While this was taking place, Miss Allen, who had remained below to escape injury during the engagement, now appeared on deck, and instantly noticed the captive. She gazed at him in astonishment, and asked how he came aboard.
He seemed as much surprised at seeing a woman aboard a slaver as if she had been a naval officer in uniform. As he solemnly swore that he would not fight any more, his lashings were cast adrift below his waist, and he was raised to his feet.
“Well, I wanter know,” was his first comment, as he stood looking at the trader’s daughter. “Be you goin’ to make the middle passage, miss?”
The “middle passage” was that from the slave coast, with human freight, to the point of destination of the slave, and the term was used to distinguish that part of the voyage from the one out and the return. The term was American, but applied as well to British ships, who, like ourselves, sailed first out of some English port. Miss Allen smiled at the long fellow and looked into his faded yellow eyes, but she disdained to answer him, and he was hustled forward by several men, while he broke forth afresh in a low tone, pouring a stream of the foulest invective upon them in the easy and indolent manner that was characteristic of his speech.
During the following fortnight we made good way to the southward, passing the high peak of Teneriffe the third day out of Funchal, leaving it a dark cloud upon the eastern horizon. We held our course now closer in toward the coast, but still distant enough to be offshore from any cruiser that might be watching for slave-ships.
Then we crossed the line and stood in through the Guinea Current for the Gulf, heading straight for the Bight of Benin.
Our captive had by this time given abundant evidence that he could be trusted about the decks without danger of his trying to escape. In fact, he appeared to take a fancy to The Gentle Hand.
Martin, who appeared drawn to the fellow, several times announced that it was a shame to keep his hands in irons, and, after repeating this to Henry and Mr. Gull for some days, it reached Hawkson and the captain.
We were now three men short in the crew, and an extra man, especially of Shannon’s build and energy, was a matter to be considered. The mate held out strenuously for either putting the long fellow ashore or hanging him forthwith, but, as Curtis, Hicks, and the rest were absolutely set against such a measure as capital punishment, and the land was some distance off, the inevitable took place. That is, Shannon was practically shanghaied into the ship, but chose to sign articles of his own free will to become a member of her crew, and was regularly installed.
His great delight was to dwell humourously upon the adventure of the treasure-box in Funchal, telling at some length how Brannigan, his mate, who had come aboard in the chest, had dropped right upon Jennings, the Dutch sailor’s back, when he went over the side. This accounted for the state of Jennings’s head, for the skipper assured us that Mr. Brannigan was a man of parts, and could do up a whole ship full of square-heads. He explained how angry he had become at the mistake he had made in taking Mr. Gull’s boat for the one meant for him, and how he had thrashed each member of the boat’s crew for not pulling harder and getting under the stern half a minute sooner. The only thing that prevented our capture in the last encounter was the fact that Brannigan had failed to jump aboard, but if he had, the two of them could easily have taken the barque.