“The more need that you should arrive at a prompt decision,” interrupted Leslie. “Now, if I may advise, what I would suggest is this. Let me have the quarter-boat and four hands. I will go down to the wreck and bring off anybody who may be upon it, and if it falls dark before we return, hoist a lantern to the peak, as a guide to us, and we shall then have no difficulty in finding the brig.”
The mate considered for a moment. Then—
“All right,” he said, “I’ll take upon myself the responsibility of agreein’ to that. The skipper’ll be madder than ever when he finds out what we’ve done; but I don’t care for that, I’m not goin’ to leave a feller-creature to die on no wreckage, if I can help it. And if the skipper makes a fuss about it, the authorities at home ’ll bear me out.”
“Of course they will,” assented Leslie. “And now that we have settled that point, the sooner a start is made the better. So please call for four volunteers to go with me in the boat, and I’ll be off.”
Then, while Purchas went forward to muster a boat’s crew, Leslie walked over to where Miss Trevor stood.
“Oh, Mr Leslie,” she exclaimed, “what a dreadful man the captain of this ship is! Is he mad; or what is it that makes him behave in so horribly violent a manner?”
“Simply overweening conceit of himself, and an enormously exaggerated opinion of his own importance as master of this ridiculous little brig; together with, perhaps, an unusually violent and ungovernable temper, I imagine,” answered Leslie, with a smile. “I am afraid,” he continued, “that those mad antics of his with his revolver must have been rather terrifying to you. However, that sort of thing will not occur again—unless he happens to have another of them—for I have the weapon now, and intend to retain possession of it until we are able to take our leave of him, which I hope will be ere long. Meanwhile, I am going away in a boat, for about half an hour, to take a man—or, it may be, a woman—off that wreckage that we were trying to reach this morning when we sighted this brig. It is still quite close at hand, and I shall not be gone very long. And during my absence Purchas will look after you and see that you come to no harm. He is a good fellow, in his way, and will not allow our mad friend to interfere with you.”
“Thank you,” she answered, with a shade of the old hauteur in the tones of her voice; “I am not in the least afraid. Mad though the man may be, I do not think he will attempt to molest me.”
“No,” acknowledged Leslie, who had not failed to observe Potter’s undisguised admiration of the girl, “to be perfectly frank with you, I do not think he will. Ah, here come the men who are going with me in the boat. I must say au revoir!”
“Good-bye, for the present,” answered Miss Trevor; “I hope you will be successful.”