“Stand by and hold her below there,” I bawled, and a man received her into the boat.  Then I called to the rest of our fellows and threw a leg over the rail to signify that we were going.  They came along, Chips last, with Johnson at his side.  The carpenter was furious and wanted to fight it out, and it would have taken very little to have set him upon them alone.  They, however, when Andrews had been overcome, were by no means anxious to engage.  This seemed strange to me, for they certainly were men who feared nothing, and the sooner we were out of the way, the surer they were of getting safe off with their necks.  Just what made Bell so determined to have us go was a puzzle to me.  As Chips climbed over the rail, England came to the side with Journegan.  I expected some outburst, and for an instant the carpenter was at a disadvantage.  But they let him go over without a hostile movement.  He stood up in the bow while a man shoved off.

“Ah, ye raskils, it’s like runnin’ away we are, but we ain’t.  It’s but lavin’ to th’ hangman what I’d do meself, curse ye.”

The boat of the Sovereign towing at the quarter came abreast us as we dropped back.  Chips still standing and glaring at the ship, with rage in his voice and eyes.

He stooped down and lifted an oar as the small boat came alongside, and with a half-suppressed yell smote her with all his strength upon the gunwale.  The oar crashed through nearly to the water line under the power of the stroke.

“Blast ye,” he cried, “ye’ll niver leave that ship alive,” and he smote the boat again and again, crushing her down until she began to fill.  Johnson took a hand also in spite of England and Journegan hauling away at the painter.  Our men backed water so hard they held her back until the boat was hopelessly stove and had settled to the thwarts.  Then we let go and drifted away, while the men aboard the Sovereign hurled belaying-pins and gratings at us.

“A pleasant voyage to you,” came the soft notes of Mr. Bell’s voice; and then we rowed slowly away to the northward, leaving the Sovereign a dark, sunken grisly thing against the moonlit sky.

“Rig the mast and sail,” I said.  “It’s no use getting tired before the struggle comes.  We’re some six hundred miles out, and may not raise a vessel for days.”

The oars were taken in, and the tarpaulin which had done duty for a sail was rigged.  Under the pressure of the light air the whale-boat made steering-way and a little more.  The moon now made the night as light as day, and although it was slightly chilly in this latitude, we suffered little from the exposure, each settling himself into the most comfortable position possible, and gazing back at the strange black outline of the wrecked ship.  Her sunken decks and patched-up jury rig with the trysail set from the after-stay gave her an uncanny look, while her masts and spars with the set canvas seemed as black as ink against the light sky beyond.  There she lay, a horrid, ghastly thing, wallowing along slowly toward a port she would never reach.