For the Term of His Natural Life
Page 23
Mrs Vickers, pale and sick with terror, yet sustained by that strangecourage of which we have before spoken, passed rapidly under the openskylight, and prepared to ascend. Sylvia--her romance crushed by toodreadful reality--clung to her mother with one hand, and with theother pressed close to her little bosom the "English History". In herall-absorbing fear she had forgotten to lay it down.
"Get a shawl, ma'am, or something," says Bates, "and a hat for missy."
Mrs. Vickers looked back across the space beneath the open skylight,and shuddering, shook her head. The men above swore impatiently at thedelay, and the three hastened on deck.
"Who's to command the brig now?" asked undaunted Bates, as they came up.
"I am," says John Rex, "and, with these brave fellows, I'll take herround the world."
The touch of bombast was not out of place. It jumped so far with thehumour of the convicts that they set up a feeble cheer, at which Sylviafrowned. Frightened as she was, the prison-bred child was as muchastonished at hearing convicts cheer as a fashionable lady would be tohear her footman quote poetry. Bates, however--practical and calm--tookquite another view of the case. The bold project, so boldly avowed,seemed to him a sheer absurdity. The "Dandy" and a crew of nine convictsnavigate a brig round the world! Preposterous; why, not a man aboardcould work a reckoning! His nautical fancy pictured the Ospreyhelplessly rolling on the swell of the Southern Ocean, or hopelesslylocked in the ice of the Antarctic Seas, and he dimly guessed at thefate of the deluded ten. Even if they got safe to port, the chances offinal escape were all against them, for what account could they give ofthemselves? Overpowered by these reflections, the honest fellow made onelast effort to charm his captors back to their pristine bondage.
"Fools!" he cried, "do you know what you are about to do? You will neverescape. Give up the brig, and I will declare, before my God, upon theBible, that I will say nothing, but give all good characters."
Lesly and another burst into a laugh at this wild proposition, butRex, who had weighed his chances well beforehand, felt the force of thepilot's speech, and answered seriously.
"It's no use talking," he said, shaking his still handsome head. "Wehave got the brig, and we mean to keep her. I can navigate her, thoughI am no seaman, so you needn't talk further about it, Mr. Bates. It'sliberty we require."
"What are you going to do with us?" asked Bates.
"Leave you behind."
Bates's face blanched. "What, here?"
"Yes. It don't look a picturesque spot, does it? And yet I've lived herefor some years"; and he grinned.
Bates was silent. The logic of that grin was unanswerable.
"Come!" cried the Dandy, shaking off his momentary melancholy, "lookalive there! Lower away the jolly-boat. Mrs. Vickers, go down to yourcabin and get anything you want. I am compelled to put you ashore, but Ihave no wish to leave you without clothes." Bates listened, in a sortof dismal admiration, at this courtly convict. He could not have spokenlike that had life depended on it. "Now, my little lady," continued Rex,"run down with your mamma, and don't be frightened."
Sylvia flashed burning red at this indignity. "Frightened! If there hadbeen anybody else here but women, you never would have taken the brig.Frightened! Let me pass, prisoner!"
The whole deck burst into a great laugh at this, and poor Mrs. Vickerspaused, trembling for the consequences of the child's temerity. To thustaunt the desperate convict who held their lives in his hands seemedsheer madness. In the boldness of the speech however, lay its safeguard.Rex--whose politeness was mere bravado--was stung to the quick by thereflection upon his courage, and the bitter accent with which the childhad pronounced the word prisoner (the generic name of convicts) made himbite his lips with rage. Had he had his will, he would have struck thelittle creature to the deck, but the hoarse laugh of his companionswarned him to forbear. There is "public opinion" even among convicts,and Rex dared not vent his passion on so helpless an object. As men doin such cases, he veiled his anger beneath an affectation of amusement.In order to show that he was not moved by the taunt, he smiled upon thetaunter more graciously than ever.
"Your daughter has her father's spirit, madam," said he to Mrs. Vickers,with a bow.
Bates opened his mouth to listen. His ears were not large enough to takein the words of this complimentary convict. He began to think that hewas the victim of a nightmare. He absolutely felt that John Rex was agreater man at that moment than John Bates.
