Immediately on gaining the deck he gave orders to haul the chain of the anchor short, to shake out the sails, and to make other preparations to avail himself without delay of the light breeze off the land which his knowledge of the weather and the locality taught him to look for before morning.
While his orders were being executed, a boat came alongside with that part of the crew which had been sent ashore by Gascoyne to escape the eye of the British commander. It was in charge of the second mate,--a short, but thick-set, and extremely powerful man, of the name of Scraggs,--who walked up to his superior the moment he came on board, and, in a tone somewhat disrespectful, asked what was going to be done.
"Don't you see?" growled Manton; "we're getting ready to sail."
"Of course I see that," retorted Scraggs, between whom and his superior officer there existed a feeling of jealousy as well as of mutual antipathy, for reasons which will be seen hereafter; "but I should like to know where we are going, and why we are going anywhere without the captain. I suppose I am entitled to ask that much."
"It's your business to obey orders," said Manton, angrily.
"Not if they are in opposition to the captain's orders," replied Scraggs, firmly, but in a more respectful tone; for in proportion as he became more mutinous, he felt that he could afford to become more deferential. "The captain's last orders to you were to remain where you are; I heard him give them, and I do not feel it my duty to disobey him at _your_ bidding. You'll find, too, that the crew are of my way of thinking."
Manton's face flushed crimson, and, for a moment, he felt inclined to seize a handspike and fell the refractory second mate therewith; but the looks of a few of the men who were standing by and had overheard the conversation convinced him that a violent course of procedure would do him injury. Swallowing his passion, therefore, as he best could, he said:
"Come, Mr. Scraggs, I did not expect that _you_ would set a mutinous example to the men; and if it were not that you do so out of respect for the supposed orders of the captain, I would put you in irons at once."
Scraggs smiled sarcastically at this threat, but made no reply, and the mate continued: