"But very far-reaching, sir," continued the lieutenant, "and I promise
you full protection for all that you do.  Why, surely, man, you will be
able to cultivate your plantation far more peacefully and with greater
satisfaction with the river cleared of this abominable traffic."

"Well, if you put it in that way, mister, I should," said the man, "and
that's a fine range of rich land where the black chief has his people
and their huts.  I could do wonders with that bit if I could hold it
safely.  The rubber I'd plant there would be enough to--"

"Rub out all the black marks that the slave-trade has made."

"Very good, Mr Murray," said the lieutenant, smiling pleasantly, "but
this is no time to try and be smart."

"Eh?" said the American.  "Was that what he was aiming at?  I didn't
understand; but I tell yew that there is about a mile of rich syle there
which if I had I could make it projuice a fortune."

"Look here, sir," said the lieutenant, "I have no doubt about the
possibility of your being helped by the British Government to take
possession of such a tract after we have done with it."

"Why, you don't mean, Mister Chief Officer, that you will let your
British Lion put his paw upon it and stick to it till you've done with
it, as you say?"

"No, no, no," said the lieutenant, smiling.  "I mean that the British
Lion will put its paw upon the horrible settlement in this way and will
root out the traffic, and we shall only be too glad to encourage the
rise of a peaceful honest culture such as you are carrying on."

"You mean then that you'll root out the slaves and burn the chief's
town?"

"Most certainly," said the lieutenant.  "And help me to get hold of that
there land?"

"I believe I may promise that."

"And take care that the Portygee slaver cock has his comb cut so as he
dursen't meddle with me?"

"I feel sure that all this will follow if you help us to capture the
slaver, and point out where the abominable traffic is carried on."

"Shake on it," said the American, thrusting out a thin yellow hand with
unpleasantly long nails.

"Shake hands upon the compact?" said the lieutenant good-humouredly.
"Very good;" and he gave the yellow hand a good manly grip.

"Then I'm on!" cried the man effusively.  "But look here, yew're in this
too;" and he stretched out his hand to Murray.  "Yew're a witness to all
your chief said."

"Oh, all right," said Murray, and he let the long, thin, unpleasantly
cold and dank fingers close round his hand, but not without a feeling of
disgust which was expressed by the making of a grimace as soon as the
American turned to the lieutenant again.

"That's settled, then," said the latter, "so go on at once and lead
while we follow."

"What!" said the American, with a look of wonder.

"I say, go on and guide us to the slaver's nest."

"What, just alone like this here?"

"Yes, of course.  You see we are well-armed and ready to board and take
the schooner at once.  Fire will destroy the chief's town."

"Well, you do 'maze me," said the American, showing his teeth.

"What do you mean?" said the lieutenant sternly.  "Are you going to draw
back?"

"Not me, mister.  That's a bargain," said the man, grinning.  "I mean
that you 'maze me, you Englishers do, by your cheek.  I don't doubt you
a bit.  You mean it, and yew'll dew it.  Why, I dessay if yew yewrself
wasn't here this here young shaver of an officer would have a try at it
hisself.  You would, wouldn't you, youngster?"

"Why, of course I would," said Murray proudly; and then, feeling afraid
that his assertion might be looked upon as braggadocio, he hastened to
add, "I--I--er--meant to say that I would try, and our brave fellows
would take the prisoners."

"Nay, nay, yew would," said the American.  "There ain't nothing to be
ashamed on in being brave, is there, mister?"

"Of course not," said the lieutenant.

"Of course not," said the American; "but look here, sirree, it's no good
to lose brave men by trying to do things that's a bit too strong and
starky for you."

"What, do you mean that the schooner's crew would be too strong for us?"

"Nay, not me, mister.  Yew'd chaw them up safe.  But there's the black
king; he's got close upon a hundred fighting men, chaps with spears.
He'd fight too, for though they ain't got much brains, these niggers,
he'd know you'd be going to do away with his bread and cheese, as you
may say.  No, sirree, I ain't a fighting man; rubber's my line, but I
want to _get_ hold of that bit of syle--make sewer of it, as you may
say; and if I'd got that job to do I should get another boatful of men
if you could.  Don't know of a British ship handy, do you?"

"Of course.  My captain is off the coast not far away.  You did not
suppose that we came alone?"

"Oh, I didn't know, mister.  Could you bring your captain then?"

"Yes."

"And another boat?"

"Of course."

"Then if I was you I should tell him to sail up the river."

"What, is there water enough--deep water?" asked the lieutenant.

"Whatcher talking about?" said the man contemptuously.  "Why, didn't you
see me sail out?"

The lieutenant shook his head.

"Think o' that!" said the American.  "Way in's bit narrer, but as soon
as you get threw the trees you're in a big mighty river you can sail up
for months if yew like.  I have heerd that there's some falls somewhere,
but I've never seem 'em.  Water enough?  My snakes!  There's water
enough to make a flood, if you want one, as soon as you get by the
winding bits."

"The river winds?" said the lieutenant.

"Winds?  I should think she does!  Why, look yonder, mister," continued
the man, pointing.  "It's all trees like that for miles.  You've got to
get through them."

"Deep water?" asked the lieutenant.

"Orful!  On'y it's 'bout as muddy as rivers can be made."

"And you assure me that you could pilot us in and right up to the
slaver's stronghold?"

"Pilot yew?  Yew don't want no piloting; all yew've got to do is to sail
up in and out through the big wilderness of trees.  Yew wouldn't want no
piloting, but if you undertake to see that I have that chief's land, and
clear him and his black crews away, I'll lay _yew_ off his front door
where you can blow his palm-tree palace all to smithers without losing a
man."

"And what about the slaver?" asked Murray.

"What about her?  She'll be lying anchored there, of course."

"With any colleagues?" asked the lieutenant.

"Whatche'r mean--t'others?"

"Yes."

"Not now, mister.  There's as many as four or five sometimes, but I only
see her go up the river this time.  Yew should have come later on if you
wanted more."

"The slaver is up the river now, then?" said the lieutenant, looking at
the man searchingly.

"Yes, of course," was the reply, as the American involuntarily gave a
look round, and then, as if taking himself to task for an act of folly,
he added laughingly.  "If she wasn't up there she'd be out here, and you
can see for yourselves that she ain't."

"You could show us the way in?" said Murray.

"Why, didn't I say I could?" replied the man sharply.

"Yes; but I should like to have a glimpse of her first," said Murray.

"What for, youngster?  To let her know that you're coming?  You take my
advice, mister, and come upon her sudden like."

The lieutenant gazed intently upon the man.

"Yes; I should like to reconnoitre a bit first.  With your assistance we
ought to be able to run our boats close up under the shelter of the
trees and see what she is like."

"See what she's like, mister?  Why, like any other schooner.  You take
my advice; you'll slip off and fetch your ship, and I'll wait here till
you come back."

Murray looked at the man searchingly, for somehow a sense of doubt began
to trouble him as to the man's trustworthiness, and the lad began to
turn over the position in his mind.  For though the man's story seemed
to be reasonable enough, an element of suspicion began to creep in and
he began to long to ask the lieutenant as to what he thought about the
matter.

But he did not speak, for the keen-looking American's eyes were upon
him, and when they shifted it was only for them to be turned upon the
lieutenant.

"Wal," he said at last, "whatcher thinking about, mister?"

"About your running me up to where you could point out the schooner."

"But I don't want to," said the man frankly.

"Why?" asked the lieutenant sharply.

"'Cause I don't want to lose the chance of getting that there mile of
plantation."

"There ought to be no risk, sir, if we were careful."

"I dunno so much about that there, mister.  Them slaver chaps always
sleep with one eye open, and there's no knowing what might happen."

"What might happen!  What could happen?"

"Nothing; but the skipper might hyste sail and run his craft right up
towards the falls.  As I said, I never see them, but there must be falls
to keep this river so full."

"But we could follow him."

"Part of the way p'raps, mister, but he could go in his light craft much
further than you could in a man-o'-war."

"True," said the lieutenant; "you are right."

"Somewhere about," said the man, showing his teeth.  "There, you slip
off and fetch your ship, and I'll cruise up and down off the mouth of
the river here so as to make sure that the schooner don't slip off.
She's just as like as not to hyste sail now that the fog's all gone.
She'd have been off before if it hadn't come on as thick as soup.  Say,
'bout how far off is your ship?"

"Half-a-dozen miles away," said the lieutenant.

"That ain't far.  Why not be off at once?"

"Why not come with us?" asked Murray.

"Ain't I telled yer, youngster?  Think I want to come back and find the
schooner gone?"

The lieutenant gazed from the American to the midshipman and back again,
with his doubts here and there, veering like a weather vane, for the
thought would keep attacking him--suppose all this about the slave
schooner was Yankee bunkum, and as soon as he had got rid of them, the
lugger would sail away and be seen no more?

"You won't trust him, will you?" said Murray, taking advantage of a puff
of wind which separated the two boats for a few minutes.

"I can't," said the lieutenant, in a whisper.  "I was nearly placing
confidence in him, but your doubt has steered me in the other direction.
Hah!" he added quickly.  "That will prove him."  And just then the
lugger glided alongside again, and the opportunity for further communing
between the two officers was gone.

"That's what yew have to be on the lookout for, mister, when yew get
sailing out here.  Sharp cat's-paws o' wind hot as fire sometimes.
Well, ain't you going to fetch your ship?"

"And what about you?" said the lieutenant.

"Me?" said the man wonderingly, and looking as innocent as a child.

"Yes; where am I to pick you up again?"

"Oh!  I'll show you.  I'll be hanging just inside one of the mouths of
the river, and then lead yew in when yew get back with yewr ship."

Murray softly pressed his foot against his officer's without seeming to
move, and felt the pressure returned, as if to say--All right; I'm not
going to trust him--and the lieutenant then said aloud--

"But why shouldn't you sail with us as far as our sloop?"

"Ah, why shouldn't I, after all?" said the man.  "You might show me your
skipper, and we could talk to him about what we're going to do.  All
right; sail away if you like to chance it."

The lieutenant nodded, and a few minutes later the two boats were
gliding about half a mile abreast of the dense mangrove-covered shore in
the direction of the _Seafowl_, and only about fifty yards apart.

"You'll be keeping a sharp lookout for treachery in any shape, sir?"
said Murray, in a low tone.

"The fellow's willingness to fall in with my proposal has disarmed me,
Mr Murray," said the lieutenant quietly, "but all the same I felt bound
to be cautious.  I have given the marines orders to be ready to fire at
the slightest sign of an attempt to get away."

"You have, sir?  Bravo!" said Murray, in the same low tone, and without
seeming to be talking to his chief if they were observed.  "But I did
not hear you speak to the jollies."

"No, Mr Murray; I did not mean you to, and I did not shout.  But this
caution is, after all, unnecessary, for there comes the sloop to look
after us.  Look; she is rounding that tree-covered headland."

"Better and better, sir!" cried Murray excitedly.  "I was beginning to
fidget about the lugger."

"What about her, Mr Murray?"

"Beginning to feel afraid of her slipping away as soon as we were out of
sight."

"You think, then, that the lugger's people might be on the watch?"

"Yes, sir."

"Quite possible," said the lieutenant.  "Well, we have her safe now."

"Yes, sir; but won't you heave to and wait?"

"To be sure, yes, Mr Murray; a good idea; and let the sloop sail up to
us?"

"Won't it make the captain storm a bit, sir, and ask sharply why we
didn't make haste and join?"

"Most likely, Mr Murray," said the lieutenant quietly; "but if he does
we have two answers."

"The lugger, sir."

"Yes, Mr Murray, and the discovery of the schooner."

"Waiting to be boarded, sir," said the midshipman.

"Exactly, Mr Murray.  Any one make out the second cutter?"

"Ay, ay, sir!" cried Tom May.  "There she is, sir--miles astarn of the
_Seafowl_, sir."

"I wish we could signal to her to lay off and on where she is."

"What for, sir?"

"There may be one of the narrow entrances to the great river
thereabouts, and the wider the space we can cover, the greater chance we
shall have of preventing the slaver from stealing away."



CHAPTER FOUR.

THE YANKEE'S FOOD.

"Grand, Mr Anderson," said the captain, after a time.  But his first
words had come pouring out like a storm of blame, which gave the first
lieutenant no opportunity to report what he had done.  "Yes: could not
be better sir.  There, we are going to capture a slaver at last!"

"Yes, sir, if we have luck; and to stamp out one of the strongholds of
the accursed trade."

Then the captain became silent, and stood thoughtfully looking over the
side at the indiarubber planter's lugger.

"Humph!" he ejaculated, at last.  "Rather a serious risk to run, to
trust to this stranger and make him our guide."

"So it struck me, sir, as I told you," said the lieutenant.

"Let me see, Mr Anderson, did you tell me that?"

"Yes, sir, if you will recall it."

"Humph!  Yes, I suppose you did.  But I was thinking.  Suppose he plays
us false."

"Why should he, sir?"

"To be sure, why should he, Mr Anderson?  All the same, we must be
careful."

Meanwhile, Murray was being cross-examined by his brother midshipman,
who looked out of temper, and expressed himself sourly upon coming
aboard.

"You have all the luck," he said.  "You drop into all the spirited
adventures, while I am packed off with prosy old Munday."

"Oh, nonsense!  It is all chance.  But didn't you see anything, old
chap?"

"Yes--muddy water; dingy mangroves; the tail of a croc as the filthy
reptile slid off the tree roots into the water.  That was all, while
there I was cooking in the heat, and listening to old Munday prose,
prose, prose, till I dropped off to sleep, when the disagreeable beggar
woke me up, to bully me about neglecting my duty, and told me that I
should never _get to_ be a smart officer if I took so little interest in
my profession that I could not keep awake when out on duty."

"Well, it did seem hard, Dick, when he sent you off to sleep.  I
couldn't have kept awake, I know."

"I'm sure you couldn't.  But there: bother!  You couldn't help getting
all the luck."

"No; and you are going to share it now."

"Not so sure, Frank.  As like as not the skipper will send me away in a
boat to watch some hole where the slaver might slip out.  So this Yankee
is going to act as pilot and lead us up the river to where the schooner
is hiding?"

"Yes, and to show us the chief's town, and the place where he collects
the poor unfortunate blacks ready for being shipped away to the Spanish
plantations."

"My word, it's fine!" cried Roberts excitedly.  "And hooroar, as Tom May
has it.  Why, the lads will be half mad with delight."

"And enough to make them," said Murray.  "But I say, how does it strike
you?"

"As being glorious.  Franky, old fellow, if it wasn't for the look of
the thing I could chuck up my cap and break out into a hornpipe.  Dance
it without music."

"To the delight of the men, and make Anderson or Munday say that it was
not like the conduct of an officer and a gentleman."

"Yes, that's the worst of it.  But though of course we're men now--"

"Midshipmen," said Murray drily.

"Don't sneer, old chap!  And don't interrupt when I'm talking."

"Say on, O sage," said the lad.

"I was going to say that of course, though we are men now, one does feel
a bit of the boy sometimes, and as if it was pleasant now and then to
have a good lark."  As the young fellow spoke he passed his hand
thoughtfully over his cheeks and chin.  "What are you grinning at?" he
continued.

"Not grinning, old fellow; it was only a smile."

"Now, none of your gammon.  You were laughing at me."

"Oh!  Nothing!" said Murray, with the smile deepening at the corners of
his mouth.

"There you go again!" cried Roberts.  "Who's to keep friends with you,
Frank Murray, when you are always trying to pick a quarrel with a
fellow?"

"What, by smiling?"

"No, by laughing at a fellow and then pretending you were not.  Now
then, what was it?"

"Oh, all right; I only smiled at you about your shaving so carefully
this morning."

"How did you know I shaved this morning?" cried the midshipman,
flushing.

"You told me so."

"That I'll swear I didn't."

"Not with your lips, Dicky--_Dick_--but with your fingers."

"Oh!  Bother!  I never did see such a fellow as you are to spy out
things," cried Roberts petulantly.

"Not spy, old chap.  I only try to put that and that together, and I
want you to do the same.  So you think this is all glorious about yonder
planter chap piloting us to the slaver's place?"

"Of course!  Don't you?"

"Well, I don't know, Dick," said Murray, filling his forehead with
wrinkles.

"Oh, I never did see such a fellow for pouring a souse of cold water
down a fellow's back," cried Roberts passionately.  "You don't mean to
say that you think he's a fraud?"

"Can't help thinking something of the kind, old man."

"Oh!" ejaculated Roberts.  "I say, here, tell us what makes you think
so."

"He's too easy and ready, Dick," said Murray, throwing off his ordinary
merry ways and speaking seriously and with his face full of thought.

"But what does Anderson say to it?"

"He seemed to be suspicious once, but it all passed off, and then the
skipper when he heard everything too talked as if he had his doubts.
But now he treats it as if it is all right, and we are to follow this
American chap wherever he leads us."

"Yes, to-morrow morning, isn't it?"

"No, Dick; to-night."

"To-night--in the dark?"

"I suppose so."

"Oh!" said Roberts thoughtfully, and he began to shave himself with his
finger once more, but without provoking the faintest smile from his
companion.  "I say, Franky, I don't like that."

"No; neither do I, Dick."

"It does seem like putting ourselves into his hands," continued Roberts
thoughtfully.  "Oh, but I don't know," he continued, as if snatching at
anything that told for the success of the expedition; "you know what
Anderson often tells us."

"I know what he says sometimes about our being thoughtless boys."

"Yes, that's what I mean, old fellow; and it isn't true, for I think a
deal about my duties, and as for you--you're a beggar to think, just
like the monkey who wouldn't speak for fear he should be set to work."

"Thanks for the compliment," said Murray drily.

"Oh, you know what I mean.  But I suppose we can't think so well now as
we shall by and by.  I mean, older fellows can think better, and I
suppose that the skipper and old Anderson really do know better than we
do.  It will be all right, old fellow.  They wouldn't let themselves be
led into any trap; and besides, look at the Yankee--I mean, look at his
position; he must be sharp enough."

