All about me was a babel of shouts and cries, a rush and trampling of feet, but I sped all unheeding, my gaze ever upon the loathed, fleeing shape of this vile blackamoor. I was hard on his heels as he scrambled up the quarter-ladder and within a yard of him as he gained the deck, while behind us in the waist were men who ran pell-mell, filling the night with raving clamour and drunken halloo. Now as I reached the quarter-deck, some one of these hurled after me a belaying pin and this, catching me on the thigh, staggered me so that I should have fallen but for the rail; so there clung I in a smother of sweat and blood while great moon and glittering stars span dizzily; but crouched before me on his hams, almost within arm's reach, was this accursed negro who gaped upon me with grinning teeth and rolled starting eyeballs, his breath coming in great, hoarse gasps. And I knew great joy to see him in no better case than I, his clothes hanging in blood-stained tatters so that I might see all the monstrous bulk of him. Now, as he caught his breath and glared upon me, I suffered my aching body to droop lower and lower over the rail like one nigh to swooning, yet very watchful of his every move. Suddenly as we faced each other thus, from the deck below rose a chorus of confused cries:
"At him, Pompey! Now's ye time, boy! Lay 'im aboard, lad, 'e be a-swounding! Ha—out wi' his liver, Pompey—at him, he's yourn!"
Heartened by these shouts and moreover seeing how feebly I clutched at the quarter-rail, the great negro uttered a shrill cry of triumph and leapt at me; but as he came I sprang to meet his rush and stooping swiftly, caught him below the knees and in that same moment, straining every nerve, every muscle and sinew to the uttermost, I rose up and hove him whirling over my shoulder.
I heard a scream, a scurry of feet, and then the thudding crash of his fall on the deck below and coming to the rail I leaned down and saw him lie, his mighty limbs hideously twisted and all about him men who peered and whispered. But suddenly they found their voices to rage against me, shaking their fists and brandishing their steel; a pistol flashed and roared and the bullet hummed by my ear, but standing above them I laughed as a madman might, jibing at them and daring them to come on how they would, since indeed death had no terrors for me now. And doubtless steel or shot would have ended me there and then but for the man Diccon who quelled their clamour and held them from me by voice and fist:
"Arrest, ye fools—stand by!" he roared. "Yon man be the property o'
Captain Jo—'tis Joanna's man and whoso harms him swings—"
"Aye, but he've murdered Pompey, ain't 'e?" demanded Job.
"Aye, aye—an' so 'e have, for sure!" cried a voice.
"Well an' good—murder's an 'anging matter, ain't it?"
"An' so it be, Job—up wi' him—hang him—hang him!"
"Well an' good!" cried Job again. "'Ang 'im we will, lads, all on us, every man's fist to the rope—she can't hang us all, d'ye see. You, Diccon, where be Belvedere; he shall be in it—"