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What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" For once the fellow was taken completely off his guard. He glanced around as if he wished to run away, but there was no escape. He saw only hostile faces. "What do you know about who killed Captain Whidden?" "Mr. Kipping killed him," the fellow gasped, startled out of whatever reticence he may have intended to maintain. "Yes, sir! Yes, sir!"
It was a peaceful, beautiful world that met our eyes as the Island Princess stood through the Straits and up the east coast of Sumatra; the air was warm and pleasant, and the leaves of the tufted palms, lacily interwoven, were small in the distance like the fronds of ferns in our own land. But Captain Whidden and Mr.
Thomas," Captain Whidden called in a deep voice, "is all clear forward?" "All clear, sir," the mate replied; and then, with all eyes upon him, he took charge, as was the custom, and proceeded to work the ship.
Thomas, I had known a long time, and I had thought myself on terms of friendship with them, even familiarity; but so far as any outward sign was concerned, I might now have been as great a stranger to either as to the second mate. We were twenty-two men all told: four in the cabin Captain Whidden, Mr. Thomas, Mr.
Falk scowled and replied, "Nonsense! We'd be murdered in cold blood." So we stood there, bareheaded, silent, sad at heart, and heard the droning voice of the second mate, even then he could not hide his unrighteous satisfaction, who read from a worn prayer-book, that had belonged to Captain Whidden himself, the words committing the bodies of three men to the deep, their souls to God.
'There's only one man between us and a hundred thousand dollars in gold. And Falk Kipping was talking to Falk low-like and didn't know I was anywhere about and Falk says, 'No, that's too much. Then he says, wild-like, 'Shoot go on and shoot. Then Kipping laughs and says, 'So you've got a little gumption, have you? and he shot Captain Whidden and killed him. Don't point that pistol at me, sir!
"Have you heard any one say just what this little group is trying to accomplish, or just when it is going to act?" "No, sir." "Do you, Lathrop, know anything about the cargo of the Island Princess? Or anything about the terms under which it is carried?" "Only in a general way, sir, that it is made up of ginseng and woolen goods shipped to Canton." Captain Whidden looked at me very sharply indeed.
"Yes, Ben, you may come with us to Canton; but as your father says, you must fill your own boots and stand on your own two feet. And will you, friend Lathrop," he turned to my father, "hazard a venture on the voyage?" My father smiled. "I think, Joe," he said, "that I've placed a considerable venture in your hands already." Captain Whidden nodded. "So you have, so you have.
But some one aboard her, if I guess aright, resented so tame an end to a long pursuit and insisted on at least an exchange of volleys. Now she came down on us, running easily with the wind on her quarter, and gave us a round from her muskets. "Hold your fire," Captain Whidden ordered. "They're feeling their way." Emboldened by our silence, she wore ship and came nearer.
We thought of our comrades whom we had left in far seas; we longed and feared to ask a thousand questions about those at home, of whom we had thought so tenderly and so often. Already boats were putting out to greet us; and now, in the foremost of them, one of the younger Websters stood up. "Mr. Hamlin, ahoy!" he called, seeing Roger on the quarter-deck. "Where is Captain Whidden?"
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