CHAPTER XXII.

THE CUBANO UNMASKED.

As we kept the coast of South America well aboard, a few days after we saw Cape San Roque, or, as it is sometimes named, Point Pelinga, the north-eastern extremity of Brazil, rising from the blue water like a purple cloud. But it diminished to a low black streak on our weather quarter when the sun set, and we found ourselves ploughing the waves of the Southern Atlantic.

There fell a calm for a whole day after this, and while the _Eugenie_ rolled lazily on the long glassy swells, with her topsails flapping, and her courses hauled up, the sole amusement of the crew consisted in catching albatrosses, or in killing them, undeterred by the old superstition that it was a bird of "good omen," or by the story of the "Ancient Mariner," of which they were probably ignorant.

A flock of these gigantic sea-birds congregated under our stern, where they gobbled up every thing that was thrown over to them; so Hislop and I proceeded methodically to fish them on board.

We procured strong lines, baited the hooks with pieces of pork, lashing thereto a buoy formed of a common cork, and lowered four of these over the stern.

They had scarcely touched the water, when amid a furious flapping of heavy pinions, they were eagerly swallowed; the hooks and lines began to bear tautly, and we soon had four gigantic albatrosses splashing the water into froth in their ineffectual efforts to escape.

We towed them in, hand over hand, and after measurement found the smallest to be eleven feet from the tip of one wing to the tip of the other. Though rank and fishy in flavor, the flesh of these birds was made into sea-pies, on which the crew were regaled for two days after, and they partook of it with great apparent relish. But Jack is not very particular, especially when at sea.

Though none of the crew shared the superstition connected with the destruction of an albatross, and probably none, save Hislop and myself, knew the splendid ballad written by Coleridge, it would seem as if our misfortunes commenced with _that_ day's wanton sport!

The huge sea-birds became shy and left us. The sun set amid saffron-colored waves, and the western sky was all aflame, when the sails began to fill and collapse as the wind came in heavy puffs, causing the masts to sway from side to side, and the bellying courses to crack and flap with a sound like thunder.

At last there came a steady breeze; the courses were let fall, and with both sheets aft, for the wind was fair, the _Eugenie_ once more walked through the shining water.

Full, round, and silvery the moon arose, and tipped with liquid light every wave, that seemed to dance onward with the brig, which in half an hour had the snow-white foam flying in sheets over her catheads.

It was about the hour of one in the morning that the horrible events which I am about to relate occurred.

I was in the middle watch, relieving Weston, who, as the tropical dews were heavy, always ordered Billy the cabin boy to give me a glass of brandy-and-water before going on deck, for fear of ague, and then he turned in.

The sullen Spaniard Antonio was at the wheel. Tom Lambourne, Ned Carlton, and I, were walking to and fro, loitering at times, and looking at the compass to see how she headed,--now aloft to observe how the sails drew,--anon over the side, where the water bubbled merrily past, or ahead at the patch of blue and star-studded sky which was visible under the leach of the forecourse, as the brig's bow lifted every now and then, and she rolled heavily from side to side, as all vessels do when running before the wind.

All was very still, for save the bubble of the water in the wake astern, or a gurgle as it surged up in the rudder-case, the creaking of a block, or the iron slings of the lower yards, not a sound stole upon the first hour of the silent morning.

Two of the albatrosses we had caught, were hanging by the legs from the gallows-top abaft the foremast, where their great extended wings swung somewhat mournfully to and fro in the wind and by the motion of the ship.

"Hallo!" said Tom Lambourne, suddenly looking aloft, as the topsails flapped and shivered; "she's yawing or steering wild; what is that Spaniard about?"

"But where is he?" added Carlton, as we now missed Antonio from the wheel; "Antonio, where are you?"

"Gone overboard, I hope," exclaimed the second mate, with something more that need not be repeated, as he rushed to the wheel, and after making it revolve a few turns rapidly, he filled the sails and steadied the brig. This was done just in time, for the _Eugenie_ had a press of canvas on her, and had she been taken aback, the consequences might have been most serious.

"Look about for the skulking lubber," said Lambourne, in great wrath, "and souse him well with a slush-bucket; another moment and the craft would have broached to!"

"He must have crept behind the longboat, and got into the forecastle," suggested Carlton.

"I'll bring him up with a round turn for playing this trick!" grumbled Lambourne.

"Hush," said I, as a strange sound fell upon my ear.

"What is it?" asked the others, listening.

"A cry!--did you not hear it?"

"No,--nonsense!" said they, together.

"It was a cry that came from somewhere."

"I did hear something," said Will White; "but it was a sheave creaking in a block aloft, I think."

"No, no," said I, pausing just by the capstan, as a terrible foreboding seized me; "it came from the cabin."

