Tales and Sketches

Star (Christchurch), Issue 5056, 15 September 1894, Page 1

Tales and Sketches

THE GOOD SHIP MOHOCK.

[BY W. OIiABE BUSSBIiL, Author of " The Golden Hope : A Romance of the Deep/' " A Sea Queen," " The Wreok of the Grosvenor, "My Danish Sweetheart," &0., &c] (AV Bights Beservtd.) Chapxbb I. introduces the reader to Mus Laura Hayes, stepdaughter to Captain Sinclair, who proposes to take her on Iris ship, the Mohock, to !New York. She accepts, leaving her niarried sister, Maria Holfoxd, behind, and they start on their Journey. Among the passengers are Colonel N.P. Wills, Mons. luard, a preacher, and Mr Jonas Jackson, a well-known comedian. Chaptxe ll.— Miss Laura Hayes relates how the Mohock, proceeding on her way, encounters what promises to be rough weather, and meets the schooner "JBeindeer," from New Orleans to Bristol. She has lost her reckoning, and the time and longitude are obtained from the captain of the Mohock. ' Chawbb llL— Continuing their voyage they Bee an iceberg and then meet the Cunarder Britannia bound from Boston to Liverpool. An hour or two later the doctor of the ship is missed, and it is conjectured that he has fallen overboard from the captain's gig which hang over the stern, end sitting in which he was last seen. No sooner has the excitement occasioned by the doctor's loss abated than a boat is sighted, containing twelve men, a portion of the survivors of the barque Bemerara burnt at sea. ' CSA?xaE IV.— The so-called survivors of the Deinerara prove to be pirates, and they rise in the sight' and take possession of the ship. Their leader is a man whom Miss Hayes recognises as having seen entering her stepfather's house before the ship Mohock left England. She tails Captain Sinclair this, but the latter indignantly denies the truth of the statement. When the ship is captured the passengers are imprisoned in the saloon, and the officers in their respective cabins, but the prisoners are all well tztatod.

Chapter V.— (Continued.) s The breakfast was long in serving. The teward bad to work alone; the fellow uwding the companion would not let the tewardess through. Never did a more orlorn company sit; down to a meal at eea. Conversation was restrained, perhaps fortunately, by the wiry fellow giving na an occasion aV view of hia figure as he slowly walked past the open, skylight, keeping a lookout. Io was soon whispered round that the ship had ninety-eight thousand pounds in aer 3 and every face darkened, at the intelligence; the capture was a rich prize in a word, and God alone could tell how it was to go with us, armed to the teeth a« the twelve determined devils were,, and ejrery son! aboard secured under the h ateheß. ' ' ' I never could have imagined so dejected » countenance as Mr Jackson's? scarcely the tremendous charaoter of the thing that had wrought it oaved me from bursting into a laugh at 'him. His dark eyes were looted to. the tablecloth ; he ate but little. Consigner Luard spoke soothingly to the ladies and tried to comfort them. "I am pleased/' he said, " to hear of the money. Ido not agree with Colonel Wills and the other gentlemen that it deepens the significance of our peril. My conviction is' that the robbers will bring the ship to a stand off some coast with which they axe acquainted, where,' after carrying the money ashore, they will abandon as. It will prove a true romance of the sea,, which might be of great professional use to Mr Jackson, for what could form a more thrilling subject for a nautical drama than this experience P" The comedian spat a curse at the deck. I could not guess what sorb of a wind blew. I saw fine weather in the mottled azure through the skylight. Through that glasa, too, the mizzenmast was visible ; the yards were braced square, and the marble white cloths Bank and swelled languidly with the regular curtseying of the ship on the long heave of brine that followed her. All remained wonderfully quiet On deukfor a long while. From time to time one or soother of the gentlemen, finding heart, would spring upon the table and cautiously apply his eye to the skylight glass, and report softly what he saw ; but what he saw was never more than this— a fellow armed with a musket leaning against the companion, a second at the wheel, and from time to time a third walking a lookout. The sight of the steward was a God-send when they let him down to get us some lunch. But Master Milk-liver had never any news to tell us. I think that steward, whose real name I'd publish if I remembered it, was the greatest coward that ever shipped to serve at table. Itwaa degrading to hear him tbank the armed* ruffian above for opening the door and letting him down. All that be could cell us was that the captain and mateß were still locked up, and the crew under hatches. Some of the steerage pasaangerß had been allowed on deck to cook a mid-day meal for all of them ; the mainha^ch under ■which the rest lay was guarded, jußt as was the companion. I have sajd there were sixteen cabin papssjngers, including children, and at four o'clock that afternoon the whole of. us were assembled in the Ealocn, seldom speaking, and staring idly ; for ad had been said; it was only now and again that somebody would break out ; but speculation' was exhausted, and there was nothing elee to base our talk upon. On a BUdden we heard the voice? of men oborusing the familiar sea-ebaut of "yheerily, Men! " this was accompanied by a grinding and scraping of feet on deok. One or two got upon the table, but the commotion was forward and it was impossible to see that way. The stewardess, coming out of Mrs Maobride's cabin cocked her head a moment or two, and lifted her eyebrows. "What dp you think ib is?" asked someone. Bb e listened again and then answered : " I believe they are hoisting out the big boat they came, in." ♦'They may have got the money and mean to leave the ship," said the colonel. "What 1 carry off ninety-eight thousand in au open boat ? " cried the grasshopper, with a sarcastic sneer. " How much d'ye think ninety - eight thousand pounds 'weighs? Not to mention twelve stout !men to sink he"r yet, along with all the .provisions and water they need} for aren't we in the middle of the Atlantic, hey P " " V7hat can they mean to do?" cried 'Mm "Wills in a thrilling voice, t We had not long to wait to discover. Loud shouts of " Slacken away ! Easa off handsomely!" and the like reached us, and shortly afterwards we heard the splash of ft Urge body lowered quiokly and waterborne " with a run." Had the side of the ebrp been depressed we might have caught a sight of the boat through an open porthole; but the Mohock floated upright ,under square wings, and you could sae nothing but the horizon and tho eky above it through fte windowo. Whatever was happening, however, was brim? carried on with great activity; mea sprang about, cries sharp as with temper »nd urgency reached us through the open skylight, under which some of the gentle- ! lnen stood, straining their eavs with all their might to gather from the noise tho least import of what vraa intended. Mr Macbride had terrified us by suggesting in & trembling voiae that the boat wbb meant for us salopn passengers, who were to be feint adrift as a sort of beginning. Occasionally thiapoor man would whine most dolefully. " Oh ! " he cried out once, breaking into along silence and addressing himself to Monßignor, "How is out little excursion— •

