Joscelyn Cheshire: A Story of Revolutionary Days in the Carolinas
Page 15
CHAPTER XV.
AN AWAKENING AND A MUTINY.
"I can bear scorpion's stings, tread fields of fire, In frozen gulfs of cold eternal lie; Be tossed aloft through tracts of endless void-- But cannot live in shame." --JOANNA BAILLIE.
Besides the patrol and the ship's long-boat only one other ever tied upto the prison-vessels, and that one belonged to Dame Grant, the bumboatwoman, who brought such small luxuries as the prisoners were able topurchase. She herself seldom came on board, but sent up her tiny parcelsby two boys who made their deliveries under the eye of the warden. Thiswas the woman Richard had hoped to bribe to aid his escape, but withwhom he had never found the smallest opportunity to speak at closerange. She was corpulent and coarse of feature, and the boys who servedher often felt the weight of her big hand; but Richard had once thrownher a jest over the rail, and she had laughed good-naturedly, showingthat she had a soft side to her rough exterior. In the lining of hisragged boot were the few coins Colborn had given him, but not so much asa letter had he been able to bribe her to take. Often he cursed thewatchfulness of the sentinel, longing to send at least some littlemessage to those who thought of him in far-off Hillsboro'-town.
The morning of his awakening from the despairing stupor in which nearlytwo months had been passed, it so chanced that Dame Grant brought in herboat a basket of pears. Very luscious they looked, for sun and dew hadkissed them lavishly; but only the guards could pay their price, so theprisoners feasted with their eyes only. By and by, however, one of thesentinels who had purchased some of the fruit went to attend to someduty below, and left one of the pears on the rail of the deck. Sotransparent was his action and so subtle the temptation, that it almostseemed he had set a delicate trap for some unwary captive. If, indeed,it was a trap, it caught its prey; for one of the prisoners, a poor oldman, starving, yet too ill to eat the mouldy biscuit and rancid meatthat was their daily portion, saw the tempting fruit and stole it,hoping the owner would think it had rolled off into the water with therocking of the ship. But nothing escaped the argus-eyed watch; one ofthe other sentinels saw him as he ravenously devoured it, and collaringthe trembling culprit carried him to the warden. He acknowledged thetheft, excusing himself on the plea of extreme hunger, and begged formercy. He might as well have asked for the sun, whose rays whitened thedeck and shimmered on the restless waves.
"I will make an example of him that we may have no more thieving on thisship. Order the prisoners out that they may see," commanded the warden,a big-thewed fellow with the face of a bulldog.
The culprit, whose age alone should have protected him, was stripped tothe waist and dragged to the middle of the deck, where he stood weak,scarred, emaciated,--as pitiful an object as the sun ever shone upon. Ina wide circle about him were crowded the unwilling prisoners, theirfaces scowling with a helpless rage; and behind these were posted theguards with levelled guns. While the warden knotted his lash, Peter andRichard, after a whispered consultation with those nearest to them,stepped forward and touched their caps.
"If you please," said Peter, acting as spokesman, "we will all of usgive something toward the price of the fruit, if you will spare thisman."
The warden wheeled suddenly upon them and struck out with his whip,barely missing Peter's head. "Back with you, an you want not the lashupon your own backs, hounds that you are! The first man of you who stirsagain shall have his share of this pastime." The ferocity of his lookand voice quelled any further attempt at conciliation, and the prisonersturned their faces sullenly away.
"So it's delicacies your stomach craves, is it?" sneered the warden tothe trembling man before him. "Well, does that taste like pears--orthat--or that?" and the cruelly knotted lash swirled through the air,and fell again and again upon the quivering flesh of the helplesscreature. The man staggered, screamed, reeled from place to place, andfinally fell. A harsh laugh answered his cries for mercy, and the lashwent on until the blood spurted from the livid welts upon his body,while his groans were horrible to hear; and the prisoners groaned inanswer. But the warden's fury was aroused, and the blows fell untilinsensibility mercifully came, and the man lay still in a pool of hisown blood.
"So shall it fare with every thief among you!" cried the warden,throwing the whip down and facing around the scowling circle. But he sawthere no intimidation, but a wrath that needed but a touch to burst intoa storm, and he was quick to take the warning.
"Dismiss the prisoners below," he thundered to the guards, and wentswiftly to his own cabin.
As Richard watched the cruel scene, something had stirred and thensuddenly snapped within him; the inert, despairing stupor was gone, andin its place was a wild desire for action. Every nerve within himquivered with a savage impulse to give the brutal warden blow forblow--nay, two for one; that was what he wanted to do. His fingersclosed in a fierce grip, and only Peter's firm hand held him in hisplace.
"The guards would riddle you with bullets before you could get to him,"the latter whispered, under cover of that other terrible noise of theflogging.
"I have but once to die. Unhand me!"
"Yes, but death here would be wasted. Wait."
From that hour Richard was a changed man; the dulness of despondency wasgone, and in its place there had come a recklessness, a demon ofdesperation, that nothing could still.
"I shall not stay quietly here to be flogged or to rot with the feverand starvation," he said to Peter, and his jaw was hard and square. "Ishall get away or I shall die in the attempt."
Two days later the flogged man was sewed into his blanket and carriedaway in the funeral-boat; and the malcontent of the prisoners broke outin angry mutterings. Here Richard, who had been brooding over a plan ofescape, believed he saw his chance. By night his plan was laid; and whenthe hatches were beaten down and they lay in serried rows in thestinking hold, he went from man to man and told his scheme. It was to bea mutiny, a direct revolt. At a given signal they were to rise in abody, fall upon the guards, over-power them--kill them--and then pullingup the anchor they were to run the ship to the open sea, beach hersomewhere on the Jersey coast if she gave signs of leaking, and taketheir chance to hide along the shore until they could get away into theinterior. Richard was to head them, for in his voice and manner the menrecognized the spirit of a leader. He longed with something akin toferocity to strike the first blow at the warden.
