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From my earliest days to the present time I have been gradually climbing up the ladder towards a comfortable berth on the top; and if a ratlin has given way beneath my feet, I always have had a firm hold above my head. The first step I took was off the mud on to dry ground. I can recollect nothing clearly before that time.
"We have not even asked you, Captain Ratlin, what trade you are in," said the mother, as they sat together, her daughter and the young commander, upon the quarter-deck beneath an awning which had been rigged for their comfort. "Ahem! madam!" hesitated the young officer, "we are, that is, yes, we are on a trading voyage to the coast just at the present time."
"You are not long arrived, Captain Ratlin?" asked the other. "Within these two weeks," was the calm reply. "Not seeing your vessel, I presume she has gone to the windward, for ivory." "Or perhaps to leeward for other cargo," answered the other, somewhat haughtily.
Captain Ratlin understood the taunt, and stepping to where the English officer had thrown his discharged weapon, he threw it high in the air, and at the exact moment when the power of gravitation turned the piece towards the earth, he quickly raised his arm and fired, sending the bullet in his own pistol completely through the wooden stock of the other.
A better sailor never lay on a yard, or stretched a ratlin, than Dick Fid; but I must allow he has the quality of good fellowship to excess." "You are fortunate in having one man left you to pull the boat ashore," carelessly returned the other. "I am more than equal to that little exertion myself nor do I like to separate the men.
All paused, save two of the most daring of the rascals who continued to press on. Captain Ratlin now bade the mates to shoot the first man who came aft unbidden, while he marched a few paces forward, and once more bid them stand. They heeded him not, and the foremost one fell with a bullet though his heart!
The girl avoided his eyes while she uttered her well-fabricated story, but had she met the eyes of the young commander, she would have seen more of pity there than of anger, more of surprise than of reproach, even. But in the meantime, while these feelings were moving him, the case was steadily progressing, and began to wear a most serious aspect as it regarded the fate of Captain Will Ratlin.
"That is honorable, noble in you, Captain Ratlin, so promptly to relinquish all connection with a calling, which though it affords fortune and command, can never permit you self-respect." "The ship will probably be despatched within these two weeks, and then I will take any birth in legitimate commerce, where I may win an honorable name and reputation."
Let the stranger be whom he might, the "Sea Witch" seemed to have no intention of making his acquaintance, and as easily dropped the topsails of the vessel again as she had made them, while from the manner in which the stranger steered, it was doubtful whether his lookout had made out the "Sea Witch" at all and so Captain Ratlin remarked to his first officer, while he ordered the ship to be kept on her present course for an hour, then to haul up on the wind and run in shore again.
At the same moment there shot out from a little nook or bay in the rear of the barracoons, a light skiff propelled by a single oarsman, who rowed his bark in true seamen style, cross-handed, while a second party sat in the stern. The rower was Captain Ratlin, and his companion was the swarthy and fierce-looking Don Leonardo.
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