Speaker 1: The Glorious Scott. I have some papers here, said my
friend Shark Holmes, as we sat one winter's night on
either side of the fire, which I really think, Watson,
that it would be worth your while to glance over.
These are the documents in the extraordinary case of the
Glorious Scott. And this is the message which struck Justice
of the piece Trevor dead with horror when he read it.
He had picked from a drawer a little tarnished cylinder,
and undoing the tape, he handed me a short note
scrawled upon a half sheet of slate gray paper. The
supply of game for London is going steadily up, it
ran head keeper Hudson. We believe has been now told
to receive all orders for fly paper and for preservation
of your hen pheasant's life. As I glanced up from
reading this enigmatical message, I saw Holmes chuckling at the
expression upon my face. You look a little bewildered, said he.
I cannot see how such a message as this could
inspire horror. It seems to me to be rather grotesque
than otherwise very likely. Yet the fact remains that the reader,
who was a fine robust old man, was not cleaned
down by it as if it had been the butt
end of a pistol. You arise my curiosity, said I,
But why did you just say now that there were
very particular reasons why I should study this case, because
it was the first in which I was ever engaged.
I had often endeavored to elicit from my companion what
had first turned his mind in the direction of criminal research,
but had never caught him before in a communicative humor.
Now he sat forward in this arm chair and spread
out the documents upon his knees. Then he lit his
pipe and sat for some time, smoking and turning them over.
You never heard me talk of Victor. Trevor, he asked.
He was the only friend I made during the two
years I was at college. I was never a very
sociable fellow, Watson, always rather fond of moping in my
rooms and working out my own little methods of thought,
so that I never mixed much with the men of
my year bar fencing and boxing. I had few athletic tastes,
and then my line of study was quite distinct from
that of the other fellows, so that we had no
points of contact at all. Trevor was the only man
I knew, and that only through the accident of his
bull terrier freezing on to my ankle one morning as
I went down to chapel. It was a prosaic way
of forming a friendship, but it was effective. I was
laid by the heels for ten days, but Trevor used
to come in to inquire after me. At first it
was only a minute's chat, but soon his visits lengthened,
and before the end of the term we were close friends.
He was a hearty, full blooded fellow, full of spirits
and energy, the very opposite to me in most respects,
but we had some subjects in common, and it was
a bond of union when I found that he was
as friendless as I. Finally he invited me down to
his father's place at Donnithorpe in Norfolk, and I accepted
his hospitality for a month of the long vacation. Old
Trevor was evidently a man of some wealth and consideration,
a j P and a landed proprietor. Donnithorpe is a
little hamlet just to the north of Langnere in the
country of the Broads. The house was an old fashioned,
wide spread oak beamed brick building, with a fine lime
lined avenue. Leading up to it. There was excellent wild
duck shooting in the fens, remarkably good fishing, a small
but select library taken over, as I understand, from a
former occupant, and a tolerable cook, so that he would
be a fastidious man who could not put in a
pleasant month there. Trevsenior was a widower and my friend
his only son. There had been a daughter, I heard,
but she had died of diphtheria while on a visit
to Birmingham. The father interested me extremely. He was a
man of little culture, but with a considerable amount of
rude strength, both physically and mentally. He knew hardly any books,
but he had traveled far, had seen much of the world,
and had remembered all that he had learned in person.
He was a thick set, burly man, with a shock
of grizzled hair, a brown, weather beaten face, and blue
eyes which were keen to the verge of fierceness. Yet
he had a reputation for kindness and charity on the
country side, and was noted for the leniency of his
sentences from the bench. One evening, shortly after my arrival,
we were sitting over a glass of port after dinner,
when young Trevor began to talk about those habits of
observation and inference which I had already formed into a system,
although I had not yet appreciated the part which they
were to play in my life life. The old man
evidently thought that his son was exaggerating in his description
of one or two trivial feats which I had performed.