"And besides," he said, "since I have proposed the plan it is but meetthat I should assume the first risk. If I fall, Peter will take myplace. Jack Bangs here has been on the sea all his life, and knows thecoast hereabouts as we know our farms at home. What say you to givinghim charge of the ship and letting him choose his own sailing crew?"
"Good; he is the man for the place."
"Very well," said Bangs; "but we cannot go down the Jersey coast, for wewould have to pass too many posts of the enemy, besides the guns in theNew York harbour. We must steer east through the sound, and if the shipis beached, it must be on the Connecticut or Rhode Island coast."
"Very well; that is not so convenient, since it takes us far from ourarmy, but anywhere will be better than here."
They counted every risk: the difficulty of disarming the guards, theproximity of the other two prison-ships, the interference of the shorepatrol in their swift-sailing boat, the disabled and sailless conditionof their own vessel; but nothing turned them from their purpose. Everydetail of the plot was arranged when toward morning the men lay down fora little rest and sleep.
All the morning Richard scrubbed or cleaned as the guards bade, and thensat on deck with his eyes alternately upon the sun and the ship.
But toward the middle of the afternoon Richard noticed signs ofdissatisfaction among a few of the men near the stern, where there wasan improvised back-gammon board. They were evidently angry aboutsomething. A quarrel at this spot was a daily occurrence, and occasionedno surprise among the sentinels; but Richard guessed that some othercause was at the bottom of this, and gradually made his
way to Peter'sside.
"'Tis Henry Crane," Peter whispered, and his close-shut fists showed anemotion his face concealed. "He is jealous that the ship was given toBangs rather than to him, and he and some of his fellows--his oldcrew--are threatening mischief."
"Fool, to risk his neck and liberty for a damnable vanity!" Rising,Richard crossed to the group of players, and sinking down upon the deckgathered the dice into his hand as though to take part in the sport.
"I play to win; and the man who fouls my game--for any causewhatsoever--has me to answer to," he said with stern emphasis, hisfearless eyes fixed steadily on Crane's face. The man flushed and beganto mumble an answer, but the guard, passing, said sharply:--
"Since you cannot play without a row, break up the game."
The players got up slowly. "You understand?" Richard said under hisbreath, and Crane nodded surlily.
The afternoon wore on and all remained quiet. Crane had evidentlythought better of his foolish jealously. It was growing late, and therewas going to be a high wind, and that was well, for it would set thetide yet stronger in its outward sweep, and their flight would be allthe swifter.
It lacked only a little while before the drum-tap. Richard got up andstood with his face to the glowing west to take his last farewell of thedream-girl with whom he kept his tryst each evening at this hour.
"Good-by, sweetheart," he said in his inner consciousness. "I love you.On your dear eyes I kiss you--so--"
"Attention! First division carry down their bedding!"
He wheeled; for he was in that first division. A quick glance about thedeck showed everything quiet as usual. Crane and a few others stood atthe far end of the deck awaiting their order to go down with the rest ofthe bedding. This would take only ten minutes, then the drum-tap for theroll-call and--death or liberty.
"... THE PRISONERS LINED UP AND ANSWERED TO THEIRNAMES."]
Swiftly the first division seized their allotment of the bedding andpassed below. Knowing what was to follow, they did not lose a moment;but, quick as they were, something happened up above. There was a soundas of a struggle, a fierce cry, the report of a musket, all so closetogether as to seem almost blended into one sound; and then the shipwrithed and quivered with the reverberation of the cannon on the upperend of the deck. Richard sprang to the ladder, but thrust only hishead above deck when an order to halt, accompanied by a touch of steelto his temple, brought him up with a pull. But a look showed him whathad happened. Crane and three others lay motionless upon the deck, andthe other two men who had stood with them were covered by the muskets ofthe guards, while the warden leaned against the cannon ready to sweepthe deck with another shot should so much as a hand be lifted withouthis orders. He was absolute master of the situation. A signal was runup to the patrol boat, the two mutineers were bound and hurried away;then the drum tapped for roll-call. But no one made any show of revolt.With the guards aroused, the patrol alarmed, and that murderous cannonready to rake the deck, it had been the act of madmen to resist; so,scowlingly and surlily the prisoners lined up and answered to theirnames, and then marched below, their plans all gone wrong. Richard threwhimself down and sobbed like a child. The plot had failed through themalice of one man. Crane, thinking everything was ready, and that themen would all respond to the signal, gave it while Richard was below,thinking thus to snatch the leadership and gain control of the wholevessel. But the other men, watching only for Richard's signal, did notcomprehend or respond to this unexpected whistle, only the five whostood immediately with Crane falling in with his plan. But even theywere not quick enough, for the sentinel upon whom they leaped had timeto cry out the alarm and discharge his gun, while the warden sprang tothe ever-ready cannon.
Although the prisoners felt the warden's anger in many petty ways, noother arrests were made; for the two captives took their punishmentheroically and told no tales, and inquiry of course failed to elicit anyinformation from the rest of the prisoners.
"I cannot stay here--I will not!" Richard cried vehemently to Peter. "Iam going, and soon at that."
"What is it you propose to do?"
"I do not yet know, but I am going, or they shall kill me with arifle-ball instead of by slow starvation," he said doggedly.
Then one night a month later, as they lay gasping for air in the blackhold, he unfolded a plan that made Peter's heart sick with dread anduncertainty.