When I reached the top, there was a sort of undignified scuffle, and in the end I found myself standing above a ghastly white gentleman who, from a sitting posture, was gasping out, “I’ll commit you! … I swear I’ll commit you! …” I helped him to his feet rather apologetically, while the admiral behind me was asking insistently who the deuce I was. The man I had picked up retreated a little, and then turned back to look at me. The light was shining on my face, and he began to call out, “I know him. I know him perfectly well. He’s John Kemp. I’ll commit him at once. The papers are in the barouche.” After that he seemed to take it into his head that I was going to assault him again. He bolted out of sight, and I was left facing the admiral. He stared at me contemptuously. I was streaming with perspiration and upbraiding him for assaulting a cripple.
The admiral said, “Oh, that’s what you think? I will settle with you presently. This is rank mutiny.” I looked at Oldham, who was the admiral’s secretary. He was extremely dishevelled about his neck, much as if a monkey had been clawing him thereabouts. Half of his roll collar flapped on his heaving chest; his stock hung down behind like a cue. I had seen him kneeling on the ground with his head pinned down by the hunchback. I said loftily:
“What did you set him on a little beggar like that for? You were three to one. What did you expect?”
The admiral swore. Oldham began to mop with a lace handkerchief at a damaged upper lip from which a stream of blood was running; he even seemed to be weeping a little. Finally, he vanished in at the door, very much bent together. The undaunted David hopped in after him coolly.
The admiral said, “I know your kind. You’re a treasonous dog, sir. This is mutiny. You shall be made an example of.”
All the same he must have been ashamed of himself, for presently he and the two others went down the steps without even looking at me, and their carriage rolled away.
Inside the inn I found a couple of merchant captains, one asleep with his head on the table and little rings shining in his great red ears; the other very spick and span—of what they called the new school then. His name was Williams—Captain Williams of the Lion, which he part owned; a man of some note for the dinners he gave on board his ship. His eyes sparkled blue and very round in a round rosy face, and he clawed effusively at my arm.
“Well done!” he bubbled over. “You gave it them; strike me, you did! It did me good to see and hear. I wasn’t going to poke my nose in, not I. But I admire you, my boy.”
He was a quite guileless man with a strong dislike for the admiral’s blundering—a dislike that all the seamen shared—and for people of the Topnambo kidney who affected to be above his dinners. He assured me that I had burst upon those gentry roaring … “like the Bull of Bashan. You should have seen!” and he drank my health in a glass of punch.
David Macdonald joined us, looming through wreaths of tobacco smoke. He was always very nice in his dress, and had washed himself into a state of enviable coolness.
“They won’t touch me now,” he said. “I wanted that assault and battery. …” He suddenly turned vivid, sarcastic black eyes upon me. “But you,” he said—“my dear Kemp! You’re in a devil of a scrape! They’ll have a warrant out against you under the Black Act. I know the gentry.”
“Oh, he won’t mind,” Williams struck in, “I know him; he’s a trump. Afraid of nothing.”
David Macdonald made a movement of his head that did duty for an ominous shake:
“It’s a devil of a mess,” he said. “But I’ll touch them up. Why did you hit Topnambo? He’s the spitefullest beast in the island. They’ll make it out high treason. They are capable of sending you home on this charge.”
“Oh, never say die.” Williams turned to me, “Come and dine with me on board at Kingston tomorrow night. If there’s any fuss I’ll see what I can do. Or you can take a trip with me to Havana till it blows over. My old woman’s on board.” His face fell. “But there, you’ll get round her. I’ll see you through.”
They drank some sangaree and became noisy. I wasn’t very happy; there was much truth in what David Macdonald had said. Topnambo would certainly do his best to have me in jail—to make an example of me as a Separationist to please the admiral and the Duke of Manchester. Under the spell of his liquor Williams became more and more pressing with his offers of help.
“It’s the devil that my missus should be on board, just this trip. But hang it! come and dine with me. I’ll get some of the Kingston men—the regular hot men—to stand up for you. They will when they hear the tale.”
There was a certain amount of sense in what he said. If warrants were out against me, he or some of the Kingston merchants whom he knew, and who had no cause to love the admiral, might help me a good deal.
Accordingly, I did go down to Kingston. It happened to be the day when the seven pirates were hanged at Port Royal Point. I had never seen a hanging, and a man who hadn’t was rare in those days. I wanted to keep out of the way, but it was impossible to get a boatman to row me off to the Lion. They were all