the trip that my wife and I have baenlooking forward to for months and months -^saving up and praying for— how is it to end ? She lies in hex bed motionless, and almost dead with headache. Surely there must be some error— if representatives of the twelve men were invited into this saloon in a kindly gentlemanly way, and the faota of our situation submitted to them with moderation— -appealingly- " "Ask the sentry to let you pass and see what you can do for us," the grasshopper growled out. ■ The clergyman, in fact, had been silenced by finding no response to his twaddling lamentations in the looks of us. Two of the saloon cabin windows on the Btatboard side were open, and wo knew by a fountain-like noise of rippling waters that a large boat was towing alongside. We stood, or moved about, hearkening with paaßionate eagerness; if ever anyone spoke he was Bilenced by grimaces or gesturea. All thia while I wa3 wondering what part Captain Sinclair was going to j play in this audaoiona drama of the sea. I was surprised also that, saving Colonel i Willa' remark, no referance was made by any of the people to what surely suggested itself as a deep-laid conspiracy. But then, of course, I had reason to be shockingly ; suspicious, and to carry conjecture beyond j anything tbe most imaginative could de- j picture. It web not only tbe presence of the wiry man on board ; I had noticed the anxious, secret look-out the captain had kept— for what, if not for the boat whose twelve men had been brought aboard as shipwrecked people? Again, I thought I saw plenty to raise suspicion in that strange freak of the barometer. Nor could I forget the queer, wary, steadfast look I caught that sallen, straight-headed old seaman Gordon directing at my stepfather. "Hark!" suddenly ones Monaignor, lifting his hnnd in a prießtly way. " What is happening?" It wa3 a sound of trudging in the waist, accompanied by a continuous growl of voioea of men, raging but halpleßS; occasionally a clear sentence would leap out of that brute-like clamour. "Over you go. By God! You'll not be spared more than another if yon hang back!" It was strange we did not hear more, seeing that the cabin windows were open and the weather quiet, and. no noises in the ship saving, an occasional light musketry of canvas when, the swell launched her, along with the ticking of doors on hooks and creakings of bulkheads. Mr Jackson got upon the table, and peering affc through the skylight, reported that the companion door jwaa unguarded. " Depend upon it," eaid Monsignor, " they're doing something that requires all their strength." " I've a good mind to force my way on deck," exclaimed Colonel Wills. "Thiaia a ship and, I'm no rat." "You'll do nothing of the sorb," half Bhri.efc.ed his. wife. "They'd think no more of shooting yon than if you were a rat." Colonel Wills appeared to take the same view : he remained motionless ; evidently he had no intention to attempt anything raah. He got out of the thing gallantly by exclaiming, with a s^.owl at tbe. steps and in a grumbling voice, "I'dßtepoub and take my chance by thunder, if I didn't know those doozs were secured outside." Thus some time passed, when all of a sudden a starboard cabin window wae whitened by the passing of a large 6ail close by, and I beard Mr Gordon's hurrir cane voice roar but from the surface of the sea, " You'll be lagged for it, every man of you. You'ze dogs and derils to send a boatful of men adrift with night coming on——" Thiß was subdued into a dim, indisfcingniehable roaring till the white sail of the boat slid' abreast of the next open window, and then we heard the fellows in , her shouting at the people on deck : 'twas j a mere gibberish of curses, oaths, insults, and the boat slipped aft^ and I he*rd nothing save an occasional iaaolent inhuman roar of laughter above. . ! A thought came into my head and I went ty> the captain's cabin j I was free of it, and had used it when the captain himsolf wrb present, lying down or writing; It was a large airy cabin, with a big stern window after the old pattern. The hour was about five ; the eun hung a good bit above the eea, and as the ship's stern faced north the splendour of the . afternoon was 0^ the left in the wafer : the atmosphere trembled with the rich lights of the ocean, and hung in a blue glimmering transparency across the cabin window, making tbe distance a little misty with its radiance. Yeb I instantly saw on going to the window the white, needle-like heights of a couple of ships, apparently standing to the westward, just under the bronzed round of a large, faint, swollen heap of yellow cloud, riding clear of the se-i-ec!g:e. The next thing my Bigfet- caught wa3 the boat that had left us. Sho was the boat the twelve men had been taken out of, a fine large craft, sitting buoyantly, though crowded, and in that instant of watching I saw them trim the larpo lugsail, and "with an inverted Union Jack flying from the masthead, slant away with spitting stem and foaming rudder for the ships in the distance. I snatched up a biaocular glass, and looked whilst the boat was clearly framed in the square of the window. The lenseß instantly gave ma the faces of our old chip's company. I could scarcely credit my sight; Mr Gordon sat in the sternsheets of the boat, steering her. Next him was Mr Turnbull. I also saw the boatswain of the Bhip, a man named "Vigors, with many a face that had grown familiar. There looked above, twenty. My puls9 went quickly, whilst I searched that crowd for my stepfather, and when I saw nothing of him I thought to myself, " Does not his remaining on board prove my suspicions? What will those poor fellows out there think of him ? Was it ever before told of a shipmaster that he turned his whole ship's company adrift in an open boat, with the darkness coming on, themselves guiltless of any wrong?" The breeze that blew languidly for us floating before it, was a fresh ait for the little craft, and she seethed through the brine nimbly, marking tbe swiftness of her flight upon the eea by the arrow straight riband of foam Eke seemed to trail; there could be no doubt of her coming up with, or at all events of her being saen by one or the other of the ships whesa upires were red in the air. I watched through the glaia till the boat had passed out of the compass of the window, and then re-entered the saloon. The steward was preparing the table for dinner, which bad been delayed two hours beyond the usual time, but nobody appeared to have noticed this. He was answering questions when I passed out o£ my stepfather's cabin, and I stood still to hear him, being almost as private and withdrawn there as in a berth. "The whole of the crew, do you Bay ?" exclaimed Mr Bergheim. "Barring me and the cook/' was the answer. "Then we are completely in the power of the fellows who bare seized the ship!" said Mr Macbride. " Bin so all along," answered the steward, proceeding in his business of dressing the table with agitated gestures, aod frequent upheavals ol his pale lace at tbe skylight. " But it's like murdering men to send them adrift in an open beat in this wide ocean," said Monsignor Lvard. " There's two ships in sight," Baid the Bteward, " and the boat's got & distress

