Page 101 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

‘Be easy, sir,’ says old Pine; ‘I am acting for the best; upon
my soul I am. You don’t know what convicts are, or rather
what the law has made ‘em—yet—‘
‘Poor wretches!’ says Vickers, who, like many martinets,
was in reality tender-hearted. ‘Kindness might do much for
them. After all, they are our fellow-creatures.’
‘Yes,’ returned the other, ‘they are. But if you use that ar-
gument to them when they have taken the vessel, it won’t
avail you much. Let me manage, sir; and for God’s sake, say
nothing to anybody. Our lives may hang upon a word.’
Vickers promised, and kept his promise so far as to chat
cheerily with Blunt and Frere at dinner, only writing a brief
note to his wife to tell her that, whatever she heard, she was
not to stir from her cabin until he came to her; he knew that,
with all his wife’s folly, she would obey unhesitatingly, when
he couched an order in such terms.
According to the usual custom on board convict ships,
the guards relieved each other every two hours, and at six
p.m. the poop guard was removed to the quarter-deck, and
the arms which, in the daytime, were disposed on the top
of the arm-chest, were placed in an arm-rack constructed
on the quarter-deck for that purpose. Trusting nothing to
Frere—who, indeed, by Pine’s advice, was, as we have seen,
kept in ignorance of the whole matter—Vickers ordered all
the men, save those who had been on guard during the day,
to be under arms in the barrack, forbade communication
with the upper deck, and placed as sentry at the barrack
door his own servant, an old soldier, on whose fidelity he
could thoroughly rely. He then doubled the guards, took

100 For the Term of His Natural Life