"I--I--I don't mean you any harm," gasped jovial Captain Robinson.

"Liar!" thundered Joe Deering; "you dare make that statement, hovering as you do, between life and death!"

"No, no, no, no!" shrieked the jovial captain; "not that, Joe, not that."

"Yes, I say; for you are not long for this world."

"You are not sent to tell me that, Joe," said Robinson, his voice dying away in spite of a desperate effort to make it audible.

"I am."

"Ugh!"

And with a half groan, half grunt, he sank upon the ground prostrate.

Before his senses had fairly fled, Joe Deering strode over to him, and delivered him a heavy kick behind.

This brought him round in a wonderful way.

He knew that it was a material foot that had given that kick, and the conviction was a marvellous relief to him.

He scrambled up.

As he got to his feet, Joe Deering fixed him by the throat, and shook him.

"You plotted to accomplish my murder," he said, "but now my turn's come, Robinson, and I mean to punish you."

Jovial Captain Robinson was a coward, an arrant cur, yet he infinitely preferred having to tackle flesh and blood, to battling with a ghost.

He turned upon his a.s.sailant.

But Deering was not to be denied.

Before the jovial captain could do any thing to help himself, Joe Deering hammered his face into a jelly.

Half dazed, stunned, and blinded, Robinson fought it out, and struggling fiercely, he shook himself free.

And then he fled like a beaten cur from the house.

Joe Deering did not attempt to follow him.

"There," he said, calmly enough, considering what had gone before, "that's done. Thank goodness it's off my mind. Mr. Murray must have my next attention."

He little thought that the wretched shipowner had already paid the penalty of his crimes.

Jovial Captain Robinson was never the same man again.

Whether it was the physical or the mental punishment he had had, we cannot possibly determine, but certain it is that something broke him up from that day, and he lingered on a miserable life of two years or more, and died in abject want.

CHAPTER C.

A DOSE OF PALM OIL.

Having settled the hash of jovial Captain Robinson, we now proceed to the pleasant task of measuring out justice to others.

Messieurs Murray and Chivey are the persons we mean.

Those gentlemen, having taken such excellent precautions to cut off young Jack Harkaway's communications with the outer world, fancied themselves tolerably safe.

Yet every now and then Murray's nerves were shaken as he thought of the vindictive Lenoir.

What had become of that dangerous individual?

The police had gone to the spot where Murray told them he had left the coiner senseless, and there they certainly found traces of a severe struggle, but Lenoir had disappeared.

The peasant also had done his duty as a French citizen by reporting the affair to the first gendarme he met on his road.

But though Ma.r.s.eilles was thoroughly searched, no trace of the man could be found, either in the town or the surrounding rural districts.

"There's one consolation, guv'nor," observed Chivey, "he won't dare show his ugly mug in Ma.r.s.eilles any more, so you're safe enough here."

"He's desperate enough for any thing."

"It's galleys for life if he's collared, and he knows it well enough."

"Galleys!--ugh!"

And Herbert Murray gave a convulsive shudder, in which he was sympathetically joined by Chivey.

"Ain't it 'orrid to see them poor devils chained to the oars, and the hoverseer a walkin' up and down with his whip, a-lashin' 'em?" said Chivey.

"'Tis, indeed."

Murray again paused and shuddered, but after a moment, he continued--

"But it would be jolly, though, to see Harkaway and his friends at it."

"Crikey! and wouldn't I jest like to see that old beast of a Mole pulling away on his stumps. D'ye think they'll all get it?" asked Chivey.

"Yes, unless they manage to communicate with their friends or the consul."

"Then I had better just stroll up and see if our old pal the gaoler has stopped any more letters."