CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
WE ARE ATTACKED BY CHINESE PIRATE WRECKERS.
We had finished luncheon, and were all on deck watching the junk, when,about half-past two o'clock--she having by that time arrived withinabout a mile of the lagoon entrance--we saw her heave to; and a minuteor two later it became evident that she was preparing to launch a boat,or boats. She was now close enough in for us to see, with the aid ofthe telescope, pretty nearly everything that was happening aboard her,and I was far from reassured when I noticed that the man upon the poop--probably the junk's captain--who was directing operations, wore aformidable-looking broad-bladed Chinese yatagan girded to his side,while, when he faced in our direction once or twice, pointing, I feltalmost certain that I could detect one, if not a brace of pistols in hisbelt.
Presently we saw a boat of very respectable dimensions rise above thejunk's bulwarks and slowly disappear over her lee rail; and this wasfollowed by a second, and a third of at least equal size.
"Three boats!" I exclaimed. "That settles it. If she were here upon afriendly mission she would not send in three boats to take off half adozen people. She is a wrecker, and only too probably a pirate as well.Her people know that there are survivors on this wreck--our flareduring the night and our ensign to-day will have told them that much--but they do not know how many of us there are; so her skipper is sendingin enough men to make quite sure of us, as he believes. And guns, too,by George!" I continued, as I saw an old-fashioned smooth-bore cannonin slings top the rail. "The rascals mean business, that is quiteevident; but so do I. I am going below to bring up half a dozen moreshells; it is just possible that we may need them. Meanwhile, madam,will you kindly keep an eye on the junk while I am gone, and report tome what you have _seen_ when I return?"
Thrusting the glass into Mrs Vansittart's hands, I hurried away to themagazine and brought out six additional shells, with the necessarycartridges, and, conveying them up on deck, placed them convenientlynear the guns of the port battery, which I now saw were the onlymain-deck pieces that were at all likely to be of use to us.
Having at length completed my task, I rejoined the little group upon thepoop. I saw that the boats had already pushed off from the junk, andwere pulling at a good pace toward the opening in the reef, while thejunk herself had filled away again, and was beating up in the samedirection.
"There are three boats, Walter, as you see," said Mrs Vansittart,handing over the telescope to me; "and if you look at them carefullythrough the glass you will also see that they are crowded with men--atleast twenty in each boat, I should say. I dare say you will alsonotice, as I did, the glint of the sun upon many weapons; and, unless Iam very greatly mistaken, each boat has a gun mounted in her bows. I amafraid there can be no possible doubt as to the intentions of thosemen."
"No," I agreed, as I raised the telescope to my eye; "no doubt whatever.They mean to wipe us out if they can, and then plunder the wreck. Butthey will not do that while I am alive and able to resist them. Now," Icontinued, "you two ladies have each a revolver, and so have thestewardesses. They are fully loaded; and I have already explained toMiss Anthea why I have given them to you. I most fervently hope thatthere will be no need for you to use them in that way; but should therebe--and one never knows; I may be bowled over and killed, or renderedhelpless by a shot or a pike-thrust--I implore you not to hesitate toolong. It would be infinitely better that you should die instantly andpainlessly by a well-directed pistol shot than that you should fallalive into the hands of a crew of Chinese pirates."
The colour ebbed away from the cheeks of Mrs Vansittart and herdaughter as I uttered the concluding words, but I saw a look of firmnessand determination tightening about their lips while the elder lady said:
"Have no fear for us, Walter. I hope, with you, that we may not bedriven to any such desperate step; but should we be, we both havecourage enough to take it, and so, I think, have the two maids."
"Thank you!" I replied. "It is a relief to me to hear you speak sobravely. But do not act, I pray you, until the very last moment--untilit has become clear beyond all question that everything is lost. Now,since those boats are within easy range, I will just give them a hintthat we want to have nothing to do with them, and that they had betterkeep their distance."
I swung myself down off the poop on to the main-deck, and, running tothe forward gun of the port battery, which was the gun that could bestbe brought to bear on the advancing boats at that moment, I levelled thepiece, aiming to strike the water at a point a few fathoms ahead of themiddle boat of the three--they were advancing in line abreast. Icalculated that the shot would rebound and fly over the heads of hercrew close enough to frighten them a bit and make them think twicebefore advancing any farther. It was a rather difficult and riskyshot--risky for those in the boat, I mean--but I pulled it offsuccessfully. The shell dashed up a great column of snow-white spray,which completely hid the boat for a moment; and when this cleared away Isaw that all the boats' crews were holding water, evidently taken a gooddeal by surprise, and apparently undecided what to do.
