The guess seemed a shrewd one, and highly probable, but the men's talk was sheer Hebrew to the four of us. Nakier listened, darting looks from side to side, then suddenly lifted both his hands in the most dramatic posture of denunciation that could be imagined, and hissed some word to them, whereupon every man fell as silent as though he had been shot. He picked up the volume and extended it to the fellow next him.

'Takee, takee,' he cried, speaking that we might understand. 'Lady, and you, sah, Misser Vise and Jacob my mate, this is the Mussulman oath we men now take. I speak not well your language, but dis is my speech in English of what you shall hear.' Then, composing his countenance and turning up his eyes till nothing gleamed but the whites of them in his dark visage, he exclaimed in a profoundly devotional tone and in accents as melodious as singing:

'In de name of Allah de most merciful, and de good Lord of all things, if break dis oath do I, den, O Allah, may I go to h.e.l.l!'

He paused, then turned to the man who held the volume, who forthwith held the book at arm's length above his head and p.r.o.nounced in his native tongue what we might suppose the oath that Nakier had essayed to make English of. This done, the book was handed to the next man, and so it went round, all in dead silence, broken only by the strange, wildly solemn accents of the oath-taker, and I noticed that the glittering eyes of Nakier rested upon every man as he swore, as though he constrained him to take the vow by his gaze.

Abraham and his mate looked on with open mouths, breathing deeply. The book came to Nakier. He was about to lift it, paused, and spoke to the fierce-looking fellow that was called Ong-Kew-Ho, who immediately glided out of the cabin--none of these men seemed to walk: the motion of their legs resembled that of skaters. I was wondering what was to happen next, when the fellow who had been stationed at the wheel arrived. Nakier addressed him. Immediately he extended his arms and levelled his forefingers at us as the others had; then elevated the book and recited the oath.

'All this looks very honest,' I whispered to Helga.

Then Nakier took the oath, handed the volume to a man, and said something. Instantly every man's arms were pointed at us, with the index fingers touching, and a minute later all the men, saving Nakier, had quitted the cabin.

'You see, lady, it is allee right,' said he, smiling.

'Yes, we are satisfied,' she exclaimed, rising from her chair; but her eye caught the stain on the deck; an expression of horror worked in her face like a spasm, and she brought her hand to her breast with a half-stifled exclamation.

'When day come,' said Nakier, addressing Helga, 'we look at de chart and find out de place for you to steer we to.'

His bearing was still full of Eastern grace and courtesy. No expression entered his face to deform its beauty; yet somehow I seemed sensible of a subtle spirit or quality of command in the fellow, as though he was now disguising his sense of power and possession with difficulty. It was clear that he looked to Helga mainly, if not wholly, for what was to be done for them.

'You shall point out the spot you have in your mind,' said she.

'You sabbee navigation, sweet lady?'

'Among us,' she answered, with a motion of her hand that comprehended the two boatmen and myself, 'we shall be able to do all you require.'

He made a sort of salaam to her, and said, looking at Abraham: 'Who keep de watch?'

'Whose watch on deck is it?' I asked.

'The starboard's--moine,' answered Abraham, with an uneasy shuffling of his feet.

'Allee right, Mr. Vise; allee right! It is veree fine night. I go now to sleep,' said Nakier; and he went in his sliding, spirit-like fashion to the cuddy-door, and vanished in the blackness on the quarter-deck.

The four of us stood grouped at the head of that little table, staring at one another. Now that the coloured crew were gone, a sense of the unreality of what had happened possessed me. It was like starting from a nightmare, with the reason in one slowly dominating the horror raised by the hideous phantasmagoria of sleep.

'We must not seem to be standing here as though we were planning and plotting,' exclaimed Helga. 'Dark figures out in that shadow there are watching us.'

'That's right enough, miss,' said Abraham; 'but what's to be done?'

'Here stands a man,' cried Jacob hotly, striking his breast, 'as dorn't mean for to be carried to the Cape in a bloomin' wessel full o' b.l.o.o.d.y savages; and that's speaking straight!'

'Hush!' cried I. 'Soften those leather lungs of yours, will you?'

'Ain't there no firearms knocking about?' said Abraham.

'I hope not,' said Helga; 'we shall be able to manage without firearms!'

'What is in your mind?'

'An idea not yet formed,' she answered. 'Give me time to think. I believe that not only are our lives to be saved, but the vessel too!'

'Ha!' cried Abraham, with a thirsty look. 'It needs a sailor's la.s.s to get such a fancy as that into her head! I'm a c.o.c.kney if I don't seem to see a salwage job here!'

But Jacob was staring at us gloomily.

