“We must wait, however, till daylight,” he observed, “or we may be getting on shore again.”
Bumping on a pointed rock tries a vessel. Scarcely had we got off, when one of the carpenter’s mates, who acted as our carpenter, came aft.
“She’s making water very fast, sir,” he said, addressing our commander. “It’s as much as we can do to keep her afloat till the morning.”
“Rig the pumps, then; and, Mr Norton, send the hands to work them,” said Mr Ormsby, quite composedly. “We must not let the Fawn go down, whatever we do.”
In another minute the clank of the pumps was heard, and on it went—“clank! clank! clank!” I dropped asleep in the midst of it. When morning broke, a large fleet of prows was discovered about three miles to leeward; we immediately made sail, and stood down towards them, a bright look-out being kept for reefs and shoals. The size of the little vessel evidently encouraged the pirates. Their numbers having been now increased, instead of running, they stood boldly up towards us.
“We shall see some fun now, Jack,” said Dicky Plumb, “depend on that.”
In a short time we were near enough to open fire on the leading junks. They, in no way daunted, returned it with their long brass guns and gingals, peppering us very hotly. I rather suspect that Mr Ormsby now saw that it would have been wiser had we kept clear of such gentry, especially in the sinking condition of the schooner; as long as the breeze held, and the schooner was under command, we could run here and there, raking the prows, and handling them very severely. At length, however, as the evening was coming on, the wind fell; our enemies, on this, were seen to get out their long sweeps, and come out towards us in a body, some on one side, some on the other. It was evident that we should have to fight for our lives; for the moment, not a man on board thought of the leak. I got hold of a cutlass, which I could handle pretty well, and a brace of pistols; Mr Plumb armed himself in a similar manner. For some time we managed to keep the enemy at a distance with our guns, which we fired as rapidly as we could load them. It was now again almost dark. Just as the nearest prow was about to board, down she went; our men cheered, and redoubled their efforts; but we had another big enemy on the other side. On she came, though hulled several times; her crew were ready to spring on board. Mr Ormsby, aided by Ned Rawlings and one or two others and myself, had run in a gun, and loaded it; it was quickly run out again, and fired right down into the hold of the prow. Just as the Malays were about to spring on board, a thundering noise was heard; flames burst forth, and up went the vessel into the air; the schooner’s sails were set on fire, and several of our people were hurt; my face was blackened all over, and so was Dicky Plumb’s. Down came the wreck of the prow on our deck, while the limbs of her unfortunate crew were sent right over us, some sticking in the rigging; this fearful event kept the rest of our enemies at a distance for a few minutes, and enabled us to put out the flames, and to clear away the wreck. Scarcely, however, had we done this, than with fierce cries and shouts once more the prows pulled up towards us; we met them with further discharges of shot, but though many of their people were killed, yet a big prow grappled us on either side. So fiercely did our people fight, that not a man who reached the deck had time to recover his legs before he was cut down. Joss exerted himself bravely, and though not big enough to handle a cutlass, kept bringing ammunition up from below, and then getting hold of a revolver, did good execution with it, running in and out among the men, and killing numbers of pirates as they attacked our people with their sharp scimitars. At length we succeeded in casting off the grapnels which the Malays had thrown on board; and the breeze catching our topsails, we stood out once more from between them; we had, by this time, lost four or five of our men, three of whom were killed outright; and it seemed too likely, if the Malays were determined to overpower us, they would do so. Our young commander fought like a lion, and Dicky Plumb, I must say, fought like a lion’s whelp; no sooner did a Malay show his brown face over the bulwarks, than Dicky was at him; indeed, all hands were doing their utmost. I will not boast of myself; in fact, if I had been ever so great a coward, I should have fought; for I felt very sure, and so did everybody on board, that if we did not fight, we should one and all be knocked on the head. Directly there was a moment’s cessation of firing we had to run to the pumps, and to work away for our lives to keep the vessel from sinking. Again and again, however, the prows came round us, and no sooner had we beaten off one set, than others took their places. At length Mr Ormsby was hit; he sank on the deck. Dicky and I, who were standing near, ran to help him up.
“Don’t give in, Mason?” he shouted; “fight to the last!”
“Are you much hurt, sir?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Lend me a handkerchief.”