The Iron Pirate Part 20

He leant over his writing-table and put the paper into my hands, a rough sheet of parchment, which he wished me to read. But my eyes were dimmed with the restless excitement of the situation, with the dread terror of the alternative put to me; and I saw nothing but lines of writing which swam before me. The silence of the room was terrible to bear; and it was as though I struggled for life while already in the tomb. My thoughts went hurriedly to Europe, to my home, to my friends; above all I recalled the night when Martin Hall went to his death, and his shadow seemed by me, his face beseeching me, his hand holding mine back from the pen that it would have clutched. During this time the man Black leant towards me, and watched me, expectancy in his face, threatening in his pose. Yet he did not speak, and my eyes left the paper and I gave him look for look, and from his face my glance pa.s.sed to his right hand which held the pistol; and in that instant I took heart for a step which was the last mad design of a driven man.

"Give me the pen!" I said suddenly, rising and bending over the table.

He put the pen into my hands, and leant back with a chuckle of satisfaction; but the movement cost him the game. I clutched his pistol with a lightning grasp, and covered him with it--

"If you raise a finger I'll shoot you like a dog," I cried.

Then the man, who was no craven, sat motionless in his chair; and I saw the beads of terror falling from his forehead, but he betrayed no emotion, and his face might have been cut from marble. I had the muzzle of the pistol upon him, and I continued with greater confidence--

"If you raise your voice to call out, or if anyone comes to this room, you die where you sit."

He heard me then more calmly, and replied deliberately--

"Boy, you are the first that's bested Black."

"I'll take your word for that," I said; "but take care--you are moving your hand." He held it still at once and continued--

"I'm caught like a rat in the hole. What do ye want? Name it, and I'll know how we stand!"

"I want my life--my life, now that I refuse to sign that paper."

"Yes," he said, "that's a fair request, though I can't say it's in my power to make it that way."

"It's in your power to stand with me--you can give the order that no man's to lay a finger on me, and you will?"

He thought a moment, looking straight down the barrel of the Colt. Then he said--

"Yes, I can't avoid that--I'll give you that."

"And my liberty on the first occasion offering."

"No," he replied very slowly and sternly; "that's more than the devil himself could offer you; they'd tear me to pieces."

There was no doubt that he had right in this; and I reflected that I could gain nothing whatever by holding out. There was just the hope that he would abide by his word in the matter of my personal safety, but more I could not look for. The man could only die, and, it he gave me freedom, his own men would requite him as he said. I thought of this and put the pistol down; then I offered him my hand, and he jumped up from his seat, grasping it with a great clutch altogether painful to bear, while he dragged me to the light and looked at me with that curious expression I had noticed when first I met him in the room.

"You're a sound plank of a boy," he said: "shake my hand, young 'un, shake it hearty; go on, don't you think I mind; shake it right so, you beauty of a boy!"

What else he would have said or done, what new token of his repulsive favour he would have bestowed on me, I know not; but his wild antics were cut short by the sound of firing, rapid and oft repeated, which came to us from the sh.o.r.e of the cove below. At the first report he let go my hand and went to his window, from which he drew the curtain, so that I saw the whole bay lit with silver light from a full-risen moon, and the distant peaks as grim beacons above a land of rest; a land which once, perchance, flowered with exotic luxuriance, but which now wore the snow-silk mantle that had fallen upon countless centuries of its past. Yet the whole glory and enhancement of the perfect peace were for the moment ruined, for out on the snow there was a hungry crowd of starving souls, crying, I doubt not, for bread; and those to whom they cried answered them with their muskets, dyeing the glittering white with many a red stream, bringing many a hungered wretch to his last sleep in the frozen night of death. And out over the silence of the hills the cries for mercy rang as in bitterness to G.o.d, the dreadful cries of the weak, down trodden beneath the feet of those who knew not G.o.d, the last scream of peris.h.i.+ng souls, the sobs of strong men in their agony. In vain I closed my ears, shut out the sight from my eyes.

The picture came to me again and again, the sound of the voices would not be hushed, and in turn I cried to Black--

"For G.o.d's sake, help those men, if you have anything but the instincts of a brute in you!"

He shrugged his shoulders defiantly. "What am I to do?" he asked.

