"A horrid notion of Jones's purpose crept through my mind at first; but on second thoughts I easily saw this wasn't the occasion for him to choose, if he had really meant ill, and accordingly there was more the reason to trust him. Indeed, as I stood listening and watching, after Westwood and the planter went below, the Indiaman's binnacle lamp seemed to go slowly out, while at the same time the sound of her watch speaking on the forecastle apparently got distincter, till I could hear them clear of the ship's hull and rigging, like low voices muttering in the air betwixt her and us. 'Twas only her having sheered gradually bow-on to the schooner again, however, as a calm near the equator has always something like a pulse in it—but it struck me there were men out on her jib-boom, which being of course the very privatest part of any in a ship for talk—why, to find more than one going out there, of a dark night, and with no work to do, never looks otherwise than suspicious. Nothing of this kind surprised me at present in the Seringapatam, with the opinion I had of her; but the curious thing was, that the fellows must have supposed it the farthest point they could get out of sight of us, as well as from their own decks, she having had her beam to the schooner when the moon set.
"The desperate feelings that steal upon a man in such a case, and the fearful notions that breed in his head, with the quickness of his senses and the way he holds on by a single rope, you can scarcely conceive, though if a cry had come from the Indiaman at that moment I daresay I should have sprung in head foremost to get to her, when all at once, from up in the air again, I thought I heard the smart click of a flint and steel; at any rate, I saw the sparks showering from it in the midst of the black space before me—even the pair of fists as they knocked together, then a mouth blowing the match, till there was a light in a lantern between four heads leaning towards each other over the spar. Queer enough it would have been to see, in ordinary circumstances, but you'll readily fancy what a thing it looked all of a sudden, right out in the midst of the pitch-black night, one didn't know how or where—in fact, two of them faced each other in the stream of light from one side of the lantern, like the two edges of a rent in the dark, and another was like a sprawling blot in the centre—you just saw they were faces and heads, with a foot or two of the thick round boom slanting up betwixt them; but as for their bodies, they were all of a piece with the perfect blackness beyond. I could see one of them hold up the lantern and pass it round the three others' faces, bringing out their chins and noses, as if to be sure who they were—a piece of caution which served almost equally well for me, for I remembered each of them by headmark amongst the crew, only I didn't see the said fellow himself, even when he drew out some paper or other in one hand, seemingly unfolded it with the help of his teeth, and spread it over the jib-boom under the lantern, whereupon the whole four of the heads drew close together in a black lump round the light, peering down upon the paper, and muttering away as much at their ease, no doubt, as if they'd been in a tap-room. All I wished for was a good rifle-barrel in my hand at the time, to have knocked the light out from the midst of them, and sent the bullet by accident through the tarpaulin hat behind it—especially when a glaring red flipper was shoved out on the white paper, and the thumb planted steadily on a particular spot. All at once, however, the light was put out in the lantern, and I heard them going in-board, as the noise of the morning watch being called, at four o'clock, got up round the forehatchway.
