Homeward Bound - James Fenimore Cooper (free e books to read .txt) 📗

he felt no relish for his duty. Still he felt himself bound to urge on Captain Truck a compliance with his request. The master of the packet was a good deal divided by an inherent dislike of seeming to yield anything to a British naval officer, a class of men whom he learned in early life most heartily to dislike; his kind feelings towards this particular specimen of the class; a reluctance to give a man up to a probable death, or some other severe punishment; and a distaste to being thought desirous of harbouring a rogue. In this dilemma, therefore, he addressed himself to John Effingham for counsel.

"I should be pleased to hear your opinion, sir, on this matter," he said, looking at the gentleman just named, "for I own myself to be in a category. Ought we, or not, to deliver up the culprit?"

" Fiat justitia ruat coelum " answered John Effingham, who never fancied any one could be ignorant of the meaning of these familiar words.

"That I believe indeed to be Vattel," said Captain Truck; "but exceptions alter rules. This young man has some claims on us on account of his conduct when in front of the Arabs."

"He fought for himself, sir, and has the merit of preferring liberty in a ship to slavery in the desert."

"I think with Mr. John Effingham," observed Mr. Dodge, "and can see no redeeming quality in his conduct on that occasion. He did what we all did, or, as Mr. John Effingham has so pithily expressed it, he preferred liberty in our company to being an Arab's slave."

"You will not deliver me up, Captain Truck!" exclaimed the delinquent. "They will hang me, if once in their power. Oh I you will not have the heart to let them hang me!"

Captain Truck was startled at this appeal, but he sternly reminded the culprit that it was too late to remember the punishment, when the crime was committed.

"Never fear, Mr. Sandon," said the office-man with a sneer; "these gentlemen will take you to New York, for the sake of the thousand pounds, if they can. A rogue is pretty certain of a kind reception in America, I hear."

"Then, sir," exclaimed Captain Truck, "you had better go in with us."

"Mr Green, Mr. Green, this is indiscreet, to call it by no worse a term," interposed Captain Ducie, who, while he was not free from a good deal of the prejudices of his companion, was infinitely better bred, and more in the habit of commanding himself.

"Mr. John Effingham, you have heard this wanton insult," continued Captain Truck, suppressing his wrath as well as he could: "in what mariner ought it to be resented?"

"Command the offender to quit your ship instantly," said John Effingham firmly.

Captain Ducie started, and his face flushed; but disregarding him altogether, Captain Truck walked deliberately up to Mr. Green, and ordered him to go into the corvette's boat.

"I shall allow of neither parley nor delay," added the exasperated old seaman, struggling to appear cool and dignified, though his vocation was little for the latter. "Do me the favour, sir, to permit me to see you into your boat, sir. Saunders, go on deck, and tell Mr. Leach to have the side manned--with three side boys, Saunders;--and now I ask it as the greatest possible favour, that you will walk on deck with me, or--or--damn me, but I'll drag you there, neck and heels!"

It was too much for Captain Truck to seem calm when he was in a towering passion, and the outbreak at the close of this speech was accompanied by a gesture with a hand which was open, it is true, but from which none of the arts of his more polite days could erase the knobs and hue that had been acquired in early life.

"This is strong language, sir, to use to a British officer, under the guns of a British cruiser," exclaimed the commander of the corvette.

"And his was strong language to use to a man in his own country and in his own ship. To you, Captain Ducie I have nothing to say, unless it be to say you are welcome. But your companion has indulged in a coarse insult on my country, and damn me if I submit to it, if I never see St. Catherine's Docks again. I had too much of this when a young man, to wish to find it repeated while an old one."

Captain Ducie bit his lip, and he looked exceedingly vexed. Although he had himself blindly imbibed the notion that America would gladly receive the devil himself if he came with a full pocket, he was shocked with the coarseness that would throw such an innuendo into the very faces of the people of the country. On the other hand, his pride as an officer was hurt at the menace of Captain Truck, and all the former harmony of the scene was threatened with a sudden termination. Captain Ducie had been struck with the gentlemanlike appearance of both the Effinghams, to say nothing of Eve, the instant his foot touched the deck of the Montauk, and he now turned with a manner of reproach to John Effingham, and said,

"Surely, sir, you cannot sustain Mr. Truck in his extraordinary conduct!"

"You will pardon me if I say I do. The man has been permitted to remain longer in the ship than I would have suffered."

"And, Mr. Powis, what is your opinion?"

"I fear," said Paul, smiling coldly, "that I should have knocked him down on the spot."

"Templemore, are you, too, of this way of thinking?"

