Part 15 (1/2)
”Is it jokin' you are, Ned?” siz I; ”shure you tould me to leave it all to you.”
”Ah! Darby,” siz he, ”you're for takin' a rise out o' me. But I'll stick to my promise; only, Darby, you must pay your way.”
”O, Ned,” says I, ”is this the way you're goin' to threat me after all?
I'm a rooin'd man; all I cou'd sc.r.a.pe together I spint on you. If you don't do something for me, I'm lost. Is there no place where you cou'd hide me from the captin?”
”Not a place,” siz Ned.
”An' where, Ned, is the place I saw you comin' up out ov?”
”O, Darby, that was the hould where the cargo's stow'd.”
”An' is there no other place?” siz I.
”Oh, yes,” siz he, ”where we keep the wather casks.”
”An' Ned,” siz I, ”does anyone live down there?”
”Not a mother's soul,” siz he.
”An' Ned,” siz I, ”can't you cram me down there, and give me a lock ov straw an' a bit?”
”Why, Darby,” siz he (an' he look'd mighty pittyfull), ”I must thry. But mind, Darby, you'll have to hide all day in an empty barrel, and when it comes to my watch, I'll bring you down some prog; but if you're diskiver'd, it's all over with me, an' you'll be put on a dissilute island to starve.”
”O Ned,” siz I, ”leave it all to me.”
When night c.u.m on I got down into the dark cellar, among the barrels; and poor Ned every night brought me down hard black cakes an' salt meat.
There I lay snug for a whole month. At last, one night, siz he to me:--
”Now, Darby, what's to be done? we're within three days' sail ov Quebec; the s.h.i.+p will be overhauled, and all the pa.s.sengers' names call'd over.”
”An' is that all that frets you, my jewel,” siz I; ”just get me an empty meal-bag, a bottle, an' a bare ham bone, and that's all I'll ax.”
So Ned got them for me, anyhow.
”Well, Ned,” siz I, ”you know I'm a great shwimmer; your watch will be early in the morning; I'll just slip down into the sea; do you cry out 'There's a man in the wather,' as loud as you can, and leave all the rest to me.”
Well, to be sure, down into the sea I dropt without as much as a splash.
Ned roared out with the hoa.r.s.eness of a brayin' a.s.s--
”A man in the sea, a man in the sea!”
Every man, woman, and child came running up out of the holes, and the captain among the rest, who put a long red barrel, like a gun, to his eye--I thought he was for shootin' me! Down I dived. When I got my head over the wather agen, what shou'd I see but a boat rowin' to me. When it came up close, I roared out--
”Did ye hear me at last?”
The boat now run 'pon the top ov me; I was gript by the scruff ov the neck, and dragg'd into it.
”What hard look I had to follow yees, at all at all--which ov ye is the masther?” says I.
”There he is,” siz they, pointin' to a little yellow man in a corner of the boat.