The Congo Rovers Part 17

"Armitage evidently has not recognised my voice as yet," remarked Smellie, "or else," he added, "they have given us up on board as dead, and he is unable so suddenly to realise the fact of our being still alive."

Then, as we finally rounded-to under the _Daphne's_ quarter, Armitage reappeared aft, and the confab was renewed, Smellie this time taking the lead.

"_Daphne_ ahoy!" he hailed, "has Captain Vernon yet retired for the night?"

"I think not," was the reply. "What do you want?"

"Kindly pa.s.s the word to him that Mr Smellie and Mr Hawkesley are alongside in a captured slaver: and say we shall feel greatly obliged if he will send a prize crew on board us to take possession."

"Ay, ay! I will."

Armitage thereupon disappeared, and, we being at the time to leeward of the sloop, a slight but distinct commotion became perceptible on board her. Presently a figure appeared in the fore-rigging, and a deep, gruff, hoa.r.s.e voice hailed:

"Schooner ahoy! Did you say as Mr Smellie and Mr Hawkesley was on board you?"

"Yes I did. Do you not recognise my voice, Collins?"

"Ay, ay, sir! in course I does _now_," was the boatswain's hearty response. Then there followed, in lower tones, certain remarks of which we could only catch such fragments as:

"--lieutenant hisself, by--reefer, too;--man--rigging, you sea-dogs-- give--sailors' welcome."

Then in an instant the lower rigging became black with the figures of the men, and, with Collins as fugleman, they greeted our unexpected return with three as hearty cheers as ever pealed from the throats of British seamen.

For the life of me I could not just then have spoken a word had it been ever so necessary. That hearty ringing British cheer gave me the first convincing a.s.surance that I was once more _safe_ and among friends, and, at the same time, enabled me to _fully_ realise, as I never had before, the extreme peril to which I had been exposed since I last saw the craft that lay there rolling gracefully upon the ground-swell, within a biscuit toss of us.

The men were just clearing the rigging when a small slight figure appeared on the sloop's quarter, and Captain Vernon's voice hailed us through the speaking-trumpet:

"Schooner ahoy! How many hands shall I send you?"

"A dozen men will be sufficient, sir," replied Smellie. "And I shall feel obliged if you will send with them the necessary officers to relieve us. We are both hurt, and in need of the doctor's services."

"You shall have the men at once," was the reply. "Shall I send Burnett to you, or can you come on board the sloop?"

"We will rejoin the sloop, sir, thank you. Our injuries are not very serious," replied Smellie.

"Very well, be it so," returned the skipper; and there the conversation ended.

The next moment the clear _tee-tee-tweetle-tweetle-weetle-wee-e-e_ of the boatswain's whistle came floating down to us, followed by his gruff "Cutters away!" and presently we saw the boat glide down the s.h.i.+p's side, and, after a very brief delay, shove off and come sweeping down toward us.

Five minutes later the prize crew, under Williams, the master's mate, with young Peters, a fellow mid of mine, as his second in command, stood upon the schooner's deck, and Mr Austin, who had accompanied them, was wringing our hands as though he would wring them off.

Smellie saw the exquisite agony which our warm-hearted "first luff" was unconsciously inflicting upon _me_ by his effusive greeting, and thoughtfully interposed with a--

"Gently, Edgar, old fellow. I am afraid you are handling poor Hawkesley a little roughly. He has received rather a bad hurt in the right shoulder to-night in our fight with the schooner's people."

"Fight!--schooner's people! I beg your pardon, Hawkesley; I hope I haven't hurt you. Why, you never mean to say you have had to _fight_ for the schooner?" Austin interrupted, aghast. "Well, we _took_ her by surprise; but her people proved very troublesome, and very pertinacious in their efforts to get her back again," Smellie replied. "But, come, let us get on board the old _Daphne_ once more. I long to set foot on her planks again; and, like Hawkesley here, I shall not be sorry to renew my acquaintance with Burnett."

So said, so done. We made our way into the boat, leaving the prize crew to secure the prisoners, and a few minutes later stood once more safe, if not altogether sound, on the deck of the dear old _Daphne_.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN.

A STERN CHASE--AND A FRUITLESS ONE.

"Welcome back to the _Daphne_, gentlemen!" exclaimed Captain Vernon as he met us at the gangway and extended his hand, first to Smellie and then to me. "This is indeed a pleasant surprise--for all hands, I will venture to say, though Armitage loses his step, at least _pro tem_., in consequence of your reappearance, Mr Smellie. But he is a good-hearted fellow, and when he entered my cabin to report you alongside, though he seemed a trifle incredulous as to your personality, he was as delighted as a schoolboy at the prospect of a holiday."

Smellie took the skipper's extended hand, and after replying suitably to his greeting, said:

"I must beg you will excuse Hawkesley, sir, if he gives you his left instead of his right hand. His starboard shoulder has been disabled to- night by a pistol-bullet whilst supporting me most intrepidly in the task of bringing out the schooner."

