Chapter Eighteen.
We turn the tables upon Monsieur Renouf.
It was drawing well on toward sunset when Renouf, having apparently appropriated all the most valuable portions of the Spaniard’s cargo that he could readily lay hands on, began to clear his disorderly rabble of a crew out of the ship, sending them aboard the schooner, a boatload at a time, and, to my surprise, using the Spanish boats, as well as his own, for this purpose. Meanwhile, the stories told by the men who had from time to time come from the Spanish ship had had the effect of gradually enticing the more sober half out of the schooner and on board the Santa Theresa, until the Jean Bart had at length been left practically in possession of us five Englishmen, and some thirty Frenchmen, the whole of whom were more or less helplessly drunk. And, this being the state of things on board the schooner, it would have been a comparatively easy matter for us five to have overpowered the Frenchmen, who were lying or staggering about the decks, and to have made off with the vessel; but not even to secure our liberty did I consider that I should have been justified in leaving Renouf and the bulk of his ruffians on board the Santa Theresa, to wreak his vengeance on the hapless crew and passengers. At length pretty nearly all the Frenchmen, save Renouf, his brother, and some half a dozen more, had rejoined the schooner, and I perceived with intense satisfaction that, although they were, without exception, in an almost helpless state of intoxication, every man brought with him at least a couple of bottles of wine or spirits; some men brought as many as half a dozen with them; and, at a hint from me, Anstey and his shipmates zealously assisted in getting these precious bottles safely up over the ship’s side for their owners, who at once took them below and stowed them away in their hammocks. Among the earliest of the main body of arrivals, so to speak, came Dumaresq; he was perfectly sober, and I was gratified to observe that his countenance wore a quite unmistakable expression of fiery indignation, in which I thought I could also trace indications of horror and disgust. He caught my eye for an instant, as he sprang in over the rail; threw up his hands expressively, laid his finger on his lips, and vanished below.
Only the schooner’s gig and the Spanish ship’s pinnace now remained to join, and I had found time to observe that the latter was being loaded with a number of very small but apparently heavy packages, the nature of which I shrewdly suspected, for I had seen something very like them before. At length the operation of loading the pinnace appeared to be complete. There was a pause of about a quarter of an hour, and then the gig started for the schooner, with the pinnace in tow. As soon as I saw these two boats coming I directed my four shipmates to go below and turn into their hammocks, as at least half the Frenchmen had done, and to remain there, if possible, until I should call them, at the same time warning them not to touch a drop of liquor, as they valued their lives. In a few minutes the two boats were alongside, and I saw that my suspicion as to the nature of the small packages was correct. There were just forty of them, weighing about one hundred pounds each; each package was carefully sewn up in raw hide, and I knew that these small but exceedingly heavy packages were so many gold ingots! So the Jean Bart had made a very handsome haul, apart from the probably valuable bales that had come up out of the Spaniard’s hold. As Renouf and his brother came up over the side I observed that their faces were flushed, as with excitement, or wine, or both, and their voices were thick and husky, but neither of them was what might be called intoxicated. As they turned to go aft to the cabin the brothers glanced at the Spanish ship, and the elder gave utterance to a brutal jest that made my hands tingle to take him by the throat and heave him overboard. But I seldom permit my passion to conquer prudence, and I allowed him to go, promising myself that his unhappy victims should be amply avenged in due time. Alas! even then I did not know the full measure of the villain’s infamy, or I should have cast prudence to the winds, and dared everything for immediate freedom of action. They went below for a few minutes, and then returned to the deck to watch the trans-shipment of the gold, standing close to the gangway, and execrating in unmeasured terms the incapacity of the drunken mob who were performing the operation. For my own purpose I also assumed the demeanour of semi-intoxication, and accordingly came in for my full share of abuse. The gold, as it was hoisted on deck, was passed down into the cabin, and when it had all been got safely aboard the schooner, the pinnace was passed astern and made fast to the rest of the Spanish boats, when, to my astonishment, we filled and made sail with the Santa Theresa’s boats in tow!
For some time I was puzzled to divine what could possibly be Renouf’s motive in taking away the Spanish boats, for they could be of no use or value whatever to us. There was no room for them on deck or at the schooner’s davits, and I could hardly imagine that a man like Renouf would seriously contemplate the idea of attempting to tow them across the Atlantic. It was while I was marvelling at this extraordinary eccentricity, as I considered it, that I happened to allow my gaze to rest abstractedly on the Spaniard that still remained hove-to, and as I gazed it dawned upon me that a subtle change was taking place in the appearance of the vessel. At first I could not satisfy myself at all as to the nature of the change, although I was convinced of its reality, but suddenly I understood it all. The craft was deeper in the water than before; she was gradually, almost imperceptibly, settling down, and already the rise and fall of her upon the swell was becoming characterised by that heavy sluggishness of movement that marks a water-logged ship. The scoundrels had scuttled her—I could understand it all now—and were taking away the boats in order that the miserable passengers and crew might by no possibility escape to tell the tale of Renouf’s piratical behaviour. With this conviction strong upon me, I made my way below, and at length found Dumaresq, sitting upon a chest, with his face buried in his hands, and wearing every appearance of the most abject melancholy.
“Dumaresq,” exclaimed I, in a fierce whisper, grasping him by the shoulder and shaking him almost savagely in my agitation; “rouse yourself, man, and listen to me! I want to ask you a question or two. You have been aboard the Spanish ship, and were an eye-witness, I suppose, of some at least of the deeds of Renouf and his crew. I want to hear the particulars, as briefly as possible, and I also want to know what is your feeling in the matter.”
He removed his hands from his face and looked up at me, and even in the dim uncertain light of the ’tween-decks I could read the horror, sorrow, and indignation in his eyes.
“Bowen, my friend,” he replied in low, cautious tones, “do not ask me for I cannot tell you; I could not find words to describe the scenes of which I have been a helpless, horrified eye-witness this day. Everything may be summed up in a few words: Renouf and his crew are pirates of the most ruthless character; men who absolutely revel in wickedness of the vilest description, who take positive delight in inflicting the most horrible indignities upon those who unfortunately happen to fall into their power, who gloat over the unavailing tears and entreaties of their victims, and who scoff at the mere mention of the word ‘mercy’. Picture to yourself the very worst that you have ever heard or read of piratical atrocities, and you will be able to arrive at a very accurate conception of the horrors of which that unfortunate ship was the theatre to-day. And I, my friend, I was compelled to look on, powerless to mitigate a single horror; nay, worse, my remonstrances were jeered at, and if I ventured to intercede in behalf of a victim, some additional insult or barbarity was at once inflicted upon the unhappy creature. And these are the fiends into whose power we have fallen. It would have been a thousand times better had we perished in the gig!”
“Is that your view of the matter?” I exclaimed contemptuously. “Then I can only say, Monsieur Dumaresq, that I have been mistaken in you. Man, man!” I continued angrily; “what are you thinking about? Are you going to crouch here, dumb, abject, and inactive, like a whipped hound, instead of bestirring yourself and helping me to put an end to the career of these fiends and bring them to justice, to say nothing of the possibility of saving those unhappy wretches on board the Spanish ship, unless I am to understand from you that they have all been murdered in cold blood.”
“No, no, it was not quite so bad as all that,” he answered, looking at me with a bewildered air; “bloodshed there certainly was, and cruel torture to extract the secret of the hiding-place of the gold, but no life was actually taken, so far as I know. What do you mean by your talk of ‘saving’ the unhappy wretches on board the Spanish ship?”
“I mean,” said I impressively, “that the ship has been scuttled, and is now surely but slowly sinking, while Renouf has all her boats in tow, in order that there may be no possible chance of escape for anybody on board her.”
“Merciful heaven! it cannot be!” he exclaimed, starting to his feet, and gripping me by the arm. “Why, nobody but a fiend incarnate would dream of doing such a thing!”
“Then,” said I, “Renouf is a fiend incarnate; and that is an additional reason for putting an end to his career at once; for, as surely as that you are standing here, he has not only dreamed of doing such a thing, but has actually done it.”
“Horrible, horrible!” exclaimed Dumaresq, smiting his forehead with his hand as he stared at me, still more than half incredulous. “But what can we do, my friend; what can we do? There are but six of us, at most, against more than eighty!”
