so he gave ordersfor the paraffin to be emptied over the pile and over the deck. As soonas this was done lighted matches were thrown down, and hardly had theytime to regain the boat and push off, ere columns of dark smoke camespewing up the hatchways, followed high into the air by tongues andstreams of fire.
Before noon the derelict sank spluttering into the summer sea, and onlya few blackened timbers were left to mark the spot where she had gonedown.
A few days after this the wind fell and fell, until it was a dead calm.
Once more the sea was like molten lead, and its surface glazed andglassy, but never a bird was to be seen, and for more than a week not acloud was in the sky as big as a man's hand. Nor was the motion of theship appreciable. By day the sun shone warm enough, but at night thestars far in the southern sky shone green and yellow through a strange,dry haze.
On Saturday night Tandy as usual gave orders to splice the main-brace.He, and Halcott also, loved the real old Saturday nights at sea, of thepoet Dibdin's days. And hitherto, in fair weather or in foul, these hadbeen kept up with truly British mirth and glee.
There was no rejoicing, however, on this particular evening, for two ofthe hands lay prostrate on deck. Halcott himself ministered to them,sailor fashion. First he got them placed in hammocks swung under ascreen-berth on deck. This was for the sake of the fresh air, andherein he showed his wisdom.
Then he took a camp-stool and sat down near them to consider theirsymptoms. But these puzzled him; for while one complained of fierceheat, with headache, and his eyes were glazed and sparkling, the otherwas shivering and blue with cold. He had no pain except cramps in hislegs and back, which caused him an agony so acute that he screamed aloudevery time they came on.
Halcott went aft to study. He studied best when walking on hisquarterdeck. Hardly knowing what he did, he picked up a bone thathonest Bob had been dining off, and threw it into the sea. There wasstill light enough to see, and the man at the wheel looked languidlyastern. When three monster sharks dived, nose on, towards the bone, helooked up into the captain's face.
"Seen them before?" said Halcott, who was himself superstitious.
"Bless ye, yes, sir. It's just four days since they began to keepwatch, and there they be again. Ah, sir! it ain't ham-bones they'sa-lookin' arter. They'll soon get the kind o' meat they likes best."
"What mean you, Durdley?"
"I means the chaps you 'as in the 'ammocks. Listen, sir. There's nodeceivin' Jim Durdley. We've got the plague aboard! I've been shipmatewith she afore to-day."
Halcott staggered as if shot.
"Heaven forbid!" he exclaimed.
No one on board cared much for this man Durdley. Nor is this to bewondered at. In his own mess he was quarrelsome to a degree. Poorlittle Fitz fled when he came near him, and many a brutal blow hereceived, which at times caused fierce fights, for every one fore andaft loved the nigger boy.
Durdley was almost always boding ill. His only friends were theforeigners of the crew, men that to make a complement of five-and-twentyTandy had hired in a hurry.
Mostly Finns they were, and bad at that, and if there was ever anygrumbling to be done on board the _Sea Flower_ these were the fellows tobegin it.
Halcott recovered himself quickly, gave just one glance at Durdley'sdark, forbidding countenance--the man was really ugly enough to stop achurch clock--and went below.
He met Tandy at the saloon door, and told him his worst fears.
Alas! these fears were fated to be realised all too soon.
The men now stricken down were those who had boarded the derelict withHalcott. One died next evening, and was lashed in his hammock anddropped over the bows a few hours afterwards.
No doubt, seeing his fellow taken away, the other, who was one of thebest of the crew, lost heart.
"I'm dying, sir," he told Halcott. "No use swallowing physic, theothers'll want it soon."
By-and-by he began to rave. He was on board ship no longer, but walkingthrough the meadows and fields far away in England with his sister byhis side.
"I'll help you over the old-fashioned stile," Fitz, who was nursing him,heard him say--"yes, the old-fashioned stile, Lizzie. Oh, don't I loveit! And we'll walk up and away through the corn-field, by the little,winding path, to the churchyard where mother sleeps. Look, look at thecrimson poppies, dear siss. How bonnie they are among the green.Ah-h!"
