Part 36

The channel was easily crossed, and the pirogue came alongside the opposite shore of the islet. This was done not without some precaution, in case pirates might have been lurking in that place. But, after observation, it appeared certain that the islet was deserted. Then Ayrton, followed by Pencroff, traversed it with rapid step, startling the birds nested in the rock crevices; then, without hesitation, he threw himself into the sea and swam silently in the direction of the ship, whose few lights, kindled shortly before, then indicated its exact position.

As for Pencroff, he crouched in a cleft of the shore and awaited the return of his companion.

Meanwhile, Ayrton swam with a vigorous arm and glided across the sheet of water without producing even the slightest ripple. His head scarcely showed, and his eyes were fixed on the dark mass of the brig, whose lights were reflected in the sea.

He thought only of the duty he had promised to accomplish, and gave no thought even to the dangers he ran, not only aboard the ship, but also in those waters which sharks often frequented. The current bore him along, and he moved rapidly away from the coast. Half an hour later, Ayrton, without having been seen or heard, slipped between two waters, came alongside the ship, and clutched with one hand the bobstay of the bowsprit. He then breathed, and, raising himself on the chains, he managed to reach the end of the jib-boom. There were drying some sailors' trousers.

He put on a pair. Then, having secured himself firmly, he listened.

They were not sleeping aboard the brig. On the contrary. They were arguing, singing, laughing. And here are the remarks, accompanied by oaths, which chiefly struck Ayrton:

“A good acquisition, our brig!

-- She sails well, the Speedy! She deserves her name!

-- All the navy of Norfolk can get on her heels! Chase after!

-- Hurrah for her commander!

-- Hurrah for Bob Harvey!”

What Ayrton felt upon hearing this fragment of conversation will be understood, when it is known that, in this Bob Harvey, he had just recognized one of his former companions from Australia, a daring sailor, who had taken up again the thread of his criminal designs. Bob Harvey had seized, off the coasts of Norfolk Island, this brig, which was laden with arms, ammunition, utensils and tools of all sorts, destined for one of the Sandwich Islands. His whole band had come aboard, and, pirates after having been convicts, these wretches scoured the Pacific, destroying ships, massacring crews, more ferocious than the Malays themselves!

These convicts spoke aloud, they recounted their exploits while drinking to excess, and here is what Ayrton could understand:

The present crew of the Speedy was composed exclusively of English prisoners, escaped from Norfolk.

Now, here is what Norfolk is.

At 29°2' south latitude and 165°42' east longitude, east of Australia, is found a small island of six leagues in circumference, which Mount Pitt dominates at a height of eleven hundred feet above sea level. It is Norfolk Island, become the seat of a settlement, where the most intractable condemned of the English penitentiaries are penned up. They are there five hundred, subjected to an iron discipline, under the blow of terrible punishments, guarded by a hundred and fifty soldiers and a hundred and fifty employees under the orders of a governor. It would be difficult to imagine a worse gathering of scoundrels. Sometimes — though this is rare — despite the excessive surveillance to which they are subject, several manage to escape, seizing ships they surprise, and they then roam the Polynesian archipelagos.

Thus had done this Bob Harvey and his companions.

Thus had Ayrton once wished to do. Bob Harvey had seized the brig the Speedy, anchored in sight of Norfolk Island; the crew had been massacred, and, for a year, this ship, become a pirate vessel, had beaten the seas of the Pacific, under the command of Harvey, formerly a captain on long voyages, now a scourge of the seas, and whom Ayrton knew well!

The convicts were, for the most part, gathered on the poop, at the stern of the ship, but some, stretched on the deck, talked aloud.

The conversation continuing always amid cries and libations, Ayrton learned that chance alone had brought the Speedy in sight of Lincoln Island.

Bob Harvey had never yet set foot there, but, as Cyrus Smith had foreseen, finding on his route this unknown land, whose situation no chart indicated, he had formed the project of visiting it, and, if need be, if it suited him, of making it the home port of the brig.

As for the black flag hoisted at the peak of the Speedy and the cannon shot which had been fired, after the example of warships at the moment they lower their colors, pure bravado of pirates.

It was not a signal, and no communication yet existed between the escapees of Norfolk and Lincoln Island.

The domain of the colonists was therefore threatened with immense danger. Evidently, the island, with its easy watering-place, its little port, its resources of all sorts so well developed by the colonists, its hidden depths of Granite House, could only suit the convicts; in their hands, it would become an excellent refuge, and, by the very fact that it was unknown, it would assure them, perhaps for long, impunity with security.

Evidently also, the life of the colonists would not be respected, and the first care of Bob Harvey and his accomplices would be to massacre them without mercy.

Cyrus Smith and his people therefore did not even have the resource of fleeing, of hiding in the island, since the convicts counted on residing there, and since, in the event the Speedy departed for an expedition, it was probable that some men of the crew would remain on shore, in order to establish themselves there. Therefore, it was necessary to fight, it was necessary to destroy to the last these wretches, unworthy of pity, and against whom any means would be good.

This is what Ayrton thought, and he knew well that Cyrus Smith would share his way of seeing.

But was resistance, and in the last resort victory, possible? That depended on the armament of the brig and the number of men who manned it. This is what Ayrton resolved to ascertain at any cost, and as, an hour after his arrival, the vociferations had begun to calm down, and a good number of the convicts were already plunged in the sleep of drunkenness, Ayrton did not hesitate to venture onto the deck of the Speedy, which the extinguished lights then left in profound darkness.

He hauled himself up on the jib-boom, and, by the bowsprit, he reached the forecastle of the brig. Then gliding between the convicts stretched here and there, he made the tour of the vessel, and he recognized that the Speedy was armed with four cannons, which must launch balls of eight to ten pounds. He verified even, by touching them, that these cannons were loaded at the breech. They were therefore modern pieces, of easy use and terrible effect.

As for the men lying on the deck, they must be about ten in number, but it was supposable that others, more numerous, slept inside the brig. And besides, in listening to them, Ayrton had thought he understood that they were about fifty aboard. That was a great many for the six colonists of Lincoln Island! But at last, thanks to the devotion of Ayrton, Cyrus Smith would not be surprised, he would know the strength of his adversaries and would take his measures accordingly.

There remained therefore to Ayrton only to return and render account to his companions of the mission with which he had charged himself, and he prepared to regain the front of the brig, in order to slip down to the sea.

But, to this man who wished — he had said it — to do more than his duty, there then came a heroic thought. It was to sacrifice his life, but he would save the island and the colonists. Cyrus Smith could evidently not resist fifty bandits, armed to the teeth, who, either by penetrating by force into Granite House, or by starving the besieged there, would have the better of them. And then he represented to himself his saviors, those who had remade of him a man and an honest man, those to whom he owed all, killed without pity, their works annihilated, their island changed into a den of pirates! He told himself that he was, in sum, he, Ayrton, the first cause of so many disasters, since his former companion, Bob Harvey, had only realized his own projects, and a sentiment of horror seized his whole being. And then he was taken with this irresistible desire to blow up the brig, and with it all those it carried. Ayrton would perish in the explosion, but he would do his duty.

Ayrton did not hesitate. To reach the powder magazine, which is always situated at the stern of a vessel, was easy. Powder could not be lacking to a ship that did such a trade, and a single spark would suffice to annihilate it in an instant.

Ayrton lowered himself with precaution into the between-decks, strewn with numerous sleepers, whom drunkenness, more than sleep, held weighed down. A lantern was lit at the foot of the mainmast, around which was hung a rack furnished with firearms of all sorts.

Ayrton detached from the rack a revolver and assured himself that it was loaded and primed. He needed no more than that to accomplish the work of destruction.

He glided therefore toward the stern, so as to arrive beneath the poop of the brig, where the magazine must be.

