“Bill’s right there,” said Terence, “and I feel that Nature is getting the best of me already.”
While they were holding this conversation they noticed that one of the Kroomen kept near them, and seemed listening to all that was said. His sparkling eyes betrayed the greatest interest.
“Do you understand us?” asked old Bill, turning sharply towards the African, and speaking in an angry tone.
“Yus, sa—a lilly bit,” answered the Krooman, without seeming to notice the unpleasant manner in which the question had been put.
“And what are you listening for?”
“To hear what you tell um. I like go in Ingleesh ship. You talk good for me. I go ’long with you.”
With some difficulty the sailor and his companions could comprehend the Krooman’s gibberish. They managed to learn from him that he had once been in an English ship, and had made a voyage along the African coast, trading for palm-oil. While on board he had picked up a smattering of English. He was afterwards shipwrecked in a Portuguese brig, cast away on the shores of the Saara, just as our adventurers had been, and had passed four years in the desert, a slave to its denizens.
He gratified our adventurers by telling them that they were in no danger of having to endure a prolonged period of captivity, as they would soon be sold into liberty, instead of slavery. Golah could not afford to keep slaves; and was only a kidnapper and dealer in the article. He would sell them to the highest bidder, and that would be some English consul on the coast.
The Krooman said there was no such hope for him and his companions, for their country did not redeem its subjects from slavery.
When he saw that Golah had obtained some English prisoners, he had been cheered with the hope that he might be redeemed along with them, as an English subject, to which right he had some claim from having served on an English ship.