That was a scream which frightened poor Fitz.
"Go not there, sister. See, see, the monster has killed her! Ah, me!"
Fitz rushed aft to seek for assistance, for the captain had told him tocall him if Corrie got worse.
Alas! when the two returned together, Corrie's hammock was empty.
No one had heard even a plash, so gently had he lowered himself over theside, and sunk to rise no more.
Book 2--CHAPTER ELEVEN.
MUTINY ON BOARD--FAR TO THE SOUTH'ARD.
"Nothing certain at sea except the unexpected." The truth of this wassadly exemplified by the terrible calamity which had befallen the _SeaFlower_--and befallen her so suddenly, too!
Only one week ago she was sailing over a rippling sea on the wings of afavouring breeze, every wavelet dancing joyously in the sunlight. Onboard, whether fore or aft, there was nothing but hope, happiness, andcontentment. Till--
"The angel of death spread his wings on the blast."
Now all is terror and gloom--a gloom and a terror that have struck deepinto the heart of every one who knows what death and sorrow mean.
A breeze has sprung up at last, and both Halcott and Tandy havereluctantly come to the conclusion that it will be better to steer forcolder weather. So southward the _Sea Flower_ flies, under every stitchof canvas, with studding-sails low and aloft. Shall the plague bestayed? Heaven alone can tell!
As it is, the depression hangs like a dark, foreboding cloud over theship.
No one cares to talk much by day or by night. The men sit silently attheir meals, with lowered brows and frightened looks. They eye eachother askance; they know not who may be the next. They even avoid eachother as much as possible while walking the decks. Hardly will a manvolunteer to nurse the sick. The hammocks containing these hang on thelee side, and the crew keep far away indeed.
But they smoke from morn till night.
Halcott himself and little Fitz are the only nurses, and both are wornout for want of rest. With their own hands they sew up the hammock ofthe dead, unhook it, lift the gruesome burden on to the top of thebulwark, and, while the captain with uncovered head raises his eyes toheaven and utters a prayer, the body is committed to the deep, to betorn in pieces next minute by the tigers of the sea.
Poor little Nelda! She is as merry as ever, playing with Bob or the'Ral on the quarterdeck, and it is strange, in this ship of death, tohear her musical voice raised in song or laughter in the midst ofsilence and gloom!
No wonder that, hearing this, the delirious or the dying fancythemselves back once more in their village homes in England.
Nelda wonders why the captain, who used to romp and play with her, triesall he can now to avoid her; and why little Fitz, the curious,round-faced, laughing, black boy, with the two rows of alabaster teeth,never comes aft.
Halcott himself never goes below either. He insists upon taking hismeals on deck. Nor will he permit Tandy or Ransey to come forward. If_he_ can, he means to confine the awful plague to the fore part of theship.
They say that in a case of this kind it is always the good who go first.In this instance the adage spoke truly.
Terrible to say, in less than a fortnight no less than thirteen fellvictims to the scourge. But still more, more awful, the crew now becamemutinous.
Luckily, all arms, and ammunition as well, were safely stored aft.
Durdley was chief mutineer--chief scoundrel! Out of the fourteen menleft alive, only four were true to the captain, the others were ready tofollow Durdley.
This fellow became a demon now--a demon in command
of demons; for theyhad found some grog which had been in charge of the second mate--who wasdead--and excited themselves into fury with it.
Durdley, the dark and ugly man, rushed to the screen-berth where Halcottwas trying to ease the sufferings of a poor dying man.
He was as white as a ghost; even his lips were pale.
Beware of men, reader, who get white when angry. They are dangerous!
"Here, Halcott," cried Durdley, "drop your confounded mummery, andlisten to _me_. Lay aft here, my merry men, lay aft."
Nine men, chiefly Finns and other foreigners, armed with ugly knives andiron marline-spikes, quickly stationed themselves behind him.
"Now, Halcott, your game's up. You brought this plague into the shipyourself. By rights you should die. But I depose you. I am captainnow, and my brave boys will obey me, and me alone.
"You _hear_?" he shouted, for Halcott stood a few paces from him, calmlylooking him in the