Page:Dumas - Tales of Strange adventure (Methuen, 1907).djvu/121

Rh and swearing. One thing was plain, that the ship was in danger, and imminent danger. The greater the peril, the more imperatively it claimed my presence; so without troubling my head further as to its precise nature, I rushed to the hatchway and sprang on deck.

"The sea was smooth, the sky spangled with stars, except where an enormous mass that seemed to hang above our heads, ready to fall at any moment on the ship, made a dark blotch in the sky. All eyes were fixed upon it, all efforts were directed to avoiding it. But what was this strange and terrifying object? Your man of science would have devoted his energies to solving the problem and been swallowed up before he discovered the secret. But I was a man of action. I sprang aft and put the helm hard-a-port; at that moment a smart puff from the nor'-nor'-west—God must have sent it us—struck the ship and sent her flying forward like a startled horse. Consequently, just as the impending mass came down, instead of falling right atop of us, as it had threatened to do, it grazed our poop, and it was we who now found ourselves high on the crest of a wave instead of down in the trough of the sea.

"What had come so near overwhelming us was an enormous Chinese junk with a hull as round as a calabash, which had come upon us without a word of warning, I had learned in Ceylon and at Goa a few words of Chinese—not, perhaps, of the most polite kind, but at any rate not wanting in vigour. I seized my speaking trumpet and hurled these like a broadside at the subjects of the Sublime Emperor.

"But to our amazement not a soul replied. Then we noticed for the first time that the junk lay like a log, as if there was no one on deck to steer a course; no light was visible either through the portholes or in the binnacle. It might have been a great dead fish, the carcase of Leviathan. She was under bare poles, and altogether the thing was so extraordinary as to demand investigation. We knew the Chinese were very lazy fellows, but the laziest of lubbers are not in the habit of going to the devil quite so calmly as all this, I gathered that something out of the common had befallen ship or crew, and as we had still a couple of hours or more to wait for daylight, I manoeuvred so as to keep company with the junk. This was easy enough to do, the only danger being that of a collision with her, for she rolled about like a log. I kept the lugger under a single sail, so as to guard against this risk.

"Little by little day dawned, and as the darkness lessened, we strained our eyes to make out any signs of life in the huge vessel; but not a soul stirred. Either she was a derelict or all hands were fast asleep. I hauled in as close as possible. I sang out all the Chinese words I knew; one of my crew who had lived ten years at Macao hailed them in the same language. But no one answered. Then we determined to make a circuit of the hulk to see if all was as quiet to starboard as to port; just the same, only an accommodation ladder hung from the starboard bulwarks, I worked in as near as I could, got hold of the ladder, and in five minutes stood on her decks. It was plain something had happened of a disagreeable nature to the junk's crew. Broken woodwork, flying cordage, rags and tatters of clothing, here and there pools of blood; everything pointed to a desperate fight, a fight in which the Chinese had evidently had the worst of it,

"While I was making my survey of the deck, I thought I heard stifled groans from below. I tried to get down into the lower-decks, but the hatches were battened down. I looked round and caught sight of a marlinspike lying by the capstan, which seemed the very thing for my purpose. Using this as a lever, I prized off the cover of one of the hatchways and let in daylight below decks.

"At the same moment the groans grew louder. I climbed down with some trepidation, I must confess, but half-way down the ladder I saw a sight that restored my confidence. On the main deck, ranged in a row like mummies, and tied up like sausages, lay a score of Chinese gnawing their gags and grimacing more or less hideously, according as nature had endowed them with more or less patience.

"I went up to the one who seemed the most important man amongst them; he had the honour and distinction of being bound with the thickest ropes and had the biggest gag in his mouth, I unlashed him and ungagged him as fast as I could; he proved to be the owner and skipper of the junk, Tsing-Fong by name. His first act was to thank me very cordially, as