Page:The Dark Frigate (Hawes).djvu/147

Hunching his bent shoulders, Mate Malcolm came nimbly down the ladder and from the chest of arms drew forth muskets and pistols.

“Come, my bullies below there, knock open your ports!” It was the Old One’s voice, but so softly and briskly did he speak that it might have been Harry Malcolm.

As the dim figures on deck moved cautiously about, the subdued voice again floated down to them : —

“Let all the guns be loose in tackles and stand by to run them out when the word is given. Port your helm! Every man to his quarters. Now, my hearts, be ready to show your courage and we’ll have this wandering ketch for a consort to our good Rose of Devon.”

Then Harry Malcolm came in haste along the deck. “Who’s to this gun? And who to this? Nay, you’ve a man too many there. Here, fellow, come hither! Here a man is lacking. You there, who are playing the part of gunner, have you ever heard these bulldogs bark? And understand you the business? Good, good!’’ And he passed on up the deck. Nought escaped him. In the silence they heard the sound of his voice and the quick pattering of his feet when they could see no more than that he was still moving among the guns.

They had come so near the stranger that they must soon hail or be hailed, when a figure emerging from the steerage room in the darkness came upon Phil Marsham by the quarter-deck ladder and gave a great start. As Phil turned, the fellow whispered, ‘‘God be thanked it is thou! I thought it was another. Come with me to the side — here by the shrouds.”

The two stepped lightly under the shadow of the