The Black Bar | Page 7

a human being--a fellow-creature cast to destruction by the brutal captain of the slaver--and he had failed.
"Got him?" came faintly from the distant ship.
"No, sir," shouted the second lieutenant, through his hands.
"Oh, look! look!" cried Mark, wildly. "Pull, my lads. Starboard men, back water. He must be somewhere here. He is sure to come up again."
The men obeyed, and in those terrible moments the silence was appalling. Then came the deafening roar of a gun--the last fired then at the now distant schooner--and Mark sank down from the thwart and was turning away from the men to hide his drawn face, when he uttered a wild cry, flung himself half over the side of the boat, and made a desperate clutch at something which just rose above the water. Then hand grasped hand, the white holding the black in a desperate clutch, as the lieutenant dropped the rudder-lines, and saved Mark from going overboard by seizing him round the waist.
Then came a little hauling, followed by a cheer, as the nude figure of a stalwart black was dragged in, to sink helpless, perfectly insensible, in the bottom of the boat.
"Now pull, my lads!" shouted the lieutenant; "pull all you know, and let's get aboard. We've got to take that schooner before we've done."
The men cheered, and pulled for the ship, from which came an answering cheer; but as Mark knelt down by the black he felt they had been a little too late, for the man lay there, in the moonlight, apparently quite dead. He had not stirred, neither did there seem to be the slightest pulsation as the boat was pulled alongside the Nautilus and run up to the davits, the graceful vessel beginning to glide once more rapidly in pursuit of the schooner, which had by the cruel manoeuvre placed a considerable distance between her and her pursuer.
"The black-hearted scoundrel!" cried the captain, as he stood looking down at the slave. "I'll follow him to America but what I'll have him. Well, doctor, all over with the poor fellow?"
"Oh no," said the gentleman addressed; "he's coming round."
Almost as he spoke there was a faint quiver of the black's eyelid, and a few minutes after he was staring wildly round at the white faces about him. The men set up a cheer, while a feeling of exultation such as he had never before experienced caused a strange thrill in the midshipman's breast.
"He may thank you for his life, Vandean," said the second lieutenant, "for we should never have seen him. Now I wonder whether that scoundrel will try the same game over again."
"Safe to, Russell," said the first lieutenant, gruffly. "Here, my lads, get the black below; give him a place to lie down. He'll be all right in the morning, and a free man at any rate."
"I say, Van," said Bob Howlett, "aren't we all making a precious lot of fuss about a nigger? Wonder whether you'd all make as much about me."
"Go overboard and try," said Mark.
"Eh? Thankye. Well, not to-night. I say, can't that schooner sail?"
"So can we--and faster. What a rate we're going at. Shan't capsize, shall we?"
"Hope not, because if we did that schooner would escape. Why don't they fire?"
"Waste of powder and shot, my boy," said a voice behind them; and, looking sharply round, there stood the first lieutenant with his glass to his eyes, watching the flying boat. "Ha! we're moving now. Better get on a lifebelt, Mr Vandean, if you feel afraid."
He walked away, leaving the lad flushed and indignant. "Needn't catch a fellow up like that," he muttered. "Who said anything about being afraid?"
Bob Howlett laughed, and then turned his eyes in the direction of the schooner.
CHAPTER FOUR.
IN GREAT JEOPARDY.
Meanwhile everything possible was being tried to get another half knot of speed out of the Nautilus, which glided along under her cloud of sail, sending the water foaming in an ever-widening double line of sparkling water on either side. The hose was got to work, and the sails wetted, sheets were hauled more tightly home, and the captain and officers walked the decks burning with impatience as they scanned the distant schooner.
"If I was the skipper I'd be ready for him this time," said Mark to his companion.
"How? What would you do?"
"Have the boat's crew ready to drop down the moment the slaver captain pitched another poor fellow overboard. No, no," he added, quickly; "he'll never be such a wretch as to do that again."
"Oh, won't he just?" cried Bob, nodding his head, a great many times; "he'll go on chucking the whole cargo out one by one, just like the man did his gloves and things to the bear, for it to stop and smell them while he escaped. Here, I mean to go and save the next black