"Bravo, Walter; a beautiful shot!" exclaimed Mrs Vansittart, and I sawher snatch up the telescope and peer through it. She held it to her eyefor a full minute; then, without lowering the instrument, she cried:
"There is a man standing up in the stern-sheets of the middle boatapparently haranguing the crews, for he is flourishing his arms about agreat deal. Ah! he has stepped down again; and now--yes--the oarsmenare giving way again. The two outside boats look as though they wereturning back--no, they are only opening out into wider order, and arecoming on again. Try them with another shot, Walter. Perhaps if youcan hit one of those boats the others may be induced to go back."
"Ay, ay!" I replied, with a flourish of my arm; and I carefully spongedout and reloaded the piece. But I did not now want the boats to return;I wanted them to come on and be destroyed. I was by this time convincedthat the matter must be fought out to the bitter end, and that we mustdestroy that junk and the whole of her crew if we would not be ourselvesdestroyed. If the boats were driven back the vessel would hang about,watching her opportunity, or possibly return some night during the darkand take us unawares. It was their lives or ours that hung in thebalance; therefore when I had reloaded the piece I ran my eye along thesights, and was in the act of training them upon the middle boat, whenmy attention was distracted for a moment by the distant boom of a gun.Looking up, I saw that the junk had fired. I knew by the ring of thereport that the gun was shotted, and presently I saw the shot comeskipping toward us just inside the reef; but it fell a good way short,and I turned to my own gun again.
But now, when I wanted actually to hit the mark, I found that it was notquite so easy as I had imagined. To aim straight was easy enough, buteven where they were the boats presented but a small mark, and they wereconstantly disappearing in the trough of the swell. It was thereforenecessary for me to wait until my particular target reappeared beforefiring, and although the next two shots went very near indeed they didnot actually hit. Meanwhile the junk was firing rapidly, making shorttacks to keep as nearly abreast of us as might be, and her shot weregradually dropping nearer to us. Seeing this, I insisted that theladies at least should go below, as now a shot might at any moment comeaboard us. Julius begged hard to be allowed to remain, and, his motherraising no objection, I willingly consented, as there was no knowingwhen I might be glad of his assistance.
The three boats were now so close to the passage through the reef thatthey were obliged to alter their formation to "line ahead" in order topass through it; and it was at this moment that, with my fourth shot, Icaught the leading boat fair and square, and literally blew her topieces. I thought that perhaps this might check the advance of theremaining two boats; but not a bit of it. They did not even pause topick up any of the survivors of the leading boat's crew--probably therewere no survivors--but came on with a blood-curdling yell that evoked afaint shriek from, I thought, somewhere in the neig
hbourhood of thecompanion. Almost immediately afterward a round shot from the junkstruck the water at a little distance away, and then went hummingdirectly over my head, so close that I felt the wind of it.
At this juncture I became aware of the fact that the wind, what littlethere was of it, was falling lighter; our ensign was drooping from itsstaff all but dead, while the junk's sails were flapping with her everyroll, and the little curl of water about her bows had all butdisappeared. This afforded me a grain of comfort, for she could notdraw very much nearer, though, to be sure, she was near enough alreadyif her gunners' eyes were but straight enough to hit us; my great hopewas that her heavy rolling would distract their aim, and so cause theirshot either to fall short of or to fly over us. But I had no time tomeditate at length upon these chances; the two boats were drawingdangerously near, and I must stop them by hook or by crook before theyactually got alongside. I therefore quickly recharged my piece andcarefully pointed it at the inner end of the passage through the reef.I had barely got this done to my satisfaction, when the leading boatthrust her nose through. Bang! The four-inch barked out its greeting,and a moment later that boat disappeared in flame and smoke, to myintense relief.
Mentally I patted myself on the back. "Now, surely," I thought, "thatremaining boat will turn tail, and I shall have a chance to wipe her outon her way back to the junk!" But no; on she came, her crew yellinglike demons, and churning the placid waters of the lagoon into foam withtheir oars. They sprang to their feet at each stroke, that they mightthrow the whole weight of their bodies into it, while a man standing inthe stern-sheets frantically waved a most murderous-looking blade abovehis head. I jumped to the next gun--there was no time to reload now--and hastily levelled it. As I did so I saw a flash burst from her bows,followed by a gust of smoke; the ball struck the waterway close by myfeet and hurtled past, sending a shower of splinters flying, and thisdistracted my aim. I missed, and the shot harmlessly struck the watersome distance astern of the boat, to be greeted by its occupants with ayell of mingled triumph and derision.
