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

Chapter Eighteen. Lifts the Curtain slightly as to piratical Doings in the nineteenth Century.

Silently they glided on, until the shades of evening fell, and the brilliant stars came out. Silently, for the gun-boat went at half-speed; silently, for her engines were good and new, and worked softly without the jarring of age or mal-construction; silently, because those on board were in a tranquil mood, and did not raise their voices above a low murmur.

“How romantic,” said Aileen, in a low tone, as she sat by the stern-rail and watched the gleaming track left by the screw; “how enjoyable, if we could only forget what has just passed, and the object we have in view. The world is a mystery!”

“Is this the first time you have thought so?” asked Edgar, who leaned on the rail near her.

“Well, I think it is,” she replied, with a sad smile; “at least it is the first time I have been deeply impressed with the thought.”

“It is a very old thought,” returned the youth, musingly. “Philosophers from the earliest times have recorded it. Thoughtful men and women of all ages have expressed it. Young people of all generations fancy they have discovered it. The Bible is a key which opens up much of it, and makes it plain; but much still remains in mystery, and I suppose will continue so to remain, till Time merges in Eternity.”

“Do you think such mystery undesirable?” asked Aileen.

“No. It is desirable, else God would not have left it there. ‘Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?’ There is a need be, I doubt not, for mystery, and there is no need for our being distressed by it, for what we know not now we shall know hereafter. But there is much cause for anxiety lest we, either through wilful ignorance, or carelessness, or stupidity, should allow that to remain involved in mystery which is made plain by revelation. The way of salvation was an insurmountable mystery to me once, but since you gave me that poor man’s Testament, Aileen, it has become very plain and very dear to me, through Jesus Christ.”

Aileen thanked God in her heart, and a thrill of gladness filled her, but before she could utter a word in reply, the captain came forward and said in a low tone:—

“Stop the engine, Mr Berrington. We’ll lie by in this creek till day-break.”

Edgar went below. The vibrating of the boat ceased, and an awful stillness seemed to sink down upon her as she glided into a little creek or bay, which was deeply shaded by mangrove trees.

But the silence did not last long. It was still three hours from daylight, and the captain employed the time in preparations for the action which he anticipated on the following day. The yards were sent down; the decks were cleared of all useless incumbrances; the guns were got ready; and an attempt was made, to some extent, to disguise the vessel, so that, in the event of the pirates being found, the gun-boat might get as near as possible without her true character being discovered. The men, meanwhile, who were not engaged in such work, busied themselves in sharpening cutlasses and cleaning small arms, while they conversed in an undertone. All was activity and order, without fuss or needless noise—the result of a man of the right stamp being in command.

“It’s a brush we’ll be havin’ soon,” said Rooney Machowl, with a flash of the eye which told that he inherited a little of his nation’s love of fighting.

“Looks like it,” replied Maxwell, who sat beside his friend in the midst of a group of the Malay crew, rubbing up his cutlass with much interest.

“Does anybody know how many of a crew we have altogether?” asked Rooney.

“I heard the captain say to Mr Berrington,” answered Joe Baldwin, who was busy cleaning a rifle, “that we’ve got ninety men all told, which is quite enough for a 180-ton vessel. With these and seven guns we should be more than a match for all the pirates of the eastern seas.”

“Ho!” exclaimed Ram-stam, looking up from the weapon he was engaged on with an amused expression, “you know noting of pirits of dem seas. Hi! Hi! Wait.”

Ram-stam said this with the air of one who held the decided opinion that when he had waited Joe would have his views enlarged.

“What, are they such bold fellows?”

“Ho yis, vely muchee bold. Ca’es for noting. ’Flaid of noting. Doos a’most anyting—’cept what’s good.”

“Swate cratures,” murmured Rooney; “I hope we’ll be introdooced to aich other soon.”

As it is desirable that the reader should have a little more extended knowledge of the miscreants referred to, we will retrace our steps in time a little, and change the scene.

On one of those sweltering mornings in which the eastern seas appear to have a tendency to boil under the influence of the sun, three piratical junks might have been seen approaching a small island which lay on the sea as if on a mirror. They were propelled by oars. The largest of these junks was under command of our red-jacketed acquaintance, Pungarin. It was what is termed double-banked, and the oars were pulled by “slaves,” that is to say, the crews of trading vessels recently captured.

Pungarin had more slaves than he knew what to do with on that occasion. He had been unusually successful in his captures. All the white men taken had at once been slaughtered, also all who attempted to give the pirates trouble in any way, including those who chanced to be too weak, ill, or old to work. In regard to the rest, each man was secured to his place at the oar by means of a strip of cane, called rattan, fastened round his neck, and a man was appointed to lash them when they showed symptoms of flagging. This the unhappy wretches frequently did, for, as on a former occasion to which we have referred, they were made to pull continuously without food or water, and occasionally, after dropping their oars through exhaustion, it took severe application of the lash, and the discovery of some unusually sensitive spot of the body, to rouse some of them again to the point of labour.

The junks were strange, uncouth vessels, of considerable size, capable, each, of containing a very large crew. They might almost have been styled “life-boats,” as they had hollow bamboos wrought into their structure in a manner which gave them great buoyancy, besides projecting beyond the hulls and forming a sort of outside platform. On these platforms the slaves who rowed were fastened. In each vessel there were at least forty or fifty rowers.

Pungarin walked up and down his poop-deck as if in meditation, paying no regard to what was going on around him until a feeble cry was heard from one of the rowers,—a middle-aged and sickly man. The pirate captain looked carelessly on, while the overseer flogged this man; but the lash failed to arouse him, and the captain ordered the man to desist—but not in mercy.

“Over with him,” he said, curtly, and then resumed his walk.

The slave-driver drew his knife, and cut the rattan that bound the man, who turned his dying eyes on him with an imploring look.

At that moment one of the pirates, who from his dress and bearing seemed to occupy a position of authority, stepped upon the platform and looked at