"Oh yes, he's sharp enough," said Murray.  "Hear him talk, and you'd
think he was brought up on pap made of boiled-down razor-strops."

"Well, then, he must know well enough that if he did the slightest thing
in the way of playing fast and loose with us, he'd get a bullet through
his head."

"Yes--if he wasn't too sharp for us."

"Oh, it will be all right," cried Roberts.  "Don't be too cautious,
Franky.  Put your faith in your superior officers; that's the way to
succeed."

"Then you think I am too cautious here, Dick?"

"Of course I do," cried Roberts, patting his brother middy on the
shoulder.  "It will be all right, so don't be dumpy.  I feel as if we
are going to have a fine time of it."

"Think we shall have any fighting?"

"Afraid not; but you do as I do.  I mean to get hold of a cutlass and
pistols.  I'm not going to risk my valuable life with nothing to
preserve it but a ridiculous dirk.  Don't you be downhearted and think
that the expedition is coming to grief."

"Not I," said Murray cheerily.  "I suppose it's all right; but I
couldn't help thinking what I have told you.  I wish I didn't think such
things; but it's a way I have."

"Yes," said his companion, "and any one wouldn't expect it of you,
Franky, seeing what a light-hearted chap you are.  It's a fault in your
nature, a thing you ought to correct.  If you don't get over it you'll
never make a dashing officer."

"Be too cautious, eh?" said Murray good-humouredly.

"That's it, old chap.  Oh, I say, though, I wish it was nearly night,
and that we were going off at once.  But I say, where's the Yankee?"

"What!" cried Murray, starting.  "Isn't he alongside in his boat?"

"No; didn't you see?  He came aboard half-an-hour ago.  Old Bosun
Dempsey fetched him out of his lugger; and look yonder, you croaking old
cock raven.  We always have one jolly as sentry at the gangway, don't
we?"

"Of course."

"Very well, look now; there are two loaded and primed ready for any
pranks the lugger men might play; and there are the two cutters ready
for lowering down at a moment's notice, and it wouldn't take long for
Dempsey to fizzle out his tune on his pipe and send the crews into
them."

"Bah!  Pish!  Pooh! and the rest of it.  What do you mean by that?
Look, the lugger is a fast sailer."

"Well, I dare say she is, but one of our little brass guns can send
balls that sail through the air much faster.  So drop all those dismal
prophecies and damping thoughts about danger.  Our officers know their
way about and have got their eyes open.  The skipper knows about
everything, and what he doesn't know bully Anderson tells him.  It's all
right, Franky.  Just look at the lads!  Why, there's Tom May smiling as
if he'd filled his pockets full of prize money."

"Yes," assented Murray, "and the other lads have shaped their phizzes to
match.  But let's get closer to the lugger."

"What for?" said Roberts sharply.

"To have a good look at her Indiarubber-cultivating crew."

"Not I!" cried Roberts.  "If we go there you'll begin to see something
wrong again, and begin to croak."

"No, no; honour bright!  If I do think anything, I won't say a word."

"I'd better keep you here out of temptation," said Roberts dubiously.

"Nonsense!  It's all right, I tell you.  There, come along."



CHAPTER FIVE.

TRUSTING A GUIDE.

The two lads made for where they could get a good view of the lugger
swinging by a rope abreast of the starboard gangway, and as they passed
along the quarter-deck, the shrill strident tones of the American's
voice reached them through one of the open cabin skylights, while
directly after, Murray, keen and observant of everything, noted that the
two marines of whom his companion had spoken were standing apparently
simply on duty, but thoroughly upon the alert and ready for anything,
their whole bearing suggesting that they had received the strictest of
orders, and were prepared for anything that might occur.

Roberts gave his companion a nudge with his elbow and a quick glance of
the eye, which produced "Yes, all right; I see," from Murray.  "I'm
afraid--I mean I'm glad to see that I was only croaking; but I say,
Dick, have a good quiet look at those fellows and see if you don't find
some excuse for what I thought."

"Bah!  Beginning to croak again."

"That I'm not," said Murray.  "I only say have a look at them,
especially at that fellow smoking."

"Wait a moment.  I have focussed my eye upon that beauty getting his
quid ready--disgusting!"

"Yes, it does look nasty," said Murray, with the corners of his lips
turning up.  "The regular Malay fashion.  That fellow never came from
these parts."

"Suppose not.  Why can't the nasty wretch cut a quid off a bit of black
twist tobacco like an ordinary British sailor?"

"Instead of taking a leaf out of his pouch," continued Murray, "smearing
it with that mess of white lime paste out of his shell--"

"Putting a bit of broken betel nut inside--" said Roberts.

"Rolling it up together--" continued Murray.

"And popping the whole ball into his pretty mouth," said Roberts.  "Bah!
Look at his black teeth and the stained corners of his lips.  Talk
about a dirty habit!  Our jacks are bad enough.  Ugh!"

"I say, Dick," whispered Murray, as the Malay occupant of the boat
realised the fact that he was being watched, and rolled his opal
eyeballs round with a peculiar leer up at the two young officers.

"Now then," was the reply, "you promised that you wouldn't croak."

"To be sure.  I only wanted to say that fellow looks a beauty."

"Beauty is only skin deep," said Roberts softly.

"And ugliness goes to the bone," whispered Murray, smiling.  "Yes, he
looks a nice fellow to be a cultivator of the indiarubber plant."

"Eh?  Who said he was?" said Roberts sharply.

"His skipper.  That's what they all are.  Splendid workers too.  Do more
than regular niggers."

"Do more, no doubt," said Roberts thoughtfully.  "But they certainly
don't look like agricultural labourers.  Why, they're a regular crew of
all sorts."

"Irregular crew, you mean," said Murray.  "That one to the left looks
like an Arab."

"Yes, and the one asleep with his mouth open and the flies buzzing about
him looks to me like a Krooboy.  Well, upon my word, old Croaker, they
do look--I say, do you see that blackest one?"

"Yes; and I've seen them before, you know."

"But he opened and shut his mouth just now.  You didn't see that, did
you?"

"Yes, I saw it; he has had his teeth filed like a saw."

"That's what I meant, and it makes him look like a crocodile when he
gapes."

"Or a shark."

"Well," said Roberts, after a pause, "upon my word, Frank, they do look
about as ugly a set of cut-throat scoundrels as ever I saw in my life."

"Right," said Murray eagerly.  "Well, what do you say now?"

"That I should like to point out their peculiarities to the skipper and
old Anderson, and tell them what we think.  Go and ask them to come and
look."

"I have already done so to Anderson."

"But you ought to do it to the skipper as well.  Look here, go at once
and fetch him here to look."

"While the American is with him?  Thank you; I'd rather not."

"Do you mean that?"

"To be sure I do.  What would he say to me?"

"Oh, he'd cut up rough, of course; but you wouldn't mind that in the
cause of duty."

Murray laughed softly.

"Why, Dick, I can almost hear what he would say about my impudence to
attempt to teach him his duty.  No, thank you, my dear boy; if he and
Anderson think it right to trust the American, why, it must be right.
If you feel that the nature of these fellows ought to be pointed out,
why, you go and do it."

Roberts took another look at the lugger's crew, and then shrugged his
shoulders, just as the captain came on deck, followed by the American
and the first lieutenant.

The American was talking away volubly, and every word of the
conversation came plainly to the ears of the two lads.

"Of course, cyaptain, I'll stop on board your craft if yew like, but I
put it to yew, how am I going to play pilot and lead you in through the
mouth if I stop here?  I can sail my lugger easy enough, but I should
get into a tarnation mess if I tried to con your big ship.  Better let
me lead in aboard my own craft, and you follow."

"In the darkness of night?" said the captain.

"There ain't no darkness to-night, mister.  It'll be full moon, and it's
morning pretty early--just soon enough for you to begin business at
daybreak.  I shall lead you right up to where the schooner's lying, and
then you'll be ready to waken the skipper up by giving him a good round
up with your big guns."

"And what about the slaves?"

"Oh, you must fire high, sir, and then yew won't touch them.  High
firing's just what yew want so as to cripple his sails and leave him
broken-winged like a shot bird on the water."

The captain nodded, and the two midshipmen, after a glance at the first
lieutenant, to see that he was listening attentively with half-closed
eyes, gazed at the American again.

"Lookye here, mister," he said, "yew must make no mistake over this job.
If yew do, it's going to be pretty bad for me, and instead of me being
rid of a bad neighbour or two, and coming in for a long strip of rich
rubber-growing land, I shall find myself dropped upon for letting on to
him yewr craft; and I tell yew he's a coon, this slave cyaptain, as
won't forgive anything of that kind.  He's just this sort of fellow.  If
he finds I've done him such an on-neighbourly act, he'll just give his
fellows a nod, and in less time than yew can wink there'll be no
rubber-grower anywhere above ground, for there'll be a fine rich
plantation to sell and no bidders, while this 'ere industrious
enterprising party will be somewhere down the river, put aside into some
hole in the bank to get nice and mellow by one of the crockydiles, who
object to their meat being too fresh."

"Ugh!" shuddered Roberts.

"Oh, that's right enough, young squire," said the man, turning upon him
sharply.  "I ain't telling you no travellers' tales.  It's all true
enough.  Wal, cyaptain, don't you see the sense of what I am saying?"

"Yes, sir.  But tell me this; do you guarantee that there are no shoals
anywhere about the mouth of the river?"

"Shoals, no; sands, no, sir.  All deep water without any bottom to speak
of.  But where you find it all deep mud yew can't take no harm, sir.
The river's made its way right threw the forest, and the bank's cut
right straight down and up perpendicular like, while if _you_ were to go
ashore it would only be to send your jib boom right in among the trees
and your cut-water against the soft muddy bank.  Why, it's mostly a
hundred feet deep.  Yew trust me, and yew'll find plenty of room; but if
yew don't feel quite comf'table, if I was yew I'd just lie off for a bit
while you send in one of your boats and Squire First Lieutenant there,
to see what it's like, and the sooner the better, for the sun's getting
low, and as I dessay yew know better than I can tell _yew_, it ain't
long after the sun sinks before it's tidy dark.  Now then, what do yew
say?  I'm ready as soon as yew are."

"How long will it take us to get up to the chief's town?"

"'Bout till daylight to-morrow morn', mister.  That's what I'm telling
of yew."

"Then it's quite a big river?"

"Mighty big, sir."

"And the current?"

"None at all hardly, mister.  Yew'll just ketch the night wind as blows
off the sea, and that'll take yew up as far as yew want to go.  Then
morrow mornin' if yew're done all yew want to do yew'll have the land
wind to take yew out to sea again.  Though I'm thinking that yew won't
be able to do all yew want in one day, for there's a lot of black folk
to deal with, and I wouldn't be in too great a hurry.  Yew take my
advice, cyaptain; do it well while yew're about it, and yew won't
repent."

"Never fear, sir," said the captain sternly.  "I shall do my work
thoroughly.  Now then, back into your lugger and show us the way.  Mr
Munday, take the second cutter and follow this American gentleman's
lead, and then stay alongside his boat while Mr Anderson comes back to
report to me in the first cutter.  You both have your instructions.
Yes, Mr Roberts--Yes, Mr Murray," continued the captain, in response
to a couple of appealing looks; "you can accompany the two armed boats."



CHAPTER SIX.

INTO THE MIST.

Murray thought that the American screwed up his eyes in a peculiar way
when he found that the two boats were to go in advance of the sloop, but
he had no opportunity for telling Roberts what he believed he had seen,
while so busy a time followed and his attention was so much taken up
that it was not till long afterwards that he recalled what he had noted.

The American, upon rejoining his lugger, sailed away at once with the
two boats in close attendance and the sloop right behind, their pilot
keeping along the dingy mangrove-covered shore and about half-a-mile
distant, where no opening seemed visible; and so blank was the outlook
that the first lieutenant had turned to his young companion to say in an
angry whisper--

"I don't like this at all, Mr Murray."  But the words were no sooner
out of his mouth than to the surprise of both there was a sudden
pressure upon the lugger's tiller, the little vessel swung round, and
her cut-water pointed at once for the densely wooded shore, so that she
glided along in a course diagonal to that which she had been pursuing.

"Why, what game is he playing now?" muttered the lieutenant.  "There is
no opening here.  Yes, there is," he added, the next minute.  "No wonder
we passed it by.  How curious!  Ah, here comes the moon."

For as the great orb slowly rose and sent her horizontal rays over the
sea in a wide path of light, she lit-up what at first sight seemed to be
a narrow opening in the mangrove forest, but which rapidly spread out
wider and wider, till as the three boats glided gently along, their
sails well filled by the soft sea breeze, Murray gazed back, to see that
the sloop was now following into what proved to be a wide estuary, shut
off from seaward by what appeared now in the moonlight a long narrow
strip of mangrove-covered shore.

"River," said the lieutenant decisively, "and a big one too.  Now, Tom
May, steady with the lead."

"Ay, ay, sir!" cried the man, and he began to take soundings, one of the
sailors in the second cutter receiving his orders and beginning to
follow the example set.

Then there was a hail from the lugger.

"What game do you call this?"

"Soundings," replied the lieutenant gruffly.

"Twenty fathom for miles up, and you can go close inshore if _you_ like.
It's all alike."

"P'raps so," said the officer, "but my orders are to sound."

"Sound away, then," said the American sourly; "but do you want to be a
week?"  And he relapsed into silence, till about a couple of miles of
the course of the wide river had been covered, sounding after sounding
being taken, which proved the perfect truth of the American's words.

Then the two cutters closed up and there was a brief order given by the
first lieutenant, which resulted in the second cutter beginning to make
its way back to where the sloop lay in the mouth of the estuary.

"What yer doing now?" came from the lugger.

"Sending word to the sloop that there's plenty of water and that she may
come on."

"Course she may, mister," grumbled the American.  "Think I would ha'
telled yew if it hedn't been all right?  Yew Englishers are queer fish!"

"Yes," said the lieutenant quietly.  "We like to feel our way cautiously
in strange waters."

"Then I s'pose we may anchor now till your skipper comes?  All right,
then, on'y you're not going to get up alongside of the schooner this
side of to-morrow morning, I tell yew."

"Very well, then, we must take the other side of her the next morning."

The American issued an order of his own in a sulky tone of voice,
lowering his sails; and then there was a splash as a grapnel was dropped
over the side.

"Hadn't yew better anchor?" he shouted good-humouredly now.  "If yew
don't yew'll go drifting backward pretty fast."

For answer the lieutenant gave the order to lower the grapnel, and
following the light splash and the running out of the line came the
announcement of the sailor in charge as he checked the falling rope--

"No bottom here."

"Takes a tidy long line here, mister," came in the American's sneering
voice.  "Guess your sloop's keel won't touch no bottom when she comes
up."

The lieutenant made no reply save by hoisting sail again and running to
and fro around and about the anchored lugger, so as to pass the time in
taking soundings, all of which went to prove that the river flowed
sluggishly seaward with so little variation in the depth that the
soundings were perfectly unnecessary.

It was tedious work, and a couple of hours passed before, pale and
spirit-like at first, the other cutter came into sight in the pale
moonlight, followed by the sloop, when the American had the lugger's
grapnel hauled up and ran his boat alongside of the first cutter.

"Look here," he said angrily, "yewr skipper's just making a fool of me,
and I may as well run ashore to my plantation, for we shan't do no good
to-night."

The man's words were repeated when the sloop came up, and a short
discussion followed, which resulted in the captain changing his orders.

"The man's honest enough, Anderson," he said, "and I must trust him."

"What do you mean to do, then, sir?" said the first lieutenant, in a low
tone.

"Let him pilot us to where the slaver lies."

"With the lead going all the time, sir?"

"Of course, Mr Anderson," said the captain shortly.  "Do you think me
mad?"

"I beg your pardon, sir," replied the chief officer.  "Perhaps it will
be best."

It proved to be best so far as the American's temper was concerned, for
upon hearing the captain's decision, he took his place at the tiller of
his lugger and led the way up the great river, followed by the stately
sloop, whose lead as it was lowered from time to time told the same
unvarying tale of deep water with a muddy bottom, while as the river's
winding course altered slightly, the width as far as it could be made
out by the night glasses gave at least a couple of miles to the shore on
either hand.

From time to time the first cutter, in obedience to the captain's
orders, ran forward from where she was sailing astern--the second cutter
swinging now from the davits--crept up alongside of the lugger, and
communicated with her skipper; and Murray's doubts grew more faint, for
everything the American said sounded plausible.

The night was far spent when another of these visits was paid, and as
the coxswain hooked on alongside of the lugger the American leaned over
to speak to the lieutenant, but turned first to Murray.  "Well, young
mister," he said; "sleepy?"

"No, not at all," was the reply.  "Good boy; that's right; but if your
skipper hadn't been so tarnation 'spicious yew might have had a good
snooze.  Wall, lieutenant, I was just waiting to see you, and I didn't
want to hail for fear our slave-hunting friend might be on his deck and
hear us.  Talk about your skipper being 'spicious, he's nothing to him.
The way in which the sound of a shout travels along the top of the water
here's just wonderful, and my hail might spyle the hull business."

"But we're not so near as that?" asked the lieutenant.

"Ain't we?  But we jest are!  See that there bit of a glimpse of the
mountains straight below the moon?"

"Yes," said the lieutenant; "but I should have taken it for a cloud if
you had not spoken."

"That's it," said the skipper; "that's where the river winds round at
the foot, and the quieter yewr people keep now the better.  Oh yes, yewr
skipper has knocked all my calc'lations on the head, I can tell yew.
That there sloop sails A1, and she's done much more than I 'spected."

"I'm glad of it," said the lieutenant, while Murray's spirits rose.

"So'm I," said the man, with a chuckle; "and now it's turned out all
right I don't mind 'fessing."

"Confessing!  What about?"

