“Who is it, then?” said Lauré sharply.
“I think Oakum was on deck,” said another voice.
“Here you, Sam Oakum, come down,” said Lauré, in a clear, loud voice. “Come down and you shall not be hurt.”
“That’s nice palaver after sending bullets to fetch a man down,” said Sam to himself, “and after pitching one poor chap to the sharks. I think I’ll stay where I am.”
“Here, two of you to the port, and two to the starboard shrouds. Take your knives with you, and if the scoundrel won’t give in, fetch him down best way you can.”
Sam Oakum drew a long breath as he heard these words, and then, the rigging beginning to quiver, he set his teeth, and began to make cautiously for one of the stays, intending to get to the next mast if he could, and so steal down on deck, where, if he could contrive to reach the poop, he might climb over and join those below through the cabin windows.
It was ticklish work, though, for as he glided and swung from place to place, he could hear by the hard breathing that he was closely pursued. Spider-like, too, the touching of the various ropes by his enemies gave him fair warning that he was in danger, though, unfortunately, his movements were in the same way telegraphed to his enemies.
At last they came so near that his capture seemed certain, or if not capture, he felt sure that a blow from a knife would be his portion. For just as he was going to pass on to the shrouds he had reached, he felt by their vibration that some fresh men were coming up, and seizing a rope he swung himself out clear from the top and hung there, gently swaying about, hearing his pursuers pass close by him, so near that he could have stretched out one hand and touched them.
As far as he could judge, he was now just over the cabin skylight, and his heart bounded, for somewhere about here ought to be the top of the wind-sail hung up in the rigging, so that the great canvas tube might convey the fresh air below to take the place of the hot.
“If I could only reach that,” thought Sam, “I might slip inside, and go down with a run into the cabin.”