"There is no one there but the Captain, Hislop, and the boy Bill, who sleeps in the steerage, and they are all three sound enough by this time," said Lambourne.

"But the sound _was_ from the cabin," I persisted, hastening aft.

At that moment another cry, loud and piteous,--a cry that sank into a hoarse moan, echoed through the brig, "piercing the night's dull ear," and ringing high above the welter of the sea alongside, the bubble at the stem and stern, or the hum of the wind through the taut rigging.

We all rushed aft to the companion, and at that instant Antonio sprang up the cabin stair. By the clear splendor of the tropical moonlight, we could see that his usually swarthy visage was pale as death, while his black eyes blazed like two burning coals. He grasped his unsheathed knife, the blade of which, as well as his hands and clothes, were covered with blood!

My heart grew sick with vague apprehension, and my first thought was for a weapon; but none was near.

"What have you been about, you rascally picaroon,--and why did you leave the wheel?" shouted Lambourne, becoming greatly excited; "the masts might have gone by the board,--what devil's work have you been after below?"

Then the dark Spanish Creole grinned, as the blood dripped from his hands on the white and moonlit deck.

"Knock him down with a handspike, Carlton," added Lambourne, who could not leave the wheel; "knock him down,--the shark-faced swab!"

On hearing this, Antonio drew from his breast a revolver pistol, one of a pair which we knew always hung loaded in Weston's cabin, and fired straight at the head of Carlton, who dodged the shot, which killed the seaman, named Will White, who stood behind him.

The ball pierced the brain of the poor fellow, who bounded convulsively, nearly three feet from the deck; he fell heavily on his face, and never moved again, for he was dead,--dead as a stone!

In its suddenness, this terrible deed paralyzed us with horror, not unmixed with fear, as we were all unarmed and completely in the power of this Spanish demon, the report of whose pistol brought all the startled crew, tumbling over each other, out of the forecastle.

"Aha, maldita! Santos y Angeles!" said the Spaniard, waving the pistol, the muzzle of which yet smoked, toward us in a half circle, as a warning for all to stand back; "did you think to run your rigs upon me? I am Antonio el Cubano, and don't value you all a rope's-end or a rotten castano, as you shall find. I am now the captain of this ship, and shall force you all to obey me, or else"--here he swore one of those sonorous and blasphemous oaths which run so glibly from a Spanish tongue--"I will shoot you all in succession, till I am the last man left on board; and when I am tired of the ship I can burn or scuttle her. Do you understand all this?"

Dead silence followed this strange address, the half of which was scarcely understood by our men, as it was said in Spanish.

"Basta!" (avast) "I see that you _do_ understand," he resumed; "and now begin by obedience. Throw this carrion--this _bestia muerta_--overboard."

But perceiving how we all shrunk back,--

"Overboard with him," he added, brutally kicking the inanimate body of poor Will White; "or demonio, I shall send the first who disobeys me to keep him company!"

He grasped me by the arm, his hateful clutch was firm as a smith's vice; and then he levelled his pistol at the head of Ned Carlton.

For a moment the latter stood irresolute, and then seeing the black muzzle of the revolver within a foot of his head, he muttered a deep malediction, stamped his foot with rage on the deck, and said,--

"Mr. Rodney, bear a hand with me to launch this murdered man,--this poor fellow overboard!"

"Obey!" thundered Antonio.

Like one in a dream I bent over the dead man, on whose pale face, glazed eyes, and relaxed jaw, the bright moonlight was shining, and in my excitement and bewilderment, I nearly slipped and fell in the pool of blood which flowed from his death wound.

I had never touched a corpse before, and an irrepressible shudder ran through all my veins. But that emotion once over, I could have handled a dozen, with perhaps indifference; and there are few who, after touching the dead, have not experienced this change of feeling.

Ned Carlton, with a sound like a sob in his honest breast--a sob of mingled rage and commiseration--raised the yet warm body; I took the feet, and through one of the quarter-boards, which was open, we launched it into the great deep, and as the brig flew on, rolling before the early morning wind, there remained no trace of poor Will White but his blood, a dark pool upon the deck; and the crew stood staring at it and at each other with blank irresolution, horror, and dismay expressed in all their faces.

Empty-handed and defenceless as we all were, each was afraid to speak or act, lest he might be the next victim whom the merciless Cubano would shoot down.

With a growl of defiance Antonio now turned away, and brandishing the revolver in token of the obedience he meant to exact, he descended slowly into the cabin, where we soon heard him smashing open the lockers, and busy with the case-bottles in the steward's locker, or Billy the cabin-boy's pantry.

His departure seemed a relief to all, but in half a minute after he was gone below, little Billy, or "boy Bill," as he was usually termed, whose sleeping place was the steerage, rushed up the cabin stair in his shirt, and ran among us, sobbing with fear and dismay.