Come now, mister Holmes, said he, laughing good humoredly. I
am an excellent subject. If you can deduce anything from me,
I fear there is not very much, I answered, I
might suggest that you have gone about in fear of
some personal attack within the last twelve months. The laugh
faded from his lips, and he stared at me in
great surprise. Well that's true enough, said he. You know, Victor,
turning to his son, when we broke up that poaching gang,
they swore a kniphus and Sir Edward Holly has actually
been attacked. I have always been on my guard since then,
though I have no idea how you know it. You
have a very handsome stick, I answered, by the inscription,
I observed that you had not had it more than
a year but you have taken some pains to bore
the head of it and poor melted lead into the hole,
so as to make it a formidable weapon. I argued
that you would not take such precautions unless you had
some danger to fear. Anything else, he asked, smiling, you
have boxed a good deal in your youth, right again,
How did you know it is my nose knocked a
little out of the strait, No, said I, it is
your ears. They have the peculiar flattening and thickening which
marks the boxing man. Anything else, You have done a
good deal of digging by your callosities, made all my
money at the goldfields. You have been in New Zealand
right again. You have visited Japan, quite true, and you
have been most intimately associated with some one whose initials
were j A, and whom you afterwards were eager to
entirely forget. Mister Trevis stood slowly up, fixed his large
blae two eyes upon me with a strange, wild stare,
and then pitched forward with his face among the nutshells
which strewed the cloth in a dead faint. You can
imagine Watson, how shocked both his son and I were
his attack did not last long, however, for when we
undid his collar and sprinkled the water from one of
the finger glasses over his face, he gave a gasp
or two and sat up, Ah, boys, said he forcing
a smile. I hope I haven't frightened you. Strong as
I look, there is a weak place in my heart,
and it does not take much to knock me over.
I don't know how you manage this, mister Holmes, but
it seems to me that all the detectives of fact
and of fancy would be children in your hands. That's
your line of life, sir, And you may take the
word of a man who has seen something of the world,
and that recommendation, with the exaggerated estimate of my ability
with which he prefaced it was, if you will believe me, Watson,
the very first thing which ever made me feel that
a profession might be made out of what had up
to that time been the merest hobby. At the moment, however,
I was too much concerned at the sudden illness of
my host to think of anything else. I hope that
I've said nothing to pain you said, I, well, you
certainly touched upon rather a tender point might I ask
how you know and how much you know? He spoke
now in a half jesting fashion, but a look of
terror still lurked at the back of his eyes. It
is simplicity itself, said I. When you bared your arm
to draw that fish into the boat, I saw that
j A had been tattooed in the bend of the elbow.
The letters were still legible, but it was perfectly clear
from their blurred appearance, and from the staining of the
skin around them, that efforts had been made to obliterate them.
It was obvious then that those in this had once
been very familiar to you, and that you had afterwards
wished to forget them. What an eye you have, he cried,
with a sigh of relief. It is just as you say,
but we won't talk of it. Of all ghosts, the
ghosts of our old lovers are the worst. Come into
the billiard room and have a quiet cigar. From that day,
amid all his cordiality, there was always a touch of
suspicion in mister Trevor's manner towards me. Even his son remarked,
it you've given the governor such a turn, said he,
that he'll never be sure again of what you know
and what you don't know. He did not mean to
show it, I am sure, but it was so strongly
in his mind that it peeped out at every action.
At last, I became so convinced that I was causing
him uneasiness that I drew my visit to a close.
On the very day. However, before I left, an incident
occurred which proved in the sequel to be of importance.
We were sitting out upon the lawn and garden chairs,
the three of us, basking in the sun and admiring
the view across the broads, when a maid came out
to say that there was a man at the door
who wanted to see mister Trevor. What is his name,
asked my host. He would not give any What does
he want? Then he says that you know him, and
that he only wants a moment's conversation. Show him round here.
An instant afterwards, there appeared a little wizened fellow with
a cringing manner and a shambling style of walking. He
wore an open jacket with a splotch of tar on
the sleeve, a red and black check shirt, dungaree trousers
and heavy boots badly worn. His face was thin and
brown and crafty, with a perpetual smile upon it, which
showed an irregular line of yellow teeth, and his crinkled
hands were half closed in a way that is distinctive
of sailors. As he came slouching across the lawn, I
heard mister Trevor made a sort of hiccuping noise in
his throat, and jumping out of his chair, he ran
into the house. He was back in a moment, and
I smelt a strong reek of brandy as he passed me. Well,
my man, said he, What can I do for you?
