The skipper did not like to see my idleness or this display of inactive indifference.
"Don't you think you might help?" he asked.
"Help—what help can I give? You don't suppose we can outsteam them, do you?"
"That's a child's question; they'll run us to a stand in four hours—any man with one eye should see that; but are you going down like a sheep, or will you give them a touch of your claws? I will, so help me Heaven, if there's not another hand breathing!"
"The skipper's right, by Jove!" said Roderick; "if it's coming to close quarters, I'll mark one man anyway," and with that he tumbled down the ladder, and into his cabin. I followed him, and got all the arms I could lay hands on, a couple of revolvers and a long duck-gun amongst the number. There were two rifles—the two we had used in the trouble with the men—in the chart-room, and these we brought on deck, with all the other pistols we had amongst us. We made a distribution of them amongst the old hands, giving Dan the duck-gun, which pleased him mightily.
"I generally shoots 'em sittin'," he said, "but I'll go for to make a bag, and willin'. You're keepin' the Missie out of it, sir?"
"Of course; she's looking after the sick hands downstairs. You go forward, Dan, and wait for the word, then blaze away your hardest."
"Ay, ay," replied he; and I took myself off to see after the others, whom we posted in the stern to keep a closer look-out; while Roderick, the first officer, and myself went above to the bridge.
The men now fell to work in right good earnest. They had all the grit of the old sea-dogs in them—how, I know not, except in this, that their lives had been given to the one mistress. The thought of a brush-up put dash and daring into them; they had the boats cleared, the water-barrels filled, and the life-belts free, with an activity that was remarkable. Then they stood to watch the oncoming of the nameless ship; and when we hoisted our ensign, they burst again into that hoarse roar of applause which rolled across the water-waste, and must have sounded as a vaunting mockery to the men behind the walls of metal. But they answered us in turn, running up an ensign, and a cry came from all of us as we saw its colour, for it was the blue saltire on a white ground.
"Russian, or I'm blind," said the skipper, and I looked twice and knew that his sight was safe to him; for the nameless ship, which five days ago showed her heels under a Chilian mask, now made straight towards us in Russian guise.
"Are you sure she's the same ship?" asked Roderick, when his amazement let him speak.
"Am I sure that my voice comes out of my throat?" said the old fellow testily. "Did you ever see but one hull shaped like that? And now she signals."
So rapidly had she drawn towards us that she was, indeed, then within gun-shot of us. After the first enthusiasm the men had stood, held under the spell of her amazing approach, and no soul had spoken. Even with their plain reckoning and hazy notion of it all, they seemed conscious of the peril; but not as I was conscious of it, for in my own heart I believed that no man amongst us would see to-morrow. There we stood alone, with no prospect but to face the men who openly declared war against us. I turned my eyes away to the crimson arch which marked the sun's decline; I looked again to the east, whence black harbingers of night hung low upon the darkened sea; I searched the horizon in every quarter, but it lay barren of ships, and soon the last light would leave us, and with the ebb of day there was no security against an enemy whose intentions were no longer disguised. I say no longer disguised—but of this the skipper made me cognisant. He pointed to the mast on the nameless ship, where the Russian ensign had hung ten minutes before. It was there no longer; the black flag took its place.
"Pirates, by the very devil!" said the skipper; and then he whistled long and loud and shrilly as a man who has solved a sum.
"Gentlemen," he added very slowly, "I said I would resign this ship at New York: with your permission I will withdraw that. I will sail with you wherever you go."
He shook our hands heartily, as though the discovery of our purpose had unclouded his mind. But we had no time for fuller understanding, for at that moment the air itself seemed torn apart by a great concussion, and a shell burst in the water no more than fifty yards ahead of us. When the knowledge that we were not hit was sure on the men's part, they bellowed lustily; and old Dan fired his gun into the air with a great shout. Yet we knew that all this was the cheapest bravado; and when the skipper touched the bell to stop our engines, I was sure that he was wise.
"That's the end of it, then," I said. "Well, it's pretty ignominious, isn't it, to be shot down like fools on our own quarter-deck?"
"Wait awhile," he answered, looking anxiously behind him, where a mist gathered on the sea; "let 'em lower a boat, the lubbers!"
By this time the great vessel rode still some quarter of a mile away from us; but the glass showed me the men upon her decks, and conspicuous amongst them I saw the form of Captain Black standing by the steam steering gear. Others below were moving at the davits, so that in a small space a launch was riding in a still sea, and was making for us. I watched her with nerves strained and lips dry; she seemed to me the message boat from Death itself.
"Stand steady, and wait for me!" suddenly yelled the skipper, his fingers moving nervously, and his look continually turning to the banks of mist behind us. "When I sing 'Fire!' pick your men!"
The boat was so near that you could see the faces in it; and three of the five I recognised, for I had seen them in the room of the Rue Joubert. The others were not known to me, but had rascally countenances; and one of them was a Chinaman's. The man who was in command was the fellow "Roaring John"; and when he was within hail he stood and bawled—
"What ship?"
"My ship!" roared back the skipper, again looking at the mist-clouds, and my heart gave a bound when I read his purpose: we were drifting into them.
"And who may you be?" bawled the fellow again, growing more insolent with every advance.
"I'm one that'll give you the best hiding you ever had, if you'll step up here a minute!" yelled the skipper, as cool as a man in Hyde Park.
"Oh, I guess," said the man; "you're a tarnation fine talker, ain't you? But you'll talk less when I come aboard you, oh, I reckon!"
They came a couple of oars' lengths nearer, when Captain York made his reply. There was a fine roll of confidence in his voice; and he almost laughed when he cried—
"You're coming aboard, are you? And which of you shall I have the pleasure of kicking first?"
The hulking ruffian roared with pleasant laughter at the sally.
"Oh, you're a funny cuss, ain't you, and pretty with your jaw, by thunder! But it's me that you'll have the pleasure of speaking to, and right quick, my mate, oh, you bet!"
"In that case," said the skipper, with his calmness well at zero; "in that case—you, Dan! introduce yourself to the gentleman."
Dan's reply was instantaneous. He leant well over the bulwark, and his cheery old face beamed as he bellowed—
"Ahoy, you there that it's me pleasure to be runnin' against so far from me old country. Will you have it hot, or will you have it the other way for a parcel of cold-livered lubbers? By the Old 'Un, how's that for salt 'oss!"
He had up with his shot gun, and the long ruffian, who had reached forward with his boat-hook, got the dose full in his face as it seemed to me. At the same moment the skipper called "Fire!" and the heavy crack of the rifles and the sharp report of the pistols rang out together. The very launch itself seemed to reel under the volley; but the Chinaman gave a great shout, and jumped into the sea with the agony of his wound; while two of the others were stretched out in death as they sat.
"Full steam ahead!" roared Captain York, as the nameless ship replied with a shell that grazed our chart-room. "Full speed ahead!" Then, shaking his fist to the war-ship, he almost screamed—"Bested for a parcel of cut-throats, by the Powers!"
There was no doubt about it at all. The moment the yacht answered to the screw the fog