CHAPTER XXVII
"In about half-an-hour the faint glimmer of Jones's oar in the water showed how hard it was to find the schooner again; however, he managed to get aboard at last, by which time I was walking carelessly past the binnacle in the dark, and as soon as he sought me out and began to speak, I saw it was all right. Mr Snelling came on deck to his watch, blowing up the men for letting out the only light aboard, as he didn't know fore-and-aft from 'thwart-ships, nor north from south. The cabin lamp under the skylight had gone out too for want of oil, without being noticed as long as the moon shone, and not even the planter's cheroot was to be seen. From the snatches of their conversation he had time to gather, I agreed with Jones that, whatever the four fellows on the jib-boom might have intended beforehand, their present cue wasn't at all to try seizing the ship; in fact, the schooner's sudden appearance in this latitude, with what they knew of her before, had naturally enough brought out a number of the crew in different colours to what they'd stick to after getting a fright and finding their mistake—though by this time I had no doubt in my own mind that the villain who bent on his silk neckerchief to the signal halliards in that hurry the afternoon before actually meant it for the black flag, while the absurdity of an Indiaman striking at all to a cruiser that wanted her just to heave-to, was a sign how most of the crew's minds went, as long as they fancied us pirates. However, Jones had seen sufficient of the lantern affair on the boom to explain it to my great relief; the ringleader of them, no other I was sure than ugly Harry himself, seemed to scrub trousers ordinarily for one of the quarter-deck officers, and had got hold of an old chart in his berth that same evening, which the four had come out there to get a private overhaul of. All Jones could get room to see was that it was a chart of some islands, with a particular mark at one of them, on which the fellow with the lantern put his thumb, when another asked if there weren't any trees on it. 'Trees, ay, trees enough to hang all the blasted lubbers afloat!' said the first, as Jones listened. 'I'd as soon think of sailing in a craft without spars as aboard a dazart ileyand without trees!' One was tired of the Indiaman, another sick of the world, and a third, with Jack down on the bowsprit, wanted to chase buffaloes and shoot birds. As for the rest, the head of the gang assured his mates there were plenty of other islands not far off, and natives in them; whereupon the light was put out, and, in short, they made it up amongst them to take one of the ship's boats quietly some night as soon as she got in the latitude of the Maldives, and steer for this said island; although, in case of their being dogged about by the schooner, of which the chief scoundrel seemed, by Jones's account, to have a wholesome fear, it wouldn't be so easy a matter. Indeed the last words he was heard to say, as they crept inward down the boom, were to the effect that he thought there were some aboard as anxious to drop the cruiser as they were. ''Faith, Mr Jones,' said I, glad to find this was what they wanted, 'if that's all, I shan't stand in their way—so as soon as the breeze springs up, we'd better clear off altogether. The smoothest way is to let them take themselves quietly off and I've no fear of the ship—only, before fairly shaping our own course for Bengal, we must manage to have another sight of her under full sail for Bombay!'
"Neither of us thought of turning in, for by the next half-hour, in fact, the Indiaman's hull and canvas began to blacken out of the gloom on one side—the blue of the water spread round till it glittered against the ring of light kindling and kindling on the horizon, till it rose seemingly in a perfect fire at one spot in the rim of it, blazing up toward the cool blue aloft; then the sun was out. As long as we had to stick to your niceties and fine manners, in fact, I felt as much afraid of meeting Violet herself as a country booby would—I'll be hanged if I wasn't in doubt of her cutting me dead, suppose I met her, and I shouldn't have had a word to say; whereas with a spice of the rough work I thought of all night, or even a chance of something desperate behind, why, a fellow needn't to mind much how he went about it—seeing that in the midst of a hubbub the words come into your mouth of themselves, and you're not expected to stand upon ceremony.
"The Scotch mate, being now first officer, had the side-ropes handed us civilly enough, having just seen the decks washed down in his own thorough manner, carronades, ropes, and all; but as the captain wasn't turned out yet, I went up the poop, where a couple of boys were still swabbing up the wet. The moment I reached it, the sight of the only two passengers that were out so early, rather took me aback, one of them being the last I cared to meet—namely, the Irish Brigadier's lady, who was walking the deck in pattens, the boys evidently keeping clear of her with their swabs; and the stout red-faced Brigadier himself, buttoned up to the throat, while he stalked dismally fore-and-aft with her on his arm. At the first glimpse of me, General Brady stopped short and stared—I daresay he was doubtful whether to call me out or not. 'Glad to say you again, sir!' said he. 'Well, now,' said his lady, 'you're the very man I wanted to see!' I still looked at her, unable to say the like of herself, but terrified to speak a wrong word, with the knowledge of her confounded temper: the Brigadier had planted himself betwixt me and the poop-stairs, and never having fairly come across her since the affair about her dog and the shark, why, absurd as it was, I didn't know what the woman might make of my connection with the same craft that carried her off so soon after.
