Page:The Iron Pirate 1905.djvu/163

Rh pistol, so that he rolled senseless off the narrow bridge, and we heard the thud of his head against the iron of the engine-room hatch. He had scarce fallen when Mary, with the laugh still upon her lips, reeled at the sight of him, and fell fainting in my arms. I knocked at the skipper's door, but he was already on his feet, and passed me to the bridge, where I laid the swooning girl on the sofa in the chart-room.

The skipper got the whole situation at the first look, and acted in his usual silence. He re-entered his own cabin, and came to us again with a couple of rifles, which he loaded. We were now all crouching together by the wheel amidships, for Mary had recovered, and insisted that I should leave her, and we waited for the heavy black clouds to lift off the moon; but the fore-deck lay dark ahead of us; and we could not tell whether the men who had fled had gone below, or were crouching behind the galley, and the skylights of the fore-cabins. Nor could we hear any sound of them, although the skipper hailed them twice. He was for going forward at once; but we held back until the light came, and then by the full moon we saw dark shadows across the hatch. The men were behind the galley, as we thought—the eight of them.

The skipper hailed them again.