"Shove a knife between 'is ribs," suggested another.
"Of course you would," said the ex-boatswain. "But here's a man who gets you on board his ship and then tells you to do something that'll get you hanged as sure as infants eat pap. And you'd sooner risk your necks than tell him that, if he wants any murdering done, he'd better do it himself. You're a perishing set of heroes, strike me blind!"
"Why don't you tell that to the old man yourself?" asked one of the audience. "Your neck's as much in danger as ours."
"Aye, aye, tell 'im yourself," echoed the others.
"So I would if I thought you'd stand by me. But you're such a set of white-livered skunks that, at the first word from this one-eyed skipper, you'd turn on me. Why, if you were men instead of a damned pack of slaves, you'd take charge of this packet yourselves and clap that lunatic aft in irons. Then you'd take the ship into the nearest port and claim salvage, and a nice little fortune you'd make out of it. It'd be every man his own pub then and don't you forget it."
"What about the orf'cers, old son?" inquired someone.
"Treat 'em the same if they refused to come in with us. One of them would have to do the navigating, and if he had any objections we'd soon get rid of them. A bit of whipcord tightened round a man's head is a wonderful persuader."
"So's the wooden 'orse," cried a fireman, referring to the manner in which the fiery orator had been induced to waive his claim to be regarded as a passenger.
There was another burst of laughter at this sally, but the would-be righter of wrongs, though annoyed, was not to be put down.
"Whose fault was that?" he demanded. "One man couldn't fight the whole crowd of you, and if that swivel-eyed swine had given the word you'd have been on me like a pack of dogs. But I haven't forgotten, and I'll lay my life against a mouldy biscuit that I get even before I leave this stinking slave-dhow."