Blackbeard: Buccaneer Part 3

"The _Plymouth Adventure_," replied Jack. "It would ruin my uncle's temper beyond all mending to be taken by pirates."

"I pledge you my word," swore Stede Bonnet. "Moreover, if trouble befall you by sea or land, Master c.o.c.krell, I pray you send me tidings and you will have a friend in need."

That night those who dwelt near the harbor heard the clank of a windla.s.s as the crew of the _Royal James_ hove the cable short, and the melodious, deep-throated refrain of a farewell chantey floated across the quiet water. With the flood of the tide and a landward breeze, the brig stole out across the bar while the topsails were sheeted home. When daylight dawned, she had vanished in the empty reaches of the Atlantic.

The brig sailed without Jack c.o.c.krell. His shrewd uncle saw to that. It was not by accident that a constable of the town watch loitered in the lane by the Secretary's house. And Uncle Peter himself was careful not to let the lad out of his sight until the beguiling Stede Bonnet had left his haunts in Charles Town. Life resumed its routine next day but the boy's whole current of thought had been changed. He was restless, craving some fresh excitement and hoping that more pirates might come roaring to the tavern green.

He found welcome diversion when the _Plymouth Adventure_, merchant trader, arrived from London after a famous pa.s.sage of thirty-two days to the westward. Her master's orders were to make quick dispatch and return with freight and pa.s.sengers direct from Charles Town. Jack was given no more leisure to brood over his own misfortunes. There were many errands to be done for Mr. Peter Forbes, besides the chests and boxes to be packed and stoutly corded. As was the custom, they had to supply their own furniture for the cabin in the ship and Jack c.o.c.krell enjoyed the frequent trips aboard.

He found much to interest him in the sedate, bearded Captain Jonathan Wellsby of the _Plymouth Adventure_, in the crew of hearty British tars who feared neither man nor devil, in the battery of nine-pounders, the stands of boarding-pikes, and the triced hammock nettings to protect the vessel against hand-to-hand encounters with pirates. The voyage might be worth while, after all. There were to be a dozen of pa.s.sengers, several ladies among them. The most distinguished was Mr. Peter Arbuthnot Forbes, Secretary of the Provincial Council, who was accorded the greatest respect and given the largest cabin.

It was an important event when the _Plymouth Adventure_ hoisted all her bunting on sailing day and Charles Town flocked to the harbor with wistful envy of the lucky people who were bound home to old England.

There were sad faces among those left behind to endure the perils, hardships and loneliness of pioneers. Jack c.o.c.krell's heart beat high when he saw sweet Dorothy Stuart in the throng. He tarried ash.o.r.e with her until the boatswain's pipe trilled from the _Plymouth Adventure_ to summon the pa.s.sengers on board. Colonel Stuart, blonde and bronzed and stalwart, escorted his winsome daughter and he praised Jack for his deed of courage, telling him:

"There will soon be fewer pirates for you to trounce, I hope, my lad."

"The town will be a stupid place without a visit from the jolly rovers now and then," honestly replied Jack, at which Colonel Stuart laughed and his daughter suggested:

"With my brave knight in distant England, deliver me from any more pirates."

Jack blushed and was both happy and sad when the dear maid took a flower from her bodice and gave it to him as a token of remembrance. He solemnly tucked it away in a pocket, stammered his farewells, and went to join his uncle who waited in the yawl at the wharf. Once on board the _Plymouth Adventure_, they were swept into a bustle and confusion.

Captain Jonathan Wellsby was in haste to catch a fair wind and make his offing before nightfall. His sailors ran to and fro, jumping at the word, active and cheery. Stately and slow, the high-p.o.o.ped merchant trader filled away on the larboard tack and pointed her lofty bowsprit seaward.

The watches were set, ropes coiled down, and the tackles of the cannon overhauled. The skipper paced the after-deck, a long telescope under his arm, while the pa.s.sengers lined the rail and gazed at the rude settlement that was slowly dropping below the horizon. The sea was tranquil and the breeze steady. The ship was clothed in canvas which bellied to drive her eastward with a frothing wake. Safely she left the outer bar astern and wallowed in the ocean swell.