"Why, this here," said the man.  "Your skipper had wasted so much time
with his soundings and messing about that I says to myself that if I
tried to see the business out our Portygee friend would see me mixed up
with it all and take the alarm.  Yewr sloop wouldn't get near him, for
he'd run right up the river where you couldn't follow, and he'd wait his
time till you'd gone away, and then come down upon me as an informer.
D'you know what that would mean for me then?"

"Not exactly," replied the lieutenant, "but I can guess."

"Zackly," said the man, and he turned sharply upon Murray and made a
significant gesture with one finger across his throat.

"Look here," said the lieutenant, "don't talk so much, my friend."

"That's just what I want yew to go and tell your skipper, mister.  Tell
him to give orders that his men are not to say a word above a whisper,
for if it's ketched aboard the schooner our friend will be off."

"I will tell him," said the lieutenant; "but now tell me what you mean
to do?"

"To do?  Jest this; put your vessel just where she can lie low and send
three or four boats to steal aboard the schooner and take her.  Yew can
do that easy, can't yew, without firing a shot?"

"Certainly," said the lieutenant; "and what about you?"

"Me?  Get outer the way as fast as I can, I tell yew.  I'm not a
fighting man, and I've got to think of what might happen if you let the
slaver slip.  See?"

"Yes, I see," said the lieutenant; "but you need not be alarmed for
yourself.  Captain Kingsberry will take care that no harm shall befall
you."

"Think so, mister?"

"I am sure so, my friend.  But now tell me this; how soon do you think
that you can lay us abreast of that schooner?"

"Jest when you like now, mister.  What I've set down as being best is,
say, about daybreak."

"Exactly; that will do."

"Jest what I said to myself.  Daybreak's the time when everybody aboard
will be fast asleep, for they don't carry on there like yew do aboard a
man-o'-war with your keeping watch and that sort of thing."

"Of course not," said the officer.  "Well, then, I may go and tell the
captain what _you_ say?"

"That's jest as yew like, mister.  I should if it was me."

"Exactly.  And you feel sure that you can keep your word?"

"Wish I was as sure of getting hold of that there piece o' territory,
mister, and the nigger chief cleared away."

"Then you don't feel quite sure?" put in Murray.

"Course I don't, young officer.  There's many a pick at a worm as turns
out a miss, ain't there?  How do I know that my Portygee neighbour
mayn't slip off through your boats making too much of a row instead of
creeping up quiet?  You mean right, all of you, but I shan't feel sure
till you've made a prisoner of that chap and scattered the nigger chief
and his men where they'll be afraid to come back.  Now then; you said
something about talking too much.  I'm going to shut up shop now and
give my tongue a holiday till I've laid you where you can send your
boats to do their work.  But I say, just one word more, mister," said
the man anxiously; and the lieutenant felt his hand tremble as he laid
it upon his arm; "yew will be careful, won't yew?"

"Trust us," replied the lieutenant.

"That's what I'm a-doing; but jest you think.  It puts me in mind of the
boys and the frogs in your English moral story--what may be fun to yew
may be death to me.  Tell your skipper that he must take all the care he
can."

"I will," said the lieutenant.

"But look here; perhaps I'd better come aboard and say a word to him.
Don't you think I might?"

"No," was the reply.

"But what do yew say, young mister?"

"I say no too," replied Murray.  "Your place is here aboard your
lugger."

"Wall, I suppose you're right," half whimpered the man, "for we're
getting tidy nigh now, and I don't want anything to go wrong through my
chaps making a mistake.  I'll chance it, so you'd best get aboard your
vessel.  Tell the skipper I shall do it just at daylight.  Less than
half-an-hour now.  Then'll be the time."

"One moment," said Murray, as the lieutenant was about to give the order
for the coxswain to unhook and let the cutter glide back to the sloop.

"Yes, mister; what is it?"

"What's that dull roaring sound?"

"Roaring sound?  One of them howling baboon beasts in the woods perhaps.
Calling its mates just before sunrise."

"No, no; I mean that--the sound of water."

"Oh, _that_!" said the man.  "Yes, yew can hear it quite plain, and
we're nigher than I thought.  That's on my ground over yonder.  Bit of a
fall that slops over from the river and turns a little sugar-mill I've
got.  There, cast off and tell your skipper to look out and be smart.
Less than half-an-hour I shall be taking yew round a big point there is
here, and as soon as it's light enough when yew get round, yew'll be
able to see the chief's huts and thatched barracks where he cages his
blackbirds, while the schooner will be anchored out in front, waiting
for you to have sailed away.  Her skipper will be taken all on the hop.
He'll never think of seeing you drop upon him."

"He'll never suspect that the way up the river will be found out?" said
the lieutenant.

"That's it, mister; but you'll tell your skipper to be spry and careful,
for if yew don't do it right it'll be death to me."

"I see," said the lieutenant rather hoarsely from excitement.  "Now
then, my man, cast off."

"One moment," said the American, and Murray saw him through the paling
moonlight raise his hand as if to wipe his brow.  "You quite understand,
then?  The river gives a big bend round to left, then another to the
right, and then one more to the left, jest like a wriggling wum.  Tell
your skipper to follow me close so as to run by me as soon as he sees
the schooner lying at anchor.  She'll come into sight all at once from
behind the trees like, and whatever you do, run close aboard and grapple
her.  Her skipper'll have no time to show fight if you do your work to
rights.  I'm all of a tremble about it, I tell yew, for it means so much
to me.  There; my work's jest about done, and I'm going to run for the
shore out of the way.  I don't want the Portygee to get so much as a
sniff of me."

"Cast off," said the lieutenant; and as the cutter dropped back free,
the lugger seemed to spring forward into faint mist, which began to show
upon the broad surface of the great river, while the sloop glided up
alongside, one of the men caught the rope that was heaved to them, and
directly after Murray missed their pilot and his swift craft, for it was
eclipsed by the _Seafowl_ as she glided between, right in the lugger's
wake.



CHAPTER SEVEN.

TRAPPED.

"Well, Mr Anderson," said the captain, as the latter briefly related
the last sayings of the American, "that's all plain enough, and in a few
minutes we ought to be alongside."

"Yes, sir, after following the windings of the river, or in other words
following our guide, till we see the masts of the schooner above the
trees."  And the lieutenant stood anxiously watching the lugger, which
seemed to have rapidly increased its distance.  "I presume, sir, that we
are all ready for action?"

"Of course we are, Mr Anderson," said the captain stiffly.  "We shall
keep on till we are pretty close, then run up into the wind, and you and
Mr Munday will head the boarders.  We shall take them so by surprise
that there will be very little resistance.  But I see no signs of the
schooner's spars yet."

"No, sir, but we have to make another bend round yet."

"Yes, of course," said the captain, as he swept the river banks with his
night glass.

"The river seems to fork here, though, sir," said the lieutenant
anxiously.

"Humph!  Yes; but I suppose it's all right, for the lugger keeps on.  We
must be on the correct course if we follow him."

"Beg pardon, sir," said Murray excitedly.  "I caught sight of the masts
of a vessel lying yonder."

"Eh?  Where, Mr Murray?" said the captain, in a low voice full of
excitement.

"Yonder, sir, about half a mile to starboard, beyond the trees on the
bank."

"To be sure!  Tall taper spars.  I see, Mr Murray."

"But the sloop is running straight away to port, sir," said the
lieutenant anxiously.

"Well, what of that, Mr Anderson?  Did not the American tell you that
we were to follow certain bends of the river?"

"Yes, sir, but--"

"Yes, sir, but!" said the captain, in an angry whisper.  "Is this a time
for raising buts?  According to your own showing, the schooner was to be
found at anchor in one of the bends where the black chief's town lay."

"Yes, sir, but I see no sign of any thatched huts."

"All in good time, Mr Anderson.  We shall see the lugger swing round
that next point directly, and then we shall be in full view of our
prize."

The captain turned from his chief officer impatiently, and then in a low
tone issued a few orders with respect to future proceedings, the master
following out the instructions, while the two boarding parties, each
armed and ready, stood waiting for the command which should launch them
on board the now invisible slaver.

"Bah!" ejaculated the captain.  "We are half-an-hour too late.  We ought
to be alongside now.  Hang the fellow, Mr Anderson!  Can he be taking
us the right way round that point?"

"I hope so, sir, but I have my suspicions," replied the lieutenant
anxiously.

"What, that he is playing us false?"

"No, sir, but that he has lost heart and is afraid to pilot us right to
where the schooner lies."

"The scoundrel!  If he has--" began the captain, sharing now in his
subordinate's anxiety.  "Oh, impossible!  He must know better than we
do.  Ahoy, there!" he cried, speaking just loud enough for the lookout
to hear.  "Can you make out where the lugger is making for?"

"Ay, ay, sir!  Bit of a creek yonder, right inshore."

"That's it, sir," cried the lieutenant excitedly; "he has taken fright.
We must run round that bend yonder, keeping to mid-stream."

"Or anchor," exclaimed the captain sharply.  "Why, confound it, man!
The river forks here, and we are in a branch with a current running in
another direction.  Stand by there to lower the anchor!" he roared, "or
we shall be ashore."

The order came too late, for as in obedience to order after order, the
sloop's course was altered and her sails began to shiver, there was a
preliminary shock as if bottom had been lightly touched, then a shiver
which seemed to communicate itself upward from the deck through Murray's
spine, and the next minute the _Seafowl_ heeled over slightly as she
seemed to cut her way onward into the soft mud, where she stuck fast
with the fierce current into which they had run pressing hardly against
her side as it raced swiftly by.

"Trapped!" said a voice from close to Murray's ear, and the young man
turned swiftly from where he had been gazing over the side in the
direction of the further shore, to encounter the first lieutenant's
angry eyes.  "Well, Mr Murray," he said bitterly, "where is that Yankee
snake?"

"Just gliding in yonder among the trees, sir," cried the young man
passionately.  "I suspected him from the first."

"Well, Mr Anderson," said the captain, hurrying up, and as coolly as if
nothing whatever was wrong, "either you or I have placed the sloop in
about as unpleasant a position as it was possible to get.  Now then, how
about getting out of it?"

"We're on soft mud, sir," said the gentleman addressed.

"And with a falling tide, I'm afraid.  There, get to work man, and see
what can be done with an anchor to haul her upon a level keel before the
position is worse, for we shall board no slaver to-day."

"Beg pardon, sir."

"What is it, Mr Murray?"

The midshipman pointed right aft, where the faint mist was floating away
from where it hung about a mile away over the distant shore.

"Well, sir, why don't you speak?" cried the captain, now speaking
angrily.  "Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr Murray; another mist was in my
eyes.  That must be the course of the other fork of the river.  I see it
plainly now.  We have been lured up here and run upon this muddy shoal
in the belief that we shall never get off; and there goes our prize with
her load of black unfortunates.  Do you see her, Mr Anderson?"

"Too plainly, sir," said the chief officer sadly.

For it was now broad daylight and the swift-looking schooner was gliding
along apparently through the trees which covered a narrow spit of land.

"Hah!" said the captain quietly.  "Yes, that's it, Mr Anderson--our
prize, and a beautiful morning for her to make her start for the West
Indies.  Bless that straightforward, timorous, modest American skipper!
Do you know, Mr Anderson, I am strongly of opinion that he commands
that craft and that he will find his way through some of the muddy
creeks and channels of the mangrove forest back to where she will be
waiting for him.  Well, master, what do you think?" he continued, as
that officer came up hurriedly.  "Will the sloop lie over any further?"

"No, sir; that is stopped; but we are wedged in fast."

"So I suppose.  Well, Mr Thomson, it does not mean a wreck?"

"No, no, sir, nor any damage as far as I can say."

"Damage, Mr Thomson," said the captain, smiling at him pleasantly; "but
it does, man; damage to our reputation--mine--Mr Anderson's.  But you
were going to say something, to ask me some question."

"Yes, sir; about taking steps to get the sloop out of the bed in which
she lies."

"Poor bird, yes; but you see no risk for the present?"

"Not the slightest, sir.  The mud is so soft."

"Mud generally is, Mr Thomson," said the captain blandly.  "Well, then,
let her rest for a while.  We are all tired after a long night's work.
Pass the word to Mr Dempsey, and let him pipe all hands for breakfast.
I want mine badly."

There was a faint cheer at this, followed by another, and then by one
which Murray said was a regular "roarer."

"I say," he said to Roberts, "doesn't he take it splendidly!"

"Don't you make any mistake," replied that young gentleman.  "He seems
as cool as a cucumber, but he's boiling with rage, and if he had that
Yankee here he'd hang him from the yard-arm as sure as he's his mother's
son."

"And serve him right," said Murray bitterly.

"What's that, young gentlemen?" said the captain, turning upon them
sharply, for he had noted what was going on and placed his own
interpretation upon the conversation--"criticising your superiors?"

"No, sir," said Murray frankly; "we were talking about punishing the
Yankee who tricked us into this."

"Gently, Mr Murray--gently, sir!  You hot-blooded boys are in _too_
great a hurry.  Wait a bit.  I dare say we shall have the pleasure of
another interview with him; and, by the way, Mr Anderson, I think as we
are so near, we might as well inspect the indiarubber plantations of our
friend.  We might see, too, if he has any more work-people of the same
type as those who manned his galley."

"I'm afraid we should only find them on board the schooner, sir," said
the chief officer bitterly.

"Exactly," said the captain; "but I wonder at you young gentlemen," he
continued--"you with your sharp young brains allowing yourselves to be
deceived as you were.  Those fellows who formed the lugger's crew ought
not to have hoodwinked you."

"They did me, sir," said Roberts, speaking out warmly, "but Murray,
here, sir, was full of suspicion from the first."



CHAPTER EIGHT.

AMONGST THE HORRORS.

The crew of the _Seafowl_ had a busy day's work after a good refresher,
during which officers and men had been discussing in low tones the way
in which "the skipper," as they called him, had let himself be tricked
by the Yankee.  The younger men wanted to know what he could have been
about, while the elder shook their heads sagely.

"Ah," more than one said, "it has always been the same since the
revolution; these Yankees have been too much for us.  There's something
in the American air that sharpens their brains."

Then old Dempsey, the boatswain, who had heard pretty well all that the
captain had said, chewed it over, digested it, and gave it voice as if
it was something new, to first one knot of listeners and then another,
ending with the two midshipmen.

"You see, Mr Murray, and you too, Mr Roberts, it was like this.  That
schooner had just started for the West Injies with a full load of
niggers, when she sighted the _Seafowl_ and knowed she was a king's ship
looking after a prize."

"How could the Yankee skipper know that?" said Murray.  "He could only
get just a glimpse before we were hidden by the fog."

"Cut of the jib, sir--cut of the jib," said the old man.  "What else
could he think?  'Sides, Yankee slaving skippers have got consciences,
same as other men."

"Rubbish, Mr Dempsey!" said Roberts contemptuously.

"Course they are, sir--worst of rubbish, as you say, but there's bad
consciences as well as good consciences, and a chap like him, carrying
on such work as his, must be always ready to see a king's ship in every
vessel he sights.  But well, young gentlemen, as I was a-saying, he
sights us, and there was no chance for him with us close on his heels
but dodgery."

"Dodgery, Mr Dempsey?" said Roberts.

"Yes, sir; Yankee tricks.  Of course he couldn't fight, knowing as he
did that it meant a few round shot 'twixt and 'tween wind and water, and
the loss of his craft.  So he says to himself, `what's to be done?' and
he plays us that trick.  Sends his schooner up the river while he puts
off in that there lugger and pretends to be a injyrubber grower.  That
ought to have been enough to set the skipper and Mr Anderson thinking
something was wrong, but that's neither here nor there.  He pretends
that he was a highly respectable sort of fellow, when all the time he
was a sorter human fox, and lures, as the captain calls it, our sloop
into this sort of a branch of the big river where the current runs wrong
way on because part of the waters of the great river discharges
theirselves.  And then what follows?"

"Why, we were carried by the strange current into the muddy shallow and
nearly capsized, Mr Dempsey, while we had the satisfaction of seeing
the slaver sail away with her crew," interposed Murray impatiently.

The grizzly-headed, red-faced old boatswain turned upon the lad with an
offended air and said with dignity--

"If you'd only had a little patience, Mr Murray, I was going to tell
you all that."

He grunted audibly as he walked away, and as soon as he was out of
hearing Murray cried impatiently--

"What did he want to bore us with all that for?  Tiresome old fogey!
But I say, Dick, you take my advice--don't you get anywhere near the
skipper if you can help it to-day.  He took things very smoothly before
breakfast, but you'll see now that he will be as savage as a bear with a
sore head, as they say, and lead every one a terrible life."

"Oh, if you are going to deal out old saws, young man," replied Roberts,
"you go and teach your grandmother how to suck eggs.  Just as if I was
likely to go near him until he has got the sloop well afloat!"

But what proved to have been every one's opinion turned out entirely
wrong, for the captain had never shown himself to better advantage.

As soon as breakfast was over, and had been partaken of in the most
deliberate way as far as he was concerned, he turned to the officers,
all smiles, and began giving orders in the coolest of fashions and all
guided by so much judgment that by carefully laying out anchors, the use
of the capstan, haulage, and taking advantage of the wind, the sloop
soon rose upon an even keel and rested at last in a safe position.  The
tide that ran up as far as the black king's city did the rest, and the
next day the sloop lay at anchor just where the schooner had been the
previous morning, that is to say, in a position where she could easily
gain access to the sea.

Once the sloop was in safety and the officers had pretty well mastered
the intricacies of the river's course, and the tidal and other currents
which protected the slaver's lair, a couple of armed boats pulled ashore
to examine the place with caution, lest they should encounter some other
trap.

"There's no knowing, Mr Anderson," said the captain, "so at the
slightest sign of danger draw back.  I don't want a man to be even
wounded at the expense of capturing a score of the black scum, even if
one of them proves to be the king."

