A Roving Commission by G. A. Henty

Author:G. A. Henty
Language: eng
Format: epub

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CHAPTER XII

A RESCUE

The Arrow was one morning lying at anchor in a small bay on the south coast, when one of the sailors called Nat's attention to a boy who had run down and was wildly waving his arms. Nat caught up his telescope.

"It may be a white boy," he said. "Lower the gig! I will go myself in her. Quick! he may be pursued."

It took but a very short time to cross the quarter of a mile of water. The lad rushed in up to his chin to meet them, and was quickly hauled into the boat. His hands and face had been blackened, but this had so worn off that he merely presented the appearance of a sooty-faced white boy. He burst into a fit of convulsive sobbing as he found himself among friends. Nat saw that it was useless to question him at the moment, so he told the men to row back at once to the schooner; then he half-carried him down to his own cabin, brought out a glass of wine, and gave it to him.

"Drink that up, lad," he said, "then you can tell me something about yourself." The boy put the glass with shaking hands to his lips and drank it down.

"That is right, lad; now tell me something about yourself. What is your name?"

"I am a girl, monsieur; my name is Louise Pickard. We have been hiding in the forest for six weeks--my father and mother, my sister, and ten Frenchmen, who worked for us. We lived on fruit and what provisions the men could obtain by going down to the plantations at night. Two days ago the negroes found us; they killed one of the men at once, and the rest of us they took. My sister and I were dressed as boys. They were going to kill us one by one; they burnt one of the men to death yesterday, and tied us to trees round and made us look on. This morning they killed another; they cut off his arms at the elbows and his legs at the knees, and then cut him about with knives till he died. Then they shut us up together again. There was a little window, and my father pushed me through it. He had heard the negroes say that there was a vessel in the bay with white men in it. The hole was in the back of the house, and there were trees there, so that I managed to get off without being seen by the negroes. My father tried to get Valerie through the same window, but she was too big. She is two years older than I am, and I could not have squeezed through had not my father pushed me. He told me to come down to the shore and take refuge with you."

"How many of these black scoundrels are there?" Nat asked.

[Illustration: THE RESCUE OF LOUISE PICKARD.]

"Two or three hundred. The negroes are going to attack you to-night--there are some fishermen's boats at a village a mile or two along the shore.

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