Matters were becoming frightfully critical now. Should I have time foranother shot, I wondered? As the thought flashed through my brain arifle shot rang out from the poop, and, glancing that way, I saw the boyJulius with a Remington repeater at his shoulder aiming at the rapidlyadvancing boat. And--what I had absolutely forgotten--I saw also theMaxims standing there, ready for action! To dash up on to the poop andlevel the port Maxim at the enemy was the work of but a moment, and thenext instant the deadly little weapon was thudding away, pouring itsleaden stream fair into the boat. At that range--a bare three hundredyards--it was impossible to miss, and in a few seconds every occupant ofthe boat was either dead or wounded; the oars trailed motionless in thewater, the boat lost her way, and in less than a minute it becameevident that the craft was sinking, literally riddled with that leadenhail.
"Hurrah!" I yelled. "There goes the last of them, and, thank God, thatdanger's over! Now for the junk herself. She must be settled, or therewill be no safety for us."
I made my way down to the main-deck again, very nearly tumbling headover heels over Mrs Vansittart and her daughter, whom I found seatedupon the stairs of the companion way. I paused just long enough toexplain the situation to them, and then rushed out on deck in time tosee the last boat, submerged to her gunwale, slowly roll over and godown bows first, leaving a few forms feebly struggling on the surface.
The junk was by this time completely becalmed and had lost her way;nevertheless she maintained a fairly steady fire upon us, and some ofher shot came so unpleasantly close that I thought it well to orderJulius down off the poop, where he could be of no further use. I got towork with the main-deck guns again, and, possibly because I could takeall the time I pleased over the aiming, did some very neat shooting. Ifired six shells in all at the junk, every one of which but the firstwent home--three of them close to her water-line.
They were destructive missiles, those shells, bursting as they hit andblowing great holes in the junk's sides; and it soon became apparentthat the vessel was sinking rapidly. I therefore ceased firing and wentup on to the poop to see the last of her. But she died game, for hercrew maintained a steady fire upon us until she foundered, her last shotbeing fired at the very moment when she was plunging stern first beneaththe waves. And by an unlucky chance that last shot came slap aboard thewreck, struck the teak poop rail within a foot of where I stood, andscattered a number of splinters, one of which, a heavy one, caught me inthe side of the head, very nearly scalped me, and sent me reeling to thedeck senseless.
I recovered consciousness slowly, my first sensation being that the topof my head seemed to be on fire. Then I became aware that I was beingpartially supported by somebody's knee behind my shoulders, and that myhead was being bathed. Finally I opened my eyes, to find MrsVansittart bending over me with a sponge in her hand, which she was justwithdrawing from a basin of bloodstained water, while the boy Juliussupported me in a semi-recumbent position as I lay on the deck.
"Ah, that is better!" exclaimed Mrs Vansittart, as she bent over me."He is coming to himself. Lizette," raising her voice; "hurry with thatbrandy. Is your head very painful, Walter?"
"It feels as though it were being held much too close to a fierce fire,"I replied, "and, in addition, it is aching most atrociously. It is mostunfortunate that--"
"Yes, it is indeed, you poor boy!" replied Mrs Vansittart as I paused,a feeling of deadly nausea sweeping over me. "Ah," she continued, asthe chief stewardess appeared with a tumbler in her hand, "here is thebrandy! Sip this, Walter; it will revive you. And as soon as you areable to move, we must get you below, and I must attend to your head anddress it properly. Then you must go to bed and endeavour to get somesleep. You have taken splendid care of us this morning, and now it willbe our turn to take care of you."
"Oh, thank you very much!" I murmured; "but I hope this unlucky blow onthe head is not going to make me a nuisance to you. As to turning in, Isimply cannot do it. A careful watch must be maintained for severalhours yet, lest some of the men from that junk should swim to the wreckand get aboard us. Even so few as half a dozen able-bodied Chinamencould make a lot of trouble for us just now."
"Yes," agreed Julius, "they could. But I guess I'm not going to givethem the chance. You'll just have to turn in, as Momma says, and leaveme to look after things. And, see here, Mr Leigh, don't you worryabout anything. I'll keep a look-out, and if any swimming Chinks comemeandering around here, I'll just give 'em socks, you bet!"
This was reassuring; for if the boy was willing to undertake the duty hecould quite easily keep a considerable number of swimmers at a distancewith the assistance of a Remington. A few sips of brandy served torestore my strength greatly; and presently, with the help of MrsVansittart and Lizette, I was able to make my way below to thedrawing-room. There I passed a particularly unpleasant three-quartersof an hour while the lady skipper snipped most of my hair off andafterwards coaxed the lacerated scalp back into place, securing it inposition with straps of sticking plaster and finishing off by a dressingof healing ointment and bandages.
