Fighting for the Right by Oliver Optic (good books for high schoolers .TXT) 📗

feet. The Nassau officers doubtless had a great deal of this sort of quarrelling, for 210 drinking strong liquors was the principal occupation of the officers and crews of the blockade-runners while in port and on shore.

"What is all this about? Who began this quarrel?" demanded one of them, as he looked from one party to the other in the battle.

"I was passing the door of this saloon, and did not even look into it, when that man rushed upon me, and seized me by the collar," replied Christy. "I tried to shake him off, but I could not, and then I struck him in the side of the head."

"Look here, you nigger!" shouted Captain Flanger. "It's none of your business who began it."

"I shall arrest you for a breach of the peace," said the policeman.

"I don't reckon you will. Do you see my nose? Look at it! Don't you see that it is knocked into a cocked hat?" said Flanger fiercely.

"I see it is; but what has that to do with this matter?" asked the negro officer.

"That man shot my nose off!" roared Flanger. "I am going to kill him for it, if it costs me my head!"

"You shall not kill him here," protested the 211 guardian of the peace. "You have been drinking too much, sir, and you must go with me and get sobered off."

The two policemen walked up to him with the intention of arresting him; but he showed fight. He was too tipsy to make an effectual resistance. His companions in the saloon huddled around him, and endeavored to compel the policemen to let go their hold of him; but they held on to their prisoner till two more officers came, and Flanger was dragged out into the street, and then marched to the jail.

Christy was very much surprised that nothing was said to him by the officers about the affair in which he had been one of the principal actors. He had expected to be summoned as a witness against the prisoner they had taken, but not a word was said to him. He looked about to see if the detective was in sight, but he had disappeared.

"That was an ugly-looking man," said a gentleman in the street, after the carousers had returned to the saloon. "I hope he has not injured you."

"Not at all, sir; he was too drunk to do all he could have done if he had been in full possession of his faculties, for he is a much heavier person 212 than I am," replied Christy. "Why was I not summoned as a witness at his examination?"

"Oh, bless you, sir! they will not examine or try him; they will sober him off, and then discharge him. He is the captain of that little steamer near the public wharf. She is called the Snapper, and will sail for the States on the high tide at five o'clock."

"Do you know to what port she is bound?" asked Christy.

"Mobile."

The young officer walked down to the public wharf to see the Snapper.

213 CHAPTER XIX AN OLD ACQUAINTANCE

The Snapper was quite a small craft, and looked like an old vessel; for she was a side-wheeler, though she had evidently been built for a sea-going craft. Whether Flanger had escaped from the Bellevite after being transferred to her from the Bronx, or had been regularly exchanged as a prisoner of war, Christy had no means of knowing. It made little difference; he was in Nassau, and he was thirsting for revenge against him.

The young officer did not feel that the brutal wretch had any reasonable cause to complain of him, and especially no right to revenge himself for an injury received while his assailant was the aggressor. He had done his duty to his country. He had been compelled to act promptly; and he had not aimed his revolver particularly at the nose of his dangerous assailant. Flanger was engaged in a foolhardy enterprise; and the mutilation of 214 his nasal member had resulted very naturally from his folly.

His enemy was probably a good sailor, and he was a bold ruffian. Christy had captured the steamer loaded with cotton, in which he was all ready to sail from St. Andrew's Bay; and doubtless this was his first reason for hating the young officer. But no soldier or sailor of character would ever think of such a thing as revenging himself for an injury received in the strife, especially if it was fairly inflicted. The business of war is to kill, wound, and capture, as well as for each side to injure the other in person and property to the extent of its ability.

"Want a boat, sir?" asked a negro, who saw that Christy was gazing at the Snapper, even while he was thinking about his quarrel with Captain Flanger.

"Where is your boat?" asked the officer.

"Right here, sir," replied the boatman, pointing to the steps at the landing-place. "The best sailboat in the harbor, sir."

"I want to sail about this bay for a couple of hours," added Christy, as he stopped on the upper step to examine the craft.

215 It was built exactly like the Eleuthera, though not quite so large.

"I saw you looking at the steamer there," said the boatman, pointing to the vessel in which Christy was interested. "Do you wish to go on board of her, sir?"

"No; I desire only to sail about the harbor, and perhaps go outside the bar. Can you cross it in this boat?"

"Yes, sir; no trouble at all about crossing it in the Dinah. Take you over to Eleuthera, if you like."

"No; I only want to sail about the harbor, and look at the vessels in port," replied Christy.

While he was looking at the boat, he became conscious that a young man, who was standing on the capsill of the wharf, was looking at him very earnestly. He only glanced at him, but did not recognize him. He had taken the first step in the descent of the stairs, when this person put his hand upon his shoulder to attract his attention. Christy looked at him, and was sure that he had seen him before, though he failed to identify him.