The sailor stood looking at him with puckered eyes and
with the same loose lipped smile upon his face. You
don't know me, he asked. Why, dear me, it is surely, Hudson,
said mister Trevor, in a tone of surprise. Hudson, it is, sir,
said the seaman. Why. It's thirty years or more since
I saw you last. Here you are in your house
and me still picking my salt meat out of the
harness cask. Tut. You will find that I have not
forgotten old times. Cried mister Trevor, and walking towards the sailor,
he said something in a low voice. Go into the kitchen,
he continued out loud, and you will get food and drink.
I have no doubt that I shall find you a situation.
Thank you, sir, said the seaman, touching his forelock. I'm
just off a two yearer in an eight knot tramp,
short handed at that, and I want a rest. I
thought i'd get it either with mister Bedders or with you, Ah,
cried Trevor. You know where mister Beddrows is. Bless you, sir,
I know where all my old friends are, said the
fellow with a sinister smile, and he slouched off after
the maid to the kitchen. Mister Trevor mumbled something to
us about having been shipmate with the man when he
was going back to the diggings, and then leaving us
on the lawn he went indoors. An hour later, when
we entered the house, we found him stretched dead drunk
upon the dining room's sofa. The whole instant left a
most ugly impression upon my mind, and I was not
sorry next day to leave Donithorpe behind me. For I
felt that my presence must be a source of embarrass
to my friend. All this occurred during the first month
of the long vacation. I went up to my London rooms,
where I spent seven weeks working out a few experiments
in organic chemistry. One day, however, when the autumn was
far advanced and the vacation drawing to a close, I
received a telegram from my friend imploring me to return
to Donnithorpe, and saying that he was in great need
of my advice and assistance. Of course, I dropped everything
and set out for the north once more. He met
me with the dog cart at the station, and I
saw at a glance that the last two months had
been very trying ones for him. He had grown thin
and care worn, and had lost the loud, cheery manner
for which he had been remarkable. The governor is dying.
With the first words, he said, impossible, I cried, what
is the matter. Apoplexy, nervous shock. He's been on the
verge all day. I doubt if we shall find him alive.
I was, as you may think, Watson, horrified at this
unexpected news. What has caused it? I asked, Ah, that
is the point, jump in and we can talk it
over while we drive. You remember that fellow who came
upon the evening before you left us perfectly? Do you
know who it was that we let into the house
that day? I have no idea. It was the devil Holmes,
he cried. I stared at him in astonishment. Yes, it
was the devil himself. We have not had a peaceful
hour since, not one. The Governor has never held up
his head from that evening, and now the life has
been crushed out of him, and his heart broken all
through this accursed Hudson. What power had he then? Ah,
that is what I would give so much to know,
the kindly, charitable, good old governor. How could he have
fallen into the clutches of such a ruffian. But I
am so glad that you have come homes. I trust
very much to your judgment and discretion, and I know
that you will advise me for the best. We were
dashing along the smooth white country road, with a long
stretch of the broads in front of us, glimmering in
the red light of the setting sun. From a grove
upon our left, I could already see the high chimneys
and the flag staff which marked the squire's dwelling. My
father made the fellow gardener, said my companion, and then
as that did not satisfy him, he was promoted to
be butler. The house seemed to be at his mercy,
and he wandered about and did what he chose in it.
The maids complained of his drunken habits and his vile language.
The dad raised their wages all round to recompense them
for the annoyance. The fellow would take the boat and
my father's best gun and treat himself to little shooting trips,
and all this with such a sneering, leering, insolent face,
that I would have knocked him down twenty times over
if he'd been a man of my own age. I
tell you, Holmes, I have had to keep a tight
hold upon myself all this time, and now I am
asking myself whether if I had let myself go a
little more, I might not have been a wiser man. Well,
matters went from bad to worse with us, and this
animal Hudson became more and more intrusive, until at last,
on making some insolent reply to my father in my presence,
one day I took him by the shoulders and turned
him out of the room. He slunk away with a
livid face and two venomous eyes which uttered more threats
than his tongue could do. I don't know what passed
between the poor dad and him after that, but the
dad came to me next day and asked me whether
I would mind apologizing to Hudson. I refused, as you
can imagine, and asked my father how he could allow
such a wretch to take such liberties with himself and
his household. Ah, my boy, said he. It is all
very well to talk, but you don't know how I
am placed. But you shall know, Victor, I'll see that
you shall know, come what may. You wouldn't believe harm
of your poor old father, would you, lad? He was
very much moved and shut himself up in the study
all day, where I could see through the window that
he was writing busily. That evening, there came what seemed
to me to be a grand release for Hudson told
us that he was going to leave us. He walked
into the dining room as we sat after dinner and
announced his intention in the thick voice of a half
drunken man. I've had enough Norfolk, said he. I'll run down,
sir mister Bedrow's in Hampshire. He'll be as glad to
see me as you were. I dare say, you're not
going away in an unkind spirit, Hudson, I hope, said
my father, with a tameness which made my blood boil.
