Part 12 (2/2)
”I have no particular plan,” Will said. ”I am in no hurry to return to England, having no relatives there. After being so long absent--for it is now a year since I sailed from Yarmouth--I should not care to return and take up my apprentices.h.i.+p as a fisherman.”
”Will you s.h.i.+p regularly on board the Sea Belle?” the captain asked.
”Thank you, sir, I think I would rather not decide upon anything until we get to Calcutta. I have thirty pounds in money--fifteen pounds of which were given me on board the Dutch s.h.i.+p, and the rest I received as wages for the voyage from England to Java. I carried the money in a belt round my waist, and have kept it ever since. So I need not be in any great hurry to settle upon what I shall do; but certainly, after a regular sea life, I should not like to go back to being a fisherman. I am now past sixteen and, in another three years, shall be able to earn more wages.
”I should have taken you for at least two years older,” the captain said; ”you are as big and strong as many lads of eighteen.”
”I have done a good lot of hard work, in the last two years,” Will said; ”for on board the Dutch s.h.i.+p--although, of course, I was only rated as a boy--I used to do man's work, aloft.”
Other people would have been deceived, as well as the captain. Hard work and exposure to the air had done much to age the boy. He had been tall and slight for his age when he left the workhouse and, while he had not ceased growing in height, he had widened out considerably and, had he a.s.serted himself to be eighteen years of age, few would have questioned the statement.
The Sea Belle for some time kept south, touching at some of the islands where a trade was done with the Papuans; then her head was turned north and, after an eventful voyage, she reached Calcutta, where the captain had been ordered to fill up with cotton, or grain, for England. The captain at once landed, and proceeded to the office of the agent of the firm who owned the Sea Belle. He was shown into that gentleman's private room where, at the time, two gentlemen were seated, chatting. The agent was personally acquainted with the captain, and asked him to sit down and smoke a cigar.
”This is Captain Mayhew, of the Sea Belle,” he said to his friends.
”He has been trading, for the last three months, down among the islands.
”These gentlemen, Captain Mayhew, are Major Harrison and Captain Edwards, who have just arrived from China, with their regiment, in the Euphrates.
”Has your voyage been a pleasant one, captain?”
”Pleasant enough, sir, on the whole; but we were attacked by the Malay pirates, and I should certainly not be here to tell the tale, at present, had it not been for the quickness and shrewdness of a lad, who had been s.h.i.+pwrecked on the coast.”
”How is that, Mayhew? Tell us all about it.”
Captain Mayhew related the whole story of the fight with the pirates; saying that, unquestionably, had it not been for Will's pointing out the pa.s.sage through the reef, in the first place, and his idea of burying a submarine mine, in the second, the Sea Belle would have fallen into the hands of the pirates.
”But where did the boy spring from? How on earth came he to be there?”
Captain Mayhew then related the story of William Gale's adventures, as he had them from his own lips.
”He must be a cool and plucky young fellow, indeed,” Major Harrison exclaimed. ”I should like to see him.
”What style and type is he, captain? A rough sort of chap?”
”By no means,” the captain answered. ”He is surprisingly well mannered. Had I met him elsewhere, and in gentleman's clothes, I do not think that I should have suspected that he was not what he appeared. His features, too, somehow or other, strike one as being those of a gentleman; which is all the more singular when, as a fact, he told me he had been brought up in a workhouse.
”In a workhouse!” Major Harrison repeated. ”Then I suppose his parents were farm laborers.”
”No,” the captain answered; ”he was left at the door, on a stormy night, by a tramp who was found drowned, next morning, in a ditch near. He had, when found, a gold trinket of some kind round his neck; and he tells me that, from that and other circ.u.mstances, it was generally supposed by the workhouse authorities that he did not belong to the tramp, but that he had been stolen by her; and that he belonged, at least, to a respectable family.”
”All this is very interesting,” Captain Edwards said. ”I should like much to see the boy. Will you come and dine with us this evening on board the Euphrates--Mr. Reynolds, here, is coming--and have the boy sent on board--say, at nine o'clock--when we can have him in, and have a chat with him?”
Captain Mayhew readily agreed. William was even then waiting outside for him, having landed with him; and the captain, when he entered the office, had told him to walk about for an hour and amuse himself with the sights of Calcutta, and then return and wait for him. He said nothing about his being close at hand, as he did not wish the officers to see him in the rough outfit which had been furnished him on board s.h.i.+p; intending to surprise them by his appearance in decent clothes. Accordingly, on leaving Mr. Reynolds'
office he took him to one of the numerous shops, in the town, where clothes of any kind can be procured.
”Now, Will,” he said, ”I want you to get a suit of sh.o.r.e-going clothes. You can get your sea outfit tomorrow, at your leisure; but I want you to show up well at the mess, this evening, and a suit of good clothes will always be useful to you.”
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