The captain's orders were carefully carried out, while once more the two
midshipmen succeeded in accompanying the landing parties, to find that
the king's town of palm-thatched hovels was completely deserted.  It had
evidently been a busy, thickly inhabited place, where prisoners were
herded together by the brutal savages who made incursions in different
directions, and held their unfortunate captives ready for the coming of
the slaver.  But now the place was a dreary silent waste, and the trail
well marked showed plainly the direction taken by the native marauders
to some forest stronghold, near at hand or far distant, it was
impossible to say which.

"Pah!" ejaculated Murray, as he sprang back with disgust from the
strongly palisaded enclosure which was evidently the prisoners'
barracks.  "Let's get away, Dick."

"I'm ready," was the reply, "but I say, did you go round the other side
yonder?"

The lad pointed as he spoke.

"No.  What was there to see?"

"Tom May found it out," replied the midshipman, "and I was idiot enough
to go.  Here, Tom," he cried, signing to the generally amiable-looking
sailor to approach; and he strode up, cutlass in hand, musket over his
shoulder, scowling and fierce of aspect.  "Tell Mr Murray what you
showed me over yonder, Tom."

The man's face puckered up as he turned and met Murray's eyes.

"It's 'most too horrid, sir," he said, "and don't do no good but make a
man savage, sir.  There's just fourteen of 'em among the trees there."

"What, prisoners?" said Murray excitedly.

"Yes, sir, and six on 'em got the chains on 'em still."

"Well, what about the armourer?" cried Murray excitedly, turning upon
Roberts.  "Didn't Mr Anderson have them struck off?"

"No, lad," replied Roberts.  "There was only one of them alive out of
the whole fourteen, and I don't think she'll be alive when Munday comes
back."

"Comes back!  I didn't know he had put off again."

"Gone for the doctor," said Roberts.  "Go on, Tom May.  Tell him what
you made it out to be."

"Just this, sir--that they'd got more than the schooner could take away,
and they finished off the sick and wounded."

"How could you tell that?" said Murray, with a look of horror.

"Seemed pretty plain, sir.  All the men had old wounds as well as what
must have been given them to finish 'em yes'day morning, sir, when the
black fellows forsook the place."

"But you said--finished the men who had old wounds?"

"Yes, sir; half healed.  T'other wounds was fresh, and the women and
children--"

"Women and children!" cried Murray excitedly.

"Yes, sir; knocked on the head--clubbed.  Didn't care to take 'em away
with them, sir, when we come."

"Oh, Dick," said Murray, whose face now looked ghastly, "I knew that
there were horrors enough over the slave-trade, but I never thought it
could be so bad as that.  Here, Tom, where is this?  Show me."

"Don't be a fool, old chap," whispered Roberts, grasping his companion's
arm.  "You've heard what Tom said.  I've seen it too, and I could tell
you, but I won't.  It's too horrid to go and see again."

"Yes, it must be horrible," said the young man passionately; "but you
said one poor creature was still alive?"

"Yes, and the doctor's being fetched."

"But something might be done--water--carried into the shade."

"We did all that, sir," said the sailor gruffly.

"Who did?" asked Murray excitedly.

"Well, I helped, sir, and the poor black lass looked at me as if she
thought I was one of 'em going to take her aboard a slaver."

"But didn't you tell her--Oh, you are right, Dick; I am a fool!  She
couldn't have understood unless it was by our acts."

"Oh, don't you worry about that, Mr Murray, sir," said the man eagerly.
"The poor thing took quite a turn like when I knelt down and held my
waterbottle to her lips."

Murray stood looking at the man, with his brow furrowed, and then he
nodded.

"Now then," he said, "where was this?"

"T'other side of this barrack place, sir," said the man; "just over
yonder."

"Show me," said Murray abruptly.

"I wouldn't go, Frank," whispered Roberts.

"I must," was the reply.  "Lead the way, Tom."

"One of our lads is with her, sir," said the man, hesitating.

"So much the better," cried Murray firmly.  "You heard what I said?"

Roberts, who was nearest to the sailor, heard him heave a deep sigh as
he gave his trousers a hitch, and led the way past the vile-smelling
palm and bamboo erection which had quite lately been the prison of a
large number of wretched beings, the captives made by the warlike tribe
who kept up the supply of slaves for bartering to the miscreants.  Those
who from time to time sailed up the river to the king's town to carry on
the hateful trade content if they could load up with a terrible cargo
and succeed in getting one-half of the wretched captives alive to their
destination in one of the plantation islands, or on the mainland.

Tom May took as roundabout a route as he could contrive so as to spare
the young officers the gruesome sights that he and the other men had
encountered; but enough was left to make Murray wince again and again.

"Why, Tom," he exclaimed at last, "no punishment could be too bad for
the wretches who are answerable for all this."

"That's what me and my messmates have been saying, sir; and of course
it's going to be a nasty job, but we're all ready and waiting for our
officers to give the word--Course I mean, sir, as soon as we get the
chance."

"Only wait, my lad," said Murray, through his set teeth.

"That's what we keep on doing, sir," said the man bitterly.  "You see,
it's pretty well all wait."

"The time will come, Tom."

"Yes, sir; course it will, and when it does--"

The man moistened the palm of his right hand, clapped it to the hilt of
his re-sheathed cutlass, and half drew it from the scabbard.  "My!" he
ejaculated, and his eyes seemed to flash in the morning sunshine.  "It's
going to be a warm time for some of 'em.  I shouldn't like to be in that
Yankee gentleman's shoes, nor be wearing the boots of his men where they
had 'em."

"Oh, but these people could not be such inhuman wretches," said Murray
excitedly.  "The murderous, atrocious treatment--the killing of those
poor prisoners must be the act of the black chief and his men."

"Hope so, sir," said the sailor bluntly.  "It's too black to be done by
a white.  But all the same, sir, if the white skipper didn't want his
cargoes, the nigger king and his men wouldn't supply 'em; and here's the
doctor come ashore, sir," added the man, in a whisper.

For the two parties met just at the edge of a clump of trees, within
whose shade the unfortunate creature who had interested the midshipman
in her fate was lying with one of the seamen standing by her head, his
musket grounded and his crossed arms resting upon the muzzle.

"Ah, gentlemen, you here!" said the doctor, nodding shortly.  "Nice
place, this.  Humph!" he ejaculated, as with brows contracting he went
down on one knee.--"There, don't be frightened, my lass," he continued
softly, for as he drew near, the poor creature, who had been lying in
the shade with her eyes half-closed, startled by the footsteps, suddenly
raised her lids in a wild stare of horror and shrank away.  "Poor
wretch!" continued the doctor.  "The sight of a man can only mean
horrors for her."

"Horrors indeed, doctor," cried Murray excitedly; "but pray do something
for her!"

"No," said the doctor gravely.  "Nature is her doctor now."

"What do you mean?" said the young man, half annoyed by the doctor's
inaction.

"That she is in the hands of a kinder doctor than I could be--one who
knows what is best for her.  Look!"

He shrugged his shoulders and turned away.

"Let your men cut a few of those big leaves, Mr Murray, and lay over
her."

"You are too late?" said Roberts excitedly.

"Yes, my dear boy," replied the doctor.  "With such hurts as the poor
girl had received it was only a matter of time.  Ah, I wish to goodness
we had caught that schooner!  It's time all this was stamped out.
There, come away and bring your men.  Oh, here comes Mr Anderson.
Well, what are you going to do?"  For the first lieutenant came up,
followed by some of his men, glanced at the motionless figure and the
action being taken, and turned away.

"What am I going to do?" he replied, frowning angrily.  "Nothing but
communicate with the captain for fresh instructions."

"But aren't we going to pursue the black chief and his people through
the forest, sir, and punish them?" asked Murray, who was strangely moved
by his first encounter with the horrors of a slave encampment.

"No, Mr Murray, we certainly are not," replied the lieutenant, "for the
chief and his men will take plenty of care that we do not overtake them.
Here, come away, my lads; this place is pestiferous enough to lay every
one down with fever."

"Yes; I was just going to give you a very broad hint.  Fire, eh?" said
the doctor.

The lieutenant nodded.

"I must just have a word or two with the captain first," said the
lieutenant, and giving the order, the men began to march to where the
boats lay with their keepers, and a sentry or two had been thrown out to
guard against surprise.

Murray closed up to the doctor, who was looking sharply about him at the
trees which remained standing amongst the almost countless huts.

"Not many cocoanuts, Murray," he said.

"Oh," cried the young man, who felt more annoyed by the doctor's
indifference than ever, "I was not thinking about palm-trees!"

"But I was," said the doctor; "they'll burn tremendously."

"Ah," cried the midshipman, "that was what I wanted to speak about.  Did
you mean to suggest that the place should be burned?"

"Certainly, sir," said the doctor shortly.

"The village--but with the slave barrack?"

"Of course," said the doctor shortly.  "Don't you think it would be
best?"

"I--Oh!  It seems so horrible," began Murray.

The doctor looked at him searchingly, and laid his hand upon the youth's
shoulder.

"I understand, Murray," he said quietly.  "It does seem as you say
repugnant; but it is necessary, my lad, for several reasons, one of the
first of which it that it will be a lesson for the black king."

"But he could soon have another village built."

"Then we ought to come and burn that, and his people with him, if we
could get hold of the wretches.  I'm sure you must have seen enough this
morning to make you feel how necessary it is for this slave traffic to
be stamped out."

"Yes, of course," said Murray, "but--"

"Then take my advice, my lad," said the doctor, gripping the lad's arm;
"leave these matters to your superior officers, and don't look at me as
if I were a heartless brute.  My profession makes me firm, my lad, not
unfeeling."

"Oh, I don't think that, sir," said the lad quickly.

"But you thought something of the kind, Murray, my lad, and I like you,
so it hurt me a little.  You ought to have known that black and white,
good and bad, are all one to a doctor.  He sees only a patient, whatever
they may be.  But in this case I saw that this poor black woman was at
almost her last gasp.  Understand?"

"Yes, I see now, sir, and I beg your pardon," said the midshipman.

"We understand one another, Murray, and--Ah, here is the first luff
doing just what I wanted him to do."

For that officer had gathered his men together in the shade of a clump
of trees where the moving branches blew from off the river in a breeze
that was untainted by the miasma of the marshy ground and the horrors of
the village, for it brought with it the odour of the floating seaweed
and old ocean's health-giving salts.

By this time one of the boats was despatched, and the lieutenant joined
the pair.

"Ah, Mr Murray, you have lost your chance.  I was going to send you to
the captain for instructions, but you were busy with the doctor, so I
sent Mr Roberts.--Giving him a lecture on the preservation of health,
doctor?"

"Just a few hints," said that gentleman, smiling.  "We were taking
opposite views, but I think Murray agrees with me now."



CHAPTER NINE.

"FIRE!  FIRE!"

"Now, Mr Murray," said the lieutenant, "I don't want to expose the lads
to more of this unwholesome place than I can help, so you must use your
brains as soon as we get word from the captain, and see that they start
the fire where it will have the best effect.  This abomination must
disappear from the face of the earth, so where you begin to burn, start
your fire well.  You understand?"

"Yes, sir," said Murray, drawing a deep breath as he glanced at the
doctor and found that he was watching him.

"I can't help it," he said to himself, as he stood alone in the shade
watching the departing boat making for the sloop, "and I don't know that
I want to help it.  It does seem a horrible thing to do, but they're
right, and it's one's duty.  Wish I'd been handy, though, when the first
luff wanted to send his message to the captain.  Dick Roberts does
somehow seem to get all the luck."

It was just a dash of envy; but the feeling did not last, for his common
sense began to make itself felt directly after, as he withdrew his gaze
from the boat to watch the group of sturdy-looking men sharing his
shelter, and all excited and eager as they discussed the events of the
morning and the task they evidently knew that they had to do.

"Yes, it's all envy, and envy is a poor, small, contemptible thing to
encourage.  I wish I had none.  How stupid of me!  One never knows.  It
would have been nice enough to sit back holding the lines and steering
while the lads pulled, but only a lazy sort of a task, and here I am put
in command of half-a-dozen or so of these stout lads to carry out the
captain's orders and see that they do the work well."

Perhaps the fact of his thinking about the men and the work in prospect
made him fix his eyes upon Tom May and think that he would like to have
him in his party; perhaps not, but all the same the man turned his head
just then and met his eyes, gave his waistband a hitch in front and
rear, and then crossed a patch of sunshine and joined him in the shade.

"Yes, sir?" he said enquiringly.

"I did not call, Tom."

"No, sir, but I thought you looked as if you was signalling me.  Beg
pardon, sir; I s'pose you know we're going to burn out this here wasp
nest?"

"I expect so, Tom."

"Yes, sir, that's so, and the lads are getting so hot to begin that we
all feel warm enough to set fire to the place without matches."

"Well, it is hot, Tom," said Murray, smiling, while the man showed his
big white teeth in a broad grin.

"I expeck we shall be 'vided into squads, sir, and there's about
half-a-dozen of my messmates will fall nat'ral along o' me.  Couldn't
manage, I s'pose, sir, to have us under your command, could you?"

"I don't know, Tom," replied the young man.  "You'll see that Mr
Anderson will settle all that."

"Yes, sir; I know, sir; but I thought p'raps that if you happened to be
standing along with us just as if you and us was ready for a start, it
might happen as the first luff, sir, would see as it was all sootable
like.  They're a handy lot, so I promise you, and used to work with me."

"Oh, I know all about that, Tom, and I should be glad to have you."

"Thankye, sir; and you'll try, sir?"

"I will, Tom."

"Thankye again, sir, and I'll tell the lads."

"I make no promise, mind," said the midshipman.

"I know, sir; it's all right, sir.  It'll be like this.  Mr Munday will
take the lead, sir, with one lot; old Dempsey another; you the next, and
then Mr Roberts, sir, and the first luff'll be like tip-top of all.  I
shouldn't wonder a bit, sir, if me and my squad falls to you."

Murray never troubled himself to analyse whether it was accident or
management, but somehow or other he found himself, soon after the return
of the second cutter, in command of six of the best foremast men of the
sloop's crew, headed by Tom May, who bore a lighted ship's lantern,
while each man was provided with a bundle of dry, easily-igniting wood.

The men were drawn up and the first lieutenant gave his very brief
instructions as to the way in which the fires were to be started, the
officers in command being duly urged to exercise all care in making the
conflagration thorough, while at the same time guarding against
surprise.

"You see, gentlemen," said the lieutenant in conclusion, "we have not
had a sight of one of the blacks, but we may be sure that they are in
hiding not far away, ready to take advantage of any sign of weakness;
and their spears are not very sharp, but are handled well and can be
thrown a long way with good aim.  In an ordinary way they would not risk
our bullets, and certainly would not give our bayonets a chance, but I
feel that the sight of their burning village will rouse them up, and
hence an attack upon scattered men is very possible.  I have _no_ more
to say but this; I want the village to be burned to ashes, and every man
to get back to the boats unhurt."

The men cheered, and the next minute they had begun to open out till
they were in line ready to advance, with the now briskly blowing wind,
when a final order was given in the shape of a prolonged whistle from
the boatswain, which was followed by the starting forward of the
extended firing party with their freshly ignited torches blazing high.

"Bravo!" cried Murray excitedly, as he stood with Tom May behind ten of
the bee-hive shaped palm-walled and thatched huts, which were so close
together that five of his men were easily able to fire to right and
left, Tom and another man musket-armed ready to cover them, and their
young leader standing sword in one hand, the lantern in the other, well
on the watch, and at the same time ready to supply fresh ignition to any
of the rough torches which should become extinct.

"Bravo!" shouted Murray, for at the first start of his little party the
torches were applied to the dry inflammable palm fabrics, and the flames
sprang into fiery life at once.  "Good, my lads--good!  That's right,"
he cried.  "Right down at the bottom.  Couldn't be better."

For at the first application there was a hiss, then a fierce crackling
sound, and the fire literally ran up from base to crown of the rounded
edifice, which was soon roaring like a furnace.

"Hooray, boys!" cried Tom May.  "Don't stop to save any of the best
chayney or the niggers' silver spoons and forks.  They belong to such a
bad lot that we won't loot anything to save for prizes.  And I say,
that's it, going fine.  Never mind getting a bit black with the smoke.
It'll all wash off, and that's what these brutes of niggers can't do."

The men shouted in reply and roared with laughter at their messmates'
sallies, as they hurried from hut to hut, every one blazing up as
rapidly as if it had been sprinkled with resin.

Murray's idea was that they would be able to keep on steadily in a
well-ordered line, firing hut after hut as they went; but in a very few
minutes, in spite of discipline, he soon found that it would be
impossible to follow out his instructions.  Once the fire was started it
roared up and leaped to the next hut or to those beyond it.  The heat
became insufferable, the smoke blinding, so that the men were confused
and kept on starting back, coughing, sneezing, and now and then one was
glad to stand stamping and rubbing his hair, singed and scorched by the
darting tongues of flame.

"Hold together, my lads; hold together!" shouted Murray.  "We must look
to ourselves; the others will do the same; but keep on shouting so as to
be in touch."

"Ay, ay, sir!" cried Tom May.  "You hear, my lads?"

Half-heard shouts came back out of the smoke, but it soon became
impossible to communicate with the men with anything like regularity,
for the roar and crackle of the flames grew deafening, many of the
bamboo posts exploding like muskets, and before long Murray had hard
work to satisfy himself that the men were not using their pieces.

"That you, Tom May?" he cried, at last, as he became aware of a dimly
seen figure emerging from the smoke.

"Not quite sure, sir," was the reply, "but I think it's me."

"Where are the lads?"

"Oh, they're here, sir, somewheres, only you can't see 'em.  I've just
been counting of 'em over, sir, by touching 'em one at a time and
telling 'em to shout who it was."

"They're all safe, then?"

"Hope so, sir; but I wouldn't try to go no furder, sir.  Now the fire's
started it's a-going on like furnaces, sir, and it's every man for
himself.  We can't do no more.  Can't you feel how the wind's got up?"

"Yes, Tom; it comes rushing from seaward and whistles quite cold against
the back of my head, while in front the glow is quite painful."

