"Mercy! spare my life!" he roared, seeing that I had again covered him, having two more shots left.
The steward, capable, now that things had gone well with us, of performing prodigies of valour, rushed upon him, laid hold of his legs, and pulled him off the bulwark on to the deck.
I thought the fall had broken his back, for he lay groaning and motionless.
"Don't kill him," I cried. "Make his hands fast and leave him for the present. We may want him by-and-by."
The boatswain whipped a rope's end round him and shoved him against the rail, and then came running up the poop ladder, wiping the streaming perspiration from his face.
The breeze was freshening, and the boat alongside wobbled and splashed as the ship towed her through the water.
I ran aft and stared into the gloom astern. I could see nothing of the long-boat. I looked again and again, and fetched the night-glass, and by its aid, sure enough, I beheld her, a smudge on the even ground of the gloom, standing away close to the wind, for this much I could tell by the outline of her sail.
"Miss Robertson!" I cried, "we are saved! Yonder is the long-boat leaving us. Our lives are our own!"
"I bless God for His mercy," she answered quietly. But then her pent-up feelings mastered her; she rocked to and fro, grasping the spokes of the wheel, and I extended my arms just in time to save her from falling.
"Bo'sun!" I shouted, and he came hurrying to me. "Miss Robertson has fainted! Reach me a flag out of that locker."