'What I says is this,' he exclaimed, addressing us with his fists clenched: 'Here be three Englishmen and a gal with the heart of two men in her'--'Softly,' I interposed--'with the heart of two men in her,' he continued, with a shake of his fist; 'and what's forward? He-leven wisps of coloured yarn! He-leven heffigies with backbones separately to be broke like this!' He crooked his knee, and made as if he were breaking a stick across it. 'Are we,' he cried, with the blood mounting to his face and an expression of wrath sparkling in his eyes, 'are we fower--three men and a young lady--to quietly sit down and wait to be murdered? or are we to handle 'em as if they was a pack of apes, to be swept below and smothered under hatches as a breeze o' wind 'ud blow a coil of smoke along?'

'Lower your voice, man!' I whispered. 'What do you want?--to court the death that you bolted aloft to escape?'

'What's to prevent us,' he continued, m.u.f.fling his tone, though the fierceness of his temper hissed in every breath he expelled--'what's to prevent us a-doing this? More than the watch are below; three or fower may be on deck. Ain't the scuttle forrards to be clapped down over the forecastle, where they lie safe as if they was at the bottom of a well a hundred foot deep? Ain't that to be done? And if the three or fower that's knocking about on deck aren't to be handled by us three men--good-noight!'

He rounded his back upon us in sheer contempt of pa.s.sion.

'We may do better than that,' said Helga.

'You're for supposing that they ain't going to keep a bright look-out, mate,' said Abraham. 'See here! What good's to be done, these here hands you'll find equal to,' smiting first his left, then his right knuckles; 'but s'elp me Moses I'm not here to be killed. Them chaps are born knife-stickers. Touch one, and you're groaning at your length on deck, with a mortal wound in your witals. And if what we do ain't complete--if so be they're wan too many for us--and it's eleven to three, remember _that_, mate--what's to happen? Ask yourself the question! For the lady's sake, I'm for caution.'

'We must not remain debating here,' said I. 'They believe us sincere.

There are eyes watching us, as Miss Nielsen says. This holding a council is not going to rea.s.sure them. If you object to keeping a look-out, Abraham, I'll take charge.'

'I will keep you company,' said Helga.

'No, no!' cried Abraham. 'It's moy watch, and Oi'll keep it.'

He went clumsily, and with a bewildered manner, to the companion-steps.

'I'll remain along wi' ye, Abey,' said Jacob. 'Arter what I saw, as I stood at the wheel--the poor chap's cry--the way they chucked him overboard----' He buried his eyes in his coat-sleeve. 'The cussed murderers!' he exclaimed, lifting his face, and looking savagely around.

'Come!' cried Abraham, 'if ye _mean_ to come! What's your temper agoing to do for us?'

'I'll relieve you at four o'clock,' said I, looking at the timepiece, the hands of which stood at a quarter before two.

The men went on deck, and turning down the lamp--for the revelation of the light served as a violent irritant to the nerves on top of the fancy of the secret, fiery-eyed observation of us without--I seated myself beside Helga on a locker to whisper and to think.

The girl and I had pa.s.sed through some evil, dark, and dangerous hours since we first came together in that furious Sat.u.r.day night's gale; but never was the worst of them all comparable to this middle-watch through which we sat, for hard upon two hours of it, in gloom, in the ocean silence that lay upon the barque, imagining the movement of dark shapes in the blackness that came like a wall to the cabin-door, and the gleam of swiftly receding eyes peering at us through the cabin skylight.

Regularly through the stillness sounded the combined tread of Abraham and his mate, over our heads, with sometimes a halt that almost startled the ear, while we could clearly catch the grumbling growling of their conversation as they pa.s.sed the skylight on their way to and fro.

Yet, strangely enough--I am speaking for myself--the horror of the double a.s.sa.s.sination did not lie upon my spirit with the deadening weight I should have imagined as the effect of so shocking, sudden, and b.l.o.o.d.y a tragedy. That which might have been acute horror was subdued into little more than a dull and sickening consternation by perception of our own peril. Yet I would look at those berths lying on either side the cuddy front, as though from either one or the other of them the figure of the Captain or his mate must stalk! The stain upon the cabin-deck lay black as ink against the Captain's door. To think that _that_ was all of him his barque now contained!

We sat whispering about the unhappy creature and his wretched subordinate; then our talk went to other matters. I told Helga we need not question that the intention of the crew was to cast the vessel away upon some part of the South African coast, near enough to Cape Town to enable them to trudge the distance, but too remote from civilization for the movements of the barque to be witnessed. That was their resolution, I said: I would swear to it as though it had been revealed to me. That they would never suffer us three men to land alive we might be as sure as that they had slaughtered Bunting and his mate.

'Their oath counts for nothing, you think?' said she.

I answered, 'Nothing: they would value their lives above their oath. Not likely they would suffer us to testify to their crime.' Under the serpent-fair exterior of Nakier lay as pa.s.sionless a capacity of murder as ever formed the mechanical instinct of any deadly beast or reptile.

'His eye,' I said, 'will never be off us.' Even as we whispered, his gaze, or that of another subtle as himself, might be upon us. He was the one to fear; and this carried me into asking, 'What is to be done?'