We were hardly well clear of the boat when a hammering and shouting at the fore-scuttle told us that the watch below had awakened to the suspicion that something was amiss on deck, and that they were anxious to know why they were battened down. I accordingly went forward and, without opening the scuttle, shouted to them that the felucca had been surprised and captured by the British, which in a sense was quite true, and that, unless they wished to be treated as pirates, the best thing they could do would be to remain perfectly quiet and give no trouble whatever. That the vessel was being taken into Port Royal, and that on our arrival there I would make it my business to see the proper authorities and so explain matters to them that the worst thing likely to befall the felucca’s crew would be their temporary detention only. It is very likely that this communication puzzled them considerably, but if so, it also had the effect of keeping them quiet, for we never heard another sound from them. Indeed, had they tried to give us trouble, it is probable we should have mastered them before they could all have gained the deck, for our first act, after quieting them, was to arm ourselves each with a whole beltful of loaded pistols and the best of the swords in the felucca’s armoury, after which we pitched the whole of the remaining weapons overboard.
Next morning, at daybreak, we took on board a black pilot off Portland Point, reaching Port Royal just in time to hear eight bells struck on board the various ships lying at anchor in the harbour.
Chapter Fourteen.
A Packet of Disturbing Letters.
The first task was to send by shore-boat a brief note on board the admiral, informing him of our capture, and requesting him to send a few hands on board to take care of the vessel. A prompt reply, in the shape of a somewhat dandified mid, with a dozen stout seamen to back him, was vouchsafed to this request, the midshipman bringing with him also a verbal message to the effect that the admiral would be glad to see us on board to breakfast with him. This condescension, of course, merely meant that he was curious to hear full particulars of the capture, but we nevertheless felt much gratified at the invitation; and, detaining the gig alongside only long enough to enable us to make ourselves presentable, we jumped into her, and five minutes later found ourselves on the quarter-deck of the old Mars.
Admiral J— himself happened to be on deck at the moment when we stepped in through the entering port, and the look of mingled astonishment and anger with which he regarded us as we presented ourselves before him at once told us that something was wrong.
“How now, young gentlemen!” he testily exclaimed; “are you the two midshipmen who sent me this note, informing me that you had captured yonder cock-boat of a felucca?” We respectfully intimated that we were. “Then how comes it, sirs, that you have presumed to come on board me in those ’longshore togs? Away with you back at once, and when next you venture to appear in my presence, see to it that you come in a proper uniform.”
The murder was out. We were, of course, dressed in the clothes with which Don Luis de Guzman had so generously supplied us, and we had been for so long a time out of uniform that it had never occurred to us that our costume would be regarded as in the slightest degree inappropriate. We explained in as few words as possible that we were two of the surviving officers of the Hermione, that we had been for some time prisoners in La Guayra, and that we had only very recently effected our escape therefrom; and that put the whole affair straight in a moment, the admiral, who, peppery as was his temper, was a thoroughly kind-hearted old fellow in the main, actually condescending to apologise for his hasty speech; and, the steward at that moment announcing that breakfast was on the table, we all—that is to say, the admiral, Captain Bradshaw, Courtenay, and myself—trundled into the cabin and took our places at the table. Then, for the first time, as we found ourselves once more in the society of our own countrymen, with good wholesome English fare sending forth its grateful odours to our nostrils, with the table covered with its snowy linen, and laden with the handsome, yet home-like breakfast equipage, did we fully realise all that we had passed through since we had last found ourselves so placed, and for my part the revulsion of feeling almost overcame me. The emotions of a midshipman are, however, proverbially of a very transient character, and I soon found myself prosecuting a most vigorous attack upon the comestibles, and, between mouthfuls, relating in pretty full detail all our adventures from the moment of the mutiny, excepting, of course, my love passages with Dona Inez, which I kept strictly to myself.