I've not ut my apology, said he sulkily, glancing in
my direction. Victor, you will acknowledge that you have used
this worthy fellow rather roughly, said the dad, turning to me.
On the contrary, I think that we have both shown
extraordinary patience towards him, I answered, Oh, you do, do you?
He snarls, Very good, mate, We'll see about that. He
slouched out of the room, and half an hour afterwards
left the house, leaving my father in a state of
pitiable nervousness. Night after night I heard him pacing his room,
and it was just as he was recovering his confidence
that the blow did at last fall, and how, I
asked eagerly, in a most extraordinary fashion, A letter arrived
from my father yesterday evening, bearing the Fordingbridge postmark. My
father read it, clapped both his hands to his head
and began running around the room in little circles, like
a man who has been driven out of his senses.
When I at last drew him down on to the sofa,
his mouth and eyelids were all puckered on one side,
and I saw that he had a stroke. Doctor Fordham
came over at once. We put him to bed, but
the paralysis has spread. He has shown no sign of
returning consciousness, and I think that we shall hardly find
him alive. You horrify me, Trevor. I cried, what then
could have been in this letter to cause so dreadful
a result? Nothing there lies the inexplicable part of it.
The message was absurd and trivial. Ah, my god, it
is as I feared. As he spoke. We came round
the curve of the avenue and saw in the fading
light that every blind in the house had been drawn down.
As we dashed up to the door, my friend his
face convulsed with grief. A gentleman in black emerged from it.
When did it happen? Doctor asked Trevor. Almost immediately after
you left? Did he recover consciousness for an instant before
the end? Any message for me? Only that the papers
were in the back drawer of the Japanese cabinet. My
friend ascended with the doctor to the chamber of death,
while I remained in the study, turning the whole matter
over and over in my head, and feeling as somber
as ever I had done in my life. What was
the past of this Trevor, pugilist, traveler and gold digger?
And how had he placed himself in the power of
this acid faced seaman? Why too, should he faint at
an allusion to the half effaced initials upon his arm
and die of fright when he had a letter from Fordingham.
Then I remembered that Fordingham was in Hampshire, and that
this mister bed whom the seamen had gone to visit
and presumably to blackmail, had also been mentioned as living
in Hampshire. The letter then might either come from Hudson
the seaman, saying that he had betrayed the guilty secret
which appeared to exist, or it might come from Bedows
warning an old confederate that such a betrayal was imminent.
So far it seemed clear enough. But then how could
this letter be trivial and grotesque as described by the Sun.
He must have misread it. If so, it must have
been one of those ingenious secret codes which mean one
thing while they seemed to mean another. I must see
this letter if there were a hidden meaning in it.
I was confident that I could pluck it forth. For
an hour I sat pondering over it in the gloom,
until at last a weeping maid brought in a lamp,
and close at her heels came my friend Trevor, pale
but composed with these very papers which lie upon my
knee held in his grass. He sat down opposite to me,
drew the lamp to the edge of the table, and
handed me a short note scribbled as you see upon
a single sheet of gray paper. The supply of game
for London is going steadily up, it ran Headkeeper Hudson.
We believe has been now told to receive all orders
for fly paper and for preservation of your hen pheasant's life.
I dare say my face looked as bewildered as yours
did just now when first I read this message. Then
I re read it very carefully. It was evidently as
I had thought, and some secret meaning must lie buried
in this strange combination of words. Or could it be
that there was a prearranged significance to such phrases as
fly paper and hen pheasant. Such a meaning would be
arbitrary and could not be deduced in any way. And
yet I was loath to believe that this was the case,
and the presence of the word Hudson seemed to show
that the subject of the message was as I had guessed,
and that it was from Bedow's rather than the sailor.