However, on this between-decks which was almost obscure, it was difficult to crawl without striking some convict insufficiently asleep. Whence oaths and blows. Ayrton was, more than once, forced to suspend his march. But, at last, he arrived at the partition closing the after compartment, and he found the door which must open onto the magazine itself.

Ayrton, reduced to forcing it, set to work.

It was a difficult task to accomplish without noise, for it was a matter of breaking a padlock. But under the vigorous hand of Ayrton, the padlock gave way and the door was opened... at this moment, an arm rested on Ayrton's shoulder.

“What are you doing there?” demanded in a hard voice a man of tall stature, who, rising in the shadow, abruptly brought to Ayrton's face the light of a lantern.

Ayrton threw himself backward. In a rapid flash of the lantern, he had recognized his former accomplice, Bob Harvey, but he could not be recognized by the latter, who must believe Ayrton dead long since.

“What are you doing there?” said Bob Harvey, seizing Ayrton by the belt of his trousers.

But Ayrton, without answering, vigorously repulsed the chief of the convicts and sought to leap into the magazine. A revolver shot amid those powder barrels, and all would have been finished!...

“To me, boys!” had cried Bob Harvey. Two or three pirates, awakened at his voice, had risen, and, throwing themselves on Ayrton, they tried to throw him down. The vigorous Ayrton freed himself from their grips. Two shots of his revolver rang out, and two convicts fell; but a knife blow which he could not parry gashed the flesh of his shoulder.

Ayrton well understood that he could no longer execute his project. Bob Harvey had reclosed the door of the magazine, and there was making in the between-decks a movement which indicated a general awakening of the pirates.

It was necessary that Ayrton reserve himself to fight alongside Cyrus Smith. There remained to him only to flee!

But was flight still possible? That was doubtful, though Ayrton was resolved to attempt all to rejoin his companions.

Four shots remained to him to fire. Two then rang out, of which one, directed at Bob Harvey, did not hit him, at least gravely, and Ayrton, profiting from a movement of recoil of his adversaries, precipitated himself toward the hatchway ladder, so as to gain the deck of the brig. In passing before the lantern, he broke it with a blow of the butt, and a profound darkness was made, which must favor his flight. Two or three pirates, awakened by the noise, were descending the ladder at that moment. A fifth shot of Ayrton's revolver threw one to the bottom of the steps, and the others drew back, understanding nothing of what was passing. Ayrton, in two bounds, was on the deck of the brig, and three seconds later, after having discharged for the last time his revolver in the face of a pirate who had just seized him by the neck, he straddled the bulwarks and precipitated himself into the sea.

Ayrton had not made six strokes when the balls crackled around him like hail. What must have been the emotions of Pencroff, sheltered under a rock of the islet, those of Cyrus Smith, the reporter, Harbert, Nab, huddled in the chimneys, when they heard these detonations burst aboard the brig. They had rushed onto the beach, and, their rifles to the shoulder, they held ready to repulse any aggression.

For them, there was no possible doubt!

Ayrton, surprised by the pirates, had been massacred by them, and perhaps these wretches were going to profit from the night to effect a landing on the island! Half an hour passed amid mortal anxieties. However, the detonations had ceased, and neither Ayrton nor Pencroff reappeared. Was the islet then invaded? Must they not run to the aid of Ayrton and Pencroff? But how?

The sea, high at that moment, rendered the channel impassable. The pirogue was no longer there! Let it be judged of the horrible uneasiness which seized Cyrus Smith and his companions!

At last, toward half past midnight, a pirogue, bearing two men, came alongside the beach. It was Ayrton, slightly wounded in the shoulder, and Pencroff, safe and sound, whom their friends received with open arms. Immediately, all took refuge in the chimneys. There, Ayrton related what had passed and hid not that project of blowing up the brig which he had attempted to put into execution.

All hands were extended toward Ayrton, who did not disguise how grave the situation was.