As Mrs. Vickers descended the hatchway, the boat with Frere and thesoldiers came within musket range, and Lesly, according to orders,fired his musket over their heads, shouting to them to lay to But Frere,boiling with rage at the manner in which the tables had been turned onhim, had determined not to resign his lost authority without a struggle.Disregarding the summons, he came straight on, with his eyes fixed onthe vessel. It was now nearly dark, and the figures on the deck wereindistinguishable. The indignant lieutenant could but guess at thecondition of affairs. Suddenly, from out of the darkness a voice hailedhim--
"Hold water! back water!" it cried, and was then seemingly choked in itsowner's throat.
The voice was the property of Mr. Bates. Standing near the side, he hadobserved Rex and Fair bring up a great pig of iron, erst used as part ofthe ballast of the brig, and poise it on the rail. Their intention wasbut too evident; and honest Bates, like a faithful watch-dog, barkedto warn his master. Bloodthirsty Cheshire caught him by the throat, andFrere, unheeding, ran the boat alongside, under the very nose of therevengeful Rex. The mass of iron fell half in-board upon the now stayedboat, and gave her sternway, with a splintered plank.
"Villains!" cried Frere, "would you swamp us?"
"Aye," laughed Rex, "and a dozen such as ye! The brig's ours, can't yesee, and we're your masters now!"
Frere, stifling an exclamation of rage, cried to the bow to hook on, butthe bow had driven the boat backward, and she was already beyond arm'slength of the brig. Looking up, he saw Cheshire's savage face, andheard the click of the lock as he cocked his piece. The two soldiers,exhausted by their long pull, made no effort to stay the progress of theboat, and almost before the swell caused by the plunge of the mass ofiron had ceased to agitate the water, the deck of the Osprey had becomeinvisible in the darkness.
Frere struck his fist upon the thwart in sheer impotence of rage. "Thescoundrels!" he said, between his teeth, "they've mastered us. What dothey mean to do next?"
The answer came pat to the question. From the dark hull of the brigbroke a flash and a report, and a musket ball cut the water besidethem with a chirping noise. Between the black indistinct mass whichrepresented the brig, and the glimmering water, was visible a whitespeck, which gradually neared them.
"Come alongside with ye!" hailed a voice, "or it will be the worse forye!"
"They want to murder us," says Frere. "Give way, men!"
But the two soldiers, exchanging glances one with the other, pulled theboat's head round, and made for the vessel. "It's no use, Mr. Frere,"said the man nearest him; "we can do no good now, and they won't hurtus, I dare say."
"You dogs, you are in league with them," bursts out Frere, purple withindignation. "Do you mutiny?"
"Come, come, sir," returned the soldier, sulkily, "this ain't the timeto bully; and, as for mutiny, why, one man's about as good as anotherjust now."
This speech from the lips of a man who, but a few minutes before, wouldhave risked his life to obey orders of his officer, did more thanan hour's reasoning to convince Maurice Frere of the hopelessnessof resistance. His authority--born of circumstance, and supported byadventitious aid--had left him. The musket shot had reduced him to theranks. He was now no more than anyone else; indeed, he was less thanmany, for those who held the firearms were the ruling powers. With agroan he resigned himself to his fate, and looking at the sleeve of theundress uniform he wore, it seemed to him that virtue had gone out ofit. When they reached the brig, they found that the jolly-boat hadbeen lowered and laid alongside. In her were eleve
n persons; Bates withforehead gashed, and hands bound, the stunned Grimes, Russen and Fairpulling, Lyon, Riley, Cheshire, and Lesly with muskets, and John Rexin the stern sheets, with Bates's pistols in his trousers' belt, and aloaded musket across his knees. The white object which had been seenby the men in the whale-boat was a large white shawl which wrapped Mrs.Vickers and Sylvia.
Frere muttered an oath of relief when he saw this white bundle. Hehad feared that the child was injured. By the direction of Rex thewhale-boat was brought alongside the jolly-boat, and Cheshire and Leslyboarded her. Lesly then gave his musket to Rex, and bound Frere'shands behind him, in the same manner as had been done for Bates. Frereattempted to resist this indignity, but Cheshire, clapping his musketto his ear, swore he would blow out his brains if he uttered anothersyllable; Frere, catching the malignant eye of John Rex, remembered howeasily a twitch of the finger would pay off old scores, and was silent."Step in here, sir, if you please," said Rex, with polite irony. "I amsorry to be compelled to tie you, but I must consult my own safety aswell as your convenience." Frere scowled, and, stepping awkwardly intothe jolly-boat, fell. Pinioned as he was, he could not rise withoutassistance, and Russen pulled him roughly to his feet with a coarselaugh. In his present frame of mind, that laugh galled him worse thanhis bonds.
