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Updated: May 22, 2025
With pistols buckled to their hips, Brady, Winterslea, Hotham, and Stanbury-Jones, four officers of the ship, together with Hatch, a flinty-faced old seaman who could be trusted, all slipped down the ladder into the captain's gig and pulled with muffled oars for the break in the reef.
The comparative openness of the village began to give way to the ranker undergrowth of the plantations behind it. The path sank into a choking vegetation that stood on either side and brushed their faces as they followed in single file. A fallen tree gave them the passage of a stream. "There!" said Winterslea.
We're rescuing you from the hill tribes. Man, you're saved!" "You never was no deserter," said Hatch. "Mind you back us up, old fellow," said Winterslea. "Give us your fin, boy," said Hotham. It was some time before Jack could pull himself together.
They followed him in silence, unloosing their holsters and grimly ready. A pair of handcuffs clinked in Hatch's jumper. They inhaled the deep breath of tried and resolute men inured to danger, and accustomed to give and to receive an unflinching loyalty. Winterslea, with keen perception, led the way like a bloodhound, skirting lighted houses and following devious inland paths.
I shall try to be worthy of your kindness." He went round and shook hands solemnly with every one of them. "Damned grateful!" he repeated. "Let's be off," said Brady. "Now, lad, your word of honor," said Winterslea. Jack looked about him helplessly. "I suppose I've no right to ask such a thing," he said. "I know how good you've been to me already, and all that. But but, gentlemen, she's my wife.
Brady, Winterslea, Stanbury-Jones, Hotham, Hatch, the familiar faces, daunted him like the sight of ghosts. Friends no longer, they were now avengers, with the right to track him down and kill him. "Jack!" cried Brady in a stifled voice. The lad took a step back. The girl moaned, and tried to run between Hatch and Stanbury-Jones.
Then, acting in accordance with a preconcerted plan, Winterslea was sent forward to track down their prey, while the rest huddled together to await his return. Ten minutes, twenty minutes passed in palpitating suspense. A girl drew by wreathed in flowers; she looked out to sea, then up at the stars, and shrank again into the shadow.
Stumbling and falling against one another in the dark, they made shift to find the uncertain path, Winterslea, in the lead, coo-eeing like a bushfellow for them to follow. Little by little they gained the sleeping village, and pressed on to the beach beyond, where their boat was already afloat on the incoming tide. They took their places without a word and pulled out in the direction of the ship.
From the neighboring houses there came the sound of mellow voices and of laughter. A pig rooted and rustled among a heap of cocoanut shells. Half an hour passed, and from far across the water, as faint and silvery as some elfin signal, the ship sent her message of the time: six bells. Panting and crouching, Winterslea groped his way among them. "Come," he said.
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