"It is awful," the latter said. "Can we do nothing, sir?"
"That is the point, Mr. Lippincott. I feel that it is impossible for us to remain quiet while such devilry is being carried on among those woods. But you see the matter is rendered all the more difficult by the fact that we ourselves are going to be attacked to-night. Our crew is weak enough already. If three or four boat-loads full of blacks were to fall upon us, we could not spare a man; while if we were to land, we should need every man for the job, and even then should be terribly weak. Something has to be done, that is evident, and we have to hit upon a plan. Now, let us all set our wits to work." At this moment the black steward came up from the cabin with a bundle.
"The boy am put dese things outside him door, sah. Wat am me to do wid dem?"
"Bring them along to the galley, Sam. I must get your father to wash them. Pomp," he went on to the cook, "have you got plenty of hot water?"
"Yes, sah; allus hab hot water."
"Well, look here, I want you and Sam to set to work and wash these clothes at once. The boy I brought on board turns out to be a French girl, the daughter of a planter who is in the hands of the negroes up there. We must see to-morrow what we can do in the way of rigging her out properly, but for to-day we must manage with these things. Get them as white as you can, and then hang them up to dry. I want her on deck again as soon as possible to give us information as to where her friends are confined."
"All right, sah, we soon gets dese clean."
"And you may as well heat up a basin of that turtle-soup we had yesterday. I expect she has had little enough to eat of late."
Then he went back to the quarter-deck.
"It seems to me, sir," Turnbull said, "that if the girl would go ashore with us as a guide, we might succeed. After it gets dark, put me and one of the hands on shore, with a saw and a bottle of oil to make it work noiselessly. Then we could crawl up to this little window by which she got out, and cut away the wood—for no doubt it is a wooden hut—till the hole is large enough for all of them to get out."