He collected a quantity of combustible matter, and proceeded to set fire to some of the storerooms and other portions of the vessel in such a way that he could always keep the fires under control and extinguish them at will. It was a hazardous undertaking, but he omitted no precaution; and after the vessel had been three days at sea, and was still three hundred miles from Bahia, the effect he desired was satisfactorily produced. She appeared to have been ablaze almost from end to end, and so there was manifest a sufficient reason for the desertion of the crew at sea.
The last spark having been extinguished, Baptiste hove the vessel to while he completed his preparations. He lowered two of the boats into the sea and sank them.
"And now," he asked himself, "what things are the crew likely to have taken with them in the boats? For we must preserve the verisimilitude. Our story must be above suspicion; every circumstance must corroborate it."
So he threw overboard a chronometer, a valuable sextant, a compass, and other articles which a captain deserting his ship would most certainly have carried away. The Spaniards ridiculed this excess of caution. "Thoughtless children!" Baptiste explained; "it is most probable that there are people on shore who know exactly how many chronometers, compasses, and so on, were on board this vessel. These things will be counted up, and if none are missing, the minds of men will be puzzled at the strange conduct of the captain. Now I do not want to puzzle people; very much otherwise, my imprudent children. For the same reason I am now going to burn the ship's papers. No captain ever leaves those behind him on a derelict."
Carew had watched these preparations listlessly, assisting when asked to do so, but still suggesting nothing. He never alluded to the loss of his bottle of laudanum, and very probably he knew that Baptiste had taken it away.
Early on the sixth day of the voyage the Brazilian coast was sighted, and the mate recognised the palm-clad hills that border the entrance to the Reconcava of Bahia—a beautiful inland sea, as extensive as that of Rio de Janeiro.
And now Baptiste, feeling how great a risk would be incurred by entering the port while the captain was in his present demented condition, dared not sail into the bay; and, after a consultation with the men, braced up the yards, and steered the vessel along the coast to the northward, with the intention of making Pernambuco, which is nearly five hundred miles distant from Bahia. By this a delay of about three days would be gained; and should Carew not recover his senses in that time, he must be put out of the way. There was no help for it.
But Baptiste and the two Spaniards knew well that if they went into port without the owner of the yacht, their tale would be received with suspicion. It would be necessary to account for his absence. Their own histories would be closely inquired into; the well-elaborated scheme might end in failure after all. The gloom of the captain seemed to communicate itself to the crew. The usual cheeriness of sailors was altogether absent during the voyage. A vague foreboding of calamity oppressed the men; and on board that guilty ship all went about their work with dismal faces, never smiling, sullen and silent, suspicious of each other.
On the second day, the vessel was slowly sailing up the coast near Alagoas Bay. Baptiste was sitting on deck, rolling up and smoking his innumerable cigarettes as he contemplated the beautiful panorama that opened out before him—a land of forest-clad mountains and fertile valleys, down which broad rivers poured into the sea, while among the cocoa-nut groves upon the sandy beaches were the numerous bamboo villages of the negro fishermen. But Baptiste, though gazing at it, was in no mood to admire beautiful scenery; he was looking forward with alarm to the perils before him.
At last, after pondering over it for some while, he determined on a course of action. It was a desperate thing to do, but it would bring matters to a crisis at once.