“I say, mate, you know what better manners are,” exclaimed Ben. “Do try and teach these people to treat us decently.”
Antonio made no reply, but, without even turning his head, walked on.
“You are a pretty fellow,” shouted Ben; “I thought you would have wished to be civil, at least.”
Remembering the black’s behaviour on board the Spanish ship, however, I felt that it would be useless to appeal to him.
Presently we saw him returning, accompanied by Sinné and several other fellows, mostly as ill-favoured as himself. Approaching Ben, they threw themselves upon him, and, pinioning his arms, led him off, ordering us to follow.
“I am afraid they mean mischief,” said Halliday in a melancholy voice. “Do you think, Charlie, that they intend to murder poor Ben?”
“I hope not,” I answered, though I did not feel over confident about the matter. “I will do all I can to save him.”
We followed Ben and his captors. He turned his head towards us, and, by his look, evidently thought that his last hour had come; so indeed did we, and very sad we felt. We walked on till we had got some hundred yards from the camp, when we saw a sort of bench formed by boards on the top of a sand-hill, to which Ben was conducted. Sinné and Antonio having led Ben up to the bench, made him kneel down before it; when, to our horror, the former drew a pistol from his belt and presented it at the honest seaman’s head.
“Fire away, you rascals,” cried Ben in a loud voice, fixing his eyes on his executioners. “I am not afraid of you!”
Every instant we expected to hear the fatal shot fired, but still Sinné refrained from pulling the trigger. Feeling sure that if we rushed forward to Ben’s assistance it would be the signal for his death, we stood stock-still, not daring to move. In equally fixed attitudes stood the Arabs, evidently taking delight in our horror and anxiety. I dared not even pull out my watch to note how the time went by, but it seemed to me that a whole hour must have thus passed,—the Arab all the while standing motionless, till I thought his arm must have ached with holding the pistol. Halliday declared that he thought at least two hours must have elapsed, when Sinné, giving a self-satisfied grunt, restored the pistol to his belt, and stalked off towards the camp, followed by Antonio, and leaving Ben kneeling before the bench.