The skipper seized my left hand with his right, and pressing it earnestly yet gently, said:

"I am proud and pleased to hear so gratifying an account of you, Hawkesley. Mr Armitage has already borne witness to your gallantry during the night attack upon the slavers; and it was with deep and sincere sorrow that I received the news of your being, with Mr Smellie, missing. I fear, gentlemen, your friends at home will suffer a great deal of, happily unnecessary, sorrow at the news which I felt it my duty to send home; but that can all be repaired by your personally despatching to them the agreeable intelligence of your both being still in the land of the living. But what of your hurts? Are they too serious to be attended to in my cabin? They are not? I am glad to hear that. Then follow me, both of you, please; for I long to hear where you have been, what doing all this time, and how you happened to turn up so opportunely here to-night I will send for Burnett to bring his tools into my cabin; and you can satisfy my curiosity whilst he is doing the needful for you. Will you join us, Austin? I'll be bound your ears are tingling to hear what has befallen these wandering knights."

Thereupon we filed down below in the skipper's wake--I for one being most heartily thankful to find myself where I could once more sit down and rest my aching limbs. The skipper's steward brought out some wine and gla.s.ses, and then at Burnett's request--that individual having promptly turned up--went away to get ready some warm water.

"I think," said our genial medico, turning to me, "_you_ look in most urgent need of my services, so I will begin with you, young gentleman, if you please. Now whereabouts are your hurts?"

I told him, and he straightway began to cut away the sleeve of my coat and s.h.i.+rt, preparatory to more serious operations; whilst Smellie, drawing his chair up to the table, helped himself to a gla.s.s of wine, and then said:

"Before I begin my story, sir, will you permit me to ask what was the ultimate result of that most disastrous expedition against the slavers?

I am naturally anxious to know, of course, seeing that upon my shoulders rests the odium of our failure."

Captain Vernon stared hard at the second lieutenant for a minute, and then said:

"My dear Smellie, what in the world are you talking about? Disaster!

Odium! Why, man, the expedition was a _success_, not a failure. I admit that there was, most unfortunately, a very serious loss of life among the unhappy slaves; but we took the brigantine and afterwards raised the schooner, with a loss to ourselves of only four killed--now that you two have turned up. It was a most das.h.i.+ng affair, and admirably conducted, when we take into consideration the elaborate preparations which had been evidently made for your reception; and the _ultimate result_ about which you inquire so anxiously will, I hope, be a nice little bit of prize-money to all hands, and richly deserved promotion to yourself, Armitage, and young Williams."

It was now Smellie's turn to look surprised.

"You astonish me, sir," he said. "The last I remember of the affair is that, after a most stubborn and protracted fight, in which the schooner was sunk, we succeeded in gaining possession of the brig, only to be blown out of her a few minutes later, however; and my own impression-- and Hawkesley's too, for that matter, as I afterwards discovered on comparing notes with him--was that our losses must have amounted to at least half of the men composing the expedition."

"Well," said Captain Vernon, "I am happy to tell you that you were mistaken. Our total loss over that affair amounts to four men killed; but the severity of the fight is amply testified to by the fact that not one man out of the whole number escaped without a wound of some kind, more or less serious. They have all recovered, however, I am happy to say, and we have not at present a sick man in the s.h.i.+p. There can be no doubt that the slavers somehow received timely notice of our presence in the river, through the instrumentality of your fair-speaking friend, the skipper of the _Pensacola_, I strongly suspect, and that they made the best possible use of the time at their disposal. Had I been as wise then as I am now my arrangements would have been very different.

However, it is easy to be wise after the event; and I am thankful that matters turned out so well. And now, I think we are fairly ent.i.tled to hear your story."

Thereupon Smellie launched out into a detailed recital of all that had befallen us from the moment of the explosion on board the brig up to our unexpected arrival that same night alongside the _Daphne_. He was interrupted by countless exclamations of astonishment and sympathy; and when he had finished there seemed to be no end to the questions which one and another was anxious to put to him. In the midst of it all, however, Burnett broke in with the announcement that, having finished with me, he was ready to attend to the second lieutenant.

The worthy medico's attentions to me had been, as may be gathered from the fact that they outlasted Smellie's story, of somewhat protracted duration, and that they were of an exceedingly painful character I can abundantly testify, the ball having broken my shoulder-blade and then buried itself among the muscles of the shoulder, whence Burnett insisted on extracting it, in spite of my protestations that I was quite willing to postpone that operation to a more convenient season. After much groping and probing about, however, utterly regardless of the excruciating agony he thus inflicted upon me, the conscientious Burnett had at last succeeded in extracting the ball, which he kindly presented to me as a memento, and then the rest of the work was, comparatively speaking, plain sailing. My wound was washed, dressed, and made comfortable; and I was dismissed with a strict injunction to turn-in at once.

To this the skipper moved, as an amendment, that I be permitted to drink a single gla.s.s of wine before retiring; and whilst I was sipping this they turned upon me with their questions, with the result that I soon forgot all about my hammock. At length Captain Vernon said:

"By-the-by, Hawkesley, what sort of a young lady is this Dona Antonia whom Mr Smellie has mentioned once or twice?"

"She is simply the most lovely creature I have ever seen, sir," I replied enthusiastically.

"--And my promised wife," jerked in Smellie, in a tone which warned all hands that there must be no jocularity in connection with the mention of the dona's name.

"Ho, ho!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the skipper with a whistle of surprise. "That is how the wind blows, is it? Upon my word, Smellie, I heartily congratulate you upon your conquest. Quite a romantic affair, really.