"The poor divil. Throw him a sheet, one av yer; it's meself that's not bringing the guv'ner a dead body when he wants a live one, be Saint Pathrick!"
They tried to throw me a sheet as the man had ordered, but we had begun to move rapidly again, and I heard it fall in the water by my head. Though there was more hailing, the thud of the choppy sea against the boat forbade any more hearing, and the sheet never reached me. Yet the men had told me something with their words, and I pondered long on the remark of the Irishman, that the "guv'ner" wanted me alive. It explained much; and it put beyond doubt the reason why I had not been killed in the drinking den. It was quite clear that my life was safe from these men until they reached their chief; but where he was I had no notion, except he were on the nameless ship; and, if that were so, to the nameless ship I was going—that ship of horror and of mystery. Nor could I remember anything in what I knew of Captain Black to lead me to the hope that such a voyage was other than one to death, and perhaps to that which might be worse than death itself.
When this strange procession had lasted about an hour, the rain ceased and the sun shone again with renewed power, drying my clothes upon me and giving me prodigious thirst. I struggled to reach the flask, and in doing so I found that the ropes binding my right arm were tied with common hitches, such as any sailor could force; and my experience as a yachtsman let me get free of them with very little trouble. I did not sit up at once, for I feared to be seen from the decks; but I turned my head to look at the boat which towed me, and saw that she was a barque-rigged yacht after the American fashion; her name Labrador being conspicuous across her stern. My boat, which was no larger than I had thought, was towed by a double hawser; but no man watched me from the poop, and I lay down again reassured. The hope of escape was already in my head, for I judged that we could not be far out from New York, although no land was visible on the horizon. It occurred to me that if they would only let me be until night I could get my left hand and my feet free; and, as the hawser was passed through a ring at the bow, I needed but a knife to complete the business. But I had no knife, for a search in my pockets proved that I had been relieved of all my valuables and trifles; and I knew that another way must be found, and that ingenuity alone would help me. So I sat thinking; and all the long afternoon—I knew it was afternoon, as I saw the sun sinking in the horizon and heard the bells, moreover—I examined such devices as came to me, only to reject them and to seek for others.
Towards the second bell in the second "dog" there was a change in the monotony of the scene. I heard an order to heave the barque to, and presently I made haste to put the ropes back in their places and to await the happening. I felt all motion cease, and then someone hauling at the hawser, so that the jolly-boat was pulled against the side of the bigger ship; and, looking up, I saw half-a-dozen of Black's gang watching me from the quarter-deck. Then a ladder was put over the bulwark, and Four-Eyes himself cried out not in an unkindly tone—
"Gi-me the soop, bhoys, and let's get it in him; begorra, the divil 'll have him afore the skipper if it's no mate you're givin' him!"
He came down the ladder with a great can of steaming stuff; and the sea having fallen away with the sun to a dead calm, he stepped off the ladder to the stern seat, and then bent over me. But I saw this only, that he had a knife in his belt; and I made up my mind in a moment to get it from him.
"The young 'un from Paris," he cried, as he took a long look at me, "and near to axin' for a priest, by the houly saints; but I was tellin' ye to stop where ye was, and it's no thanks ye were giving me. Bedad, and a pretty place ye're going to, sorr, at your own wish—the divil knows what's the end av it—but sup a bit, for it's fastin' ye are by the luk av ye, and long gone at that!"
Kindly words he gave me; and he held to the rope with one hand while he put the can of hot stuff to my lips with the other. I drank half of it with great gulps, feeling the warmth spread through my body to my very toes as the broth went down; and a great hope consoled me, for I had his knife, having snatched it from him when first he stooped, and it lay in the tarpaulin beneath me. The good luck of the theft made me quick to empty the pot of gravy; and when I had returned the can, Four-Eyes went over the side again, and the yacht moved onward lazily in the softest of breezes from the west. But my boat lay behind her again; and I did not stir from my restful position until it was full dark; though the going down of the sun had left a clear night and a zenith richly set with a shimmer of stars, which did not give any great promise to my thoughts of coming freedom.
When I deemed that I had waited long enough, and had assured myself that the later night would not be more auspicious for the attempt, I cut away the remaining ropes at my feet, and crouched unbound in the boat. There was good watch upon the ship, I knew, for I could hear the "All's well!" as the bells were struck, and the passing of the orders from the poop to the fo'castle. This did not deter me; and, being determined to stake all rather than face the terrors of the nameless ship, I crawled to the bow, and began to cut the strands of the hawser one by one. The rope was very thick and hard, and the knife which I had stolen was blunt, so that the work was prodigiously slow and difficult; and when I had been at it for half an hour or more, I was interrupted in a way that sent my heart almost into my mouth. There was a man standing on the poop of the Labrador, and he seemed to be watching my occupation. I threw myself flat instantly, and listened to his hail.
"Ahoy, there, young 'un, are you getting a chill?" cried a bluff voice, which I did not recognise; but presently the man Four-Eyes hailed also, and I heard him say—