Under the Waves: Diving in Deep Waters by R. M. Ballantyne (best romance ebooks TXT) 📕

obeyed. On reaching the deck the first sight that met them was Mr Hazlit standing by the binnacle. A Malay pirate with a drawn sword stood beside him, but he was otherwise unfettered. They evidently thought him harmless. Near to him stood the skipper of the Fairy Queen with the stern resolution of a true Briton on his countenance, yet with the sad thoughtful glance of one trained under Christian influences in his eye. His hands were bound, and a Malay pirate stood on either side of him. He was obviously not deemed harmless!

The decks were everywhere covered with blood, but not a man of the crew was to be seen.

“You are the captain of this schooner?” asked Pungarin.

“Yes,” replied the prisoner, firmly.

“Have you treasure on board?”

“No.”

“We shall soon find out the truth as to that. Meanwhile, who is this?” (pointing to Mr Hazlit.)

The captain was silent and thoughtful for a few moments. He was well aware of the nature of the men with whom he had to do. He had seen his crew murdered in cold blood. He knew that his own end drew near.

“This gentleman,” he said, slowly, “is a wealthy British merchant—well-known and respected in England. He has rich friends. It may be worth your while to spare him.”

“And this,” added the pirate captain, pointing to Aileen.

“Is his only child,” answered the other.

“Your name?” asked Pungarin.

“Charles Hazlit,” said the hapless merchant.

A sudden flash of intelligence lit up for a moment the swarthy features of the pirate. It passed quickly. Then he spoke in an undertone to one of his men, who, with the assistance of another, led the captain of the schooner to the forward part of the ship. A stifled groan, followed by a plunge, was heard by the horrified survivors. That was all they ever knew of the fate of their late captain. But for what some would term a mere accident, even that and their own fate would have remained unknown to the world—at least during the revolution of Time. The romances of life are often enacted by commonplace people. Many good ships with ordinary people on board, (like you and me, reader), leave port, and are “never again heard of.” Who can tell what tales may be revealed in regard to such, in Eternity?

The Fairy Queen was one of those vessels whose fate it was to have her “fate” revealed in Time.

We cannot state with certainty what were the motives which induced Pungarin to spare the lives of Mr Hazlit and his family; all we know is, that he transferred them to his junk. After taking everything of value out of the schooner, he scuttled her.

Not many days after, he attacked a small hamlet on the coast of Borneo, massacred most of the men, saved a few of the young and powerful of them—to serve his purposes—also some of the younger women and children, and continued his voyage.

The poor English victims whom he had thus got possession of lived, meanwhile, in a condition of what we may term unreality. They could not absolutely credit their senses. They felt strangely impelled to believe that a hideous nightmare had beset them—that they were dreaming; that they would unquestionably awake at last, and find that it was time to get up to a substantial and very commonplace English breakfast. But, mingled with this feeling, or rather, underlying it, there was a terrible assurance that the dream was true. So is it throughout life. What is fiction to you, reader, is fact to some one else, and that which is your fact is some one else’s fiction. If any lesson is taught by this, surely it is the lesson of sympathy—that we should try more earnestly than we do to throw ourselves out of ourselves into the place of others.

Poor Miss Pritty and Aileen learned this lesson. From that date forward, instead of merely shaking their heads and sighing in a hopeless sort of way, and doing nothing—or nearly nothing—to check the evils they deplored, they became red-hot enthusiasts in condemning piracy and slavery, (which latter is the grossest form of piracy), and despotism of every kind, whether practised by a private pirate like Pungarin, or by a weak pirate like the Sultan of Zanzibar, or by comparatively strong pirates like the nations of Spain and Portugal.

In course of time the pirate-junk anchored at the mouth of a river, and much of her freight, with all her captives, was transferred to native boats. These were propelled by means of numerous oars, and the male captives were now set to work at these oars.

Mr Hazlit and his daughter and Miss Pritty were allowed to sit idle in the stem of one of the boats, and for a time they felt their drooping spirits revive a little under the influence of the sweet sunshine while they rowed along shore, but as time passed these feelings were rudely put to flight.

The captives were various in their character and nationality, as well as in their spirits and temperaments. These had all to be brought into quick subjection and working order. There were far more captives than the pirates knew what to do with. One of those who sat on the thwart next to the Hazlits had been a policeman in one of the China ports. He was a high-spirited young fellow. It was obvious that his soul was seething into rebellion. The pirate in charge of the boat noted the fact, and whispered to one of his men, who thereupon ordered the policeman to pull harder, and accompanied his order with a cut from a bamboo cane.

Instantly the youth sprang up, and tried to burst his bonds. He succeeded, but before he could do anything, he was overpowered by half a dozen men, and re-bound. Then two men sat down beside him, each with a small stick, with which they beat the muscles of his arms and legs, until their power was completely taken away. This done, they left him, a living heap of impotent flesh in the bottom of the boat, and a salutary warning to the rebellious.

But it did not end here. As soon as the poor fellow had recovered sufficiently to move, he was again set to the oar, and forced to row as best he could.

The voyage along the coast, and up a river into which they finally turned, occupied several days. At first, on starting, Aileen and her companions had looked with tender pity on the captives as they toiled at the heavy oars, but this deepened into earnest solicitude as they saw them, after hours of toil, gasping for want of water and apparently faint from want of food. Next day, although they had lain down in the bottom of the boat supperless, the rest had refreshed most of them, and they pulled on with some degree of vigour. But noon came, and with it culminated the heat of a burning sun. Still no water was served out, no food distributed. Mr Hazlit and his party had biscuit and water given them in the morning and at noon. During the latter meal Aileen observed the native policeman regarding her food with such eager wolfish eyes that under an impulse of uncontrollable feeling she held out her can of water to him. He seized and drank the half of it before one of the pirates had time to dash it from his lips.

Presently a youth, who seemed less robust than his comrades, uttered a wild shriek, threw up his hands, and fell backwards. At once the pirates detached him from his oar, threw him into the sea, and made another captive fill his place. And now, to their inexpressible horror, the Hazlits discovered that the practice of these wretches—when they happened to have a super-abundance of captives—was to make them row on without meat or drink, until they dropt at the oar, and then throw them overboard! Reader, we do not deal in fiction here, we describe what we have heard from the mouth of a trustworthy eye-witness.

In these circumstances the harrowing scenes that were enacted before the English ladies were indeed fitted to arouse that “horror” which poor Miss Pritty, in her innocence, had imagined to have reached its worst. We will pass it over. Many of the captives died. A few of the strongest survived, and these, at last, were fed a little in order to enable them to complete the journey. Among them was the native policeman, who had suddenly discovered that his wisest course of action, in the meantime, was submission.

At last the boats reached a village in one of those rivers whose low and wooded shores afford shelter to too many nests of Malay pirates even at the present time—and no wonder! When the rulers and grandees of some Eastern nations live by plunder, what can be expected of the people?

The few captives who survived were sent ashore. Among them were our English friends.