“What ’you grinning about, Tim?” I had not been aware that I was grinning, but I was, from ear to ear. “Get the guns and revolvers from the cabin.”
“All of them, sir?” I asked, my voice shaking with excitement.
“All you can carry.”
I jumped for the cabin stairs, and clanked up again, making a noise like an arsenal. The captain could not help laughing to see me. I had the Spencers, of course, three of the heavy bomb guns, two revolvers, and some ammunition. I distributed my arsenal among the officers.
“Here she comes,” said Mr. Baker—with satisfaction, I thought.
The junk had gone by us, until she was almost directly to windward, had turned, and was coming down before the wind, her men, who had been hidden below, swarming out upon deck. They were armed mostly with long knives.
I looked at our own men. They were taking their places at the rail according to their nature; some slowly, some quickly. I saw Peter go with business-like rapidity, and take his place by the fore rigging. He had a boarding-knife. The Prince, with a harpoon in his hand, and two more leaning against the rail at his side, leaped upon the rail beside Peter. I ran to Peter’s other side, seizing a boarding-knife as I ran, and there we were, the three of us together, the Prince, Peter, and I. Peter took it all quietly, as if it were a regular part of his duty to meet a junk-load of Chinese pirates; I was a little afraid, I think, but at the same time I was pleased, and I was wildly excited; and the Prince stood on the rail, looking down with the utmost contempt upon the Chinese. He was stripped to the waist—most of our men were half-stripped—and looked like an ebony statue, the gold hoops in his ears shining out against his shining black skin.
The junk was very near now, and one of their men crawled up with a great bronze hook on the end of a cable. He was going to try to hook fast to us, but he never did make the trial. He had to rise, for a moment, and expose himself. That moment was enough for the Prince, who was directly opposite him, and only a few feet away. The Prince raised his harpoon, and darted quickly. The sharp weapon struck the man full in the chest, went clean through him as if his body had been made of paper, and the barbs stuck a good three inches behind his back.
The Prince smiled at that. “Ha!” he cried. “You want come aboard? Come on, then.”
He jerked the body over the rail of the junk, and it fell with a thud against our side. Then, still standing erect, he hauled it over our rail, and dumped it on the deck at my very feet. It turned me sick and faint for an instant.