Part 40 (1/2)
”She, my wife, is on board that schooner dere, the mail-packet, in which we came from Angostura. I left her locked up in the cabin,” answered the consul.
”Locked up in the cabin!” exclaimed Murray, with no little surprise, beginning to suspect that Rogers would have curious pa.s.sengers on board the _Supplejack_.
”Oh yes, sare, I always lock up my wife when I do go out, for she is young, you see, and it is the safest plan; she can then no run away herself, and no one can run off with her--that what I always fear. It make my life miserable at Angostura;” and this curious representative of the ”majesty of England” shrugged his shoulders and made a grimace which showed the intensity of his feelings.
”Well, go and get your wife and your traps, and I will inform Lieutenant Rogers of the governor's wishes, that he should afford you and your wife a pa.s.sage home.”
”Thank you, sare,” answered Senhor Guedes, bowing low as he strutted off to a boat, and returned on board the schooner, which lay at a short distance from the sh.o.r.e.
Murray had invited Rogers to dine on board the _Tudor_, and a very pleasant party the three old messmates had. They talked of times gone by, and enjoyed a hearty laugh at the description Murray gave of the consul and his fair partner.
”I shall be happy to give up my cabin to the lady, but I hope her husband won't lock her in it during the whole voyage; at all events, he cannot be afraid of any one running away with her while we are at sea.”
”I wish you may at all events enjoy the company of your pa.s.sengers,”
said Adair, laughing; ”I want you to write me a full account of what occurs, or the chances are that by the time you rejoin us you will have forgotten all about it.”
Jack, promising to comply with Adair's request, returned to the _Supplejack_ somewhat earlier than he would otherwise have done, that he might be on board to receive his expected guests. He at once gave orders to his steward to clear out his cabin and prepare it for the reception of the consul's lady; however, as Jack faithfully fulfilled his promise to Adair, we have the opportunity of giving an account of the expedition in his own words:--
”I had been walking the deck for some time, thinking now of one thing, now of another, when a boat with two persons in the sternsheets came alongside, and answered to the quarter-master's hail--
”'Her Majesty's British Consul of Angostura and his family.'
”The accommodation-ladder had already been rigged in preparation for the arrival of these important personages. The sides being manned, the next instant a stout gentleman who must be, I knew, the consul, began to ascend, shoving up before him a veiled female figure. She, I rightly guessed, was his wife. I advanced to meet them, and was about to address the lady, when her husband informed me that 'She no speak English--and, as she is very tired, she wishes at once to go to her cabin.'
”I accordingly conducted the veiled lady below. From her figure, and a glimpse I caught of her countenance as the light from the lamp fell on it (as by chance, of course, her veil fell on one side), I saw that she was young and undoubtedly pretty, thus accounting for the jealousy displayed by her 'lord and master.'
”The old gentleman followed and remained for a short time in the cabin.
When he came out I observed that he examined the door, and seemed rather nonplussed on discovering that there was no key with which he could follow his usual custom of locking up his better half. I invited him to walk the deck with me, that he might give me a fuller account of the circ.u.mstances which had occurred at Angostura, requiring the visit of a British man-of-war.
”He told me a long rigmarole tale of an attack which had been made on his house by a party of brigands, as he called them, from Venezuela, the chief object of which, as he suspected, was to carry off his wife; however, they, or some one else, had pulled down the consular flagstaff.
A half-caste, who claimed to be a British subject, belonging to Trinidad, had been killed, and two or three others had been made prisoners. All the time he was speaking he was in a state of agitation, and soon hurried back into the cabin, to ascertain (as he said), whether his wife wanted anything.
”He supped with us in the gunroom, and though he played a very good knife and fork, he exhibited the same uneasiness, jumping up two or three times during the meal, to pay his spouse a visit.
”McTavish, who had not suspected the cause of his anxiety, remarked, 'that he had never seen more devoted affection displayed, and that he could not help admiring the old gentleman,' though he owned that he possessed very few other likeable qualities.
”For my own part, I did not antic.i.p.ate much pleasure in the society of my guests.
”By break of day we got under weigh and stood for the 'Boca de Huevos,'
or the Umbrella Pa.s.sage. Till I consulted our sailing directions I had fancied that we might have made a short cut to the southward through one of the Serpent's Mouths, but the hot current which sets into the Gulf of Paria, caused by the immense ma.s.s of water flowing out of the Orinoco, would have effectually prevented us from gaining our object. The longest way round, therefore, was the shortest to our destination.
”A fresh breeze on our quarter enabled us to get out into the open sea sooner than I expected, when we stood along the northern sh.o.r.e of Trinidad to the eastward. We carried the breeze with us till we rounded the point of Galera. I should not have supposed that Trinidad is the fertile place it really is, from the appearance of its northern sh.o.r.e, which is that of an immense ridge of barren rocks. Not, indeed, till we were running down the eastern coast, did its rich and smiling valleys again appear in view.
”I had good reason to be glad that we had not attempted the Serpent's Mouth; for when standing across from the southern end of Trinidad towards the Orinoco the wind fell light, and we were nearly swept by the current back again into the Gulf.
”Even before we came in sight of the mainland, we found ourselves sailing through the brown waters of the mighty stream, which as we got nearer its many mouths, became almost the consistency of pea-soup, and we had to keep a lookout to avoid the huge trunks of trees swept out by the current, the ends of some of which, broken off by lightning or the wind, might have made an ugly hole in our bows. We stood for the centre and broadest entrance of the river, the only one through which we could make our way up against the current, and hove-to off the far from attractive looking town of Cangrayos--here we were to find, the consul informed me, the trustworthy pilot Anselmo.
”A signal having been made for a pilot, a canoe speedily put off from the sh.o.r.e, bringing on board a big mulatto, dressed in an excessively dirty white jacket and trowsers, with a broad-brimmed straw hat which had seen better days, on his head. He greeted the consul with a profound bow, and introduced himself to me as 'de pilot of de Orinoco,'
who 'knowed ebery part of de river from one end to de other, and take up all de English s.h.i.+ps which come dare.'