"Yes, sir, and it's growing worse and worse."

"It's my belief, Tom, that this wind will fan the flames till the forest
will take fire before long as well as the huts."

"'Fore long, sir?" said the man, in the intervals of coughing and
choking.  "Why, it's been on fire ever so long, and roaring away right
up to the tops of the trees.  We shall be hearing some of them come
toppling down before long."

"I wish this smoke would blow over, for I can't make out where we are."

"No, sir, nor nobody else neither.  Oh!  Here's one of us, if it ain't a
nigger.  Here, who are you?"

"I'm Jenks, messmet, I think," came hoarsely.  "But I say, where's the
orficer?"

"I'm here, Jenks," cried Murray.  "What is it?"

"On'y this, sir; I just wanted to know whether fresh clothes'll be
sarved out after this here job, for I'm sure as I shan't be decent."

"What, have you got your shirt burned, my lad?"

"'Tarn't on'y my shirt, sir; I'm 'most all tinder, and I had to back out
or I should soon ha' been cooked."

"Keep back, my lads!" cried Murray now, and by degrees he managed to get
his little party all together in what seemed to be an open space where
all was smoke and smouldering ashes, where the men stood coughing, while
the heat was terrific.

"Stand still, my lad; stand still!" cried Murray.

"Can't, sir," growled the dim figure addressed; "it smarts so."

"Tut, tut, tut, tut!" ejaculated Murray.  "Can you make out which way
the sea lies, May?"

"No, sir; I've been a-trying to."

"We can't stay here, my lads, and we must make for the shore.  It would
be madness to go on now."

"That's a true word, sir," growled Tom May.

"I want to know where our chaps are, but I can't hear nothing but the
fire going it.  Seems to me as if we've set all Africa afire, and it's
going on a mile a minute."

"Who knows where the slave barrack lies?" cried Murray.  "It seems
horrible, but we must make sure that the fire has caught there."

"Seems to me, sir," said one of the men, "that we're a-standing in the
middle of it here."

"I know it ketched fire, sir," said May.

"How can you be sure, man?" said Murray angrily, for he was smarting
with pain, and forced to close the lids over his stinging eyes.

"Set it afire myself, sir, and the flames run up the bamboo postesses
which set 'em snapping and crackling and going on popping and banging
just as if the marine jollies was practising with blank cartridge on an
exercise day."

"But are you sure, Tom?"

"Sure as sure, sir.  Mr Anderson never thought it would go like this
here.  He'd got a kind of idee that we should be able to light all the
niggers' huts one at a time, 'stead of which as soon as we started a few
on 'em they set all the rest off, and the job was done."

"Done, my man!" said Murray.  "Why, hark at the roar right away yonder."

"Oh, yes, sir," grumbled the man; "I'm a-harking fast enough.  There she
goes, and as somebody said, I dunno now whether it was me or one of my
messmates, we seem to ha' set all Africa going, and it won't stop till
there's no more wood to burn."

"Well," said Murray decisively, "one thing's very plain: we can do no
more, and we must make for the river."

"But what about orders, sir?" said the man.  "We was to do it thorough,
and see as the whole blessed place was a-blazing."

"Well, it is, my man," said Murray.  "The first lieutenant didn't mean
me to get my men burned as well."

"Skeercely, sir," said one of the men.  "I don't know how my messmates
are, but I feel as if I was a bacon pig after killing time, and the
singeing's done."

"Forward, then, and keep close, my lads.  I think it looks lighter ahead
there.  Keep together."

The midshipman started forward through the blinding smoke, panting and
gasping, while at every step the hot ashes emitted sparks and the heat
became more intense.  But at the end of a score of painful paces a
strong hand gripped him by the arm and a hoarse voice growled--

"Beg pardon, sir, but this here won't do."

"Right, May," cried the midshipman.  "I was just going to say so.  Halt,
my lads.  Here, right wheel!"

_Tramp, tramp, tramp_, with the smoke and sparks rising; and the big
sailor growled again in protest.

"Wuss and wuss, sir."

"Yes.--Let's try this way, my lads."

"This here's wusser still, your honour," growled another of the men.

"Yes: it's horrible," cried Murray.  "Halt!  Now, all together, shout
with me, `_Seafowl_ ahoy!'"

The men shouted, and then again, three times, but elicited no reply, and
the roar and crackle of the blazing forest seemed to increase.

"Here, which of you can make out where the river lies?" cried Murray.

"Not me, sir," grumbled one of the men out of the stifling smoke, "or
I'd soon be into it!"

"Here, once more.  I don't think we have tried this way," cried Murray,
almost in despair.  "Look, Tom May, this does look a little lighter,
doesn't it?--No," continued the lad huskily, and without waiting for the
able-seaman's reply.  "Here, try this way, for the flames seem to be
mounting higher there.  Keep up your pluck, my lads, and follow me.  Are
you all there?"

"Ay, ay, sir!" cried the sailor.  "We're all here, arn't we, messmates?"

"Ay, ay!" came in a deep growl.

"Then follow me close," said Murray.  "Everything depends upon your
keeping together."

"Oh, we'll keep together, sir," said May.  "Won't we, messmates?"

"Ay, ay!" said another of the men.  "But I don't quite like this here
job."

"No, no, my lads; it's horrible for you," said Murray, as he tramped on,
fighting with his despair.

"'Tarn't wuss for us, sir, than it is for you," said Tom.

"Poor fellows!" thought the midshipman, and he ground his teeth with
rage and pain.  "But I ought to have led them better."  Then aloud, as
an idea struck him, "You, Tom, fire a shot upward, and then as he
reloads, the next man fire, as I give orders.  The others listen for the
reply.  Some of our fellows must hear the shots.--Halt!"

The men stood together in the deep gloom, for the smoke rose from around
them in every direction.

Then, heard distinctly above the roar and crackle of the flames, came
the clear sharp-sounding report of the seaman's musket.

"Number two make ready!" cried Murray, and then, "What's that?"  For
something passed them with a faint hiss, and as it seemed to the lad,
stuck in the smoking earth.

"Spear, I think, sir," growled Tom May.

"Impossible!  Piece of bamboo or palm fallen from above.  Now then,
Number Two--Fire!"

There was the sharp report, followed directly by another whishing sound
and a thud in the earth.

"Spear it is," growled May.

"Ay, ay," said another of the party; "and I've got it too!"

"Hush!  Silence there!" whispered Murray excitedly.  "Not wounded, my
lad?"

"Nay, sir," came in a subdued voice, "but it would have stuck in my
shirt, on'y it was gone to tinder and wouldn't hold nowt.  Here it is,
though, sir--nigger's spear, and they can see us, though we can't see
them."

"From which way did it come?"

"Way we're going, sir," said the man, in a muffled voice; and as he
spoke once more came the whish of a well-thrown spear, making another of
the men wince, and proving plainly from which direction the missile had
come.

The imminence of the fresh danger made the little party forget their
sufferings, and with the quickness of highly disciplined men, they were
apt to obey the orders whispered sharply by the midshipman.  They fell
into line, made ready, and at the command given by their officer, six
muskets flashed out, sending their bullets whizzing breast high through
the smoke, out of which, as if crossing them, came as many spears, this
time the deadly missiles being followed by a burst of savage yells.

"Load!" whispered Murray, as the yells were followed by a silence so
strange and nerve-startling that the young officer felt his heart thump
heavily against his breast.

Then, as the whistling of the air arose caused by the driving down of
the cartridges, he bethought himself and uttered a hurried question--

"Any one hurt?"

"Yes, sir," came in Tom May's familiar voice; and the midshipman, new to
the heart-stirring horrors of a real engagement, waited anxiously for
the man's next words.

"None of us, sir," came after what seemed to be a long pause, "but some
o' them got it bad and made 'em yell and run i'stead o' keeping on the
slink."

"Hah!" ejaculated Murray, as he pressed his hand to his painfully
throbbing breast.  "I thought you meant--"

"Our lads, sir?  Oh no; we're all right: the enemy, sir.  That volley
started 'em.  I heard 'em rush off quite plain.  Like us to give 'em
another?"

Murray was silent as he stood straining his eyes and ears, to pierce the
smoke and hear the _whish_ of another spear.

"No," he said, at last, in a low tone full of relief, "waste of powder;"
and then he started, and gave vent to a cry of joy.  "Hear that, my
lads?"  For from some distance away to their left came a shout which
meant in this peril-fraught position, help and the companionship of
friends.

"Ay, ay, sir," cried Tom May.

"Shout, lads--shout!" cried Murray excitedly; and as a hearty _Ahoy_!
rang out the lad winced, for he felt that he had given an order which
would show the enemy once more where they were, and he once more
strained his senses in the full expectation of the coming of another
spear.

But he gave vent to his pent-up breath with a feeling of intense relief,
as instead of the _whish_ of a spear came another hearty "ahoy!" from
certainly nearer at hand, followed by the tramp of feet and the
crackling sound of charred wood.

"Where are you?" came directly after, in a well-known voice.

"Here, sir!" cried Murray.  "Forward, my lads!"  And the men followed
him at the double.

"This way," cried the same voice.  "That you, Mr Murray?"

"Yes, sir," replied the midshipman, halting his men in the smoke,
feeling more than seeing that they were close up to their friends.

"All your men there?"

"Yes, sir.  None hurt," replied the lad.

"That's good!  Spears have begun to fly, for the enemy are creeping up
through the smoke.  You started the huts burning, of course?" he
continued, after a pause.

"Yes, sir; burning everywhere."

"Exactly, Mr Murray.  I think the work has been thoroughly done, and I
am glad you found us, for I am getting to be at fault as to how to reach
the shore.  There, I can hear nothing of our friends, so you had better
lead on.  I suppose they have made for the boats."

"Lead on, sir?" faltered Murray.

"Yes, sir," cried the chief officer petulantly; "and don't repeat my
words in that absurd way.  Haven't we had enough of this stifling
smoke?"

"But I thought you had come to help us, sir."

"To help you, sir?  Why, weren't you firing to let us know the way out
of this horrible furnace?"

"No, sir--at the blacks who were hemming us in and throwing their
spears.  Don't you know the way down to the boats?"

"No, my lad," cried the lieutenant angrily.  "Tut, tut, tut!  What a
mess, to be sure!--Silence there!  Listen.--Well," he continued, after
some minutes, during which nothing but an occasional crack from some
half-burned bamboo reached their ears.  "There, we must give a shout or
two.  I don't know, though, Mr Murray; you said that the blacks had
begun throwing their spears?"

"Yes, sir; so did you."

"Yes, Mr Murray, and if we begin shouting all together we shall be
bringing them again."

"That's what I thought, sir."

"Well, what of that, sir?" cried the officer petulantly; and for the
moment it seemed to the lad that his superior had caught the captain's
irritating manner.  "So would any sensible person.  Here, I have it!
Pass the word for Mr Dempsey.  The boatswain's whistle will bring the
stragglers all together."

"But Mr Dempsey is not with us," suggested Murray.

"Then where in the name of common sense is he, sir?  He had his
instructions--strict instructions to keep well in touch with the rest;
and now in the emergency, just when he is wanted he is not to be found.
Listen, all of you.  Can you hear anything?"

There was plenty to hear, for the half-burned posts of the savage town
or the fragments of the forest still kept up a petillation, and flames
flashed up here and there and emitted more smoke; but no one ventured to
speak.

"Bah!" ejaculated the chief officer angrily.  "We shall never get out of
the smoky maze like this.  Now then, all together, my lads, when I give
the word; a good hearty shout; but every man make ready, and at the
first spear thrown fire in the direction--fire low, mind--Who's that--
Mr Murray?"

"Yes, sir," whispered the lad, who had suddenly laid a hand upon his
officer's arm.  "I fancy I can hear the rustling of steps away to the
left, as if the enemy is creeping nearer."

"Fancy, of course, sir!" snapped out the officer.  "Bare-footed savages
are not likely to be stealing amongst these red-hot ashes."

_Bang_! and directly after _bang! bang_!  The reports of three muskets
rang out in a dull half-smothered way, followed by a piercing yell and a
distinctly heard rush of feet.  Then once more silence, which was broken
by a low hail close at hand.

"Who's that?" cried the lieutenant.

"May it is, sir," responded that individual.  "Here's one on 'em, sir,
as has got it."

"Who is it?" whispered the lieutenant, accompanying his question with an
ejaculation full of vexation.

"Oh, I dunno, your honour--Sambo or Nigger Dick, or Pompey, sir.  But
he'll never answer to his name again.  Here he is, spear and all."

"One of the enemy whom you shot down?" said the lieutenant, in a tone
full of relief.

"Not me shot him, sir, but one of my messmates."

"Speak softly, my man," said the lieutenant, "and be all ready to fire
again.  I'm afraid they've been creeping up all round."

"Not all round, sir," said the sailor, "but a whole lot on this side,
and them three shots drifted them.  There was a regular rush as soon as
the lads opened fire."

"Good," said the lieutenant.  "But they may be coming on again.  Stand
fast, my lads, ready to fire at the slightest sound.  I don't know how
they can stand it, Mr Murray," he added, "for I feel as if my boot
soles are being burned through.--Yes: what were you going to say--that
yours are as bad?"

"No, sir," replied the lad excitedly; "I was going to suggest that the
men who fired should stand fast."

"Why, of course, my lad; but why?"

"Because, sir, they can tell the direction in which they fired, and know
the way in which the enemy retreated."

"Of course, sir; but what good will that do?"

"It ought to be the way in which their friends are gathered, and the
opposite direction to that in which we ought to retreat."

"Good, my lad," said the lieutenant, clapping the lad on the shoulder.
"You'll make a smart officer some day.  I should not have thought of
that.  It may prove to be the way towards the shore.  We'll draw off at
once.  Oh!" he added.  "If a good sharp breeze would spring up, to drive
off this smoke!"

"But wouldn't it set the remains of the fire blazing up again, sir?"

"Here, Murray," whispered the officer pettishly, "you'd better take
command of the expedition.  You are sharper than I am."

"I beg your pardon, sir."

"Not at all.  I'm not so weak as to resent hearing a good suggestion.
You are quite right, my lad.  I only wonder that your brain keeps so
clear in the horrible confusion this smoke brings on.  Here, let's put
your suggestion into use.  Where's Tom May?"

"Here, sir."

"Can you tell which way the enemy retreated?"

"For sartin.  This here nigger's lying on his back with his head pynted
the way his party came from--shot right through his chesty; and there's
a spear, sir, sticking slahntindickler in the ashes as shows the way
which it was throwed from.  Both being from the same bearings seems to
say, sir, as that's the way the niggers would run."

"Humph!" ejaculated the lieutenant thoughtfully.  "Not quite sure, my
man?"

"No, sir, but I heerd them seem to run same way, so I thought it was a
bit likely, sir."

"Likely enough for us to follow, my lad," said the officer; "so lead
off, and keep on in the direction you think that the shore will lie."

"Can't do that, sir," said the man bluntly.  "Only think, sir, as it
will be farthest from where the enemy came."

"Lead on," said the officer shortly.  "It's the best thing for us now.
Forward, my lads.  You, Mr Murray, keep alongside of me.  We'll bring
up the rear."

The retreat began, with the midshipman nowise happy in his own mind, for
he could not help feeling that after all they might be marching into
fresh difficulties instead of towards safety; but before long, as they
tramped on over the heated ashes, suffering badly, for they began to
inhale more and more the heated dust thrown up by their men's feet, they
had something else to think of, for Murray suddenly caught hold of his
officer's arm to check him.

"Don't, do that, my lad," came in response.  "It's as dark as can be,
and if we are left behind we shall be worse off than ever."

"Yes, sir," whispered the midshipman; "but listen."

"I am listening, Mr Murray, and I can hear the crackling of the men's
shoes as they trample up the burning embers.  That's what you hear."

"Yes, sir, but something more."

"Eh?  What?"

"Listen again, sir.  Just stop for a moment."

The officer stopped short on the instant, and then caught the lad by the
arm.

"Forward," he whispered, "and keep step with me.  Close up to the men,
and we'll halt, fall into line, give the brutes time to get within
throwing distance for their spears, and then give them a volley.  You
are quite right, Mr Murray.  Your ears are sharper than mine.  We are
followed, my lad, and if we hear their footsteps cease we must dash
forward to put our movement into effect, for they will have halted to
throw their weapons.--Yes, they are creeping after us quite fast now."

"Yes, sir; I can hear them quite plainly."

"Never mind so long as we don't feel them quite plainly, Murray, my
lad," continued the officer, with a faint laugh.  "I don't know how you
feel, my boy, but I am suffering from a peculiar tickling sensation
about the upper part of my spine.  It is a sort of anticipation of the
coming of a spear; and the worst of it is that we can't run, though I'll
be bound to say you feel as if you would like to.  Now, frankly, don't
you?"

"Yes, sir," said the lad; "I'd give anything to run now, as fast as I
could."

"That's honest, Mr Murray," said the lieutenant, in a low, eager
whisper, and he squeezed his companion's arm.  "But then, you see, we
can't.  That's the worst of being an officer, Murray, with all his
responsibilities.  If we were to run we should throw our men into
confusion by causing a panic.  If the officer shows the white feather
his men will whisk it out directly, and, what is worse, they will never
believe in him again, and that would not do, would it?"

"No, sir," said Murray quietly; "but I've got that tickling sensation in
my back badly now."

"Of course you have, Murray, but not so bad as I have, I'm sure."

"Oh, I don't know, sir," said the lad, rather huskily.

"Better not talk, Mr Murray," said the first lieutenant; "the ashes are
getting into your throat."

"Think it's that, sir?"

"Some of it, my boy.  Well, no: it does not do for officers to be too
sure.  We'll say it is, though.  Nasty sensation, however, that of
feeling your enemies are waiting to hurl a spear through the air with
such an aim that it will stick right into your back."

"Yes, sir; it's a horrible sensation."