"How are you, Christy?" said the stranger. "Don't you know me?"

216 "Your face has a familiar look to me, but I am unable to make you out at first sight," replied the young officer, more puzzled as he examined the features of the young man, who appeared to be about twenty years old.

"You and I both have grown a great deal in the last two years, since we first met on this very wharf; but I am Percy Pierson, and you and I were fellow-voyagers in the Bellevite."

"I think you have changed in that time more than I have, or I should have recognized you," answered Christy very coldly, for he was not at all pleased to be identified by any person.

"You are a good deal larger than when I saw you last time, but you look just the same. I am glad to see you, Christy, for you and I ran a big rig over in Mobile Bay," continued Percy, as he extended his hand to the other.

Christy realized that it would be useless as well as foolish to deny his identity to one who knew him so well. A moment's reflection assured him that he must make the best of the circumstances; but he wished with all his might that he had not come to Nassau. He was particularly glad that he had insisted upon separating from Mr. Gilfleur, 217 for the present encounter would have ruined his mission. The young man's father was Colonel Richard Pierson, a neighbor of Homer Passford; and he was a Confederate commissioner for the purchase of vessels for the rebel navy, for running the blockade. Doubtless the son was his father's assistant, as he had been at the time of Christy's first visit.

Percy was not a person of very heavy brain calibre, as his companion had learned from an association of several weeks with him. Christy believed that he might obtain some useful information from him; and he decided, since it was impossible to escape the interview, to make the best of it, and he accepted the offered hand. He did not consider the young Southerner as much of a rebel, for he had refused to shoulder a musket and fight for the cause.

"I begin to see your former looks, and particularly your expression," said Christy. "I am very glad to see you, and I hope you have been very well since we met last."

"Very well indeed."

"Do you live here, Percy?"

"I have lived here most of the time since we 218 parted on board of the Bellevite, and you put me on board of a schooner bound to Nassau. That was a very good turn you did me, for I believed you would take me to New York, and pitch me into a Yankee prison. I was very grateful to you, for I know it was your influence that saved me."

This remark seemed to put a new face upon the meeting. Christy had done nothing to cause him to be set free; for the Bellevite, though she had beaten off several steamers that attempted to capture her, was not in the regular service at the time, her mission in the South being simply to bring home the daughter of her owner, who had passed the winter with her uncle at Glenfield.

"I am very glad I was able to do you a good turn," replied Christy, who considered it his duty to take advantage of the circumstances. "I am just going out to take a sail; won't you join me?"

"Thank you; I shall be very glad to do so. I suppose you are a Yankee still, engaged in the business of subjugating the free South, as I am still a rebel to the backbone," replied Percy, laughing very pleasantly.

"But you are not in the rebel army now, any 219 more than you were at that time," added Christy in equally good humor.

"I am not. You know all about my army experience. My brother, the major, sends me a letter by every chance he can get, and has offered to have my indiscretion, as he called it, in leaving the camp, passed over, if I will save the honor of the family by returning to the army; but my father insists that I can render better service to the cause as his assistant."

Christy led the way down the steps, and the two seated themselves in the bow of the boat. The skipper shoved off after he had set his sails, and the boat stood out towards the Snapper, for he could hardly avoid passing quite near to her.

"What are you doing in Nassau, Christy?" asked Percy.

This was a hard question, and it was utterly impossible to make a truthful reply without upsetting the plan of Mr. Gilfleur, and rendering useless the voyage of the Chateaugay to the Bahamas.

"I am in just as bad a scrape as you were when you were caught on board of the Bellevite," replied Christy after a moment's reflection.

"Are you a prisoner of war?"

220 "How could I be a prisoner in a neutral port like Nassau? No; I do not regard myself as a prisoner just now," answered Christy very good-humoredly.

"But you have been a prisoner, and you have escaped in some vessel that run the blockade. I see it all; and you need not stop to explain it," said Percy, who flattered himself on his brilliant perception.

"The less I say about it the better it will be for me," added Christy, willing to accept the situation as his companion had marked it out.

"But you must not let my father see you."

"I never met Colonel Pierson, though I saw him once, and he would not know me if we should meet."

"Then don't let him know who you are."

"He will not know, unless you tell him."

"You may be very sure that I will not mention you to him, or to anybody else, for that matter," replied Percy very earnestly.

But Christy did not put any confidence in his assertion. Percy was really a deserter from the Confederate army, and he knew that he had in several instances acted the traitor's part. He had 221 more respect for an out-and-out rebel than for one who shirked his duty to his country as he understood it.

"I have been afraid some one might identify me here," suggested Christy, determined not to over-act his part.

"I might help you out of the scrape," said Percy, who appeared to be reflecting upon something that had come to his mind. "I suppose you are aware