Page:The Iron Pirate 1905.djvu/270

256 "Shut your jaw, or I'll shut it for you!" replied Black. "Is the boy your affair?"

"He's the affair of all of us, I calcerlate, an' some of us wishes to know particler if he's signed or no."

Black was smothered in anger, but he showed it only with that terrible growling of the voice and his horrid calmness.

"Oh, you want to know, do you? Which of you, might I ask, is particler anxious about my business?"

There were thirty or forty of them round, and they pressed the closer at the question, as he continued— "Let them as makes complaint step right here."

Only four joined the leader; but the captain suddenly snatched my revolver from me, and fired four shots; and for each shot a man dropped dead on the beach; but the American stood untouched. The appalling brutality of the action seemed to awe the rest of the crew. They stood motionless, dumb with their rage; but when they recovered themselves they rushed upon us with wild ferocity; and the Yankee fired at Black point-blank. I thought, truly, that the end was then; but I heard a shout from the water, and, looking there, I saw Dr. Osbart in the launch; and there was a Maxim gun in the bows of her.

"Clear that beach!" roared Black in awful