The afternoon sun was sinking when a sail gleamed like a bit of cloud against the southerly sky. Captain Wellsby held to his course and showed no uneasiness. Soon another sail became visible and then a third, these two smaller than the first. They might be honest merchantmen steering in company, but the skipper consulted with his mates and the spy-gla.s.s pa.s.sed from hand to hand. The pa.s.sengers were at supper in the cuddy and their talk and laughter came through the open skylights.

Presently the boatswain piped the crew to quarters and the men moved quietly to their battle stations, opening the gun-ports and casting loose the lashings. The boys fetched paper cartridges of powder in buckets from the magazine and the gunners lighted the matches of tow.

Cutla.s.ses were buckled on and the pikes were scattered along the bulwarks ready to be s.n.a.t.c.hed up.

It was impossible to escape these three strange vessels by beating back to Charles Town, for the _Plymouth Adventure_ made lubberly work of it when thrashing to windward. She was a swift ship, however, before a fair wind, and Captain Wellsby resolved to run for it, hoping to edge away from danger if his suspicions should be confirmed.

Before sunset the largest of the strange sail shifted her course as though to set out in chase and overhaul the deep-laden merchant trader.

Captain Wellsby stood near the tiller, his hands clasped behind him, a solid, dependable figure of a British mariner. The pa.s.sengers were crowding around him in distressful agitation but he calmly a.s.sured them a stern chase was a long chase and he expected to slip away under cover of night. So far as he was aware, no pirates, excepting Stede Bonnet, had been recently reported in these waters.

Here Mr. Peter Forbes broke in to say that the _Plymouth Adventure_ had naught to fear from Captain Bonnet who had pledged his word to let her sail unmolested. Other pa.s.sengers scoffed at the absurd notion of trusting a pirate's oath, but the pompous Secretary of the Council could not be cried down. He was a canny critic of human nature and he knew an honorable pirate when he met him.

It was odd, but in a pinch like this the dapper, finicky Councilor Peter Arbuthnot Forbes displayed an unshaken courage as became a gentleman of his position, while young Jack c.o.c.krell had suddenly changed his opinion of the fascinating trade of piracy. He had not the slightest desire to investigate it at any closer range. His knees were inclined to wobble and his stomach felt qualms. His uncle twitted him as a braggart ash.o.r.e who sang a different tune afloat. The lad's grin was feeble as he retorted that he took his pirates one at a time.

The largest vessel of the pursuit came up at a tremendous pace, reeling beneath an extraordinary spread of canvas, her spray-swept hull disclosing an armament of thirty guns, the decks swarming with men. She was no merchant ship, this was already clear, but there was still the hope that she might be a man-of-war or a privateer. Captain Wellsby looked in vain for her colors. At length he saw a flag whip from the spanker gaff. He laid down the gla.s.s with a profound sigh.

The flag was black with a sinister device, a white blotch whose outline suggested a human skull.

Captain Wellsby gazed again and carefully examined the two sloops which were acting in concert with the thirty-gun ship. It was a squadron, and the brave _Plymouth Adventure_ was hopelessly outmatched. To fight meant a slaughter with never a chance of survival.

The pa.s.sengers had made no great clamor until the menacing ship drew close enough for them to descry the dreadful pennant which showed as a sable blot against the evening sky. Two women fainted and others were seized with violent hysteria. Their shrill screams were so distressing that the skipper ordered them to be lugged below and shut in their cabins. Mr. Peter Forbes had plumped himself down upon a coil of hawser, as if utterly disgusted, but he implored the captain to blaze away at the besotted scoundrels as long as two planks held together. The Honorable Secretary of the Council had been too outspoken in his opinions of pirates to expect kindness at their hands.

