"He ran away from them, and came to us when they had gone up-river, and said that they were going to beat him, and told a terrible story of the wrongs he had suffered. But he could not abide our ways any more than we his,—such a time as he led us with his swearing and thieving and lying!—and when a boat from the American cruiser came ashore while you were gone, he told the men such a story of your search for slaves and of all your gear and goods, they vowed to capture you if they lay off the coast a year and a day, and they laughed at his wretched oaths and made much of him and took him on board. And then—then—" It seemed the thought of all that had happened since swept upon her in a wave almost as overwhelming as one of those breakers through which we had fought our way; for she suddenly turned white and tried to fight back her tears, and for the time could speak no more.
"Come, Joe, look alive now!" Captain North roared, trying to mask his kind heart and lively emotions with a pretense of fierceness. "Fetch hot water from the galley to my stateroom! Have the cook bring aft hot coffee and a square meal. I'll take you below myself, ma'am, to show you the way, and I now order you to help yourself to all you need for comfort. Off with you, Joe!"
All this time the cook had been gaping from the galley door at what had been going on aft; and so eager was he to get a nearer view of the young lady who had come mysteriously out with us from the river, and to gather up new threads of the extraordinary story Abe Guptil had told forward, that, although he was the laziest Yankee who ever commanded a galley stove, he set out at a dead run aft, with a coffee-pot in one hand and a pail of hot water, which at every moment threatened to spill and scald him, in the other.
Captain North at once came on deck again and found the rest of us still intent on the approaching ship, which with all her canvas spread was bearing down upon us like a race-horse. The cook, on his way forward, paused to survey her. The watch, now glancing anxiously aft, now studying the stranger, was standing by for whatever orders should be forthcoming.
"Sir," said Arnold, "she means trouble."
"We've waited too long already," Captain North replied. Raising the trumpet he cried, "Call up all hands, there, Mr. Severance!"
A moment later he looked keenly at Matterson. "Mr. Matterson," he said, "you are exhausted."
"I am a little peaked," Matterson said thoughtfully, "a little peaked, but not exhausted."
"Will you take your station, sir?"
"I will." Still in his wet clothes and cautiously touching his inflamed wound, Matterson went forward to the forecastle. There was something soldierly in his promptness. It was so evident that his strength was scarcely equal to his task, that for his hardihood, little as I liked him, I freely gave him credit.