“If he hasn’t, what makes him ask so many questions, sir?” asked the coxswain, in reply. “He’s pumped the crew, easy like, till he’s found out everything. He wanted to know how much we got a month, and when one of the men told him that we could each have a handful of bright new yellow-boys to spend in our next port if we wanted it, but that the old man had advised us, friendly like, to leave all our earnings in his hands and he would pay us interest on it at the end of the cruise, same as the bank—when he found this out he wanted to know where the old man kept his money and how much he had. Now what did he want to know that for, sir?”
“What, indeed!” thought Frank, as Barton hurried away in obedience to some orders. “He will bear watching, I think. I wish he was safe ashore.”
Frank lost no time in making Uncle Dick acquainted with what he had heard. The old sailor looked grave while he listened, and although he said nothing in Frank’s hearing, he told Mr. Baldwin privately to keep Waters so busily employed that he would have no time to think of mischief, and at the very first sign of insubordination to promptly put him where he would be powerless to work harm to the vessel or any of her crew. Waters made the sign the very next morning. At five o’clock he was ordered to assist in pumping out the schooner, and he obeyed with altogether too much deliberation to suit Lucas, who was accustomed to see men hurry when they were spoken to. This was the way Waters always obeyed an order. He seemed to think he could do as he pleased, and no one would dare take him to task for it. But when the old boatswain’s mate was on duty he was on duty all over, and any of his men who neglected their work were sure to be called to account. He had been very patient with Waters because he was a landsman, but he could not stand “soldiering.”
“I wish this was a man-o’-war now, and that flogging had not been abolished,” said Lucas, as Waters came slowly up to the pump, staring impudently at the mate as if to ask him what he was going to do about it. “It would do me good to start you with a cat-o’-nine tails.”
“Do you think the likes o’ you could use a cat on me now?” sneered Waters.
“I’ve used it on many a better man,” was the quick reply. “Make haste, you lubber. I’ll stand this no longer. I’ll report”—
What it was that the old mate was going to report he did not have time to tell, for Waters suddenly drew one of his huge fists back to his shoulder, and when he straightened it out again Lucas went spinning across the deck, rolling over and over, and finally bringing up against the bulwarks. Every one who saw it—and every one who belonged to the schooner was on deck, except her captain—was amazed at the ease with which it was done.
Of course the excitement ran high at once. During the two years and more that had passed since the schooner left Bellville, a blow had never been struck on her deck, and never had an oath been heard there until these rescued men were brought aboard. The whole crew arose as one man, not to punish the offender for striking the petty officer, but to secure him before he could do any more mischief. But Waters was fairly aroused, and acted more like a mad brute than a human being. He backed up against the bulwarks, and in less time than it takes to tell it, prostrated the entire front rank of his assailants, including Barton, Rodgers, the Doctor, as the negro cook was called, and the old gray-headed sailor who had so badly frightened Dick Lewis by telling him that one of the Sandwich Islands was the equator, and that when they passed it they would be on the under side of the earth.
Having cleared a space in front of him, Waters sprang to the windlass, and seizing a handspike, was back against the bulwarks again before any one could prevent him. “Stand by me, mates,” he roared, “and we’ll take the ship. Back me hup, and we’ll drive these Yankees hover among the sharks.”
“I declare!” gasped Eugene, who was the first of the frightened boys who could find his tongue, “he’s started at last, and he’ll walk across the deck with that handspike as though there was no one here. The best men in the crew are like so many straws in his way.”