This was given by a dozen voices at once, but in obedience to a command there was silence, in which the heavy panting breathing of the blacks could be plainly heard.
“Now then,” said the captain, “one man speak. You, Dance, step forward. What does this mean?”
“Beg pardon, sir,” said the coxswain of the first cutter; “some of the lads got skylarking and playing tricks with the two black hands.”
“Who did?” said the captain, sternly.
“Beg pardon, sir, didn’t see, sir, but it made the two niggers wild, and one got a knife and the other a marlin-spike; and if they hadn’t been held there’d ha’ been murder done, and—”
“Man overboard!” was yelled from right forward where the fishing had been going on, and following a loud splashing from just beneath the ship’s counter came that most thrilling of cries to send the blood coursing back even from the strongest man’s cheek.
“Boat, boat—Help—help!”
In tropic waters just as the sun had sunk below the horizon, and the rapid darkness was coming on.