Poor Mrs. Vickers, with a woman's quick instinct, saw this, and, evenamid her own trouble, found leisure to console him. "The wretches!" shesaid, under her breath, as Frere was flung down beside her, "to subjectyou to such indignity!" Sylvia said nothing, and seemed to shrink fromthe lieutenant. Perhaps in her childish fancy she had pictured him ascoming to her rescue, armed cap-a-pie, and clad in dazzling mail, or, atthe very least, as a muscular hero, who would settle affairs out of handby sheer personal prowess. If she had entertained any such notion, thereality must have struck coldly upon her senses. Mr. Frere, purple,clumsy, and bound, was not at all heroic.
"Now, my lads," says Rex--who seemed to have endured the cast-offauthority of Frere--"we give you your choice. Stay at Hell's Gates, orcome with us!"
The soldiers paused, irresolute. To join the mutineers meant a certaintyof hard work, with a chance of ultimate hanging. Yet to stay with theprisoners was--as far as they could see--to incur the inevitable fate ofstarvation on a barren coast. As is often the case on such occasions,a trifle sufficed to turn the scale. The wounded Grimes, who was slowlyrecovering from his stupor, dimly caught the meaning of the sentence,and in his obfuscated condition of intellect must needs make commentupon it. "Go with him, ye beggars!" said he, "and leave us honest men!Oh, ye'll get a tying-up for this."
The phrase "tying-up" brought with it recollection of the worst portionof military discipline, the cat, and revived in the minds of the pairalready disposed to break the yoke that sat so heavily upon them, atrain of dismal memories. The life of a soldier on a convict stationwas at that time a hard one. He was often stinted in rations, and ofnecessity deprived of all rational recreation, while punishment foroffences was prompt and severe. The companies drafted to the penalsettlements were not composed of the best material, and the pair hadgood precedent for the course they were about to take.
"Come," says Rex, "I can't wait here all night. The wind is freshening,and we must make the Bar. Which is it to be?"
"We'll go with you!" says the man who had pulled the stroke in thewhale-boat, spitting into the water with averted face. Upon whichutterance the convicts burst into joyous oaths, and the pair werereceived with much hand-shaking.
Then Rex, with Lyon and Riley as a guard, got into the whale boat, andhaving loosed the two prisoners from their bonds, ordered them to takethe place of Russen and Fair. The whale-boat was manned by the sevenmutineers, Rex steering, Fair, Russen, and the two recruits pulling,and the other four standing up, with their muskets levelled at thejolly-boat. Their long slavery had begotten such a dread of authority inthese men that they feared it even when it was bound and menaced by fourmuskets. "Keep your distance!" shouted Cheshire, as Frere and Bates, inobedience to orders, began to pull the jolly-boat towards the shore; andin this fashion was the dismal little party conveyed to the mainland.
It was night when they reached it, but the clear sky began to thrillwith a late moon as yet unrisen, and the waves, breaking gently uponthe beach, glimmered with a radiance born of their own motion. Frere andBates, jumping ashore, helped out Mrs. Vickers, Sylvia, and the woundedGrimes. This being done under the muzzles of the muskets, Rex commandedthat Bates and Frere should push the jolly-boat as far as they couldfrom the shore, and Riley catching her by a boat-hook as she cametowards them, she was taken in tow.
"Now, boys," says Cheshire, with a savage delight, "three cheers for oldEngland and Liberty!"
Upon which a great shout went up, echoed by the grim hills which hadwitnessed so many miseries.
To the wretched five, this exultant mirth sounded like a knell of death."Great God!" cried Bates, running up to his knees in water after thedeparting boats, "would you leave us here to starve?"
The only answer was the jerk and dip of the retreating oars.
CHAPTER XI. LEFT AT "HELL'S GATES."