Dead Men Tell No Tales | Page 9

blazing trap-door in its
midst; and each man there a naked demon madly working to save his
roasting skin. Abaft the mainmast the deck-pump was being ceaselessly
worked by relays of the passengers; dry blankets were passed forward,
soaking blankets were passed aft, and flung flat into the furnace one
after another. These did more good than the pure water: the pillar of
smoke became blacker, denser: we were at a crisis; a sudden hush
denoted it; even our hoarse skipper stood dumb.
I had rushed down into the waist of the ship - blushing for my delay -
and already I was tossing blankets with the rest. Looking up in an
enforced pause, I saw Santos whispering in the skipper's ear, with the
expression of a sphinx but no lack of foreign gesticulation - behind
them a fringe of terror-stricken faces, parted at that instant by two more
figures, as wild and strange as any in that wild, strange scene. One was
our luckless lucky digger, the other a gigantic Zambesi nigger, who for
days had been told off to watch him; this was the servant (or rather the
slave) of Senhor Santos.
The digger planted himself before the captain. His face was reddened
by a fire as consuming as that within the bowels of our gallant ship. He
had a huge, unwieldy bundle under either arm.
"Plain question - plain answer," we heard him stutter. "Is there any ***
chance of saving this *** ship?"
His adjectives were too foul for print; they were given with such a
special effort at distinctness, however, that I was smiling one instant,

and giving thanks the next that Eva Denison had not come forward with
her guardian. Meanwhile the skipper had exchanged a glance with
Senhor Santos, and I think we all felt that he was going to tell us the
truth.
He told it in two words - "Very little."
Then the first individual tragedy was enacted before every eye. With a
yell the drunken maniac rushed to the rail. The nigger was at his heels -
he was too late. Uttering another and more piercing shriek, the madman
was overboard at a bound; one of his bundles preceded him; the other
dropped like a cannon-ball on the deck.
The nigger caught it up and carried it forward to the captain.
Harris held up his hand. We were still before we had fairly found our
tongues. His words did run together a little, but he was not drunk.
"Men and women," said he, "what I told that poor devil is Gospel truth;
but I didn't tell him we'd no chance of saving our lives, did I? Not me,
because we have! Keep your heads and listen to me. There's two good
boats on the davits amidships; the chief will take one, the second
officer the other; and there ain't no reason why every blessed one of
you shouldn't sleep in Ascension to-morrow night. As for me, let me
see every soul off of my ship and perhaps I may follow; but by the God
that made you, look alive! Mr. Arnott - Mr. McClellan - man them
boats and lower away. You can't get quit o' the ship too soon, an' I don't
mind tellin' you why. I'll tell you the worst, an' then you'll know.
There's been a lot o' gossip goin', gossip about my cargo. I give out as
I'd none but ship's stores and ballast, an' I give out a lie. I don't mind
tellin' you now. I give out a cussed lie, but I give it out for the good o'
the ship! What was the use o' frightenin' folks? But where's the sense in
keepin' it back now? We have a bit of a cargo," shouted Harris; "and it's
gunpowder - every damned ton of it!"
The effect of this announcement may be imagined; my hand has not the
cunning to reproduce it on paper; and if it had, it would shrink from the
task. Mild men became brutes, brutal men, devils, women - God help

them! - shrieking beldams for the most part. Never shall I forget them
with their streaming hair, their screaming open mouths, and the cruel
ascending fire glinting on their starting eyeballs!
Pell-mell they tumbled down the poop-ladders; pell-mell they raced
amidships past that yawning open furnace; the pitch was boiling
through the seams of the crackling deck; they slipped and fell upon it,
one over another, and the wonder is that none plunged headlong into
the flames. A handful remained on the poop, cowering and undone with
terror. Upon these turned Captain Harris, as Ready and I, stemming the
torrent of maddened humanity, regained the poop ourselves.
"For'ard with ye!" yelled the skipper. "The powder's underneath you in
the lazarette!"
They