"'Yes, indeed, and 'twas foolish of me not to see it in ye at first!' she went on, shaking her parasol at me in a knowing way, and eyeing the schooner again. 'Howiver, I heard of you!' said she, with another look that set me all alive, 'and a mighty bold sort of admirer you are!' 'Faith, sir,' said the Brigadier, 'if I'd commanded the batthery down there last night, I'd have waited till ye got nearer, and blown you out of the wather.' ''Tis only a lieutenant you are?' said his lady, speaking without scruple in the midst of his words, and frowning him quiet. 'Nothing more, ma'am,' I said. 'Well, now, Mister Lieutenant,' said the lady suddenly, 'what d'ye mean to do? You didn't find us out here, I suppose, and actually take these cowardly ship-people of ours by sayge-like a bold fellow, for nothing?' After a few words more, Mrs Brady all of a sudden vanished down the little quarter-gallery stair near the ship's taffrail; though I had scarce missed her ere she appeared again, making me a signal. 'Hush, now!' said she in a whisper out of the stairway, 'and step after me like a cat amongst broken bhottles, for he's shaving yonder just now on the opposite side—I saw his kitmagar taking in the hot water.' Next moment I had followed her into the small state-room in the larboard quarter, where she opened an inner door and left me. By Jove! I could have hugged that Irishwoman on the spot, vixen as she was—no matter though the very ship might be out of sight in a few hours, and I never set eyes on her again; I thought no more of it at the moment than I did of her skipper waiting for me—everything was lost in the notion of seeing Violet Hyde's face come out of that door. All the time there was a whispering, a rustling, and a confusion in the berth, as if she were taken by surprise, naturally enough—then I caught a word or two of the young lady's own, that made me think it was all up.
"The door-handle turned, and the door half opened, then it shut to again, and I heard Mrs Brady's voice in a coaxing sort of strain, till at last she opened the door wide and said: 'Then you won't, my dear? So Mister Lieutenant what's-his-name,' added she, 'you may be off to your vessel, and——' Suddenly I saw Violet's figure shrinking back, as it were, behind the Brigadier's lady, into the berth; but all at once she walked straight out to the state-room, half frowning and half laughing, with an angry kind of blush all over her face. Her hair was only looped up on the side, and braided on the other, as if it weren't rightly ship-shape yet for the day; while as for her dress, I remember nothing except its being some brown cloak or other wrapped so close about her that one couldn't even see her hands, like the picture of a nun. 'Mrs Brady seems so astonished to see you here again, Mr Collins,' said she, rather sharply, as I thought, 'that she cannot rest without all the passengers meeting you, I suppose, before you go?' With that she looked back, but Mrs Brady had walked out, though I heard the young lady's waiting-girl moving about inside the berth yet. ''Twas all an accident, my happening to come on board just now, Miss Hyde,' said I, anxiously, 'or, indeed, my having orders to speak the Indiaman at all!' 'Ah!' she answered—'and it was so strange of Mrs Brady to—to persist!' The lovely girl had scarce condescended to look at me yet, but here she glanced past me through the quarter-gallery window at the schooner, where there was nothing betwixt her and the gay little state-room save the blue heaving water and the light—then her eye seemed to pass from the epaulet on my shoulder to the other that had none, till it lighted for the first time on my face, with a smile.
"'How beautiful your schooner looks just now, Mr Collins!' said she, turning hastily again; 'it is the—the same that—that we saw before?' Now there was something in those blue eyes of hers, with the dark lashes over them and under them, that made me lose sight at the moment of everything in the way of my success, fear and all—a sort of a flying glance it was, that I couldn't help turning to my favour. 'For God's sake, Miss Hyde,' said I, 'let me have something one way or other to know my fate by—it's no use telling my mind after all that's come and gone; but as I mayn't see you again—and the breeze will be up directly—why——' Violet stood all the while gazing down on the state-room carpet, making no answer: there was a dead stop, and I heard the first ripple of the breeze work against the ship's rudder below—by Jove! I could have hanged myself at that moment—when I saw her shoulder tremble as she looked down, her soft eyelids just lifted till I caught the blue of her eye, and the smile came over her lip. How I got hold of her hand—for that confounded cloak, or whatever it was, I really don't know; but so it was, and out I came with the words, 'Violet—I love you to the last drop of my blood, that's all!' I said; 'and I only wish I had the chance of showing it!' Violet Hyde drew her hand gently out of mine, and looked me straight in the face for a moment with a merry sort of a quizzical air, as if I meant some other adventure—and 'Oh no! I hope not!' added she, with a shudder, and then a blush, no doubt thinking of the African river.