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Notwithstanding what I have said of Spellman, I was in reality on very good terms with him. He was continually playing me tricks; but then I paid him off in his own coin. I had, however, made the friendship of another messmate, George Grey by name. He was about my own age and size, and came from Leicestershire, but from a different part of the county to that where my family lived.
In consequence of our having been wounded, Grey and Spellman and I obtained it at once, and I invited them to pay my family a visit in Leicestershire on their way to their own homes. I got leave also for Toby Bluff to accompany us. "I'll spare him to you. Mr Merry," said Mr Johnson.
"I have no doubt that it will do Spellman a great deal of good, or of course you would not give it to him, it would be meat to him; but as I am perfectly free of pains it would be positively throwing it away on me, though I don't say it would be poison, of course not." "Oh, you humbug, you arrant humbug," exclaimed Spellman, sitting up in his hammock and clenching his fist at me.
"He is not fit to be made Lord Chief Justice, I fear." It was not always plain sailing with me. Spellman and I were pretty good friends, but he was somewhat inclined to play the bully. He was called Miss Susan simply because he was as unlike a girl as a great awkward gawky fellow, with red hair and a freckled face, could well be.
And it was the misfortune of Donald Spellman to come under Mart's aim. Or perhaps it was his good fortune to be mortally wounded by a bullet, instead of ending his life as did the captives. But Spellman had something to say before he died, and he said it to Walt Lampson. "You got us," he gasped, "an' you got us right. An' I only got one thing to tell you, an' to tell you quick.
He, however, trusting to the effect his large body of marines might produce, fired a rattling volley as we were about to pour in our broadside. Spellman and I were at the moment standing near the boatswain.
When I came to myself, I was undressed in my hammock, and, except a pain and stiffness in my shoulder, there was nothing, I thought, very much the matter with me, though when I tried to rise I found that to do so was out of the question. Spellman and Grey were in their hammocks close to me.
Hayne was also struck down almost immediately, and the fourth lad, for none of them were over twenty years old, grasped the colors, and fell mortally wounded across the body of his friend. The fifth, Gadsden Holmes, was pierced with no less than seven balls. The sixth man, Dominick Spellman, more fortunate, but not less brave, bore the flag throughout the rest of the battle.
Spellman, however, fearing that he should be detected if he refused, held his nose with his finger and thumb, and with many a wry face gulped it down. "Don't you think a little more would do him good?" said I, in a hurried tone.
Well, Mart Cooley had made the mistake of not figuring on the cleverness of Donald Spellman, and the result of this was not only to make him furious with himself, but to add to his, and to all the other men's desire for revenge. All thoughts of starving the enemy out were lost, absorbed in a lust for killing. The excited men paid no attention to the boys. It is doubtful if they even saw them.
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