An oar belonging to the lorcha was floating near me. I grasped it, and got close to the forechains. All voices on deck, save those of the captors, had ceased. The firing was at an end. A few dead bodies, thrown overboard, plunged heavily into the water near me, and raised great phosphorescent circles and bubbles of water in the gorgeous moonlight. The breeze had freshened a little; the reef points had ceased to patter upon the white sails which now curved gracefully out, and as the ship began to make a little way upon the water, I grasped the iron work under the forechains, and was carried with her.
Suddenly a rope's-end was lowered within my reach, and I heard a voice saying, in pigeon English:
'Comey up—me no killy you.'
I looked upward, and saw the terrible face of Long Kiang, with an indescribable gleam in his solitary eye, as it regarded me. Aware that it was either for life or death, and that I might as well trust him as perish by a bullet or of drowning by exhaustion, I allowed myself to be drawn on board, and one of the first sights I saw was the body of poor little Charlie Newcome, lying near one of the maindeck guns. Many dead and wounded pirates lay about.
On deck, I found myself the only living white!
Long Kiang grasped me by the arm with one hand, a long knife glittered in the other, and in a mixture of broken Portuguese and pigeon English, which would seem ridiculous to read, but was very terrible for me to hear, he questioned me about the ship; where she was from, what was her cargo, and where any money was stored. Finding that I was unable to give any account of the latter, Long Kiang, whose fierce eye when he was excited seemed to emit sparks as if struck from a flint—a peculiar phenomenon—gave me a terrible blow with the hand of his boneless arm, and, falling senseless, I remembered no more.
Meanwhile the Macao men completely sacked the ship. Rice, biscuit-bags, beef-barrels, the fowls in the coops, wines, spirits, bedding, clothes, all loose ropes, and everything portable were carried on board the lorcha, and setting fire to the cabin, intending to destroy all trace of the ship by burning her to the water's edge, they finally shoved off to the lorcha, and getting the spirit casks aboard, began, like savages as they were—to make merry and have a night of it—and a night they had of it, that they little anticipated!
About eleven p.m. I recovered, and found myself alone in the silent ship. The lorcha lay off about a quarter of a mile distant, floating on the calm and lonely moonlit sea, over which came the united noise of laughter, singing, and shouts, as the orgies were continued in her bunks below and on deck. The odour of burning wood drew me to the cabin, which I found full of smoke; but on lifting the skylight, as well as the wound I had received would permit me, I found where the fire was smouldering, and after extinguishing it by a bucket or two of water, began to look about me with a heart torn by anxiety and apprehension. Lamps, chronometers, compasses, everything, were gone; but had they remained, of what use would they have been to me?
On the blood-stained deck, where still some bodies, slashed and mutilated, were lying, their pallid visages looking doubly pale under the moon, I crawled forward, concealing myself under the bulwarks, to avoid being seen by the occupants of the lorcha, which was floating like a log upon the water.
In the forecastle bunks and elsewhere, to my intense joy, I found seven of our own men, all more or less wounded, coming forth now from their places of concealment—the old boatswain among them—but all doubtful what to do or how to act; for the slightest sound or movement in the ship might bring these wretches on board of her again; so we all cowered together in the forecastle, considering the future, and listening to the shouting and singing on board the lorcha. These seemed to grow fainter the nearer she was drawn towards the Bon Accord by the current; and some time after midnight they totally ceased, and the deepest silence reigned upon the sea, for the breeze had died completely away, and we heard only the slow flapping of the topsails, and the pattering of the reef-points above our heads.