“Pray, steward, whose clothes has this gentleman put on?”
“Mr—Mr Ossulton’s, I think—sir—my lord, I mean.”
“Very well, steward; then recollect, in future you always address that gentleman as Mr Ossulton.”
“Yes, my lord,” and the steward went down below, and was obliged to take a couple of glasses of brandy to keep himself from fainting.
“Who are they, and what are they, Mr Maddox?” cried the lady’s-maid, who had been weeping.
“Pirates!—bloody murderous, stick-at-nothing pirates!” replied the steward.
“Oh!” screamed the lady’s-maid, “what will become of us, poor unprotected females?” And she hastened into the cabin, to impart this dreadful intelligence.
The ladies in the cabin were not in a very enviable situation. As for the elder Miss Ossulton (but perhaps, it will be better in future to distinguish the two ladies, by calling the elder simply Miss Ossulton, and her niece, Cecilia), she was sitting with her salts to her nose, agonised with a mixture of trepidation and wounded pride. Mrs Lascelles was weeping, but weeping gently. Cecilia was sad, and her heart was beating with anxiety and suspense—when the maid rushed in.
“O madam! O miss! O Mrs Lascelles! I have found it all out!—they are murderous, bloody, do-everything pirates!”
“Mercy on us!” exclaimed Miss Ossulton; “surely they will never dare—?”