“So that Mr. Stukeley, he went ashore in the long-boat, after calling
me down some more before the men. He got a shore-boat to go about in.
After that he said his boatman should have dinner aboard of us. I
stopped that. But Mr. Stukeley was very rude, and then the man got
rude. All hands working the hatch there, hearing it all. Mrs. Stukeley
beside. So that was two blocks, I thought. I give the boatman a thick
ear there and then. I told him if he didn’t sheer off I’d drop a cold
shot into him. And I would have. Mr. Stukeley told me to keep my hands
off the man. Then the man wanted his money. My hat, we had it all up
and down. I thought that Stukeley would hit me, one time. I wish ’e
’ad done. I’d a laid him out.”
“And Mr. Perrin? How did it end?”
“I saw some of the hands knocked off to listen, so I give them a few.
And he stood there telling them not to take no blows. Telling ’em to
down me. And then the long-boat come alongside with water. Mr. Ramage
was in her, of course. He hears the row, and he come over the side
just as quick as cut. He just took that Stukeley by the arm, and
walked him into the alleyway. ‘Don’t you incite no sailors, sir,’ he
says. ‘No more of that, sir. I respects your feelings, sir,’ he says,
‘but for Gord’s and your lady’s sake,’ he says, ‘you quit. You don’t
know what you’re doin’.’ That was the end for that time. I suppose
we’ll ’ave another dollop of it to-day.”
“Put him in irons at once, publicly, if he gives you any more trouble.
And he’s not to talk to any man. That’s another thing. Iron him
directly he gives a back answer. Tell Mr. Ramage, too. Now bring those
fowls along doctor. I’m off to the man-of-war sloop, about them
Indian-snatchers.”
He pulled aboard the man-of-war sloop, with his present of wine and
poultry. As he sat in his gig calling to the men to pull the stroke
out, he wrote descriptions of the missing seamen.
When he returned to the _Broken Heart_, the sloop was nearly full of
trade. It was just half-past seven. He went to his cabin to wash,
walking quickly and quietly, like a forest Indian. There was some
slight noise to his left as he entered the alleyway. He turned
sharply, to look into the sail-room, to see if it were ready for the
samples. The door shut in his face with a bang. He could not swear to
it--the door shut in a fraction of a second--yet it seemed to him that
he had seen Stukeley with Mrs. Inigo, for one bright flash of time. He
would not open to make sure; for it was a woman’s cabin; he might have
been mistaken; but he turned in his tracks and blew his whistle. A man
ran to him.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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