"I fear the speech of Mr. Green has been without sufficient thought. On reflection he will recall it."

But Mr. Green would sooner part with life than part with a prejudice, and he shook his head in the negative in a way to show that his mind was made up.

"This is trifling," added Captain Truck. "Saunders, go on deck, and tell Mr. Leach to send down through the skylight a single whip, that we may whip this polite personage on deck; and, harkee, Saunders, let there be another on the yard, that we may send him into his boat like an anker of gin!"

"This is proceeding too far," said Captain Ducie. "Mr Green, you will oblige me by retiring; there can be no suspicion cast on a vessel of war for conceding a little to an unarmed ship."

"A vessel of war should not insult an unarmed ship, sir!" rejoined Captain Truck, pithily.

Captain Ducie again coloured; but as he had decided on his course, he had the prudence to remain silent. In the mean time Mr. Green sullenly took his hat and papers, and withdrew into the boat; though, on his return to London he did not fail to give such a version of the affair as went altogether to corroborate all his own, and his friends' previous notions of America; and, what is equally singular, he religiously believed all he had said on the occasion.

"What is now to be done with this unhappy man?" inquired Captain Ducie when order was a little restored.

The misunderstanding was an unfortunate affair for the culprit. Captain Truck felt a strong reluctance to deliver him up to justice after all they had gone through together, but the gentlemanlike conduct of the English commander, the consciousness of having triumphed in the late conflict, and a deep regard for the law, united on the other hand to urge him to yield the unfortunate and weak-minded offender to his own authorities.

"You do not claim a right to take him out of an American ship by violence, if I understand you, Captain Ducie?"

"I do not. My instructions are merely to demand him."

"That is according to Vattel. By demand you mean, to request, to ask for him?"

"I mean to request, to ask for him," returned the Englishman, smiling.

"Then take him, of God's name; and may your laws be more merciful to the wretch than he has been to himself, or to his kin."

Mr. Sandon shrieked, and he threw himself abjectly on his knees between the two captains, grasping the legs of both.

"Oh! hear me! hear me!" he exclaimed in a tone of anguish. "I have given up the money, I will give it all up! all to the last shilling, if you will let me go! You, Captain Truck, by whose side I have fought and toiled, you will not have the heart to abandon me to these murderers!"

"It's d--d hard!" muttered the captain, actually wiping his eyes; "but it is what you have drawn upon yourself, I fear. Get a good lawyer, my poor fellow, as soon as you arrive; and it's an even chance, after all, that you go free!"

"Miserable wretch!" said Mr. Dodge, confronting the still kneeling and agonized delinquent, "Wretch! these are the penalties of guilt. You have forged and stolen, acts that meet with my most unqualified disapprobation, and you are unfit for respectable society.--I saw from the very first what you truly were, and permitted myself to associate with you, merely to detect and expose you, in order that you might not bring disgrace on our beloved country. An impostor has no chance in America; and you are fortunate in being taken back to your own hemisphere."

Mr. Dodge belonged to a tolerably numerous class, that is quaintly described as being "law honest;" that is to say, he neither committed murder nor petty larceny. When he was guilty of moral slander, he took great care that it should not be legal slander; and, although his whole life was a tissue of mean and baneful vices, he was quite innocent of all those enormities that usually occupy the attention of a panel of twelve men. This, in his eyes, raised him so far above less prudent sinners as to give him a right to address his quondam associate as has been just related. But the agony of the culprit was past receiving an increase from this brutal attack; he merely motioned the coarse-minded sycophant and demagogue away, and continued his appeals to the two captains for mercy. At this moment Paul Powis stepped up to the editor, and in a low but firm voice ordered him to quit the cabin.

"I will pray for you--be your slave--do all you ask, if you will not give me up!" continued the culprit, fairly writhing in his agony. "Oh! Captain Ducie, as an English nobleman, have mercy on me."

"I must transfer the duty to subordinates," said the English commander, a tear actually standing in his eye. "Will you permit a party of armed marines to take this unhappy being from your ship, sir."

"Perhaps this will be the best course, as he will yield only to a show of force. I see no objection to this, Mr John Effingham?"

"None in the world, sir. It is your object to clear your ship of a delinquent, and let those among whom he committed the fault be the agents."

"Ay--ay! this is what Vattel calls the comity of nations. Captain Ducie, I beg you will issue your orders."

The English commander had foreseen some difficulty, and, in sending away his boat when he came below, he had sent for a corporal's guard. These men were now in a cutter, near the ship, lying off on their oars, in a rigid respect to the rights of a stranger, however,--as Captain Truck was glad to see, the whole party having gone