When all was done, the two stewardesses helped me to my own cabin; andafter they had left me I somehow managed to undress and get into mybunk, which I was glad enough to do, for I was beginning to feeldistinctly ill. I have a hazy recollection that after I had been in mybunk a little while, Mrs Vansittart came to me and administered a doseof medicine, which she told me was intended to make me sleep. Then Iseemed to pass into a condition wherein I was the victim of a longsuccession of hideous nightmares, during which I was either perpetuallybattling with a thousand awful perils, or was lying helpless in thehands of cruel and relentless savages, who were inflicting the mostdreadful torments upon me.
It was a close, muggy, and suffocatingly hot day when I at lengthemerged from this condition of extreme mental and physical suffering.My cabin port stood wide open close to my head, but not even thefaintest breath of air came thr
ough it. Presently I became aware of asound which I quickly identified as that of a torrential downpour oftropical rain lashing the surface of the sea outside and the deck above.I stirred uneasily in my bunk, wondering vaguely how long I had lainthere, and strove to rise upon my elbow, that I might look through theport. But I might as well have striven to lift the deck over my head; Iseemed not to have an ounce of strength left in me, and I sank my headback upon the pillow with a weary sigh. As I did so I became aware of aslight movement beside my bunk, and, turning my eyes in that direction,I saw Miss Anthea in the act of rising to her feet from a chairimmediately beneath the port. She had a book in her hand, which sheplaced face down upon the top of the desk beside her as she rose to herfeet. Then, coming to the side of the bunk, she bent over me and gazedinto my eyes. Gradually a little smile of gratification illuminated hersomewhat pale and worn features and her eyes, which, I noticed, had avery weary look, as though from prolonged sleeplessness.
Presently, as I smiled in answer, she spoke.
"You are feeling better, Wal--Mr Leigh?" she asked. "Do you know me?"
"Assuredly, Miss Anthea," I answered. "Why should I not know you?" Ispoke with most disconcerting difficulty; my words halted, and my lipsseemed scarcely capable of forming them.
"Oh! but that is splendid," she exclaimed, straightening her body andclasping her hands together after the manner of a girl who hears goodnews. "You are feeling better?" she persisted.
"Have I been ill, then?" I stupidly asked. Indeed my mind was at thatmoment tenanted merely by a mass of most confused and incoherentmemories, of which I could make little or nothing.
"You have indeed," she replied; "dreadfully ill, raving in delirium, andso violent that it is a miracle you did not do yourself or some of us aserious injury. But," she continued, stopping me as I attempted tospeak, "thank God, that is over now, I hope; and all that remains is foryou to take as much nourishment as you can, do as you are told, and getwell and strong again as quickly as possible. I must run away and leaveyou for a few minutes to tell Momma the good news, and arrange to havesome food prepared for you."
With a nod and a smile of encouragement she left the cabin, and a minuteor two later Mrs Vansittart entered it. She stepped quickly up to theside of my bunk, looked at me, and presently laid her slim, cool fingersupon my pulse, holding them there for several seconds.
"Ah!" she commented, as she removed them at length, "I guess you areoceans better than you were at this time yesterday. The fever is gone,and your skin is delightfully cool and moist; moreover, you are in yourright mind once more, and that is something gained. I expect the woundin your head is healing, although we haven't been able to look at itproperly for nearly a week. But we will attend to it now, as soon asyou have taken a little food. My stars, Walter, we have had a time withyou! Lucky for us all that you have taken it into your head to becomesensible again, or I guess we'd all have been sick people in another dayor two. Do you know how long you've been ill?"
"No," I answered; "but I am afraid that it has been much too long. Idon't know where to find words in which to express my regret for--"
"Regret!" she repeated. "Regret nothing! You couldn't help it, my dearboy. You got hurt in defending us, and it was just our duty to lookafter and nurse you as best we could; and that is all there is to it.You have been ill ten whole days. This is the eleventh morning sincethe junk appeared. During the best part of those ten days you have beenraving in delirium, with occasional outbreaks of violence, when it taxedthe energies of all five of us to the utmost to restrain you. Oh, Iguess we have had some very lively times with you, Walter, off and on!But, thank God! that is all over now and--Ah! here comes Lizette withsome broth for you. We have been hoping for this change for the lastfive or six hours, and have got all ready for it.
"Now, Lizette, I guess you've got to climb right up on to this chair,seat yourself on the edge of the bunk, and support Mr Leigh in asitting posture while I feed him. Take care that you don't hurt hishead. So--that's right; lean back against the head of the bunk, andrest his head against your shoulder. Gently, girl, gently! I reckonthe poor boy is aching all over with weakness. There, that's all right!Are you pretty comfortable, Walter? Good! Now then, all that you'vegot to do is, just drink this broth right away, rest yourself for aspell, and then I'll come along again and dress that wound on yourhead."