"Stop the devil's work, and give the men bread, as I've just given you your life!"

There was a pause before he answered me, and I could see that an old nature and a new impulse fought within him. He did not give me any direct answer to my earnest appeal, but he s.n.a.t.c.hed a rifle from a case and said--

"Take that pistol, and come on; you've fooled me once, and we'll make it even numbers. But it ain't as easy as cutting cheese, and there's blood to let."

I followed him down the pa.s.sage to the beach, where he blew a whistle sharp and shrill, and the note had a strange ring as it echoed through the canon.

"That'll wake 'em on the s.h.i.+p," he explained. "I'm not afeard of these, but there's fighting to be done--now lie behind me, and don't show till you're wanted."

He advanced towards the snow-plain and sang out--

"John, you there, d.i.c.k--hands to quarters, do you hear me! Move right quick, or I'll move you, by thunder!"

They put down their arms from their shoulders in blank amazement, and listened to him as he went on--

"There's enough down for one night, I reckon, and I'm not going to be kept awake by your cursed firing--what's to be done can be done in the morning; why, you boat-load of night rats, ain't any of you got sleep in you?"

They came round him slowly and sulkily, and he drove them to the big houses with pleasant oaths and fine round phrases. I lurked near him, but an American saw me and cried--

"Say, Cap'en, hev ye took to nursin' that boy ez ye seems so fond of?"

"Shut your jaw, or I'll shut it for you!" replied Black. "Is the boy your affair?"

"He's the affair of all of us, I calcerlate, an' some of us wishes to know particler if he's signed or no."

Black was smothered in anger, but he showed it only with that terrible growling of the voice and his horrid calmness.

"Oh, you want to know, do you? Which of you, might I ask, is particler anxious about my business?"

There were thirty or forty of them round, and they pressed the closer at the question, as he continued--

"Let them as makes complaint step right here."

Only four joined the leader; but the captain suddenly s.n.a.t.c.hed my revolver from me, and fired four shots; and for each shot a man dropped dead on the beach; but the American stood untouched. The appalling brutality of the action seemed to awe the rest of the crew. They stood motionless, dumb with their rage; but when they recovered themselves they rushed upon us with wild ferocity; and the Yankee fired at Black point-blank. I thought, truly, that the end was then; but I heard a shout from the water, and, looking there, I saw Dr. Osbart in the launch; and there was a Maxim gun in the bows of her.

"Clear that beach!" roared Black in awful pa.s.sion; and instantly, as he dropped flat and I imitated him, there was a hail of bullets, and the main part of the crowd fell shrieking; but some threw themselves down, while many stiffened and rolled in death, and blood spouted from scores of wounds.

The victory was awful, instantaneous. As the men fled towards the hills, Black called after them--

"Bring to, you limp-gutted carrion, or I'll wipe you out, every one of you! Any man who'll save his throat, let him come here!"

At these words they turned back to a man, and came cowering to the water's edge. Thirty of their fellows lay dead or wounded on the stones, and many of those crawling towards us had bullets in their limbs. Yet Black had no thought for them.

"Where's your leader?" he asked, and they pointed to the American, who lay with the blood pouring from a wound in his left thigh.

"He's there, is he?" screamed the infuriated man. "The darned skunk's down, is he? Well, I'll cure him like a ham. Get torches, some of you and ice him in."

He was swaying with pa.s.sion; yet, even regarding it, I could not understand what his order meant, and I asked--

"What are you going to do with that man?"

"What am I going to do with him?" he yelled, scarce noticing who spoke to him; "I'm going to bury him."

It was wonderful in that moment to see how the men, who had before defied him, then became as slaves at his command. A silence deep and profound rested upon them; even those with the captain watched him in his outrageous anger and were dumb; but all helped him in his ghastly work, and brought shovels and picks, which they carried to the higher plane of snow. As for the American, who sat upon the beach groaning with the pain of his wound, I do not know how any man could have wished to add to his hurt; yet he asked for no sympathy, and it was plain that he knew what they meant to do with him. At one time feverish ravings seized him, and he shook his fist at all around him; then he poured his anger upon Black, who listened to him, gratified that he should provoke it. And the more the man cursed, the greater satisfaction did the other show.