“Better that than to remain here at the mercy of such wretches as you!” gasped Sibylla, still struggling feebly, for her strength was almost exhausted.
“Well said, my beauty,” laughed Williams; “you are a rare plucky one, and no mistake. I like to see—”
“Hands off, Williams!” exclaimed Ned, as he stepped coldly forward to the rescue. “What do you mean, sir, by such dastardly conduct? Do you call this keeping faith with me?”
“Yes, of course I do,” exclaimed Williams. “I don’t want to hurt her if she’ll only keep quiet. Here, Ned, you take charge of her. She’ll be quieter with you than with me, perhaps; and see if you can persuade her that she will be better off here than overboard among the sharks. As to keeping faith with you, my hearty, why, I’ve done the best I could. Those friends of yours, that you seem to have taken such a tremendous fancy to, have been treated just as well since we took the ship as they were before. We’ve lost nearly three weeks cruising about trying to find a good place on which to land them—and a perfect paradise of a spot we’ve found for them at last; nobody could wish for a better—and, now that they are turned adrift, I’ve landed them with an outfit complete enough for them to start a regular colony. What more would you have! Haven’t I yet done enough to satisfy you?”
“No, certainly not,” answered Ned, inwardly grieving now that he had not ventured to add to the scanty “outfit” several other articles which he had felt would have been of the utmost value to the marooned party, but which he had feared to include lest the whole should have been refused them. “No; this young lady was one of the party, and was included in my stipulations. Yet you have detained her on board here, a prisoner.”
“Ah, well! the less said about that, perhaps, the better,” remarked Williams. “I quite intended to have landed her with the rest of them; but that island looming up ahead this morning—when you told us only last night that we had a clear sea ahead of us—looked so queer that we held a consultation, and came to the conclusion that, for our own safety’s sake, we ought to keep somebody aboard here to act as a sort of hostage to secure us against treachery on your part; and, as we didn’t think it would be right to separate husband and wife, or parents and children, why, you see, there was only this young lady left for us. And, whilst we are talking upon this subject, shipmates,” he continued, turning to the rest of the crew, whose curiosity had brought them about the little party, “let me say, here and now, that Bill Rogers, Bob Martin, and myself agreed this morning that she must be kept among us for the safety of the ship and all hands. You all know—for no secret has been made of it—that Ned, there, has been kept with us, not of his own free-will, but because we required somebody to navigate the ship for us. And you know, too, or I know, that the lad has just that amount of spirit in him that he wouldn’t hesitate to cast away the ship and all hands—himself included—or to play us any other awkward trick if he saw a chance of spoiling our plans for the recovery of a few of the good things that we’ve been defrauded out of. Now, so long as this young girl is all safe and sound we have nothing to fear from his treachery, because, d’ye see, I’m going to tell him and her—as I do now—that any act, or even suspicion, of treachery on his part will be followed by the young woman being turned adrift by herself in the dinghy; and, rather than see her come to harm, he will be faithful to us, and carry out our orders to the best of his ability. But if evil comes to her we shall lose our hold upon him at once—I say all this before him because I’ve studied him and know him, and I want him to understand as much—and it has, therefore, been agreed that any man who interferes with the young lady will be shot at once and on the spot. So, now, mates, as you’ve had the whole affair explained to you, it is to be hoped you’ll shape your behaviour accordingly.”
“Stop a moment!” exclaimed Ned, as Williams waved his hand by way of dismissal to his little audience, “it seems, from what Williams has said, that Miss Stanhope has been detained a prisoner solely on my account. If that be really the case, I wish to say that, if you will release her and put her on shore with her friends on the island yonder, I swear to you that, though I will never take part in any piracies or other unlawful acts which you may commit, I will in every other respect be absolutely faithful to you, and will navigate the ship whithersoever you will, to the best of my ability. This is no light sacrifice for a young man in my position to make; yet I will make it cheerfully, and take any oath of fidelity you may choose to impose upon me.”
“It is no use, Ned; we can’t—we dare not do it,” answered Williams. “You mean what you say—now—I don’t doubt; but if you ever had a chance to betray us, as you may have, you wouldn’t be able to resist the temptation. No; the matter has been fully talked over, and the young lady must stay.”
Ned was about to make a further effort on Sibylla’s behalf, but the girl herself stopped him.
“Humble yourself no more to these men!” she said; “it will be of no avail, I can clearly see. And trouble not yourself on my behalf. God is able to protect me even here; His will be done!”