"But we must put up with it, Murray," continued the lieutenant, "and be
thankful that chance comes to our help."

"Chance, sir?"

"Yes: the savages may miss us, for we are on the move, and besides, it
is very smoky and hard for them to take aim.  These blacks have very
sharp eyes, but I doubt whether they get more than a shadowy glimpse of
us, even at the nearest.  You see, we have not had a man hit as far as
we know.  But speaking seriously, Murray, my lad, I do think that we
officers have the worst of it, and the men the best.  We have to cover
them and lead them, and a good officer would never think of setting his
men to do anything we would not do ourselves.  There, Mr Murray, I have
finished my lecture upon an officer's duty, and I have only to add that
I think you have behaved very well."

"Thankye, sir," said Murray drily; "but, begging your pardon, sir, what
about you?"

"About me?  Oh, I'm old and seasoned, my dear boy.  And besides, I don't
think that if we had been hit, a spear would kill."

"But it would make a very ugly wound, sir."

"Horrible, my boy, so let's hope none of our brave fellows will be
giving the doctor a job.  Now then, quick; double up to the lads, and
we'll halt and fire, for the enemy are getting too close to be pleasant,
and it's time that they had a check."



CHAPTER TEN.

HARD TIMES.

It was, quite, for the rustling behind seemed to be terribly near, and
it was with a feeling of intense relief that the lad felt his arm
pressed, and fell into step with his officer, who directly after cried
"Haiti" in a low, stern voice, and formed his men in line, before giving
the orders: "Make ready!  Fire!"

Quite time, for spears and bullets crossed, the former in a curve, the
latter direct, and drawing from the enemy yells of mingled defiance,
rage and pain.

"That's give it 'em, sir," whispered Tom May, who was close to Murray,
and he made his rifle hiss as he rammed down a fresh cartridge.

"Any one hurt?" asked the lieutenant, in a low, eager tone.

"I got a spear a-sticking in me, sir," said one of the men, in the same
subdued tone of voice, "but I can't say as it hurts."

"Let me see," said Murray excitedly, and he stepped to where the man was
standing tugging at himself instead of following his comrades' example
and reloading.

"Don't think you can see, sir! it's so smoky.  Would you mind ketching
hold here and giving a good pull?"

As the man spoke, the midshipman did as he was requested, so far as to
take hold of the shaft of a spear.  But there he stopped short, his
imagination suggesting consequences to which he gave voice in a
strangely unnatural tone.

"I daren't draw it out," he said.  "It may be wrong to do so."

"But I can't march with a thing like that all wibble wobble at every
step, sir."

"Then you must be helped, my lad," said Murray hastily.  "If I draw it
out the wound may burst out bleeding."

"Think so, sir?"

"Yes.  You must be helped back till the doctor has seen to you."

"Here, what is it?" said a familiar voice out of the gloom.

"Titely has a spear through his shoulder, sir."

"Tut, tut, tut!  Here, let me look."

"Oh, never mind me, sir," said the injured man; "it don't hurt much,
on'y feels like a scratch; but it's orfly in the way."

"Who's this?" asked the lieutenant.

"Murray, sir."

"Let me see.  Yes: right through, evidently."

"He wants it drawn out, sir," said the midshipman, and he was holding up
the spear-shaft where he stood facing the injured man; "but it would be
dangerous to meddle with it, wouldn't it, sir?"

"Yes, certainly," said the lieutenant.  "He must be helped back.  What's
that?"

"More spears, sir," growled Tom May, as there was the whizz and thud of
the missiles once more.

"Present!  Fire!" said the lieutenant sharply; and a fresh volley was
fired, with the result of a rush of feet being plainly heard from the
enemy, now in full retreat.

"Keep silence, my lads," said the lieutenant, who had been waiting till
the thudding of the ramrods came to an end and denoted that the little
party was once more ready to deliver fire.

Silence ensued, save where Murray stood half supporting the wounded man.

"Here, give it a good pull, Mr Murray, sir," whispered the man.  "I'll
hold a couple o' plugs ready for you to stop the bleeding."

"No, no, my man; you must be patient," whispered Murray sympathetically.

"But I can't be patient, sir.  You don't know what it means."

"Does it pain you so much?"

"No, sir; not so werry much.  I can bear it well enough, but it makes me
feel as if I'd got a skewer through me."

"Silence there," said the lieutenant.

"It's all very fine," muttered the man; and then, leaning towards
Murray, "Say, sir, these here niggers on the coast are cannibals, aren't
they?"

"Yes, some of them, I believe," whispered back the midshipman.

"Don't leave me behind, then," said the man softly, and he uttered a low
chuckling laugh.  "I don't want 'em to come upon me and find a fellow
skewered and trussed ready for cooking."

"Can't you keep that man quiet, Mr Murray?" said the lieutenant
angrily, and he came up to where the pair stood together.  "It's like
telling the enemy where to throw again, for they are wonderfully quick
of hearing."

"I am trying, sir," whispered the midshipman, "but I wish you would
place your hand here."

"Place your hand there, Mr Murray!" said the officer, in a voice full
of vexation.  "I have no time to feel the poor fellow's wound."

"But it isn't quite that, sir," said the lad.  "I can't help thinking--"

"Think, then, sir, but don't bother me."

"I can't help it, sir," whispered the lad excitedly.

"What do you mean, Mr Murray?" said the officer, alarmed by the lad's
excitement.  "Don't say you are wounded too?"

"No, sir, and I don't think that Titely has got anything worse than a
scratch."

"Eh?"

"Feel here, sir.  The spear has gone right through the bandolier and his
shirt from the front and gone out through the shirt and bandolier at the
back, running all up a bit."

"Well, but what about the poor fellow's flesh and bone?" said the
officer excitedly.

"I think it's only gone through the skin, sir."

"Yes, that's right," said the man.  "I telled Mr Murray, sir, as I
didn't think I should bleed much if he pulled the skewer out."

"We must wait for daylight, my lad--till the smoke lifts.  Ah, what are
you doing?"

"On'y wiggling the spear a little, sir," replied the man gruffly.  "Just
give a tug at it.  Does hurt a bit.  I seem to have teared some'at.
There, I knowed it!  You try, Mr Murray, sir; you can lift it like now,
and--yes, that's it.  I'm a-shoving it back'ards and for'ards, and it
moves the cross-belt and my shirt, and nothing else."

"But, my good fellow--" began the officer.

"It's all right, sir.  I've shoved my hand right under my shirt and over
my shoulder.  It's just bleeding a little, but--well, it's about the
humbuggin'est humbug of a wound I ever knowed a chap to have.  Here, Mr
Murray sir, you ketch hold of my cross-belt fore and aft, and if his
honour wouldn't mind giving the spear a haul through the belt I shall be
as right as can be."

The two officers obeyed the man's request and stood holding spear and
belt, but hesitated to proceed farther.

"That hurt, my lad?" said the lieutenant.

"Hurt, sir?  Not a bit.  On'y feels preciously in the way."

"Got hold tightly, Mr Murray?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then, now then."

It took more than one good tug, but after the first tentative trial,
which seemed to cause the man no suffering, the first lieutenant pulled
hard, and at last drew the spear right through the two pierced portions
of the tough buff leather.

"That's your sort, gentlemen," said the man.  "Here, who's got my
musket?"

"Steady, my lad," said the lieutenant.  "Now, then, do you feel faint?"

"Orfle, sir, inside," said the man, "but I want a drink o' water worst."

"But are you in pain?" asked Murray.

"Smarts a bit, but it don't hardly bleed at all.  I'm all right, sir,
only tickles enough to make a chap a bit savage.  Here, don't you worry
about me, sir.  I'm as fit as a fiddle, gentlemen, and I on'y want now
to play the niggers such a toon as'll make them jump again."

"Hah!" ejaculated the lieutenant.  "Only a bit of a false alarm, Mr
Murray."

"Thankye, sir.  Yes, that's right.  Does me good to grip my musket
again."

"Then try and use it, Titely," said the midshipman, "for here they come
again.--Yes, May; we hear them."

The lieutenant's command was given directly after, and again a volley
rang out, this time to check the enemy's advance and drive them back so
thoroughly that the silence was once more intense; and as the party
stood with strained ears, listening, Murray uttered an exclamation.

"What is it, Mr Murray?"

"Firing, sir.  I heard shots."

"Are you sure?"

"I heerd it too, sir," said the injured man.

"Attention there!" said the lieutenant sharply.

"One, two, and three from the left make ready.  Present--Fire!"

The three shots rang out like one, and directly after they were replied
to, the reports sounding faintly enough but perfectly distinguishable
through the distance.

The lieutenant waited while twenty could be counted, and then ordered
the men to fire again.  This drew forth a reply, and so evidently from
the same direction that the order was given for the party to march; but
directly after the lieutenant called _Halt_, for from behind them and
quite plainly from the direction they were leaving, came the deep-toned
_thud_ of a heavy gun.



CHAPTER ELEVEN.

"THE SMOKE'S LIFTING."

"Well done, _Seafowl_!" said the lieutenant, and the men gave a cheer
which drew forth a "Silence!" from the officer.

"You're holloaing before you're out of the wood, my lads," he said.
"Ah, there they go again--nearer too.  Those must be Mr Munday's or Mr
Dempsey's men.  Halt, and stand fast, my lads.  Let's give them a chance
to join, and then we can retire together.  No doubt, Mr Murray, about
the direction we ought to take."

"No, sir," replied the midshipman, "and we are going to be quite out of
our misery soon."

"What do you mean, my lad?"

"The smoke's lifting, sir."

"To be sure, my lad, it is.  A cool breeze too--no--yes, that's from the
same direction as the _Seafowl's_ recall shot.  If it had been from the
forest we might have been stifled, after all."

The signals given from time to time resulted in those who had fired
coming before long within hail, and the men who now joined proved to be
a conjunction of the second lieutenant's and boatswain's, who had met
after a long estrangement in the smoke, and without the loss of a man.
Then, as the smoke was borne back by the now increasing sea breeze, the
general retreat became less painful.  They could breathe more freely,
and see their way through the burned forest in the direction of the
anchored sloop.

It was a terribly blackened and parched-up party, though, that struggled
on over the still smoking and painfully heated earth.  For they had no
option, no choice of path.  The forest that lay to left and right was
too dense to be attempted.  There were doubtless paths known to the
natives, but they were invisible to the retreating force, which had to
keep on its weary way over the widely stretching fire-devastated tract
that but a few hours before had been for the most part mangrove thicket
interspersed with palms.  But the men trudged on with all the steady,
stubborn determination of the British sailor, cheered now as they were
by the sight of the great river right ahead, with the sloop of war well
in view; and in place of bemoaning their fate or heeding their
sufferings the scorched and hair-singed men were full of jocular remarks
about each other's state.

One of the first things observable was the fact that to a man all save
the officers were bare-headed, the men's straw hats having suffered
early in the struggle against the flames, while the caps of the officers
were in such dismal plight that it was questionable as to whether it was
worth while to retain them.

Titely, the seaman who had been speared, was the butt of all his
messmates, and the requests to him to show his wound were constant and
all taken in good part; in fact, he seemed to revel in the joke.

But there was another side which he showed to his young officer as,
cheering at intervals, the party began to near the river edge and get
glimpses of the boats waiting with a well-armed party to take them off
to the sloop.

"It's all werry fine, Mr Murray, sir," said Titely, "and I warn't going
to flinch and holloa when one's poor mates wanted everything one could
do to keep 'em in good heart; but I did get a good nick made in my
shoulder, and the way it's been giving it to me all through this here
red-hot march has been enough to make me sing out _chi-ike_ like a
trod-upon dog."

"My poor fellow!" whispered Murray sympathetically.  "Then _you_ are in
great pain?"

"Well, yes, sir; pooty tidy."

"But--"

"Oh, don't you take no notice, sir.  I ought to be carried."

"Yes, of course!  Yes, I'll tell Mr Anderson."

"That you don't, sir!  If you do I shall break down at once.  Can't you
see it's the boys' chaff as has kep' me going?  Why, look at 'em, sir.
Who's going to make a party of bearers?  It's as much as the boys can do
to carry theirselves.  No, no; I shall last out now till I can get a
drink of cool, fresh water.  All I've had lately has been as hot as
rum."

"Hurray!" rang out again and again, and the poor fellows joined in the
cheers, for they could see nothing but the welcome waiting for them, and
feel nothing but the fact that they had gone to clear out the horrible
hornets' nest with fire, and that the task had been splendidly done.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

AFTER THE LESSON.

As the suffering party gathered together upon the river shore
preparatory to embarking in the boats, Murray's first care was to see
that A.B. Titely was placed where he could lie down and rest, and while
looking after the poor fellow, and seeing that he was one of the first
to be helped into the stern sheets of the first cutter, Roberts came up.

"Oh, I say!" he cried.  "Who's that wounded?"

"Hallo!  Who are you?" said his fellow middy sharply.  "Don't disturb
the poor fellow."

"Why, eh?  Yes--no," cried Roberts, with a mock display of interest, "I
was wondering where--well--it can't be!  Why, Frank, you do look a
pretty sweep!  Hardly knew you.  I say: is it you?"

"Is it I, indeed!" growled Murray.  "You're a pretty fellow to try that
on!  Go and look at your face in the water if you can find a still pool.
I might grin at you."

"Am I browned, then--scorched?"

"Are you scorched brown!  No, you are scorched black!  Where are your
eyebrows?  I say, Dick, those two little patches of hair in front of
your ears that you believed were whiskers beginning to shoot--they're
quite gone.  No, not quite; there's a tiny bit left in front of your
right ear."

The conscious lad clapped his hands up to the sides of his face.

"I say, not so bad as that, is it, Frank?  No games; tell us the truth."

"Games?  No, I'm too sore to be making game," cried Murray, and he gazed
carefully at both sides of his messmate's cheeks.  "You're scorched
horribly, and the whisker shoots are all gone--No, there's about half of
one left; and you'll have to shave that off, Dick, so as to balance the
other bare place.  No, no; it's all right; that's not hair, only a
smudge of sooty cinder off your burnt cap.  I say, you do look a beauty,
Dick."

"Oh, I say!" groaned the youth, patting his tingling cheeks
tenderly.--"Here, what are you grinning at, sir?" he cried, turning upon
the wounded sailor angrily.

"Beg pardon, sir.  Was I grinning?" said the sailor apologetically.

"Yes; and he can't help it, Dick.  Don't be hard upon the poor fellow;
he has had a spear through the top of his shoulder.  But you do look an
object!  Enough to make a cat laugh, as they say."

"Well, I don't see that there's anything to laugh at."

"No, old fellow, because you can't see your face; but I say, you can see
mine."

"Humph!" grunted Roberts sulkily, and his fingers stole up to pat the
scorched portions of his face.

"Case of pot and kettle, eh, Dick?" said Murray, laughing, then pulling
his face straight again as he winced with pain.  "Oh, I say, don't make
me grin at you again.  It's just as if my skin was ready to crack all
over.  There, poor old chap, I'm sorry for you if you feel as bad as I
do.  But you began it."

"Beg pardon, then," grumbled Roberts.

"Granted.  But I say, why doesn't Anderson hurry us all on board?"

"I don't know.  Yes, I do," cried the midshipman excitedly.  "The
beggars--they must have quite escaped the fire!  They're gathering
together over yonder, hundreds of them, with spears.  I believe they're
going to make a rush.  Fancy, after destroying the hornets' nest!"

"Then we shall have to kill the hornets," said Murray; and the two lads
were among the first to answer to the boatswain's whistle, which now
chirruped out loudly.

"Here we are, Mr Murray, sir," said Tom May, as the midshipman hurried
up to his little party.  "This is us, sir--your lot."

"Well, I know that," said the lad petulantly, as he winced with pain.

"Beg pardon, sir," said the man.  "Thought you might take us for the
niggers, seeing what colour we are and how our clothes are tumbling
off."

"Yes, we're black enough, Tom, but I hope you don't feel as I do," said
his leader.

"Much of a muchness, sir," said the man, with a grin half of mischievous
mirth, half of pain.  "The first luff said something about hornets, sir.
I don't know much about them insecks, but we chaps feel as if we'd been
among their first cousins the wopses; eh, lads?"

"Ay, ay!" growled another of the men.  "But aren't we soon going to have
a chance to use our stings?"

At that moment the preliminary order rang out--an order which sent a
thrill through the suffering band, making them forget everything in the
opportunity about to be given them for retaliation upon the advancing
body of warlike blacks stealing cautiously forward from the shelter of a
patch of mangroves away to the left, which had from its nearness to the
margin escaped the flames.

"The savage brutes!" muttered Murray, as he drew his sword, and winced
with pain.

"Hold your fire, Mr Murray," shouted the lieutenant.  "Wait, my lads,
till you see the whites of their eyes, and then let them have it sharply
when you hear the word."

But the little volley from the midshipman's party of reserve was held
longer, for the lieutenant's words had little more than passed his lips
when there was a flash, followed by what resembled a ball of grey smoke
from the _Seafowl_ where she lay at anchor.  Then almost instantaneously
came the roar of one of the sloop's bow guns and her charge of canister
shot tore through the sheltering bush-like trees, while a cheer burst
from the shore party, discipline being forgotten in the excitement
caused by what came as a surprise.

The heartily given cheer was followed by another puff of grey smoke, and
the crack of shot through the sheltered trees, the effect being that the
advancing party of the enemy was turned into a running crowd of
fugitives scattering and running for their lives, leaving the boats'
crews to embark quite unmolested, this last example of the white man's
power proving a quite sufficient lesson for the native king.



CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

A VISIT FROM THE HORNETS.

"Upon my word, Mr Anderson," said the captain, as he had the men drawn
up before him as soon as they reached the _Seafowl_--"Upon my word, sir,
I am delighted.  I entrust you with a couple of boats' crews to carry
out a necessary duty, and you bring me back a scorched-up detachment
only fit to go into hospital."

"I beg pardon, sir," said the chief officer shortly; "only one man
wounded, and his injury is very slight."

