“Because,” answered the man, “it was Hubert, here, who, when he heard the music from your ship, shouted to us that you were English, and that, if we would stop rowing, you would take the galley and set us all free.”
George raised his head above the combing and shouted to the armourer: “Miles, come down here at once with your hammer and chisel. There is a man here—several men—whom I wish to release from their fetters.”
“Señor,” interposed the man who was supporting Hubert’s senseless form, and who seemed to guess what George required, “if you will feel in the pocket of that dead boatswain’s doublet, you will find the key to unlock our chains.”
“Thanks,” responded George as he bent over the dead boatswain; and a minute later he had unlocked the chain which confined his brother’s body to the bench, and was calling to another man to help him to carry it up on deck.
“Señor—señor, are you not going to release us also?” demanded Hubert’s comrade, as George turned away to arrange for the dispatch of his brother to the galleon.
“In good time, amigo, in good time,” answered George. “A little patience is all you now need. I will return to you later.”
With infinite care Hubert’s body was lowered into a boat and dispatched to the galleon, with an imperative order from George to the surgeon to treat his patient gently and do his utmost for him. Then the young captain proceeded to release the remaining Englishmen and send them also aboard the galleon to be cared for.
And next came the question of what was to be done with the galley-slaves and the galley. It was a knotty question to decide, for here were a hundred-and-eighty men, many of whom were no doubt criminals and desperados of the very worst type; to release whom and turn them loose upon society involved a tremendous responsibility. Yet after even the cursory glimpse that George had caught of the life of a galley-slave, he could not bring himself to hand over those men to the tender mercies of the Spaniards and so in all probability insure for them a continuance of life in what Cary had graphically described as a floating hell, which was a punishment infinitely worse than death, and far too severe for even the most atrocious crimes. George called Basset to his aid in the consideration of this momentous question; and finally, at the suggestion of the latter, he descended again to the ship’s interior and sought the man who had been Hubert’s companion on the bench.
“Friend,” said he, “you asked me, a little while ago, to release you. If I were to do so, what would you and your comrades do with yourselves?”
“It is just what Pedro and I”—indicating his companion upon the bench—“have been discussing together, señor,” answered the man.