’"What’s the good?” Brown had said
unmoved once, seeing the Yankee, who had been swearing
under his breath, prepare to go down. “That’s
so,” assented the deserter, reluctantly desisting.
“There’s no encouragement for wounded
men here. Only his noise is calculated to make
all the others think too much of the hereafter, cap’n.”
“Water!” cried the wounded man in an extraordinarily
clear vigorous voice, and then went off moaning feebly.
“Ay, water. Water will do it,” muttered
the other to himself, resignedly. “Plenty
by-and-by. The tide is flowing.”
’At last the tide flowed, silencing the plaint
and the cries of pain, and the dawn was near when
Brown, sitting with his chin in the palm of his hand
before Patusan, as one might stare at the unscalable
side of a mountain, heard the brief ringing bark of
a brass 6-pounder far away in town somewhere.
“What’s this?” he asked of Cornelius,
who hung about him. Cornelius listened.
A muffled roaring shout rolled down-river over the
town; a big drum began to throb, and others responded,
pulsating and droning. Tiny scattered lights
began to twinkle in the dark half of the town, while
the part lighted by the loom of fires hummed with a
deep and prolonged murmur. “He has come,”
said Cornelius. “What? Already?
Are you sure?” Brown asked. “Yes!
yes! Sure. Listen to the noise.”
“What are they making that row about?”
pursued Brown. “For joy,” snorted
Cornelius; “he is a very great man, but all the
same, he knows no more than a child, and so they make
a great noise to please him, because they know no
better.” “Look here,” said Brown,
“how is one to get at him?” “He
shall come to talk to you,” Cornelius declared.
“What do you mean? Come down here strolling
as it were?” Cornelius nodded vigorously in the
dark. “Yes. He will come straight here
and talk to you. He is just like a fool.
You shall see what a fool he is.” Brown
was incredulous. “You shall see; you shall
see,” repeated Cornelius. “He is not
afraid—not afraid of anything. He
will come and order you to leave his people alone.
Everybody must leave his people alone. He is like
a little child. He will come to you straight.”
Alas! he knew Jim well—that “mean
little skunk,” as Brown called him to me.
“Yes, certainly,” he pursued with ardour,
“and then, captain, you tell that tall man with
a gun to shoot him. Just you kill him, and you
will frighten everybody so much that you can do anything
you like with them afterwards—get what you
like—go away when you like. Ha! ha!
ha! Fine .
. .” He almost danced with
impatience and eagerness; and Brown, looking over his
shoulder at him, could see, shown up by the pitiless
dawn, his men drenched with dew, sitting amongst the
cold ashes and the litter of the camp, haggard, cowed,
and in rags.’