I tried it backwards, but the combination life pheasant's hen
was not encouraging. Then I tried alternate words, but neither
thee or four nor supply game London promised to throw
any light upon it. And then in an instant the
key of the riddle was in my hands, and I
saw that every third word, beginning with the first, would
give a message which might well drive old Trevor to despair.
It was short and terse, the warning, as I now
read it to my companion. The game is up. Hudson
has told all fly for your life. Victor. Trevor sank
his face into his shaking hands. It must be that,
I suppose, said he, this is worse than death, for
it means disgrace as well. But what is the meaning
of these head keepers and hen pheasants. It means nothing
to the message, but it might mean a good deal
to us if we had no other means of discovering
the sender. You see that he has begun by writing
the game is and so on. Afterwards he had to
fulfill the prearranged cipher. To fill in any two words
in each space, he would naturally use the first words
which came to his mind. And if there were so
many which referred to sport among them, you may be
tolerably sure that he is either an ardent shot or
interested in breeding. Do you know anything of this, Beadows?
Why now that you mention it, said he, I remember
that my poor father used to have an invitation from
him to shoot over his preserves every autumn. Then it
is undoubtedly from him that the note comes, said I.
It only remains for us to find out what this
secret was which the sailor Hudson seems to have held
over the heads of these two wealthy and respected men.
Alas Holmes, I fear that it is one of sin
and shame, cried my friend. But from you I shall
have no secrets. Here is the statement which was drawn
up by my father, when he knew that the danger
from Hudson had become imminent. I found it in the
Japanese cabinet, as he told the doctor. Take it and
read it to me, for I have neither the strength
nor the courage to do it myself. These are the
very papers Watson which he handed to me, and I
will read them to you as I read them in
the Old Study that night to him. They are endorsed
outside as you see some particulars of the voyage of
the bark glorious Scott from her leaving Falmouth on the
eighth of October eighteen fifty five to her destruction in
north latitude fifteen degrees twenty west long twenty five degrees
fourteen on November sixth. It is in the form of
a letter and runs in this way, My dear dear son,
Now that approaching disgrace begins to darken the closing years
of my life, I can write with all truth and
honesty that it is not the terror of the law.
It is not the loss of my position in the county,
nor is it my fall in the eyes of all
who have known me, which cuts me to the heart.
But it is the thought that you should come to
blush for me, you who love me, and who have
seldom I hope, had reason to do other than respect me.
But if the blow falls, which is forever hanging over me,
then I should wish you to read this, that you
may know straight from me how far I have been
to blame. On the other hand, if all should go well,
which may kind God Almighty grant, then if by any
chance this paper should be still undestroyed and should fall
into your hands, I can djure you, by all you
hold sacred, by the memory of your dear mother, and
by the love which had been between us, to hurl
it into the fire, and to never give one thought
to it again. If then your eye goes on to
read this line, I know that I shall already have
been exposed and dragged from my home, or, as is
more likely, for you, know that my heart is weak
by lying, with my tongue sealed forever in death. In
either case, the time for suppression is past, and every
word which I tell you is the naked truth. And
this I swear, as I hope for mercy. My name,
dear lad is not Trevor. I was James Armitage in
my younger days, and you can understand now are the
shock that it was to me a few weeks ago
when your college friend addressed me in words which seemed
to imply that he had surprised my secret As Armitage.
It was that I entered a London banking house, and
as armitage, I was convicted of breaking my country's laws
and was sentenced to transportation. Do not think very harshly
of me, laddie. It was a debt of honor so called,
which I had to pay, and I used money which
was not my own to do it, in the certainty
that I could replace it before there could be any
possibility of its being missed. But the most dreadful ill
luck pursued me. The money which I had reckoned upon
never came to hand, and a premature examination of accounts
exposed my deficit. The case might have been dealt leniently with,
but the laws were more harshly administered thirty years ago
than now, And on my twenty third birthday I found
myself chained as a felon with thirty seven other convicts
in tween debts of the bark Glorious Scott bound for Australia.