“True,” I answered; “but if each of those six is as resolute as I am prepared to be, we may prove sufficient for my purpose. Now, listen to me. This is my plan. Look around you. There is not a man below here, save ourselves, but is nearly or quite helplessly drunk, and those on deck are little or no better. We must divide ourselves into three parties of two each, and each party must tackle one of these drunken wretches at a time, one of us clapping a gag between his jaws, while the other whips a lashing round him, and makes him fast, hands and feet. In this way everybody below here may be secured. Then, leaving two of our number here to deal with any others who may come down, the other four must go aft and seize Renouf and his brother; and when we have made them safe, we must tackle Danton. This done, our next move must be to get the schooner round, and return to the Spanish ship, and while we are making our way back we must go round the decks with a belaying-pin apiece, and simply knock the senses out of all who attempt to oppose us. It will not be a difficult matter, for I do not believe that there is a man on board, excepting ourselves and perhaps Renouf and his brother, capable of taking care of himself.”
“Mon Dieu!” exclaimed Dumaresq; “but it is a desperate scheme, and I do not believe that anybody but a Briton would have thought of it, much less talked of it so coolly as you have done. But, Bowen, my friend, dare we attempt it? Is there the remotest chance of our being successful?”
“There is every chance, if we are but resolute,” I answered, a little impatiently. “But, of course,” I continued, “you are not called upon to join us if—”
“Nay, nay,” he interrupted, “you shall never say that Anatole Dumaresq flinched when desperate work had to be done. I am with you, my friend, heart and soul. Let me but clearly understand what is to be done, and you shall have no chance to say that I did not do my fair share. There is my hand upon it.”
I silently grasped his extended hand, and then went to the hammocks in which Hardy and his mates were pretending to sleep, and told them to tumble out at once. This they did, when I explained to them very briefly what I proposed to do. Having made my meaning clear, we rejoined Dumaresq, and without further ado the six of us seized a number of jackets, trousers, and other clothing that had been hung to the bulkheads and beams, and unceremoniously cut them into suitable strips, which we rolled into gags.
On board the Jean Bart the hammocks were never taken on deck, as they are on board a man-o’-war—the schooner not being fitted with a hammock-rail,—but were simply laced up every morning. Each hammock was consequently fitted with a good stout lacing, which I thought would admirably serve as a lashing for my prisoners.
Having provided ourselves with as many gags as we could conveniently stow in our pockets, we next stationed ourselves in couples alongside three occupied hammocks, and while one of the twain loosely and quickly passed the lacing through the eyelet-holes the other stood by with the gag, which, at the proper moment, was slipped into the victim’s mouth and lashed securely, the hammock lacing at the same moment being hauled taut and made fast; and in this way each prisoner was silently and effectually secured. It took the six of us fully twenty minutes to secure everybody below—to the number of sixty-three,—as some of them had to be gagged first and afterwards lashed into their hammocks; but the work was done effectually, noiselessly, and without a hitch, every one of the Frenchmen proving to be too completely intoxicated to offer the slightest resistance worthy of the name.
This done, I crept up on deck, staggering and stumbling, with the most vacant expression of face that I could assume, and generally imitating, as nearly as I could, the gait and appearance of a drunken man, for the benefit of whosoever might happen to be in a condition to take intelligent notice of me. Reeling and staggering to the fore-rigging, I clutched at and hung on to a belaying-pin, and looked about me fore-and-aft. The deck was occupied by some twenty men or so, some of whom were asleep in the lee scuppers, while others, in little groups of two and three, hung over the bulwarks, staring idiotically at the white foam that swept aft from the schooner’s keen cut-water; and four, who had probably assumed the duty of looking out, staggered and lurched in pairs, holding each other on their legs, to-and-fro between the windlass and the fore-rigging, occasionally indulging in an ineffectual attempt to exchange remarks. So far, all was right; nobody here seemed capable of giving us the slightest trouble. In fact, discipline was for the time being at an end, lawlessness reigned supreme, everybody was his own master, and the schooner was practically left to take care of herself. Danton, however, was in charge of the deck, and although he was a trifle unsteady in his walk, I could see that he had his wits pretty well about him and would have to be somewhat carefully tackled if we wished to secure him without giving the alarm to Renouf and his brother, both of whom, I took it, were below. Astern of us, or rather about a point and a half on our starboard quarter, and some four miles distant, lay the Spaniard, still hove-to, her brasswork and the glass of her sky-lights and scuttles flashing redly in the last rays of the setting sun as she laboured over the ridges of the low swell; and I was both startled and horrified to observe how deep she had sunk into the water during the comparatively short time that I had been below. It was clear enough that if the unhappy people aboard her were to be rescued there was not a moment to lose; I therefore staggered aft and, approaching Danton with drunken solemnity, touched my forehead and, wavering upon my legs and speaking thickly, asked him to come for’ard and down below and tell me whether he could smell fire. The scoundrel’s face blanched at the word, as he probably pictured to himself the frightful predicament of all hands—himself included—should my suggestion prove true; then, without a word, he hastened forward to the hatchway, with me at his heels, and went stumbling down the steep ladder. As he reached the bottom I flung myself upon him, clasping him round the body and arms, and lifted him off his feet, at the same time singing out to Hardy to gag him; and in another minute we had him securely bound, hand and foot, and lashed hard and fast into a hammock.
