The Admiral could hardly wait now to give his orders. He interrupted himself, he was in such haste.
"String him up! string him up! If you have no cage, put a rope round his throat and leave him hanging. String him up! string him up!"
A wild shriek rang out through the lofty apartment. I knew the voice. It was Cynthia's. Then all was still. In an instant fifty torches were alight.
"Some one has discovered us!" cried the hoarse voice of Captain Jonas. "Sarch the place! Sarch the place! A thousand louis for the man who finds the spy!"
Ah! she would be found! She would be found! They would seize her and carry her away with them on their floating hell!
"String him up! string him up!" shouted the Admiral, excitedly, pointing fiercely at me.
I saw, as if in a dream, that they had lifted the lad from the ground and had placed him in the niche, and that the blacksmith was engaged in riveting the chain at the top of the headpiece to a ring bolt in the roofing of the arch. Truly these devils took much pains to be revenged upon their enemies, the world at large! I saw the Smith's lips move, as if he were whispering something to the lad. His face had a pitiful expression, as if he would fain tender some help; but young Trevelyan himself hung like a dead weight, and seemed unconscious of what was befalling him.
At the Admiral's order of "String him up!" one man had gone quickly for a rope which had been unbound from a coffer, and a noose was made and placed round my throat. The men ran, urging me along with them, looking overhead, as if to find a place where they could fasten their diabolical instrument of death.
Then the Smith spoke, leaving the lad where he had placed him. He came forward, trying, it seemed to me, to appear as bloodthirsty as the rest.
"The Chief Justice has hung for a long time, Admiral," he said. "A hanging is quickly over. The other is a pleasant reminder of one's failings for some days to come. The agony of the Chief Justice has been finished now for some time. What do you say to taking his cage for this fellow who shoots our brave sailors as if they were dogs?"