They passed several islands in the course of the day, changing their
direction to a right angle to that which they had at first pursued, as
soon as they were hidden from the sight of the galley by an intervening
island. As night came on they anchored in a little bay on the coast of
the Morea. The sails being furled, the sailors made a division of the
booty they had captured on the island, and of the portable property
found on board the wreck. A gourd full of water was placed to Gervaise's
lips by one of the men of a kinder disposition than the rest. He drank
it thankfully, for he was parched with thirst excited by the pain caused
by the tightness with which he had been bound.
He slept where he sat. All night four men remained on guard, although
from what he heard they had no fear whatever of being overtaken. In
the morning his arms were unbound, and they stripped off his tunic and
shirt. They had evidently respect for his strength, for before loosing
his arms they tightly fastened his ankles together. The removal of his
shirt exposed Claudia's gift to view.
“Take that from him and give it to me,” the captain said. As the two men
approached, Gervaise seized one in each hand, dashed them against
each other, and hurled them on the deck. But the exertion upset his
equilibrium, and after making a vain effort to recover it, he fell
heavily across them. The captain stooped over him, and, before he could
recover himself, snatched the chain from his neck.
“You are a stout fellow,” he said, laughing, “and will make a fine
slave. What have you got here that you are ready to risk your life
for?” He looked at the little chain and its pendant with an air of
disappointment. “'Tis worth but little,” he said, showing it to his
mate. “I would not give five ducats for it in the market. It must be a
charm, or a knight would never carry it about with him and prize it so
highly. It may be to things like this the Christians owe their luck.”
“It has not brought him luck this time,” the mate observed with a laugh.
“Even a charm cannot always bring good luck, but at any rate I will try
it;” and he put it round his neck just as Gervaise had worn it. The
latter was now unbound, and permitted to move about the deck. The
strength he had shown in the struggle on shore, and the manner in which
he had hurled, bound as he was, two of their comrades to the deck, had
won for him the respect of his captors, and he was therefore allowed
privileges not granted to the seamen of the vessel that had had the ill
fortune to be cast on shore so close to the spot where the corsair
was hiding. These had been seized, driven to the ship, and having been
stripped of the greater portion of their clothes, shut down in the hold.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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