‘You infernal soger!’ shouted the other, enraged beyond measure at this first sign of rebellion in his victim. ‘Come out here and I’ll show you all about that! Come out and crawl after me, and I’ll learn you how to do your work!’
He disappeared, and Ashby followed him like a flash. In a trice every soul was outside—some clinging to the running gear around the foremast, others on the galley, others in the fore rigging.
I could see no sign of any of the head sails being adrift. All, except the set fore-topmast stay-sail, lay on their booms, masses of sodden canvas, off which poured green cataracts as the Dido lifted her nose from a mighty plunge.
For a minute or two, so dense was the smother for’ard of the windlass bits, that nothing was visible but foam. But, presently, as the Dido paused, weaving her head [297] ]backwards and forwards as if choosing a good spot for her next dive, we saw, clear of everything, and high in air fronting us, the two men.
One was on the boom, the other on the foot-rope. The topmost man seemed to be hitting rapidly at the one below him, who strove with uplifted arm to shield himself.
Perhaps for half a minute this lasted. Then the ship gave her headlong plunge, the crest of a great wave met the descending bows, and when the bitter spray cleared out of our eyes again the lower figure was missing.
From the other, overhanging us, a black streak against the sullen sky, came what sounded like a faint cheer. There was a rapid throwing motion of the arm released from the supporting stay, followed by a clink of steel on the roof of the galley. Then came once more the roaring plunge, and slow upheaval as of a creature mortally wounded.
But, this time, the booms were vacant, and a man beside me was curiously examining a sheath-knife, bloody from point of blade to tip of wooden handle.
Louder shrieked the gale through the strained rigging, and more heavily beat the thundrous seas against the Dido’s sides, as, breathless, drenched and horrified, I staggered into the captain’s state-room.
‘I think I’ve got it now,’ said he, smiling, and holding up a thing like a tin saucepan.