"He forgives the Smith," said Captain Jonas. "How very polite of Mr. Jones! Of course, you feel better, Smith?"
"I want none of him or of his damned forgiveness!" said the Smith, leaning again close to my ear. "The fastening is a little weak." Aloud, "Where is that other pincers?"
There were shouts and a rush to find the pincers, during which he said in a whisper, his lips scarce moving:
"A friend could release you. I will drop the tools." And then aloud:
"It is meat and drink to me to trice up a Yankee!"
And now, as I was raised to my feet—rather to a standing posture, for I was so closely confined that I could move naught but my eyeballs—and as I was being carried to the remaining niche, the villains began their burial service.
"If we but had Mauresco here, our high priest Mauresco," said the Admiral regretfully.
"I can say the service as well as Mauresco!" shouted Jonas with scorn. "Give me half a chance." And then there was poured forth a stream of blasphemy more awful than any to which I had ever listened. If I must die, give me some tender and consoling thought to while away my hours while death is approaching. But this! I will not sully my pages with the vile words which fell from the lips of these godless men. It was a travesty upon the beautiful service of the Church of England, and was so ingenious in its obscenity that I would fain forget it. Thank God that I have forgotten it in a measure, but I do remember that, as I was being taken to that deadly niche in the wall, my whole soul revolted at what I could not but hear.
"It is nothing, sir, when you get used to it," squeaked the Admiral of the Red. "You've heard of skinning eels? Usage makes all the difference in the world." And then the old villain laughed his fiend's cackle, which set my teeth on edge.
I suppose that I was deathly pale.