Page:Demon ship, or, The pirate of the Mediterranean.pdf/18

18 quarrel against that captain down at the bottom of the sea there, so he asks our commander not to let any body lay hands on him but himself. A very natural thing to ask. There—close that locker, heave out the long table, there'll be old revel here to-night.' At this moment, Girod again descended. 'All hands aloft, ma lads,' he cried, 'make no attention to de carpet dere—matters not, for I most fairst descend, and give out de farine for pasty. We have no more eursedcursed [sic] voyagers, so may make revel here to naight vidout no incommode.' He soon descended with a light into our wooden dungeon.

'Poor Katie, poor Mary. Alas! for their aged mother!' she said, while looking with horror at Girod.—'I would have saved you all, had it been possible,' said Jacqueminot, in French. 'But how were all to be hid, and kept in this place? What I have done is at the risk of my life. But there is not a moment to be lost. I have the keeping of the stern-hold. Look you—here be two rows of meal sacks fore and aft. If you, miladi, can hide behind one, and you, colonel, behind the other, ye may have, in some sort, two little chambers to yourselves; or if you prefer the same hiding-place, take it, in heaven's name, but lose not a moment.'—'And what will be the end of all this?' asked I, after some hurried expressions' of gratitude.—'God knoweth,' he replied. 'I will from time to time, when I descend to give out meal, and clean the place, bring you provisions. How long this can last—where we are going—and whether in the end I can rescue you, time must be the shewer. Hide, hide—I dare not stay one moment longer.' He rolled down a heap of biscuits, placed a pitcher of water by them, and departed.

That night the Demon crew held their wild revelry over our hoadhead [sic]. Their fierce and iniquitous speech, their lawless songs, their awful and demoniac oaths, their wild intoxication, made Margaret thrill with a horror that half excited the wish to escape in death from the polluting vicinity of such infernal abominations. The light streamed here and there through a crevice in the trap-door, and I involuntarily trembled when I saw it fall on the white garment of Margaret, as if, even in that concealment, it might betray her. We dared scarcely whisper a word of encouragement or consolation to each other—dared scarcely breathe, or stir even a hand from the comfortless attitude in which we were placed. The captain expressed his regret that we had not, as matters turned out, been earlier disposed of, and made a sort of rough apology to his shipmates for the inconvenience our prolonged existence must have occasioned them. At length, the revellers