“So far, well!” I exclaimed, as I dragged him unceremoniously away to a dark corner. “We have now but to secure Renouf and his brother, and the schooner is ours. Hardy, Green, and Sendell, come you aft with me, providing yourselves with a belaying-pin each on the way; and you, Anstey, will keep Mr Dumaresq company on deck, mounting guard over the companion, to prevent anyone going below, or to knock down and secure anyone who may escape us and attempt to reach the deck. Our duty is very simple; four of us will enter the cabin; and while Hardy and I attempt to secure Renouf and his brother, the other two will stand by to assist, in the event of either of us becoming disabled by a pistol bullet. Come along, my hearties.”
So saying, I led my little party aft. At the head of the companion ladder Dumaresq and the man Anstey came to a halt, the former engaging the drunken helmsman in conversation, while the remaining four of us stole down the ladder, bare-footed, and noiseless as cats. I had already mentally arranged my method of procedure; so, whispering to Hardy that he was to tackle the chief mate, while I would look after Renouf, I boldly knocked at the cabin door. A command to enter, given in rather a drowsy, peevish tone of voice, was the immediate response, whereupon I flung open the door and passed into the cabin closely followed by Hardy.
Renouf and his brother occupied a locker each on opposite sides of the cabin; and it was quite apparent that they had both been indulging in a nap, which I had rudely broken in upon. They were in the act of changing from a reclining to a sitting posture, yawning and stretching as they did so, when I entered the cabin.
“Captain Renouf,” began I, as I advanced toward him, “I have taken the liberty to—”
My little ruse was, however, unavailing; the ruffian seemed to instinctively and immediately divine my purpose, and in a flash he had whipped a pistol and a long knife—the blade of which I noticed was smeared with blood—from his belt, and levelled the former straight at my head. There was no need for further words between us; nor was there time for hesitation; so, quickly ducking my head, I sprang upon him like lightning, and seized him by both wrists at the very instant that his pistol exploded; the bullet grazing the left side of my head, and neatly clipping off a lock of my hair. The fellow was as lithe as an eel in my hands, and made the most desperate efforts to stab me with his long, murderous-looking knife; but I had him fast in so powerful a grip that, after a furious struggle of a few seconds, he dropped both his weapons with a gasp of pain, my clutch having, as it presently appeared, forced both his wrists from their sockets. To snatch the remaining pistol from his belt with my right hand, while I shifted the grip of my left to his throat, was the work of but a single instant; and I then turned to see how Hardy was faring with his antagonist. He had apparently been less fortunate than myself, for his cheek was laid open by a long gash from the chief mate’s knife, which, even as I turned my head, again descended and buried itself in Hardy’s shoulder. The smart of this second wound seemed to fairly rouse my shipmate, and before I could do anything to help him his ponderous fist darted out with the force of a six-pound shot, catching the miserable Corsican fair in the centre of the face and dashing him backwards, with a shriek of pain, across the table. This blow settled the affair; there was no more fight left in either of the brothers—indeed I had unconsciously gripped my prisoner’s throat so tightly, while watching the termination of the struggle between the other two, that his tongue and eyeballs were protruding, and he was already going black in the face. So we securely pinioned the precious pair, lashing their arms and legs together, and, bundling each into his own cabin, locked the doors, the keys of which I slipped into my pocket. This done, I helped myself, from the trophy upon the after-bulkhead of the cabin, to weapons enough for our entire party; found Gaspar, the steward, in his pantry, where I lashed him fast and locked him in; and then the four of us hastened on deck to ascertain what effect, if any, had been produced by the pistol-shot fired in the cabin upon the small residue of the crew who had not yet utterly succumbed to the stupefying influence of their immoderate potations.