“O’Harrall!” exclaimed Owen. “Is it possible that you are the leader of such men?”
“It is fortunate for you that I am their leader,” answered O’Harrall, helping Owen to rise. “Were I not, you would have shared the fate of your crew. I will protect you and the three survivors, although it will be no easy matter to do so.”
“I accept your offer, and trust that you will keep your word regarding my men,” answered Owen.
More he could not say, for his feelings overpowered him, as looking round he saw his two mates stretched dead on the deck, and the rest of the men who had remained faithful to him weltering in their blood not far off. Though bruised from his fall, he was not otherwise hurt, nor were either Dan, Pompey, or Tim wounded.
“The safest place for you and these three men is your own cabin,” said O’Harrall. “Go in there with them, and I will place a sentry at the door. I cannot trust my own people, and still less the fellows who turned traitors to you.”
Owen, fully agreeing that O’Harrall was right, followed his advice. As he was going below, he saw Routh approaching O’Harrall. After gazing at each other for a moment, they shook hands. Owen, on seeing the two together, no longer wondered that he should have mistaken one for the other, so great was the likeness.
“They must be brothers, and the man who calls himself Routh is the younger, of whom my mother has spoken to me,” he thought.
Thankful to have escaped with his life, more for his mother’s and Norah’s sake than his own, Owen Massey, sad and almost broken-hearted at the loss of the ship, threw himself into a chair in his cabin, Dan, Pompey, and Tim standing round him.
“Cheer up, Cappen Massey; tings when dey come to de wust begin to mend, dey say,” observed Pompey, anxious to console his beloved master. “As de pirate sabe our lives, he set us free p’raps, and den we go back to Jamacee and you get oder ship.”
“Bad luck to the pirates for taking us, though!” exclaimed Dan. “It’s my belafe we should have bate them off, if it hadn’t been for that thafe of the world, Routh, and the other villains. By the powers! if I ever get the chance, I’ll make him repint his treachery; but as you have escaped, captin dear, the rest matthers but little to my mind in comparison.”