CHAPTER IV.

ETHEL AMONG THE MUTINEERS.

In a preceding chapter we have described the forecastle bunks of the _Hermione_, when the ship was in a state of good order and discipline, and when that portion of her hull was daily drenched with water, when the head-pump was rigged by the morning watch, and the swab and holystone were in daily use.

Now that dreary little den was as filthy as its dirty occupants could make it, and was strewn with half-picked bones of beef and bacon, with broken or empty bottles, and in almost every berth there lay, with his clothes on, a half-drunk seaman.

The atmosphere, redolent of tar, paint, and bilge, was stifling; moreover, it was thick with the smoke of coarse pig-tail tobacco, that obscured the rays of the feeble lamp, and rendered the place more noxious and horrible.

It was damp and chill, too, for there was an unheeded leak about the heel of the bowsprit, and near the windlass-bitts, which came through the deck into the forecastle, and it made the place more comfortless still.

The _tout ensemble_ of it, the grimy faces which looked forth upon her from the dark recesses of the bunks, the great chin and cheek-bones of Badger, the hideous Sharkey, the black visage of Quaco and others, the ferocious character of the man in whose grasp she found herself, helpless, abandoned, or only to be rescued after a scene, perhaps, of butchery and slaughter--the slaughter of her dearest friends--appalled, beyond all description, the soul of gentle Ethel Basset.

In her extreme perturbation and agony of spirit, she could not even pray; "but God often hears the heart that is silent better than the lips that speak."

"Jee-rusalem and apple-sarce!" exclaimed the Yankee, Badger, leaping out of his berth, and standing at about half his full height, with his long fingers planted on his knees, for the space between beams was very scanty, "here comes Capting Pedro, with the black-eyed gal--the sarcy stunner he's been nuts on so long!"

"_Para!_ hold! keep back!" said Pedro, panting, and almost breathless, as he pushed aside Badger, whose insolent face was peering within an inch of Ethel.

"Jee-rusalem! kinder rum lover you'll make her, I calkilate."

"He'll make her a rough one, at any rate," added Sharkey, while a roar of coarse laughter greeted the appearance of the miserable girl, whom Pedro seated with rough kindness on a sea-chest, saying----

"_Mi queridita--estrella mia,_* at Orizaba and San Francisco I was the terror of the old women and the idol of the young ones. So come, let us be friends and shipmates."

* My little dear--my star.

He attempted to force a kiss; but Ethel uttered a low wail, and an expression of such loathing and terror filled her face, that even he paused, and she pressed her hands upon her breast, as if her emotion would burst it.

Perceiving this action, Pedro roughly thrust his daring hand into her bosom, and tore out a packet which had lately been carried there for concealment. While holding her with one hand, he held up the packet with the other, and tore it open with his teeth.

Then he cast it from him with a malediction, on finding that it contained but a few withered leaves--the daisies she had gathered on her mother's grave.

Oh, that she were beside it now in peaceful Acton-Rennel!

"Try some o' this, my gal," said Badger, presenting a little gallipot full of rum-and-water; "it's right Jamaiky; I takes to it unkimmin, marm, like a babby to its mother's milk. Do have a drop--'alf a totful, my gal."

Ethel shrunk back in silent misery, and Pedro kept his left hand resolutely round her waist, while holding her right hand in his.

"Don't yew be so darned proud, my sarcy Britisher," resumed the bantering ruffian, with an offended air. "We'll take the pride out o' yew afore we're done with yew. I'm a true-blooded Yankee, marm, though tall enough for a Paddygonian. The Paddygonians come from South 'Merriker, Pedro's country, while I was raised about Cape Cod. 'Guess yew never heerd o' sich a cape in the stupid old country, though yew ought to rayther, for we licked the Britishers there, as we dew everywhere else on airth, and why shouldn't we, when their hearts are like wooden nutmegs?"

Ethel looked round despairingly, but saw no aid, nor hope, nor mercy.

Bad, wild, and cruel though he was, there came something of pity into the eye and heart of Zuares Barradas, when he saw this lovely girl, one so fair, and so delicately nurtured, in this frightful situation--her dress torn and disordered, and blood trickling from her nostrils--in such a place, and in such hands, for he knew what was about to ensue, and he knew his elder brother to be an incarnate fiend.