It was the year fifty five, when the Crimean War
was at its height, and the old convict ships had
been largely used as transports in the Black Sea. The
government was compelled therefore to use smaller and less suitable
vessels for sending out their prisoners. The Glorious Scott had
been in the Chinese tea trade, but she was an
old fashioned, heavy bowed, broad beamed craft, and the new
clippers had cut her out. She was a five hundred
ton boat, and besides her thirty eight jail birds, she
carried twenty six of a crew eighteen soldiers, a captain,
three mates, a doctor, a chaplain, and four warders. Nearly
a hundred souls were in her all told. When we
set sail from Falmouth, the partitions between the cells of
the convicts, instead of being of thick oak, as is
usual in convict ships, were quite thin and frail. The
man next to me upon the aft side was one
whom I had particularly noticed when we were led down
the quay. He was a young man with a clear,
hairless face, a long, thin nose, and rather nutcracker jaws.
He carried his head very jauntily in the air, had
a swaggering style of walking, and was above all else
remarkable for his extraordinary height. I don't think any of
our heads would have come up to his shoulder, and
I am sure that he could not have measured less
than six and a half feet. It was strange, among
so many sad and weary faces to see one which
was full of energy and resolution. The sight of it
was to me like a fire in a snow storm.
I was glad then to find that he was my neighbor,
and gladder still when in the dead of night I
heard a whisper close to my ear and found that
he had managed to cut an opening in the board
which separated us. Hallo, chummy, said he, what's your name
and what are you here for? I answered him, and
asked in turn who I was talking with. I am
Jack Prendergast, said he, and by God, you'll learn to
bless my name before you've done with me. I remembered
hearing of his case, for it was one which had
made an immense sensation throughout the country some time before
my own arrest. He was a man of good family
and of great ability, but of incurably vicious habits, who had,
by an ingenious system of fraud, obtained huge sums of
money from the leading London merchants. Ha, ha, are you
remember my case, said he proudly, very well. Indeed, then
maybe you remember something queer about it? What was that? Then?
I'd had nearly a quarter of a million, hadn't I?
So it was said, but none was recovered. Eh? No, Well,
where do you suppose the balances? He asked, I've no idea,
said I. Right between my finger and thumb, he cried,
By god, I've got more pounds to my name than
you've had hairs on your head. And if you've money,
my son, and know how to handle it and spread it,
you can do anything. Now, you don't think it likely
that a man who could do anything is going to
wear his breeches out sitting in the stinking hole of
a rat gutted, beetle ridden, moldy old coffin of a
China coaster. No, sir, such a man will look after
himself and will look after his chums. You may lay
to that, you hold on to him, and you may
kiss the book that he'll haul you through. That was
his style of talk, And at first I thought it
meant nothing. But after a while, when he had tested
me and sworn me in with all possible solemnity. He
let me understand that there really was a plot to
gain command of the vessel. A dozen of the prisoners
had hatched it before they came aboard. Prendergast was the leader,
and his money was the motive power. I'd a partner,
said he a rare good man, as true as a
stop to a barrel. He's got the DIBs he has.
And where do you think he is at this moment?
Why he's the chaplain of this ship, the chaplain no less.
He came aboard with a black coat and his papers right,
and money enough in his box to buy the thing
right up from keel to main truck. The crew are
his body and soul. He could buy em at so
much a gross with a cash discount, and he did
it before ever they signed on. He's got two of
the warders, and Maria the second mate, and he'd get
the captain himself if he thought him worth it. What
are we to do? Then? I asked, what d'ye think?
Said he. We'll make the coats of some of these
soldiers redder than ever the tailor did. But they are armed,
said I, and so shall we be my boy. There's
a brace of pistols for every mother's son of us.
And if we can't carry this ship with the crew
at our back, it's time we were all sent to
a young missus boarding school. You speak to your mate
upon the left to night and see if he is
to be trusted. I did so, and found my other
neighbor to be a young fellow in much the same
position as myself, whose crime had been forgery. His name
was Evans, but he afterwards changed it like myself, and
he is now a rich and prosperous man in the
south of England. He was ready enough to join the
conspiracy as the only means of saving ourselves. And before
we had crossed the bay there were only two of
the prisoners who were not in the secret. One of
these was of weak mind, and we did not dare
to trust him, and the other was suffering from jaundice
and could not be of any use to us. From
the beginning, there was really nothing to prevent us from
taking possession of the ship. The crew were a set
of Ruffians specially picked for the job. The sham chaplain
came into our cells to exhort us, carrying a black
bag supposed to be full of tracts, and so often
did he come that by the third day we had
each stowed away at the foot of our beds a file,
a brace of pistols, a pound of powder, and twenty slugs.