The pirates were alerted. They knew that Lincoln Island was inhabited. They would land there only in numbers and well armed. They would respect nothing.

If the colonists fell into their hands, they had no pity to expect!

“Well! We shall know how to die!” said the reporter.

“Let us go in and keep watch,” replied the engineer.

“Have we some chance of getting out of this, Mr. Cyrus?” asked the sailor.

“Yes, Pencroff.”

“Hum! Six against fifty!”

“Yes! Six!... not counting...”

“Who then?” asked Pencroff.

Cyrus did not answer, but he showed the sky with his hand.

CHAPTER III

The night passed without incident. The colonists had kept themselves on the alert and had not abandoned the post of the chimneys. The pirates, for their part, seemed to have made no attempt at landing. Since the last gunshots had been fired at Ayrton, not a detonation, not even a noise had betrayed the presence of the brig on the coasts of the island. Strictly, one might have believed that it had weighed anchor, thinking to have to do with too strong a party, and that it had moved away from these waters.

But it was nothing of the sort, and, when the dawn began to appear, the colonists could glimpse in the mists of the morning a confused mass. It was the Speedy.

“Here, my friends,” said then the engineer, “the dispositions which it seems fitting to me to take, before this fog is completely lifted. It hides us from the eyes of the pirates, and we shall be able to act without awakening their attention. What it imports, above all, to let the convicts believe, is that the inhabitants of the island are numerous and, consequently, capable of resisting them. I propose therefore to divide ourselves into three groups who will post themselves, the first at the chimneys themselves, the second at the mouth of the Mercy. As for the third, I think it would be good to place it on the islet, in order to prevent or at least delay any attempt at landing. We have for our use two rifles and four muskets. Each of us will therefore be armed, and, as we are amply supplied with powder and ball, we shall not spare our shots. We have nothing to fear from the muskets, nor even from the cannons of the brig. What could they do against these rocks? And, as we shall not fire from the windows of Granite House, the pirates will not have the idea of sending there shells which could cause irreparable damage. What is to be dreaded is the necessity of coming to hand-to-hand, since the convicts have numbers on their side. It is therefore against any landing that we must attempt to oppose ourselves, but without exposing ourselves. Therefore, let us not economize ammunition. Let us fire often, but let us fire true. Each of us has eight or ten enemies to kill, and he must kill them!”

Cyrus Smith had stated the situation plainly, while speaking in the calmest voice, as if it had been a matter of directing works and not of arranging a battle. His companions approved these dispositions without even pronouncing a word. It was no longer a question for each but to take his post before the fog was completely dissipated.

Nab and Pencroff immediately remounted to Granite House and brought back from it sufficient ammunition. Gideon Spilett and Ayrton, both very good shots, were armed with the two precision rifles, which carried to nearly a mile in distance. The four other muskets were distributed between Cyrus Smith, Nab, Pencroff and Harbert.

Here is how the posts were composed.

Cyrus Smith and Harbert remained ambushed at the chimneys, and they thus commanded the beach, at the foot of Granite House, over a rather wide radius.

Gideon Spilett and Nab went to crouch amid the rocks, at the mouth of the Mercy — whose bridge as well as the footbridges had been raised — so as to prevent any passage in a boat and even any landing on the opposite bank.

As for Ayrton and Pencroff, they pushed the pirogue into the water and disposed themselves to cross the channel to occupy separately two posts on the islet. In this way, gunshots, bursting from four different points, would give the convicts to think that the island was at once sufficiently peopled and strictly defended. In the event a landing should be effected without their being able to prevent it, and even if they should see themselves about to be turned by some boat of the brig, Pencroff and Ayrton were to return with the pirogue, regain footing on the shore and bear toward the most threatened place.

