"I am glad—for his sake and for mine," muttered the Englishman to himself.
CHAPTER XIV
It is no pleasant task to describe the events that now took place on the French barque. This is no tale of daring buccaneers, of exciting hand-to-hand combats of desperate men; but a narrative of cold-blooded and dastardly crime.
Now that the time for carrying out his devilish scheme had come, Baptiste had taken the lead of the conspirators. Being a pacific person who hated fighting and feared danger, he determined to omit no possible precaution to obviate the risk of failure. His brain, fertile of ingenious villainy, was not long in devising how to do this.
In the first place, he instructed Carew on no account to leave his cabin between eight and ten that evening. Then he called aside the two Spaniards and explained his plan to them. He gave El Chico the first bottle which he had taken from Carew's medicine chest, and directed him to mix a certain quantity of the contents with the soup he was about to make for the men's dinner—a quantity which he calculated would be insufficient to produce a pronounced taste in the soup, but sufficient to cause unpleasant sensations in those who partook of it.
At eight bells that evening the port watch relieved the starboard. There was absolutely nothing for the men to do, as it was still a flat calm, and all the sails had been furled. Duval had taken this precaution on the previous day, fearing that the fever might spread still further, and that he would not have enough hands left to shorten sail were a strong breeze to spring up suddenly.
Duval, however, insisted upon the watches being set and the discipline of the vessel being carried on as usual, more with the object of employing the men's time and distracting their attention from the horrors of the situation than for any other reason.
When Baptiste came aft to relieve Duval, as officer of the watch, the latter said, "Do you know if Mr. Allen is in his cabin, Fortier? I wish to see him."