There was another, half-concealed amid the smoke of this murky den, who regarded her with more than pity, and this was Cramply Hawkshaw; but he felt that to protect her was to die, and to die he had not yet the courage.

At last her eyes met his.

"Forgive me, Ethel Basset," he said, mournfully; "oh, forgive me the past!"

"I do forgive you," she replied, in a trembling voice, "and trust a time may come when you will be able to forgive yourself."

Her soft, sweet voice seemed to thrill through the marrow of his bones.

Bad and reckless, desperate and wicked though he was, the memory of pleasant and of peaceful days--days of good-will and happiness, when he had tried to forget his past wild life in South America--days spent at Laurel Lodge amid all the elegances of civilised life, came thronging now on Hawkshaw's mind. So the inscrutable soul of this miserable man seemed to die away within him, when he beheld, now in a felon's daring grasp, one who had been his hostess, his friend, and the object of his own most selfish passions!

Though she felt as if dying of shame and terror, fearfully pale, and calm, and holy Ethel looked, for she thanked God in her innocent heart that she had been taken--even from Morley--and Rose left to comfort, perhaps, their beloved father, and as she folded her white and tremulous hands upon her swelling bosom, she felt that the dread hour had come when she must surely die.

Oh, who could once have foretold the awful scene of outrage through which, perhaps, her blameless life was to pass away.

And now, as Pedro's iron grasp about her tightened, and the laughter rung around her, like a chorus of devils, she lifted her imploring eyes to Hawkshaw, and their gaze seemed to turn him into stone.

Sorrow, horror, and upbraiding--all were there expressed.

It was she, the same Ethel, that he--blood-guilty though he was, and selfish too--had ventured to love in peaceful England. She, who had never coquettishly allured nor proudly repulsed him; but had been gentle and polite, according to the rules of well-bred society--gentle, even, and pitiful--until she knew his crimes and his character, and learned to abhor them.

All this rushed like a flood upon his memory, and Cramply Hawkshaw, with all his errors, faults, and crimes, felt, for the moment, the soul of a hero within him, and he resolved to save Ethel Basset from disgrace, or die in the effort--yea, to save her even for Morley Ashton.

"Ethel," said he, in a breathless voice, "love me as a friend, and I will protect--it may be, save you!"

"Love--friendship--Oh Hawkshaw, save me if you can, but talk not of love and friendship, after the awful past, and in presence of companions such as these," replied Ethel, shuddering.

"Alas! I feel that guilt gives a shame and horror, Ethel, which fail even to cure it."

"_Morte de Dios!_" growled Pedro, grinding his teeth, and turning round with flashing eyes; "what is this I hear?"

"Your death-shot, wretch!--take that, and die!" cried Hawkshaw, as he fired his pistol full at the dark head of Pedro Barradas, who received the shot in his elbow, just as he raised the arm to protect his face.

"Malediction!" he exclaimed, with a howl of agony, as he dropped the limb, which was fearfully shattered. Then Hawkshaw--endued with twice his natural strength--for, when roused by passion, or nerved by danger, he wras no ordinary man--snatched Ethel amid the smoke, glided with her up the steps and through the forescuttle, and placed her in the arms of Dr. Heriot, who, with all her friends came rushing forward, for this episode did not occupy five minutes.

As Ethel was borne aft, a dozen of hands and arms came up through the forescuttle, and Hawkshaw was torn down within it.

"Gag him--lynch him--stick the 'tarnal varmint!" cried Badger, and the death shrieks of the miserable Hawkshaw were drowned amid the storm of maledictions which accompanied the shots and blows dealt him by the knives of Zuares, Badger, Quaco, and others; and again and again they continued to bury them in his body, long after he was dead.

It was Pedro's howl of agony, and the two first pistol-shots, that were heard by Morley as he staggered up, half-stunned, from the deck, and felt himself seized by Tom Bartelot.

All hurried below with Ethel. The cabin was regained, the barricades were again made fast, and our friends remained ignorant that one half the mutineers were in a state of helpless intoxication; that their leader had received a severe wound, which might prove mortal, and that the miserable Hawkshaw was being butchered without mercy in the forecastle bunks.

And so closed this night of outrage on board the _Hermione_.