“Oh, how I should like to give him a topper!” I thought, as I rose upon my elbow and listened, making out, in spite of the roar of the storm, every movement of our enemy.
“Why, if Mr Frewen liked, he could strike him down senseless, and then we should be masters of the ship, for the men would give in if they had no leader.”
People’s minds have a way of running in the same groove when there is anything very particular to be done, and it was so here, for Mr Frewen was thinking, as he told me afterwards, exactly as I did.
But now I could hear nothing but the creaking of the ship and the roar of the storm, and I was not sure whether the door had been opened or not. Suppose it had been, I thought, and Jarette was going to do some mischief in the darkness!
It was a horrible thought, one which made the perspiration stand upon my forehead, and begin to tickle the sides of my nose, as I listened intently for the next movement, or for the sound of his breathing.
But still I could hear nothing, and I longed for a few moments’ cessation of the thud of the waves and hiss and splash which followed, just as a billow came over the bows and swept the deck with a tremendous rush and noise.
That was what our visitors had been waiting for. The door had only been unfastened. It was now opened with a quick dash, so that the noise it would make might be covered by the storm.
Yes; I could mentally see it all now, though everything was black as ink. Jarette was standing in the door-way in his oilskins, for I could hear the crackling sound they made as the noise from the deck and the hiss of the wind came plainer, and then too, drip, drip,—in those moments I could hear the water falling from the coat on to the cabin-floor.
It was all in so many moments. He seemed to be listening either for any sound we might make, or for what was passing on deck; and then as he took a step forward into the cabin, there was a sudden rush, a struggle, and for the moment, as my blood ran cold, I thought that Jarette had seized and was about to murder poor Mr Frewen.
My hand went to the foot of the cot, and I was dragging out the revolver hidden there, when a hoarse voice exclaimed in a husky whisper—