Before going to occupy their post, the colonists shook hands one last time. Pencroff managed to master himself enough to compress his emotion when he embraced Harbert, his child!... and they separated. A few moments later, Cyrus Smith and Harbert on one side, the reporter and Nab on the other, had disappeared behind the rocks, and five minutes afterward, Ayrton and Pencroff, having happily crossed the channel, landed on the islet and hid in the clefts of its eastern shore. None of them had been able to be seen, for they themselves still scarcely distinguished the brig in the fog.

It was half past six in the morning.

Soon, the fog tore itself little by little in the upper layers of the air, and the mastheads of the brig emerged from the vapors. For some instants still, great volutes rolled at the surface of the sea; then, a breeze rose, which rapidly dissipated this accumulation of mists.

The Speedy appeared entire, moored on two anchors, head to the north, and presenting to the island its port quarter. As Cyrus Smith had estimated, it was not at more than a mile and a quarter from the shore.

The sinister black flag floated at its peak.

The engineer, with his glass, could see that the four cannons composing the artillery of the vessel had been trained on the island. They were evidently ready to fire at the first signal.

However, the Speedy remained mute. One saw some thirty pirates go and come on the deck. Some had mounted on the poop; two others, posted on the cross-trees of the main topgallant yard and furnished with long glasses, observed the island with extreme attention.

Certainly, Bob Harvey and his crew could only very difficultly render account of what had passed during the night aboard the brig.

This man, half naked, who had just forced the door of the powder magazine and against whom they had struggled, who had discharged his revolver six times upon them, who had killed one of theirs and wounded two others, had this man escaped their balls? Had he been able to regain the coast by swimming? Whence came he? What came he to do aboard? Had his project really been to blow up the brig, as Bob Harvey thought? All that must have been rather confused in the minds of the convicts. But what they could no longer doubt was that the unknown island before which the Speedy had cast anchor was inhabited, and that there were there, perhaps, a whole colony ready to defend it. And yet, no one showed himself, neither on the beach, nor on the heights. The coast appeared absolutely deserted. In any case, there was no trace of habitation. Had the inhabitants then fled toward the interior?

This is what the chief of the pirates must have asked himself, and, no doubt, as a prudent man, he sought to reconnoiter the localities before engaging his band there.

During an hour and a half, no index of attack nor of landing could be surprised aboard the brig. It was evident that Bob Harvey hesitated. His best glasses, no doubt, had not permitted him to perceive a single one of the colonists huddled in the rocks. It was not even probable that his attention had been awakened by that veil of green branches and lianas which disguised the windows of Granite House and cut against the bare wall. Indeed, how should he have imagined that a dwelling was hollowed, at that height, in the granite mass? From Cape Claw to Mandible Cap, over the whole perimeter of Union Bay, nothing must have taught him that the island was and could be occupied.

At eight o'clock, however, the colonists observed a certain movement which was producing aboard the Speedy. They were hauling on the falls of the boat davits, and a longboat was put into the sea.

Seven men descended into it. They were armed with muskets; one of them took the tiller, four the oars, and the two others, crouched at the bow, ready to fire, examined the island. Their aim was, no doubt, to operate a first reconnaissance, but not to land, for, in this latter case, they would have come in greater number.

The pirates, perched in the rigging to the cross-trees of the topgallant yard, had evidently been able to see that an islet covered the coast and that it was separated from it by a channel about half a mile wide. However, it was soon certain for Cyrus Smith, in observing the direction followed by the longboat, that it would not seek at first to penetrate into this channel, but that it would come alongside the islet, a measure of prudence justified, moreover.

Pencroff and Ayrton, hidden each on his side in narrow clefts of rocks, saw it come directly upon them, and they waited until it was within good range.

The longboat advanced with extreme precaution.

The oars plunged into the water only at long intervals. One could also see that one of the convicts placed at the bow held a sounding line in his hand and that he sought to recognize the channel dug by the current of the Mercy. That indicated in Bob Harvey the intention of bringing as near as he could his brig to the coast. Some thirty pirates, dispersed in the shrouds, lost not a single one of the movements of the longboat and took certain bearings which were to permit them to land without danger.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”