“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