At sight of the dead man the boy drew back in horror. Murder had been committed, and he had not the courage to enter upon the deck. As he turned to go down the ladder a few steps, he looked towards the shore and saw the woman Rachel Chiesley standing there at the water's edge, waving her hand in signal to the ship. Ben descended and quietly stepped into the boat. No one in the brig saw him as he rowed away to where the woman waited.
"Take me with you!" she implored, as the boat's keel grounded on the shingle. "In mercy take me away in your ship!"
Ben bade her get into the dingey, and she obeyed. He felt that, with a human companion to encourage him, he could now go on board the brig with all his lost boldness. Neither spoke as the little craft was pulled back to the vessel's side. When he had secured the boat he got out and climbed the ladder, signing to the woman to follow. He crept on board, rose to his feet, and sped forward and down the stairs to the lower deck. At the foot of the stairs he paused until Rachel Chiesley joined him; and there he pointed towards the open door of a tiny dark cabin, telling her to enter and remain in there until he should see that all was safe on board.
His heart seemed to cease its beating when, on going into the compartment where he had left the quartermaster, he discovered that the sick man's hammock was empty. What had happened? What was to be done?
He saw a cup of rum and water that the quartermaster had left untouched in the forenoon on the top of a chest. He drank some and it revived him. Leaving the cabin, he made his way through a dark passage along the lower deck to the gunner's storeroom; and there he provided himself with a cutlass, a brace of small pistols, a full powder-flask, and a handful of shot. He carefully charged the pistols, and when he was thus armed he returned to the main-deck and stole aft to the poop. The door of the captain's quarters was open now, and the splintered lock told its own tale. Voices came from within. Ben listened, crouching down on his hands and knees.
"You'd best come out of there, Mr. Strawberry-face," Goff was saying, "unless you want us to break in the door and drag you out. We'll not harm you. Come out and have a drink with us. 'Tis charming brandy, this." There was a clink of glasses. "Come," he added persuasively. "Join us in a glass, and tell us your yarn. We can get nothing from this silent shipmate of yours in the bunk here." Ben knew that the man was referring to the dead surgeon. "Twas the King's ship, you say. You may well say 'was'; for 'tis his no longer, but mine! mine! And I mean to set sail and be off on a glorious cruise so soon as my men come aboard. We'll run up the Jolly Roger and scour the seas, and send Jimmy Speeding and his Firebrands to the bottom of the Pentland Firth to play with the mermaids. Won't we, Alick?"
"That we will," gurgled Alick into the mouth of his glass of brandy. "And Strawberry-face shall be our master-gunner, and share in the swag with the rest of us."
The quartermaster's voice came faintly from within the captain's sleeping-room.
"I'll see you all hanged first!" he growled with a fierce seaman's oath. "Wait till my mates come aboard. They'll let you know what it means to trespass on a king's ship."
"Mates?" cried Goff with a short laugh. "There can't be many of 'em if they all went ashore in the cockleshell we found on the beach!"