My desire was gratified. A man I had never seen before sat at the table, but as he turned his face towards me I knew I could expect no mercy from his hands. Cold, stern, relentless, cruel—those were the characteristics I read there, and with the feeling that I had again fallen into a hard place, I paused before him.
“This is the young man I was to bring down to you when he arrived, sir,” Lieutenant Seymour said.
The officer turned and stared at me.
“Your name?” he then demanded brusquely, and I knew that it was only a matter of form.
“Arthur Dunn,” I confessed.
“You were once a midshipman on this frigate?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And ran away to join the enemy?”
“I hardly think that is a fair way to put it,” I began, when he interrupted me.
“Of course you don’t. No deserter ever did think his case was put fairly,” he exclaimed with a sneer. “To my mind there is but one thing to do with men of your stamp—it is to hang them to the nearest yard-arm. And I would do it, were there not a special order out from the Naval Board for you to be sent back to England if apprehended, where you are to be made an example. So you are safe, so far as your life is concerned, until you get there. But we’ll manage to make that life as miserable for you as it well can be,” and he grinned as though the thought was pleasing to him.