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eolour a-flying. They've got wittlea and sperrits and there's two hours of daylight left;. I don't fear gentlemen, of their not being seen and taken aboard." "They'll report this piraoy— but what then?" aays Colonel Willa, sticking out hia legs. "If the Bhip that picka them up is westward bound it may take them a month or sis weeks to arrive aS as American port. Then, or sometime afterwards, I reckon a British cruiser will be Bontiu search. But whero'll sh? look for na, and v/here'll we be by thai time? Mrs . Macbride, who Eat close, against her husband, clapped her handkerphief to her milk-white face and rocked herself. ." The only grain of comfort in this | dreadful business," txclaimed the hardfaced lady, '•' is that Captain Sinclair is Btill on board." "What's he going to do for tig, all alone as he is?" answered Mr Jackson, scowling at her. "Iff he couldn't help us with his army of men in the ship, of what; U33 can he be single-handed ?" I stepped forward at this point and exclaimed, "Has any news of my stepfather renehed the cabin V The steward answered, "They've kept him aboard, miss, bat he's still locked up." ' " What do they mean to do with him ?" I a^ked. " I expect," said, Moneignor, " thai; they have kept him to help them to navigate the ship. None of the fellows I &aw looked educated and qua ified as navigators^ . "You'll find that's it," paid the;gras=ihopper. " But will he navigate the abip ?" he proceeded with excitement. " Ought he to lift his sextant or take a single pjep at his chronometer unless under assurance 3 which will provide for our eafebj. »nd arrival in a reasonable time in Ameuca?" "Trust him to know his business,* said Monsignor gently. "You are right, madam. , It is comforting tib know that he is on board. Yet what must bo his feelings? His crew sent adrift, his ship captured, her courae altered, himself a prisoner !" He upr oiled hi9 eyes till nothing showed but the whites, and Mr Macbride groaned in sympathy with that fine expreßßive face of misery. At thia moment the wiry man thruet hie head into the skylight, and called in his hoarse note : " Below there ! Is Miss Hayes amongst ye?", I started, and- felt myself turn aaben, yet I went at once to the table and looked up and sai >1, " What do you want ?" "Tlie captain wishes to have a talk along with you, miss," answered the fellow, persevering in his voice of studied hoarseness. "In plain words, we've given him his choice, and he ft ants you to help him to decide. I'll open the doors if you'll come up." He withdrew his head. " This is no ruse, I hope," cried # the colonel. . " Miss Hayes is a fine young' woman, and by thunder the ladies must be respected and protected, first and foremost," and now be seemed in earnest, for he Bprang to his legs with bis face full of blood, and a wild look at the frame Where the man's head had. been. - "I don't think Misß Hayes has any need to be afraid," said the hard-faced lady. "Pray consider," eatd she, addref sing the others. "It's her step-father who sends for her." I went to my cabin without more ado and put on my tab and jacSat, then mounted the companion steps and knocked upon the doors j they weie immediately opened by the wiry man who on my stepping on deck, securely clossd them afresh, by Borne arrangement of staple and padlock. I felt exceedingly frightened when the doors were closed and I found mjself alone, that is, the only woman. The western light was a blaze of splendour, and the ship bowed stately before the breeze in the royal dress of crimson the stm3et draped her with. Seven or eight fellows stood about the decks ia twos or threes. One grasping a musket guarded the. main batch. I eaw no other sentry, ' I sent one quick look seaward m search of the boat, but out in the direction she bad been heading for, it was all melting dark blue water, flashful with ted gleams, slipping from one. crest to another, with the two sail en the verge of the deep showing full breastec?, and as large again as from the cabin window. The wiry man said roughly "It'll be all right with them. One of those ships bas shifted her helm to pick the boat up. Now you'd better coma along and see the captain. U3 men are impatient and want him to decide quickly." Thus Bpeafciug he led the way into the forepart of the ship. (To be continued.)