Two of the warders were agents of Prendergast, and the
second mate was his right hand man, the captain. The
two mates, two warders, Lieutenant Martin, his eighteen soldiers, and
the doctor were all that we had against us. Yet,
safe as it was, we determined to neglect no precaution
and to make our attack suddenly by night. It came, however,
more quickly than we expected, and in this way, one evening,
about the third week after our start, the doctor had
come down to see one of the prisoners who was ill, and,
putting his hand down on the bottom of his bunk,
he felt the outline of the pistols. If he had
been silent, he might have blown the whole thing. But
he was a nervous little chap so he gave a
cry of surprise and turned so pale that the man
knew what was up in an instant and seized him.
He was gagged before he could give the alarm, and
tied down upon the bed. He had unlocked the door
that led to the deck, and we were through it
in a rush. The two sentries were shot down, so
was a corporal who came running to see what was
the matter. There were two more souls at the door
of the state room, and their muskets seemed not to
be loaded, for they never fired upon us, and they
were shot while trying to fix their bayonets. Then we
rushed on into the captain's cabin, but as we pushed
open the door, there was an explosion from within, and
there he lay with his brains smeared over the chart
of the Atlantic, which was pinned upon the table, while
the chaplain stood with a smoking pistol in his hand
at his elbow. The two mates had both been seized
by the crew, and the whole business seemed to be settled.
The stateroom was next to the cabin, and we flocked
in there and flopped down on the settees, all speaking together,
for we were just mad with the feeling that we
were free once more. There were lockers all round, and Wilson,
the sham chaplain, knocked one of them in and pulled
out a dozen of brown sherry. We cracked off the
necks of the bottles, poured the stuff out into tumblers,
and were just tossing them off, when in an instant,
without warning, there came the roar of muskets in our ears,
and the saloon was so full of smoke that we
couldn't see across the table. When it cleared again, the
place was a shambles. Wilson and eight others were wriggling
on the top of each other on the floor, and
the blood and the brown sherry on that table turned
me sick now when I think of it. We were
so cowed by the sight that I think we should
have given the job up if it had not been
for Prendigast. He bellowed like a bull and rushed for
the door, with all that were left alive at his heels.
Out we ran, and there on the poop were the
lieutenant and ten of his men. The swinging skylights above
the saloon table had been a bit open, and they
had fired on us through the slit. We got on
them before they could load, and they stood to it
like men. But we had the upper hand of them,
and in five minutes it was all over. My God,
was there ever a slaughter house like that ship. Prendigass
was like a raging devil, and he picked the soldiers
up as if they had been children, and threw them overboard,
alive or dead. There was one sergeant that was horribly wounded,
and yet kept on swimming for a surprising time, until
some one in mercy blew out his brains. When the
fighting was over, there was no one left of our
enemies except just the warders, the mates, and the doctor.
It was over them that the great quarrel arose. There
were many of us who were glad enough to win
back our freedom, and yet who had no wish to
have murder on our souls. It was one thing to
knock the soldiers over with their muskets in their hands,
and it was another to stand by while men were
being killed in cold blood. Eight of us, five convicts
and three sailors, said that we would not see it done.
But there was no moving Prendigast and those who were
with him. Our only chance of safety lay in making
a clean job of it, said he, And he would
not leave a tongue with powert of wag in a
witness box. It nearly came to our sharing the fate
of the prisoners. But at last he said that if
we wished, we might take a boat and go. We
jumped at the offer, for we were already sick of
these bloodthirsty doings, and we saw that there would be
worse before it was done. We were given a suit
of sailor togs each, a barrel of water, two casks,
one of junk and one of biscuits, and a compass.
Prendegas threw us over a chart, told us that we
were shipwrecked mariners whose ship had founded in latitude fifteen
degrees and long twenty five degrees west, and then cut
the painter and let us go. And now I come
to the most surprising part of my story, my dear son.
The seamen had hauled the four yard aback during the rising,
but now as we left them, they brought it square again.
And as there was a light wind from the north
and east, the bark began to draw slowly away from us.
