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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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Support the Monkey! Tell All your Friends and Teachers |
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60 malice between us. I never bore malice against the Master-at-arms. I am sorry that he is dead. I did not mean to kill him. Could I have used my tongue I would not have struck him. But he foully lied to my face and in presence of my Captain, and I had to say something, and I could only say it with a blow, God help me!” In the impulsive above-board manner of the frank one, the court saw confirmed all that was implied in words that just previously had perplexed them, coming as they did from the testifier to the tragedy and promptly following Billy’s impassioned disclaimer of mutinous intent-Captain Vere’s words, “I believe you, my man.” Next it was asked of him whether he knew of or suspected aught savoring of incipient trouble (meaning mutiny, tho’ the explicit term was avoided) going on in any section of the ship’s company. The reply lingered. This was naturally imputed by the court to the same vocal embarrassment which had retarded or obstructed previous answers. But in main it was otherwise here; the question immediately recalling to Billy’s mind the interview with the afterguardsman in the fore-chains. But an innate repugnance to playing a part at all approaching that of an informer against one’s own shipmatesthe same erring sense of uninstructed honor which had stood in the way of his reporting the matter at the time though as a loyal man-of-war-man it was incumbent on him, and failure so to do if charged against him and proven, would have subjected him to the heaviest of penalties; this, with the blind feeling now his, that nothing really was being hatched, prevailed with him. When the answer came it was a negative. “One question more,” said the officer of marines now first speaking and with a troubled earnestness. “You tell us that what the Master-at-arms said against you was a lie. Now why should he have so lied, so maliciously lied, since you declare there was no malice between you?” At that question unintentionally touching on a spiritual sphere wholly obscure to Billy’s thoughts, he was nonplussed, evincing a confusion indeed that some ob- servers, such as can readily be imagined, would have construed into involuntary evidence of hidden guilt. Nevertheless he strove some way to answer, but all at once relinquished the vain endeavor, at the same time turning an appealing glance towards Captain Vere as deeming him his best helper and friend. Captain Vere who had been seated for a time rose to his feet, addressing the interrogator. “The question you put to him comes naturally enough. But how can he rightly answer it? or anybody else? unless indeed it be he who lies within there,” designating the compartment where lay the corpse. “But the prone one there will |
