For Joshua Trust was well enough in his way to strike a blow or carry a camp-kettle across a mountain range that topped the clouds--otherwise he was a bull-in-a-china-shop kind of a fellow, whose worth was in his forearms and not his head.
But Forsyth was cast in a finer mould: a man of education, with tags of Latin in the corners of memory, a sense of humour--subtle enough to be lost upon both his strange companions--and a wonderful brain for figures.
The man's laziness was all pretence and affectation. He always talked as if he were half asleep, and yawned at intervals, screening his mouth with a hand upon one of the fingers of which he wore a golden signet ring; and yet, his brain was ever active, and he had the happy knack of doing the right thing at the right time--as he had already proved to my cost.
Even whilst I lay imprisoned in that dingy room in Portsmouth, Forsyth returned along the coast to within a stone's throw of John Bannister's cabin by the sea, and searched vainly for the fragment of the map which I had thrown away. And that in itself was a bold thing to do; for the police--to whom Bannister had described the appearance of both Baverstock and Trust--had been told of my disappearance, and the countryside, from Arundel to Chichester, was populous with printed offers of reward.
For, all this time, my mother was well near distracted by anxiety and distress. John Bannister called upon her, and tried in his own straightforward way to set her fears at rest, and swore to her that he would find me, though he had to search the world.
Of how well he kept his oath it is my task to write, and of much else besides. For the barque, which was called the Mary Greenfield, dropped her pilot off the Needles of the Isle of Wight, and with a fair wind and under full canvas struck the open sea. And I, Dick Treadgold, was on board, sea-sick that night as any full-grown man could be, and sick at heart as well. For, when the white cliffs of dearest England faded in the evening light, I realised for the first time that I was alone, and there was no telling what the Fates held in store for me.
[CHAPTER VI--I AM CONCERNED IN A MUTINY]
I have neither space nor patience to describe in any detail that long and tedious voyage. For we were months at sea. I saw whales spouting water into the air, and schools of porpoises; and at one time, for a whole month on end, we were becalmed, the ship lying idle in the midst of a vast floating mass of seaweed, where there were all kinds of jelly-fish and squids. The heat was excessive, and there was a rank, almost putrid, smell in the air, which came from the decaying seaweed. That in itself was enough to try the temper of every member of the crew; but, to make matters worse, much of the tinned meat on board exploded in the hold. I cannot explain this, but I know that it happened, and am content to leave the explanation to the scientific reader. These circumstances, together with the surly nature of James Dagg, the captain, led from dissatisfaction to open grumbling, and thence to the mutiny of which I have now to tell.
My own fortunes were, to some extent, involved in that affair; and in any case, I must describe the incident more or less as it occurred, since nothing could better serve to illustrate the true character of Amos Baverstock, who plays as important a part as myself in the narrative that follows.
I had not been a week at sea, and just recovered from my sickness, when I was given clearly to understand that I was to hold no intercourse with any of the crew. I cannot say that I wished to, for they were a ruffianly lot--half of them, I verily believe, prison-birds, like Joshua Trust, and the remainder West Indian negroes, Chinamen, and Lascars from the coast of Malabar.