"I can't find another one, sir," the second mate replied.
I now hit upon an idea. "Here," said I, "here's what will do the work." I had picked up a six-foot pole and the others eagerly seized upon my suggestion.
I worked the pole into the space between the inner and outer planking while the man from Boston blinked at me angrily, and fished about with it until I discovered and pried within reach two more leather bags.
"Well done!" Roger cried. "Cook, suppose you take this fellow in tow,—we've a good strong set of irons waiting for him,—and I'll help carry these bags over under the hatch."
Calling up to Mr. Cledd, Roger then instructed him to throw down a tarpaulin, which he did, and this we made fast about the twenty bags. Having taken several turns of a rope's end round the whole, Roger, carrying the other end, climbed hand-over-hand the rope by which we had lowered ourselves, and I followed at his heels; then we rigged a tackle and, with several men to help us, hauled up the bundle.
"Cap'n Hamlin, sah," the cook called, "how's we gwine send up dis yeh scound'l?"
"Let him come," said Roger. "We'll see to him. Prick his calves with a knife if he's slow about it."
We heard the cook say in a lower voice, "G'wan, you ol' scalliwaggle"; then, "Heah he is, cap'n, heah he come! Watch out foh him. He's nimble—yass, sah, he's nimble."
The rope swayed in the darkness below the hatch, then the fellow's head and shoulders appeared; but, as we reached to seize him, he evaded our outstretched fingers by a quick wriggle, flung himself safely to the deck on the far side of the hatch, and leaping to the bulwark, dove into the river with scarcely a splash.
Some one fired a musket at the water; the flash illuminated the side of the ship, and an echo rolled solemnly back from the shore. Three or four men pointed and called, "There he goes—there—there! See him swimming!" For a moment I myself saw him, a dark spot at the apex of a V-shaped ripple, then he disappeared. It was the last we ever knew of the man from Boston.