Part 13 (1/2)
”Get aft!” shouted the mate, ”they're murderin' the old man.”
Smith turned and dashed off to the Captain's cabin, which he entered without even the ceremony of knocking. It was empty, but from a small room adjoining came the sound of stentorian snores.
”Blimey!” muttered Smith, glancing round him. ”He don't sound as if he were dead.”
His eye fell on the s.h.i.+p's log which lay open on the table.
Instinctively he glanced at it and, under the entry for the day, read the following:
”Jasper Skelt, boatswain of the barque _Esmeralda_. Died at sea. Cause, misadventure.”
He slowly returned to the bridge and told the mate what he had seen.
”You're sure he was alive?” asked the latter.
”Well, he was makin' a noise like a motor-'bus climbin' a hill,”
answered Smith.
At eight bells that morning Mr. d.y.k.es, in quite a different frame of mind to that of a couple of hours ago, sent the bos'n to muster all hands on deck. The men tumbled out sullenly, muttering among themselves in a manner which seemed to justify the mate's recent warning to the Captain.
Suddenly one of them gave a cry.
In the clear, grey morning light, they beheld, hanging from one of the derricks, the lifeless body of Jasper Skelt. His hands and feet were tightly bound with cords, and he was suspended from the boom by a rope round his neck.
Judging from the men's faces as they stared at the ghastly spectacle, Calamity's ”appeal” was not likely to prove a vain one.
CHAPTER XI
THE FIGHT
The German gunboat, that the _Hawk_ had been following so a.s.siduously, had disappeared in the fog of the Sunday on which the _Ann_ was stopped.
Nevertheless, Calamity set the course each day with an unhesitating decisiveness which seemed to suggest that he had some definite plan in view. A day or two after that encounter a large steam-yacht painted war-grey, and flying no ensign, was sighted steaming in a northerly direction. Calamity, who was on the bridge at the time, examined her through his gla.s.ses and then handed them to Smith, the mate being below.
”What do you make of her?” he asked.
The second-mate, after a long and careful scrutiny, handed the gla.s.ses back.
”Looks like a commerce-destroyer,” he said, ”but blowed if I can tell what nationality she is.”
”H'm, we'll soon find out,” answered the Captain. ”Go for'ad and send a shot after her as soon as I've altered the course.”
Smith left the bridge, and, mounting the foc'sle, took the tarpaulin cover off the quick-firer which was mounted there. Meanwhile Calamity had brought the _Hawk's_ nose round so that he was now in the wake of the strange s.h.i.+p.
”All ready, sir!” shouted Smith.
”Then let her have it.”
The second-mate carefully laid the gun and next minute a sh.e.l.l went hurtling over the yacht's stern; too high to do any damage, yet near enough to make any nervous persons on board feel more nervous still. The noise brought the privateer's crew tumbling on deck, eager to see what was happening. Then, before the sound of the shot had died away, the yacht was observed to be changing her course--steaming round in the arc of a circle to starboard of the _Hawk_. Obviously she was not running away, and the inference was that she intended to fight.