Our boat lay rising and falling upon the long, smooth rollers,
and Evans and I, who were the most educated of
the party, were sitting in the sheets, working out our
position and planning what coast we should make, for it
was a nice question, for the Cape de Verdes were
about five hundred miles to the north of US, and
the African coast about seven hundred to the east. On
the whole, As the wind was coming round to the north,
we thought that Sierra Leone might be best, and turned
our head in that direction. The bark being at that
time nearly hulled down on our starboard quarter. Suddenly, as
we looked at her, we saw a dense black cloud
of smoke shoot up from her, which hung like a
monstrous tree upon the sky line. A few seconds later,
a roar like thunder burst upon our ears, and as
the smoke thinned away, there was no sign left of
the glorious scot. In an instant we swept the boat's
head round again and pulled with all our strength for
the place where the hayze, still trailing over the water
marked the scene of this catastrophe. It was a long
hour before we reached it, and at first we feared
that we had come too late to save any one.
A splintered boat and a number of crates and fragments
of spars rising and falling on the waves showed us
where the vessel had founded, but there was no sign
of life, and we had turned away in despair when
we heard a cry for help and saw at some
distance a piece of wreckage with a man lying stretched
across it. When we pulled him aboard the boat, he
proved to be a young seaman of the name of Hudson,
who was so burned and exhausted that he could give
us no account of what had happened until the following morning.
It seemed that after we had left, Prendergast and his
gang had proceeded to put to death the five remaining prisoners.
The two warders had been shot and thrown overboard, and
so also had the third mate. Prendergast then descended into
the tween decks and with his own hands, cut the
throat of the unfortunate surgeon. There only remained the first mate,
who was a bold and active man. When he saw
the convict approaching him with the bloody knife in his hand,
he kicked off his bonds, which he had somehow contrived
to loosen, and rushing down the deck, he plunged into
the after hold. A dozen convicts, who descended with their
pistols in search of him, found him with a match
box in his hand. Seated beside an open powder barrel,
which was one of a hundred carried on board, and
swearing that he would blow all hands up if he
were in any way molested. An instant later the explosion occurred,
though Hudson thought it was caused by the misdirected bullet
of one of the convicts rather than the mate's match.
Be the cause what it may, it was the end
of the glorious Scot and of the rabble who held
command of her. Such in a few words, my dear boy,
is the history of this terrible business in which I
was involved. Next day we were picked up by the
brig Hotsp, bound for Australia, whose captain found no difficulty
in believing that we were the survivors of a passenger
ship which had founded the transport ship. Gloria Scott was
set down by the Admiralty as being lost at sea,
and no word has ever leaked out as to her
true fate. After an excellent voyage, the Hotspur landed us
at Sydney, where Evans and I changed our names and
made our way to the Diggings, where among the crowds
who were gathered from all nations, we had no difficulty
in losing our former identities. The rest I need not relate.
We prospered, We traveled, We came back as rich colonials
to England, and we bought country estates. For more than
twenty years we have led peaceful and useful lives, and
we hoped that our past was forever buried imagined. Then
my feelings when in the seamen who came to us,
I recognized instantly the man who had been picked off
the wreck, tracked us down somehow, and had set himself
to live upon our fears. You will understand now how
it was that I strove to keep the peace with him,
and you will, in some measure sympathize with me in
the fears which fill me now that he has gone
from me to his other victim, with threats upon his tongue.
Underneath is written in a hand so shaky as to
be hardly legible. Beddo's writes in cipher to say, H
as told all, sweet Lord, have mercy on our souls.
That was the narrative which I read that night to
young Trevor, and I think Watson that under the circumstances
it was a dramatic one. The good fellow was heart
broken at it and went out to the Terai tea planting,
where I hear that he is doing well. As to
the Sailor and Bedos, neither of them was ever heard
of again after that day on which the letter of
warning was written. They both disappeared utterly and completely. No
complaint had been lodged with the police, so that Beddos
had mistaken a threat for a deed. Hudson had been
seen lurking about, and it was believed by the police
that he had done away with Bedows and had fled
for myself. I believe that the truth was exactly the opposite.
I think that it is most probable that Bedow's, pushed
to desperation, and believing himself to have been already betrayed,
had revenged himself upon Hudson and had fled from the
country with as much money as he could lay his
hands on. Those are the facts of the case, Doctor,
and if they are of any use to your collection,
I am sure that they are very heartily at your service.
End of the Glorious Scott