"Don't talk to me like that, sir!" cried the captain.  "Look at them,
sir--look at them!"

"I have been looking at them, sir, for long enough--poor fellows--and I
am truly sorry to have brought them back in such a state."

"I should think you are, sir!  Upon my word of honour I should think you
are!  But what have you been about?"

"Burning out the hornets' nest, sir," said the lieutenant bluffly.

"Well, I suppose you have done that thoroughly, Mr Anderson: but at
what a cost!  Is there to be no end to these misfortunes?  First you
allow yourself to be deluded by a slave-trading American and bring the
_Seafowl_ up here to be run aground, with the chance of becoming a total
wreck--"

"I beg your pardon, sir!"

"Well, not total--perhaps not total, Mr Anderson; but she is in a
terribly bad position."

"One from which you will easily set her at liberty."

"Fortunately for you, Mr Anderson; and that is to my credit, I think,
not yours."

"Granted, sir," said the lieutenant; "but do you give me the credit of
being tricked by the slave skipper?"

"Well, I suppose I must take my share, Mr Anderson; but don't you think
it would be more creditable to dismiss these poor fellows at once and
have them overhauled by the surgeon?"

"I do, sir, certainly," said the chief officer.

"Have them below, then, at once, and let Mr Reston do his best with
them.  Only one seriously wounded, you said?"

"No, sir; slightly."

"Good.  But to think of the _Seafowl_ being turned at one stroke into a
hospital hulk.--You thoroughly destroyed the town and the slave
barracks?"

"We completely burned out the wretched collection of palm and bamboo
huts, sir, and the horrible barn and shambles where they keep their
wretched captives.  It was a place of horror, sir," said the lieutenant
angrily.  "If you had seen what we saw, sir, you would have felt that no
punishment could be too great for the wretches."

"Humph!  I suppose not, Mr Anderson.  And that iniquitous Yankee
scoundrel who has slipped through my fingers.  But look here, Mr
Anderson, I am going to find that wretch; and when I do--yes, when I do!
He has had the laugh of me, and I was too easily deceived, Anderson;
but I'm going to follow that fellow across the Atlantic to where he
disposes of his unfortunate cargo.  It's thousands of miles, perhaps,
and a long pursuit maybe, but we're going to do it, sir, no matter what
it costs, and I hope and believe that my officers and my poor brave
fellows who have suffered what they have to-day will back me up and
strain every nerve to bring the _Seafowl_ alongside his schooner, going
or coming.  Hang him, Mr Anderson!--Ah, I did not mean to say that,
sir; but hang him by all means if you can catch him.  We'll give him the
mercy he has dealt out to these poor unhappy creatures, and for the way
in which my brave fellows have been scorched and singed I'm going to
burn that schooner--or--well, no, I can't do that, for it must be a
smart vessel, and my sturdy lads must have something in the way of prize
money.  Look at them, Mr Anderson; and look at those two!  You don't
mean to tell me that those are officers?"

He pointed at the two midshipmen so suddenly that they both started and
turned to look at each other, then stared at the captain again, and once
more gazed at each other, puzzled, confused, angry and annoyed at their
aspect, looking so comical that the captain's manner completely altered.
He had been gazing at his young officers with an air of commiseration,
and his tones spoke of the anger and annoyance he felt to see the state
they were in; and then all was changed; he turned to the first
lieutenant, whose eyes met his, and, unable to maintain his seriousness,
he burst into a fit of laughter, in which he was joined by the chief
officer.  Then, pulling himself together, he snatched out his
handkerchief and wiped his eyes.

"Bah!" he ejaculated.  "Most unbecoming!  I did not mean this,
gentlemen; the matter is too serious.  But for goodness' sake get below
and make yourselves presentable.  Mr Anderson, you ought not to have
laughed.  See to all the poor fellows, sir.  The men must have fresh
clothes served out, and all who are unfit for duty go into the sick
bay."

Then, frowning severely, he turned sharply upon his heels and marched to
the cabin door.

"Well," exclaimed the first lieutenant, "of all--`Mr Anderson, you
ought not to have laughed!'  Well, gentlemen," he cried angrily, as he
turned upon the two young officers, "pray what do you find to laugh at?
Is my face black?"

"No, sir," cried Murray, in a half-choking voice.  "I beg your pardon,
sir.  It seemed so comic for the captain to turn upon you like that."

"Eh?  Humph!  Well, I suppose it was.  I laughed too.  Well, better
laugh than cry over spilt milk.  It's the excitement, I suppose, and
what we have gone through.  Now then, we had better go below and
interview the doctor; but he will be busy over the lads for a long time
before our turn comes."

"I believe the skipper's half-cracked," said Roberts, as the two lads
went below to their quarters.

"Then I'd keep my opinions to myself, old fellow," grumbled Murray; and
then as he seated himself upon a locker he uttered a low hissing sound
suggestive of pain.

"Pooh!  This is a free country--no, I don't mean that," cried Roberts,
pulling himself up short.  "I mean, every man has a right to his own
opinions."

"Yes, but not to give them aboard a man-o'-war."

"Bah!  We're not slaves.  Haven't we come to suppress slavery?"

"I dare say we have," said Murray, "but you'd better not let the skipper
know that you said he was a bit of a lunatic."

"Shall if I like.  You won't be a sneak and tell.  Why, it was ghastly
to see him turn as he did.  One minute he was speaking feelingly and
letting us all see that he meant to spare no efforts about pursuing and
punishing that Yankee skipper, and the next he was laughing like a
hysterical school-girl."

"He couldn't help it, poor old boy," said Murray.  "Old Anderson was
just as bad, and we caught the infection and laughed too, and so did the
men."

"Well, I can't see what there was to laugh at."

"That's the fun of it.  But it is all through every one being so
overstrung, I suppose.  There, do leave off riddling about your cheeks."

"Who's fiddling, as you call it, about one's cheeks?"

"You were, and it's of no use; the miserable little bits of down are
gone, and there's nothing for it but to wait till the hairs begin to
grow again."

"Er-r-r!" growled Roberts angrily; and he raised his fingers to the
singed spots involuntarily, and then snatched them down again, enraged
by the smile which was beginning to pucker up his companion's face.
"There you go again.  You're worse than the skipper."

"Then don't make me laugh, for it hurts horribly."

"I'll make you laugh on the other side of your face directly."

"No don't--pray don't," sighed Murray; "for the skin there's stiffer,
and I'm sure it will crack."

"You're cracked already."

"I think we must all have been, to get ourselves in such a mess, old
fellow.  But it was very brave, I suppose, and I don't believe any one
but English sailors would have done what we did."

"Pooh!  Any fools could have started those fires."

"Perhaps so.  But what's the matter now?"  For Roberts had raised his
face from the water he was beginning to use, with an angry hiss.

"Try and bathe your face, and you'll soon know."

"Feel as if the skin was coming off?  Well, we can't help it.  Must get
rid of the black.  The skin will grow again.  But I'm thinking of one's
uniform.  My jacket's like so much tinder."

A wash, a change, and a visit to the doctor ended with the sufferers
being in comparative comfort, and the two lads stood and looked at each
other.

"Hasn't improved our appearance, Dick," said Murray.

"No; but you must get the barber to touch you up.  One side of your
curly wig is singed right off, and the other's fairly long."

"I don't care," cried Murray carelessly.  "I'm not going to bother about
anything.  Let's go on deck and see what they're about."

Roberts was quite willing, and the first man they encountered was the
able-seaman Titely.

"Why, hallo!" cried Murray.  "I expected you'd be in hospital."

"Me, sir!  What for?"

"Your wound."

"That warn't a wound, sir; only a snick.  The doctor put a couple o'
stitches in it, and then he made a sorter star with strips o' stick-jack
plaister.  My belt got the worst of it, and jest look at my hair, sir.
Sam Mason scissored off one side; the fire did the other.  Looks nice
and cool, don't it?"

The man took off his new straw hat and held his head first on one side
and then the other for inspection.

"Why, you look like a Turk, Titely," said Murray.

"Yes, I do, sir, don't I?  Old Sam Mason's clipping away still.  The
other chaps liked mine so that they wanted theirs done the same.  It's
prime, sir, for this here climate."

"But your wound?" said Roberts.

"Don't talk about it, sir, or I shall be put upon the sick list, and
it's quite hot enough without a fellow being shut up below.  Noo canvas
trousis, sir.  Look prime, don't they?"

"But, Titely," cried Murray, "surely you ought to be on the sick list?"

"I say, please don't say such a word," whispered the man, looking
sharply round.  "You'll be having the skipper and Mr Anderson hearing
on you.  I ain't no wuss than my messmates."

"No, I suppose not," said Roberts, "but--why, they seem to be all on
deck."

"Course they are, sir," said the man, grinning.  "There's nowt the
matter with them but noo shirts and trousis, and they allers do chafe a
bit."

Murray laughed.

"But you ought to be on the sick list."

"Oh, I say, sir, please don't!  How would you young gentlemen like to be
laid aside?"

"But what does the doctor say?  Didn't he tell you that you ought to go
into the sick bay?"

"Yes, sir," said the man, grinning; "but I gammoned him a bit."

"You cheated the doctor, sir!" said Roberts sternly.

"Well, sir, I didn't mean no harm," said the man, puckering up his face
a little and wincing--"I only put it to him like this: said I should
only fret if I went on the sick list, and lie there chewing more than
was good for me."

"Well, and what did he say?"

"Told me I was a himpident scoundrel, sir, and that I was to go and see
him every morning, and keep my left arm easy and not try to haul."

In fact, singeing, some ugly blisters, a certain number of hands that
were bound up by the doctor, and a few orders as to their use--orders
which proved to be forgotten at once--and a certain awkwardness of gait
set down to the stiffness of the newly issued garments--those were all
that were noticeable at the first glance round by the midshipmen, and
apparently the whole crew were ready and fit to help in the efforts
being made to get the sloop out of her unpleasant position in the mud of
the giant river.

As for the men themselves, they were in the highest of spirits, and
worked away hauling at cables and hoisting sail to such an extent that
when the night wind came sweeping along the lower reaches of the river,
the sloop careened over till it seemed as if she would dip her canvas in
the swiftly flowing tide, but recovered almost to float upon an even
keel.  Twice more she lay over again, and then a hearty cheer rang out,
for she rose after the last careen and then began to glide slowly out
into deeper water, just as the captain gave orders for one of the bow
guns to be fired.

"Why was that?" said Murray, who had been busy at his duties right aft.
"Didn't you see?"

"No.  Not to cheer up the men because we were out of the mud?"

"Tchah!  No.  The niggers were beginning to collect again ashore there
by that patch of unburned forest."

"I didn't see."

"That doesn't matter," said Roberts sourly; "but the blacks did, and
felt too, I expect.  Anyhow, they sloped off, and now I suppose we shall
do the same while our shoes are good, for the skipper won't be happy
till we're out to sea again."

"Here, what now?" said Murray excitedly.  "What does this mean?"

"This" meant cheering and excitement and the issuing of orders which
made the deck a busy scene, for the men were beat to quarters ready to
meet what promised to be a serious attack.  For in the evening light
quite a fleet of large canoes crowded with men could be seen coming
round a bend of the river, the blades dipping regularly and throwing up
the water that flashed in the last rays of the sinking sun, while from
end to end the long canoes bristled with spears, and the deep tones of a
war song rhythmically accompanied the dipping of the paddles.

"Why, they must be three or four hundred strong, Anderson," said the
captain.  "Fully that, sir."

"Poor wretches!" muttered the captain.  "I thought we had given them
lesson enough for one day."

"Only enough to set them astir for revenge," said the lieutenant.

"Well, the lesson must be repeated," said the captain, shrugging his
shoulders.  "See what a shot will do with that leading canoe.  We have
come upon a warlike tribe, brave enough, or they would not dare to
attack a vessel like this."



CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

DEALING WITH A FLEET.

"I know what I should do," said Murray, as, forgetting the smarting and
stiffness from which he suffered, he stood watching the savage fleet
steadily gliding down stream.

"What?" said Roberts.

"Get out of the river as soon as I could.  We could sail right away
now."

"Cowardly," grumbled Roberts.  "Why, it would be throwing away the
chance of giving the wretches a severe lesson."

"They've had one," said Murray, "and if we sink half-a-dozen of them
they'll be ready enough to come on again."

"Then we could sink some more.  Why, if you sailed away they'd think we
were afraid of them."

"Let them!  We know better.  It seems a bit horrible with our great
power to begin sending grape and canister scattering amongst these
slight canoes."

"Oh yes, horrible enough; but they must be taught that they can't be
allowed to make war upon other tribes and sell their prisoners into
slavery."

"I suppose so," said the lad, with a sigh, possibly due to the pain he
still felt from the late fight with the flames.

"Look at that," whispered Roberts excitedly.  "Why, the skipper seems to
think as you do."

For orders were given, the capstan manned, and the sloop glided towards
the anchor by which they now swung, the sails began to fill and help the
men in their task, and soon after the anchor stock appeared above the
water.

It was quite time, for the canoes were nearing fast, and to the two
midshipmen it appeared as if the enemy would be alongside and swarming
aboard before their vessel had time to gather way.

"Why don't we fire, Frank?" said Roberts excitedly.

"Because we're not in command," replied Murray coolly, as he tried to
measure mentally the length of time it would take for the leading canoe
to reach them, rapidly advancing as it was in obedience to the lusty
strokes given by some thirty paddles which made the water foam on either
side of the frail craft packed with men.

"But it's absurd.  The skipper ought to have given the order long ago."

"And filled the surface with dead and dying men floating and struggling
amongst the shattered pieces of the canoe?"

"Yes: why not?  It's war, sir--war."

"But war when it is a necessity ought to be carried on in as humane a
fashion as is possible."

"With people like this?  Bah!  Why, if they once get aboard they will
spear us to a man, or batter our heads with their war clubs."

"They would if they could," said Murray quietly.

"They will, I tell you," said Roberts excitedly.

"No, they will not, old chap, for the skipper won't let them."

"Oh, you!" exclaimed Roberts, who stamped one foot down upon the deck in
his excitement.  "Why, you are as foolish as our officers."

"Speak gently, or some one will be hearing you," said Murray quietly.

"I want some one to hear me!" exclaimed the lad.  "We are giving all our
chances away."

"That we are not!  I've been trying to calculate how we shall stand for
distance when the _Seafowl_ glides off on the other tack."

"So have I," cried Roberts furiously, "and it will be with the crews of
two of those war canoes on board spearing and stabbing us."

"Indeed!" said Murray, in quite a drawl.  "That doesn't agree with my
calculation.  I make it that they will be about fifty yards astern, and
beyond spear-throwing distance."

"And I tell you that you are all wrong, Frank."

"Well, one of us is, old chap, for certain."

"You!" said Roberts emphatically.  "No, I think not, old fellow.  You
see, too, that I have the skipper's opinion on my side."

"The skipper's opinion isn't worth a pinch of powder.  He's a
crack-brained lunatic.  Here, what do you mean by that?"

"Only to turn my hand into a tompion to stop your fiery, foolish words,
old fellow," replied Murray.  "You'd look nice if any one carried your
remarks to the captain."

"I'm only doing my duty, sir, and am trying to save our ship from the
attack of these savages who are bearing down upon us."

"And setting your knowledge of navigation and the management of the
_Seafowl_ above that of the captain."

"I tell you I have lost faith in the skipper."

"Of the lieutenant--"

"He does not see our peril."

"And the wisdom of our old and experienced warrant officers," continued
Murray.

"There," said the midshipman, "look at that!  Not a shot fired, and
those two leading canoes abreast of us.  There'll be a massacre
directly."

"Bravo!" whispered Murray excitedly.  "Wonderfully done!  You miserable
old croaker, wasn't that splendid?"

A minute before, the lad who had remained cool and self-contained during
what seemed to be a perilous time, had watched without comprehending the
action of the forward guns' crews, who, in obedience to the orders given
by the first lieutenant, seized upon the capstan bars and stood ready to
starboard and port, waiting for something anticipated.

Then as the _Seafowl_ answered to her helm and Roberts was turning
frantic with excitement as he felt that the savages were bound to be
aboard directly, the sloop careened over from the force of the breeze
when her course was altered, there was a dull crashing sound and her
stem cut one long war canoe in two amidships, leaving the halves gliding
alongside in company with some fifty or sixty struggling and swimming
naked savages, some of whom began to climb aboard by the stays, others
by the fore chains; but as each fierce black head rose into sight, there
was a tap given by a well-wielded capstan bar, and black after black
dropped back into the water, to glide astern, stunned or struggling, to
be picked up by his companions in the second boat, which was being
overtaken by others, bristling with spears, while the vessel was a
cable's length ahead and steadily increasing its speed.

"Now then, Dick, what about my calculation?" said Murray, giving his
companion a poke in the side.  "Pretty near, wasn't I?"

"Humph!  Luck--chance," grumbled Roberts ill-humouredly.

"Of course!  But wasn't the captain right?"

"No; he ought to have given the savage wretches another lesson."

"A bloodthirsty one," said Murray.  "Pooh!  Don't be such a savage,
Dick."

"I'm not, sir," retorted the midshipman angrily.  "What are our weapons
of war for unless to use?"

"Oh yes; of course, when they are wanted.  If I were a captain I
shouldn't shrink for a minute about firing broadsides and sinking our
enemies in times of necessity, any more than I should have minded
burning out such a hornets' nest as that yonder; but the captain was
quite right over this business.  Look at the wretched creatures,
regularly defeated."

"They've been allowed to escape, sir," said Roberts haughtily, "and I
feel ashamed of our commander."

"I don't," said Murray, laughing.  "I think he's a peculiar eccentric
fellow, ready to say all kinds of unnecessary things; but he's as brave
as a lion--braver, for I believe lions are precious cowards sometimes."

"Pooh!" ejaculated Roberts.

"And the more I know of him the better I like him."

"And I like him the less, and I shall never rest till I can get an
exchange into another ship."

