Bramble and his men, but his accusers did not hesitate to represent that
he was thus guilty, and several were prepared, Maud among the rest, to
swear to this charge. Indeed, Captain Bramble found that he had people
about him who would swear to anything, and he had little doubt in
proving so strong a case as to jeopardize even the life of his prisoner,
since many of his crew had died outright in the attack upon the "Sea
Witch," to say nothing of the seriously wounded. All that could
prejudice the court against the prisoner was duly paraded before the
eyes and ears of the individual members ere yet the case was brought
legally before them, and at last when Captain Ratlin was formally
brought into court, he was little less than condemned already in the
minds of nine-tenths of the marine court.

He was rather amazed to see and to hear the free way in which evidence
was given against him, corroborating statements which amounted to the
most unmitigated falsehoods, but above all to find Maud unblushingly
declare that she saw him in the fight, and that he shot with a pistol
one of the men whose name had been returned as among the dead, and that
he had wounded another. The girl avoided his eyes while she uttered her
well-fabricated story, but had she met the eyes of the young commander,
she would have seen more of pity there than of anger, more of surprise
than of reproach, even. But in the meantime, while these feelings were
moving him, the case was steadily progressing, and began to wear a most
serious aspect as it regarded the fate of Captain Will Ratlin.

There still remained one other witness to examine, whose illness had
kept him on board ship up to the last moment, and who it was said could
identify the prisoner as one of the party engaged in defending the deck
of the slaver. He was a servant of Captain Bramble's, had attended his
master in the attack, but having received a blow from a handspike upon