"We know they would run no risks; but could we get them to believe us?"
"At least let us try."
"No—forgive me—we must not try. We must have nothing more to say. You have spoken to Stevens; let him talk among the men. If the reward tempt them, be sure they will concert measures among themselves to land you. But I beg you to have no faith in this project. They are villains, who will betray you in the end. The boatswain's arguments respecting them are perfectly just—so just that he has inspired me with a new kind of faith in him. He owns that his own life is in jeopardy, and I believe he will hit upon some expedient to save us. See how he watches us! He will join us presently. I, too, have a scheme dawning in my head, but too imperfect to discuss as yet. Courage!" I said, animated by her beauty and the deep, speaking expression of her blue eyes: "the bo'sun's confession of his own danger makes me feel stronger by a man. I have greater confidence in him than I had. If I could but muster a few firearms—for even the steward might be made a man of, fighting for his life with a revolver in his hand—there is nothing I would not dare. But twelve to two!—what is our chance? It must not be thought of, with you and your father depending for your lives on ours."
"No," she answered firmly. "There must be other and better ways. I will think as well as you."
The boatswain came sauntering towards us. He flung a coil of rope over a belaying-pin, looked over the ship's side, approached us nearer, and pulled out a pipe and asked me for a light. I had one in my pocket and gave it to him. This was his excuse to speak.
"It isn't so suspicious lookin' to talk now as it would be at night or in the cuddy—and in the cuddy there's no telling whose ears are about," he said. "I'll give you my scheme, thought on since breakfast, and listen close, for I durstn't talk much; after this we must belay, or the men 'll be set jawing. When we come to the Gulf of Mexico, you'll let me know how long it'll be afore we're fifty mile off the Mississippi. I helped to stow the cargo in this vessel, and she's choke full, and there's only one place as they'll be able to get at to scuttle her, and that's right forrards of the fore hatch. I'll let that out to Stevens bit by bit, in an ordinary way, and he'll remember it. The night afore we heave to—you'll tell me when—I'll fall overboard and get drowned. That'll happen in your watch. We'll get one o' them packin' cases full o' tin-tack up out o' the steerage and stow it away in one of the quarter-boats, and you'll let that drop overboard, d'ye see? which 'll sound like a man's body, and sink right away, and then you'll roar out that the boatswain's fallen overboard. Let 'em do what they like. I shall be stowed away forrard, down in the forepeak somewheers, and the man as comes there to bore a hole, I'll choke. Leave the rest to me. If Stevens he sings out to know if it's done, I'll say 'Yes,' and tell him to lower away the boats, and hold on for me. He'll take my voice for the fellow as is scuttling the ship. Now," he added vehemently, "I'll lay any man fifty pound agin ten shillings, that Stevens don't wait for the man he sends below. He'll get into the boat and shove off and lay by. You'll give me the signal, and I'll come up sharp, an' if there's a breath o' air we'll have the mainyards round somehow; and if the boats get in our road we'll run 'em down; and if there's no wind, and they try to board us—let 'em look out! for there'll be more blood-letting among 'em than ever they saw before, by God!"
He motioned with his hand that we should leave the poop, and walked away.
Miss Robertson looked at me and I at her for some moments in silence.
"Will it do, Mr. Royle?" she asked, in a low voice.
"Yes," I said.