"I don't believe you," said Murray, laughing merrily.

"You don't!  Why--"

"Pst!  The skipper," whispered Murray.

For the captain had approached the two midshipmen, his spy-glass under
his arm and his face puckered up with a good-humoured smile.

"Laughing at it, eh?" he said.  "That was a novel evolution of war,
young gentlemen, such as you never saw before, I'll be bound.  There; we
might have shattered up the noble black king's fleet and left the river
red with what we did and the sharks continued afterwards, but my plan
and the master's conning of the vessel answered all purposes, and left
my powder magazine untouched ready for the time when we shall be
straining every nerve, gentlemen, to overtake that Yankee's schooner.
That's what we have to do, Mr Roberts; eh, Mr Murray?"

"Yes, sir; and the sooner the better," replied the latter.

"The sooner the better?  Yes," said the captain, nodding; "and if we
have to sink her that will be work more worthy for our metal.  But
patience, patience.  Yes; for sailors like better work than sinking a
few savage canoes.  But, as I said, patience.  You hot-blooded boys are
always in such a hurry.  All in good time.  I'm not going to rest till I
have got hold of my smooth, smiling Yankee, and I promise you a treat--
some real fighting with his crew of brutal hounds.  I'll sink his
schooner, or lay the _Seafowl_ alongside, and then--it will be risky but
glorious, and you boys shall both of you, if you like, join the
boarders.  What do you say to that?"

The captain did not wait for an answer, but tucked his telescope more
closely under his arm and marched aft, to stand gazing over the stern
rail at the last of the war canoes, which disappeared directly in one of
the river bends, while the sloop glided rapidly on towards the muddy
river's mouth.

"Well, Dick, how do you feel now?" said Murray, smiling.

Roberts knit his brows into a fierce frown as if ready to resent any
remark his messmate might make.  But the genial, open, frank look which
met his disarmed him of all annoyance, and he cleared his throat with a
cough.

"Oh, I don't agree with him about the treatment of those blacks," he
said.  "There's a want of stern, noble justice about his running down
that canoe."

"But it answered all purposes, Dick."

"Humph!  Maybe; but it looked so small, especially when we had all our
guns loaded and the men ready for action."

"Patience," said Murray merrily, taking up the captain's words.
"Patience!  You boys--hot-blooded boys are always in such a hurry.  Wait
a bit, old chap, and when we catch up to the Yankee we're to have a turn
at the boarding.  You'll have a try, eh?"

"Will I?" said the boy, screwing up his features and setting his teeth
hard.  "Will I!  Yes!"

"Mean it?"

"Yes, I believe so," said Roberts thoughtfully.  "I felt ready for
anything when those war canoes were coming on, and I believe I should
feel just the same if the lads were standing ready to board the
schooner.  But I don't know; perhaps I should be all of a squirm.  I
don't want to brag.  It all depends.  Those who make the most fuss,
Frank, do the least.  We shall see."

"Yes," said Murray, looking at his comrade with a curious, searching
gaze; "we shall see."



CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

THE DOCTOR IS RILED.

It was with a peculiar feeling of relief that all on board the sloop
passed out into the open and saw the dull green banks of the mangrove
forest fading away astern.  For there had been a haunting feeling of
depression hanging over the vessel which seemed to affect the spirits of
officers and men.

"Hah!" said the doctor, coming up to where the two middies were gazing
over the stern rail, "that's a comfort, boys.  I can breathe freely
now."

"Yes," said Murray; "the air seems so much fresher and makes one feel
more elastic, sir.  Gives one more of an appetite."

"What!" said the doctor drily.  "More of an appetite, eh?  I never
noticed that you two wanted that.  Gracious, how much do you want to
devour!"

"Oh, I say, doctor, I don't eat so much," said Murray, protesting.

"No, sir; it isn't _so_ much; it's too much."

"You're mixing us up, doctor," said the lad mischievously, and he gave
the professional gentleman a peculiarly meaning look.  "You were
thinking of Roberts."

"Here, what's that?" said the middy sharply.  "I'm sure I never eat more
than a fellow of my age and size should."

"Oh, I say, Dick," said Murray.  "Hear him, doctor?  Why, I've seen the
mess steward open his eyes sometimes with wonder."

"Tchah!  He's always opening his eyes with wonder, staring at
everything.  He's a regular idiot."

"Ah, well," said Murray, "I don't want to draw comparisons."

"Then don't do it," cried Roberts warmly.

"Don't be so peppery, my lad," said the doctor.

"Well, I don't want to be accused of gluttony or eating to excess."

"Pooh!  Don't mind what he says," said the doctor good-humouredly.  "I
hate excess, but it does me good to see growing boys make a hearty
meal."

"Frank Murray's too fond of bantering, doctor," said Roberts; and then,
involuntarily passing a finger tenderly over the spots where the
incipient bits of whisker had been singed off, "I don't quite look upon
myself as a growing boy."

"Oh, don't you?" said the doctor, rather gruffly.  "I should have
thought you had not done putting on inches.  There, never mind Murray's
chaff.  By the way, why do you keep shaving yourself down the cheeks
with that finger? does the skin feel tender where you were so much
scorched?"

"Yes, doctor, a little," replied the youth innocently enough.

"H'm, yes, but that cream I gave you does good, doesn't it?"

"Oh yes, doctor."

"Nasty scorching you fellows all had.  I quite expected to have some bad
patients--burns and spear wounds.  Lucky escapes, all of you.  That
Titely was the worst, but the way in which a good healthy sailor's flesh
heals up is wonderful.  It's just like cutting into a piece of raw
native indiarubber before it has been fooled about and manufactured up
with brimstone--vulcanised, as they call it.  You lads ought to bear it
in mind, in case you get a cut or a chop.  All that's wanted is to see
that the wound is thoroughly clean and dry, and then squeeze the sides
up together and the flesh adheres after the fashion of a clean cut in
indiarubber.  Ah, I like a good clean cut."

"What!" cried the lads together, as half laughingly they stared at the
speaker in surprise.

"Well, what are you both looking at?  I don't mean that I personally
like cuts; but they're pleasant to get healed up--not like bullet wounds
or ragged holes through a fellow."

"No," said Murray; "not like holes."

"Not that I mind a clean bullet hole through the flesh so long as it
does not encounter a bone."

"Exactly, doctor; so long as it does not encounter a bone," said Murray
drily.

"That's where the trouble begins, sir," said the doctor, smacking his
lips and making the two middies exchange glances.  "You see, you get a
complicated fracture of the bone with tiny fragments that refuse to show
where they are commencing irritation and that sort of thing."

"Yes, doctor," said Murray drily; "but aren't we getting into an
uncomfortable discussion?"

"No, sir, a most interesting one; but when I spoke it was not all about
injured bones or ordinary shot-holes or cuts; I was saying how glad I
was to be out of that river and mangrove swamp where your West Coast
fever haunts the low lands, and miasmatic emanations are always ready to
pounce upon people and set up tasks for the hardest-worked man in the
ship."

"To do what, doctor?" said Roberts.

"I thought I spoke very plainly, young gentleman; I said set up tasks
for the hardest-worked man in the ship."

"But that sounds as if you--that is to say--I--I--You don't mean
yourself, sir?" said Roberts, in a stammering, half-confused way.

"Not mean myself, sir?" said the doctor angrily.  "Why, who else could I
mean?"

"That's what puzzled me, sir," said Roberts, staring.  "Frank Murray and
I have always thought--"

"Here, I say," cried Murray, laughing and enjoying the verbal engagement
that had sprung up like a squall in the tropics, "don't you begin
dragging me into the discussion."

"Exactly!  Certainly not," cried the doctor hotly.  "If there is any
need for it I can tackle Master Murray afterwards.  I am dealing with
you, sir.  You gave me to understand that you did not consider I was the
most hard-worked man in the ship."

"Very well then," cried Roberts warmly, "if you will have it that way, I
don't."

"Oh!  Indeed!" said the doctor angrily.  "Then what about the last few
days, when I am suddenly brought face to face with a score of wounded
men, and with no one to help me but a surgeon's mate or dresser who is
as stupid as men are made?"

"Wounded, sir?" said Roberts.

"Yes, sir, wounded.  Burned, if you like it better.  Singed and
scorched.  It all comes under the broad term of casualties, does it
not?"

"I suppose so, sir," said Roberts sulkily.

"Better tell me that my services were not called for, and that you could
all have done without me.  I call what I have gone through hard work,
and tell you, sir, that it was a time of great anxiety."

"So it must have been, doctor," put in Murray, "and I feel very grateful
for the way you did away with my pain."

"There's a sneak!" cried Roberts angrily.  "Who began to bully me for
dragging him into the discussion?"

"You are the sneak, sir," said the doctor, "for trying to dodge out of
the matter like this.  Murray spoke out like a man."

"Boy," growled Roberts.

"Very well, sir; like a grateful boy, if that pleases you better.  Like
one who appreciates my service and is not ready to turn up his nose at
what such fellows as you call `doctor's stuff,' just as if a medical man
or a surgeon thought of nothing but wasting the ship's stores upon those
who are glad enough to come to them when they are out of sorts, and most
often from their neglect of common sense precautions, or from over
indulgence in the good things of life."

"Precious lot of chances we get to indulge in the good things of life on
board ship!" said Roberts bitterly.

"Let me tell you, sir," said the doctor, shaking his finger at the
midshipman, "that there is nothing better for a growing lad than the
strict discipline and the enforced temperance and moderate living of
shipboard.  Better for you, though, if you had not so much idleness."

"Idleness, sir!" cried the lad.

"Yes, sir.  You want more work.  Ah!  You may sneer.  Perhaps not quite
so much as I have to do, but more than you get.  Yes, sir, when you know
better you will learn to see that the doctor's life is a very arduous
one."

"But you get lots of time, sir, for natural history and fishing and
shooting."

"Not `lots of time,' sir, as you term it, but some time certainly; and
what is that but work in the cause of science?  And look here, Mr
Roberts, whenever I do get an opportunity for going ashore shooting or
botanising, or have a boat out for fishing or dredging, do I not
invariably enlist the services of you or Mr Murray?"

"Hear, hear!" cried the latter, in the most parliamentary way.

"Thank you, Mr Murray," said the doctor.  "I shall not forget this."

"Don't you believe him, doctor," cried Roberts.  "He doesn't mean it.
He's only currying favour."

"Nothing of the kind, sir," said the doctor sharply.  "I flatter myself
that I understand Mr Murray better than you do, sir.  I understand his
temperament quite as well as I do yours, sir, which is atrabilious."

"Eh?" exclaimed Roberts.  "What's that, sir?"

"Black bilious, sir, if you really don't know.  I have studied your
temperament, sir, and let me tell you that you would be doing very
wisely if you came to me this evening for a little treatment."

"But I've only just got out of your hands, sir," cried the midshipman,
in a voice full of protest.

"That was for the superficial trouble, sir, due to the scorching and
singeing.  Now it is plain to me that what you went through in that
attack upon the blacks' town has stirred up the secretions of your
liver."

"Oh, doctor, that it hasn't!" cried the lad.  "And I'm sure that I want
no physicking."

"I think I know best, sir.  If you were in robust health there would be
none of that display of irritability of temper that you evince.  You as
his messmate must have noticed this irritability, Mr Murray?"

"Constantly, sir," said that individual solemnly.  "Oh you!" growled
Roberts fiercely.  "Just you wait!"

"There!" cried the doctor triumphantly.  "You are proving the truth of
my diagnosis, Mr Roberts.  Come to me before night, and I will give you
what you require.  There, you have given me ample reason for strongly
resenting your language, Mr Roberts, but now I fully realise the cause
I shall pass it over.  You require my services, sir, and that is
enough."

"I don't require them, sir," cried the lad, boiling over with passion
now.  "I was hurt a good deal over the expedition, but now that's
better; there's nothing whatever the matter with me; and you are taking
advantage of your position and are about to force me to swallow a lot of
your horrid stuff.  I won't, though; see if I do!"

"You see, Mr Murray," said the doctor, smiling in a way which irritated
one of his hearers almost beyond bearing, "he is proving all I have said
to the full.  There, be calm, Roberts, my dear boy; we have left the
horrible river and coast behind, and a few days out upon the broad ocean
will with my help soon clear away the unpleasant symptoms from which you
have been suffering, and--"

"Not interfering, am I, doctor?" said a voice which made the two lads
start round.

"Not in the least, Anderson; not in the least.  Mr Roberts here is a
trifle the worse for our run up that muddy river, but I shall soon put
that right with our trip through the healthier portions of our globe."

"Through the healthier portions of the globe, doctor!" said the chief
officer.  "Why, what do you mean?"

"Mean?  Only that the West Coast of Africa is about as horrible a
station as unhappy man could be placed in by the powers that be, while
now we are going where--"

"Why, doctor, you don't mean to say that you do not understand where we
are going?"

"I mean to say I do know, sir--away from the swampy exhalations and
black fevers of the horrible district where we have been cruising, and
out upon the high seas."

"Yes, to cross them, doctor," said the lieutenant drily.  "We are going
to leave the black fevers behind, but in all probability to encounter
the yellow."

"What!" cried the doctor.  "I did not understand--"

"What the captain said?  Well, I did, sir.  The skipper has only just
now been vowing to me that he will never rest until he has run down that
slaver."

"Ah!  Yes, I understand that," said the doctor.  "Then that means--?"

"A long stern chase through the West Indian Islands, and perhaps in and
out and along the coasts of the Southern American States--wherever, in
fact, the plantations are worked by slaves whose supplies are kept up by
traders such as the scoundrel who cheated us into a run up that river
where his schooner was lying.  Why, doctor, it seems to me that we are
only going out of the frying-pan into the fire."

"Dear me, yes," said the doctor.  "You are quite right.  Then under
these circumstances, Mr Roberts," he continued, turning sharply round
upon the midshipman, "the sooner you commence your treatment the
better."

"But really, sir," began Roberts, who looked so taken aback that his
messmate had hard work to contain himself and master the outburst of
laughter that was ready to explode.

"Don't argue, Mr Roberts," said the doctor importantly.  "I do not know
how you find him in your dealings, Anderson," he continued, "but as a
patient I must say that of all the argumentative, self-willed young men
I ever encountered Mr Roberts carries off the palm."

"Yes, he has a will of his own, my dear doctor," said the lieutenant,
giving the middy a meaning glance, "but you must take him in hand.  I
prescribe my way; when you take him in hand next you must prescribe
yours."

"I intend so doing," said the doctor, and he walked aft with the chief
officer.

This was Frank Murray's opportunity, and hurrying to the side, he leaned
his arms upon the bulwarks and laughed till his sides ached before his
companion fully realised the fact, his attention having been taken up by
the pair who were going towards where the captain was slowly pacing the
deck with his hands behind him.

"Oh, grinning at it all, are you?" said Roberts now.  "It's very funny,
isn't it!  An abominable, pragmatical, self-satisfied ass, that's what
he is; and are we almost grown-up men to be handed over to be treated
just as he pleases?  No; I'll resign the service first.  Yes, laugh
away, my fine fellow!  You see if I don't pay you out for this!  Oh, go
it!  But you see if I take any of his beastly old stuff!"



CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

"COLD PISON."

Roberts kept his word that same evening, for just as the darkness was
setting in and the two lads had walked forward to lean over the side and
gaze down at the unruffled transparent sea and wonder which were
reflections of the golden glory of the stars and which were the untold
myriads of phosphorescent creatures that, as far down as eye could
penetrate, spangled the limpid sea, the lad suddenly gave his companion
a nudge with his elbow.

"What do you mean by that?" asked Murray.

"Look here, and I'll show you."

"Well, I'm looking; but it's too dark to see what you are fumbling
over."

"How stupid!  What a blind old bat you are!  Well, it's a piece of plum
duff."

"Why, you're like a school-boy," said Murray.

"Oh no, I'm not."

"You may say oh no you're not, but fancy me saving up a bit of cold
pudding from dinner and bringing it out of my jacket pocket to eat!"

"Ah, but you have no reason for doing it.  I have."

"What, are you going to use it as a bait?"

"That's it, my son; but I'm not going to use hook or line."

"Then what are you going to do?"

"Throw it over for one of the sharks we saw cruising about before
sundown."

"But what for?  You don't want to pet sharks with cold pudding."

"No.  Guess again."

"Stuff!  Speak out."

"Poison--cold pison."

"What!  Why, you would never see the brute that took it turn up in the
darkness."

"Don't want to, my son," said the lad solemnly.

"Look here, Dick, it's too hot, to-night, and I'm too tired and sleepy
to try and puzzle out your conundrums, so if you want me to understand
what you're about you had better speak out.  What a rum chap you are!"

"I am."

"One hour you're all a fellow could wish; the next you are red-hot to
quarrel.  See how you were this afternoon when the doctor was talking to
you."

"Ah!  I was out of temper then, but now I feel so happy that a child
might play with me."

"Glad to hear it, but I don't want to be child-like, and I don't want to
play."

"Perhaps not, but you'll be interested."

"Fire away, then.  What has made you so happy?"

"I had an idea."

"Well, look sharp, or I shall fall asleep with my head resting on my
arms."

"Well, I'll tell you," said Roberts.  "You see that solid lump of
pudding?"

"I told you before I can't see it."

"Feel it then."

"No, I'll be hanged if I do!  Why should I feel a nasty piece of cold
pudding?"

"Don't be so jolly particular; it's quite dry."

"Look here, Dick, are you going off your head?"

"I thought I was when the idea came, for it set me laughing so that I
could not stop myself."

"Come, tell me what it all means, or I shall go below to my berth.  What
is there in all this?"

"Poison, I tell you."

"Yes, you told me before; but what does it mean?"

"You see that lump of pudding; well, there's poison in it."

"Dick Roberts, I'm hot and easily aggravated.  If you go on like this I
shall be as quarrelsome as you were this afternoon."

"Well, there, it was all my idea that I had this afternoon.  I got that
lump

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