Colonel Thorndyke's Secret by G. A. Henty (best free e reader .txt) 📕

he won't want another. The fellow seems quiet enough, and as far as strength goes he don't look stronger than a girl.”

After chatting for some time longer Mark and Dick Chetwynd went aft again. The Essex did not put into any intermediate port, and it was only on the sixth day after sailing that she approached Amsterdam. The voyage had passed off without any incident except that at nine o'clock one evening there had been a slight noise on deck and the sound of a fall. The friends went up at once. Several of the sailors had run aft, and Gibbons was explaining matters to them.

“I was walking up and down the deck,” he said, “when I saw this chap staring down through the skylight, and I said to him, 'I don't call it good manners to be prying down into your betters' cabin.' He did not answer or move, so I gave him a push, when he turned upon me like a wild cat, and drew his knife from his girdle. There it is, on the other side of the deck. As I did not want daylight put into me, I just knocked him down.”

“Served him right,” one of the sailors said. “He had no right to come aft at all, and if he drew his knife on you, you were quite right in laying him out. But you must have hit him mighty hard, for you have knocked the life pretty near out of him. Well, we may as well carry him forward and throw a bucket of water over him. That is the worst of these foreign chaps; they are always so ready with their knives. However, I don't think he will be likely to try his hand on an Englishman again.”

Mark and his friend went below again. In the morning Mark asked one of the sailors if the foreigner was much hurt.

“Well, he is a good bit hurt, sir. That big chap looks as strong as a bullock, and his blow has flattened the foreign chap's nose. He cannot see out of his eyes this morning, and is keeping his bunk. They cannot stand a blow, those foreign chaps; but I don't suppose that any of us would have stood such a blow as that, without feeling it pretty heavy. The man who hit him is quite sorry this morning that he hit him quite so hot, but, as he says, when a fellow draws a knife on you, you have not got much time for thinking it over, and you have got to hit quick and hard. I told him he needn't be sorry about it. I consider when a fellow draws a knife that hanging aint too bad for him, whether he gets it into a man or not.”

There was a growl of assent from two or three sailors standing round, for in those days the use of the knife was almost unknown in England, and was abhorrent to Englishmen, both as being cowardly and unfair, and as being a purely foreign crime.

“It will be dark before we get alongside,” Mark said to the two detectives. “Do you two walk first; we will keep just behind you, and the others shall follow as close as they can keep to us. If anyone is looking out for us they will see that we are a strong party, and that it would be no good to attack us, for even if they were to stab me it would not be possible to search me for the diamonds when I am with a party like this.”

It was indeed quite dark when the brig brought up outside a tier of vessels lying by the wharf. A few oil lamps burning by the quay showed that there were a good many people still sauntering about. The party waited until the rest of the passengers had landed. They learned from one of those who knew the place that the hotel to which they were going was but three or four hundred yards away, and obtained directions how to find it.

“Now we will go,” Mark said. “Gibbons, you had better keep a sharp lookout on your own account. That fellow you knocked down may try to put a knife into you.”

“I will keep a sharp lookout, sir, never you fear.”

“I think, Tring, you had better watch Gibbons; he is more in danger than I am. Have you seen the man go on shore?”

“Yes, he was the very first to cross onto the next vessel,” Tring said.

The loungers on the quay had gathered together to watch the passengers as they left the ship, and by the dim light from one of the oil lamps it could be seen that the majority of them were of the roughest class. As they were passing through them a man with a cry of rage sprang at Gibbons with an uplifted knife. Tring's fist struck him under the ear as he was in the act of striking, and he fell like a log. There was a cry of “Down with them!” and a rush of a score of men, most of whom were armed with heavy bludgeons.

The party was at once broken up, heavy blows were exchanged, the two pugilists rolling their assailants over like ninepins, but receiving several heavy blows from their assailants' clubs. A rush of five or six men separated Mark from the others. Those in front of him he struck down, but a moment later received a tremendous blow on the back of the head which struck him to the ground unconscious. His companions were all too busy defending themselves against their assailants to notice what had been done, and as the attack had taken place in the center of the roadway behind the quay, there was no lamp, and the fight was taking place in almost total darkness.

By this time many people had run up at the sound of the fray. A minute later there was a cry that the watch were coming, and four or five men with lanterns emerged from one of the streets leading down to the quays, and hurried towards the spot. The fight at once ceased, the men who had attacked mingled with the crowd, and when the watch came up they found the five Englishmen clustered together and ten or twelve men lying on the ground.

The instant that the fight had ceased Dick Chetwynd asked, “Where is Mr. Thorndyke?”

No answer was given. The other four men simultaneously uttered exclamations of alarm. The crowd was thinning fast as the watch came up.

“What is all this about?” one of them asked in Dutch.

“Do any of you speak English?” Dick asked.

“I do,” one of them said.

“We landed five minutes ago from that craft,” continued Dick, “and as we came across we were attacked by a band of ruffians. An Englishman, one of our party, is missing.”

“Whose bodies are these?” the watchman asked, raising his lantern and pointing to them.

“Perhaps Mr. Thorndyke is among them,” Dick Chetwynd said.

The fallen figures were examined by the light of the lanterns. Mark was not among them. The watchmen uttered an exclamation of astonishment as they looked at the men's faces.

“What did you strike them with?” the one who spoke first asked.

“Struck them with our fists, of course,” Gibbons replied. “They will do well enough; you need not bother about them, they will come round again presently. The question