The next moment he was signing to the men to follow him.
They were just in time, for a ladder had been raised against a narrow slit of a window of what was fitted up as a bathroom, and as the lad dashed in, it was to find that one of the slaver’s men was in the act of leaping down into the room, striking at the middy in his bound, and with such force that he drove the lad headlong backwards, half stunning him in his fall.
“Here, what is it?” cried Murray, after a few minutes, in a confused manner. “Who did that?”
“Why, it was this here chap, sir,” said Tom May. “Here, ketch hold of his heels, man, and let’s send him back to his mates; we don’t want him here.”
“Who wounded him—who cut him?” cried Murray excitedly.
“I’m not quite sure, sir,” said Tom May drily, “but I think as it was me, sir. You see, he let himself go at you, sir, and I just give him a tap.”
“You’ve killed him, Tom,” said the lad, in rather an awe-stricken tone.
“Nay, sir. Tap like that wouldn’t take it out of him. I might ha’ hit a bit softer, but I was ’bliged to be sharp, or he’d ha’ finished you off, sir, and of course we didn’t want that. There, let go your end, messmate,” continued the man, and still half dazed, Murray stood staring as he saw one of their fierce-looking, half European, half Lascar-like enemies passed out of the narrow window, bleeding profusely, and disappear, his passing through the opening being followed by the dull sound of a heavy fall.
“You’ve killed him, Tom!” cried Murray again, with his face drawn-looking and strange.
“Nay, sir,” grumbled the sailor, “but ’twouldn’t ha’ been my fault, sir, if I had. Some un had to have it, and it was my dooty to see as it warn’t my orficer, sir. I do know that.”