“Now jist you shtop where ye are, me friend,” rejoined Garry, putting out his hand to prevent his stirring from his seat. “Sure the cap’en an’ me, with Dick Haldane here, will be enough to look afther ’em all.”
With this he made for the companion-way and descended the “stairs,” as Elsie, ignorant of nautical nomenclature, called the ladder, the skipper following close behind him.
On getting to the bottom we found the panels of the door smashed in, though of hard oak, strengthened with cross battens of the same stout wood, which showed to what fierce assault it had been subjected, the furniture piled up against it from within having duly prevented the negroes from finally forcing an entrance, as well, no doubt, as our appearance on the scene.
This barricade had, however, been now partly removed, probably to allow of little Elsie’s exit, and, quickly pitching the remaining obstacles aside, the three of us managed to squeeze ourselves inside the cabin, which was in such a state of confusion, with the long table overturned to serve as a breastwork for the gallant defenders and the settees and lockers turned away from the deck, as well as the glass of the skylight all smashed, that it looked like a veritable “Hurrah’s vest” as we sailors say.
On a pile of cushions belonging to the lounge aft—the only piece of furniture that was left intact in the place, I believe—lay the brave men who had stubbornly held the ship to the last against the mutineers.
All were covered with blood and blackened by powder and so utterly worn out from fatigue in battling throughout the night and day that had almost elapsed since the colonel had left them, besides being crippled by the injuries they had received in the fray, that they hardly moved on our entrance, though one—a little chap whom I judged to be the Englishman spoken of by the colonel and Elsie—brightened up as we bent over him, a look of satisfaction and content stealing over his drawn and haggard face, as we cauld see from the rays of the setting sun streaming down through the broken skylight, exposing the utter desolation around.
He was the first to speak.
“I’m afeard you’ve come too late for us, sirs,” said he slowly, with a deep groan of pain. “Those damned niggers have done for me, one of them giving me a dig of his knife in the ribs—did it through the doorway just now, when the fight were nearly over. You might do summat, though, for my companions here, who stood up to the darkies like Britons, in spite of them being only Frenchmen, though that ain’t their fault. But how’s the little girl? I hope she’s all right. Tell her father, if he’s alive—and I feel almost sure I heard his voice awhile ago up on deck—tell him that I kept my word, sirs, and fought for her to the last. I think I’m dying now, and—I—must—leave—off. But listen while I’ve a little breath, for I want to say something. My name is Robert Johnson, and my old mother, God bless her, lives at Camberwell, near London. You’ll find all my papers in my pocket and a letter with the address, and if any of you chances to be going back to England as I were, worse luck, you’d be doing a favour by seein’ her and letting her know why I didn’t turn up home this Christmas as I promised her. I know you will. I’m going now, I’m so tired. Good-night to you all—good-night—good—”
As he said this he gradually fell back on the cushion he was resting against, and his eyes closed.
Captain Applegarth and I both thought him dead.