“Well,” he returned, laughing, as he lowered the pistol, uncocked it, and replaced it in his belt; “you are right. I cannot; at least not in cold blood. I dare say I am pretty bad, according to your opinion, but my worst enemy cannot accuse me of cowardice. And, as to putting you ashore, I shall do nothing of the kind; on the contrary, widely as our opinions at present diverge upon the subject of my calling, I hope yet to induce you to join me. You can be useful to me,” he added, in pure English, to my intense astonishment; “I want just such a cool, daring young fellow as yourself for my right hand, to be a pair of extra eyes and ears and hands to me, and to take command in my absence. I can make it well worth your while, so think it over; I do not want an answer now.”
“But I must answer now,” I returned, also in English; “I cannot allow a single minute to elapse without assuring you, Don Fernando, that you altogether mistake my character if you suppose me capable of any participation whatever in a traffic that I abhor and detest beyond all power of expression; a traffic that inflicts untold anguish upon thousands, and, not infrequently, I should imagine, entails such a fearful waste of human life as I witnessed yesterday. Moreover, it has just occurred to me that when we attacked you and your friends in the creek this brigantine was flying a black flag. If that means anything it means, I presume, that you are a pirate as well as a slaver?”
“Precisely,” he assented. “I am both. Some day, when we know each other better, I will tell you my story, and, unlikely as you may now think it, I undertake to say that when you have heard it you will acknowledge that I have ample justification for being both.”
“Do not believe it, Don Fernando,” I answered. “Your story is doubtless that of some real or fancied wrong that you have suffered at the hands of society; but no wrong can justify a man to become an enemy to his race. I will hear your story, of course, if it will afford you any satisfaction to tell it me; but I warn you that neither it nor anything that you can possibly say will have the effect of converting me to your views.”
“You think so now, of course,” he answered, with a laugh; “but we shall see, we shall see. Meanwhile, there is my steward poking his ugly visage up through the companion to tell us that breakfast is ready, so come below, my friend, and take the keen edge off your appetite.”
It was on the day but one after this, that, about four bells in the forenoon watch, one of the hands, having occasion to go aloft to perform some small job of work on the rigging, reported a strange sail ahead. The brigantine was still running before a fair wind, but the breeze had fallen light, and it looked rather as though we were in for a calm spell, with thunder, perhaps, later on. We were going about four or maybe four and a half knots at the time, and the report of the strange sail created as much excitement on board us as though we had been a man-o’-war. For some time there seemed to be a considerable amount of doubt as to the course that the stranger was steering; for, as seen from aloft, she appeared to be heading all round the compass; but it was eventually concluded that, in general direction, her course was the same as our own.
As the morning wore on the wind continued to drop, while a heavy bank of thunder-cloud gathered about the horizon ahead, piling itself steadily but imperceptibly higher, until by noon it was as much as Mendouca could do to get the sun for his latitude. By this time we had risen the stranger until we had brought her hull-up on the extreme verge of the horizon; and the nearer that we drew to her the more eccentric did her manoeuvres appear to be; she was heading all round the compass, and but for the fact that we could see from time to time that her yards were being swung, and some of her canvas hauled down and hoisted again in the most extraordinary manner, we should have set her down as a derelict. I ought, by the way, to have said that she was a small brig of, apparently, about one hundred and forty tons. Mendouca was thoroughly perplexed at her extraordinary antics; his glass was scarcely ever off her, and when he removed it from his eye it was only to hand it to me and impatiently demand whether I could not make out something to elucidate the mystery. At length, after witnessing through the telescope some more than usually extraordinary performance with the canvas, I remarked—
“I think there is one thing pretty clear about that brig, and that is that she is in the possession of people who have not the remotest notion how to handle her.”
“Eh? what is that you say?” demanded Mendouca. “Don’t know how to handle her? Well, it certainly appears that they do not,” as the fore-topsail-halliard was started and the yard slid slowly down the mast, leaving the topgallant-sail and royal fully set above it. “By Jove, I have it!” he suddenly continued, slapping his thigh energetically. “Yonder brig is in possession of a cargo of slaves who have somehow been allowed to rise and overpower her crew! Yes, by heaven, that must be the explanation of it! At all events we will run down and see. Blow, good breeze, blow!” and he whistled energetically after the manner of seamen in want of a wind.
The breeze, however, utterly refused to blow; on the contrary, it was growing more languid every minute, while our speed had dwindled down to a bare two knots; and the thunder-clouds were piling up overhead blacker and more menacing every minute. At length, when we were a bare three miles from the brig, the helmsman reported that we no longer had steerage-way, and as the Francesca slowly swung round upon her heel, bringing the brig broad on her starboard quarter, Mendouca stamped irritably on the deck, and cursed the weather, the brig, the brigantine; in fact he cursed “everything above an inch high,” as we say in the navy when we wish to describe a thorough, comprehensive outburst of profanity. At length, having given free vent to his impatience, he stood for a moment intently studying the lowering heavens, strode across the deck and glanced through the open skylight at the barometer, then turned to me and said, in English—