The sailors also expected no quarter but they sullenly crouched at the gun-carriages, gripping the handspikes and blowing the matches while they waited for the word. The pirate ship was now reaching to windward of the _Plymouth Adventure_, heeling over until her decks were in full view. Upon the p.o.o.p stood a man of the most singular appearance. He was squat and burly and immensely broad across the shoulders. What made him grotesque was a growth of beard which swept almost to his waist and covered his face like a hairy curtain. In it were tied bright streamers of crimson ribbon. Evidently this fantastic monster was proud of his whiskers and liked to adorn them.

The laced hat with a feather in it, the skirted coat of buff and blue which flapped around his bow-legs, and the rows of gold b.u.t.tons across his chest were in slovenly imitation of a naval uniform. But there was nothing like naval discipline on those crowded decks where half the crew appeared to be drunk and the rest of them cursing each other.

Captain Jonathan Wellsby smothered a groan and his stern mouth twitched as he said to his chief mate:

"G.o.d's mercy on us! 'Tis none other than the b.l.o.o.d.y Edward Teach,--that calls himself Blackbeard! My information was that he still cruised off the Spanish Main and refitted his ships in the Bay of Honduras."

"The madman of the sea," said the stolid mate. "A bad day for us when he sailed to the north'ard. He kills for the pleasure of it. Now Stede Bonnet loots such stuff as takes his fancy and----"

"He loves to fight a king's ship for the sport of it," broke in the skipper, "but this murderer---- An unlucky voyage for the old _Plymouth Adventure_ and all hands, Mate."

One of the women who had been suffered to remain on deck was close enough to overhear the direful news. Her hands to heaven, she wailed:

"Blackbeard! Oh, my soul, we are as good as dead, or worse. Fight and sink him, dear captain. What shall I do? What shall I do? If I had only minded the dream I had the night before we sailed----"

Jack c.o.c.krell sat down beside his uncle, a limp and sorry youth for one who had offered to slay a six-foot pirate before breakfast to please a pretty maid. With a sickly grin he murmured:

"This c.o.c.kerel crowed too loud, Uncle Peter. Methinks I share your distaste for piracy."

CHAPTER III

HELD AS HOSTAGES TO BLACKBEARD

TO discover the pestilent Blackbeard in Carolina waters was like a thunderbolt from a clear sky. Captain Wellsby had felt confident that he could beat off the ordinary pirate craft which was apt to be smaller than his own stout ship. And most of these unsavory gentry were mere salt-water burglars who had little taste for hard fighting. The master of the _Plymouth Adventure_, so pious and sedate, was a brave man to whom the thought of surrender was intolerable. From what he knew of Blackbeard, it was useless to try to parley for the lives of his pa.s.sengers. Better it was to answer with double-shotted guns than to beg for mercy.

The British tars, stripped to the waist, turned anxious eyes to the skipper upon the quarter-deck while they quaffed pannikins of rum and water and cracked many a rough jest. They fancied death no more than other men, but seafaring was a perilous trade and they were toughened to its hazards. They were facing hopeless odds but let the master shout the command and they would send the souls of some of these pirates sizzling down to h.e.l.l before the _Plymouth Adventure_ sank, a splintered hulk, in the smoke of her own gunpowder.

Captain Wellsby delayed his decision a moment longer. Something most unusual had attracted his attention. A ball of smoke puffed from a port of Blackbeard's ship, but the round shot splashed beyond the bowsprit of the _Plymouth Adventure_ instead of thudding into her oaken side. This was a signal to heave to. It was a courtesy both unexpected and perplexing, because Blackbeard's habit was to let fly with all the guns that could bear as the summons to submit. Presently a dingy bit of cloth fluttered just beneath the black flag. It looked like the remains of a pirate's shirt which had once been white.

"A signal for a truce?" muttered Captain Wellsby. "A ruse, mayhap, but the rogue has no need to resort to trickery."

The two sloops of Blackbeard's squadron, spreading tall, square topsails, came driving down to windward in readiness to fire their bow-chasers and form in line of battle. The pa.s.sengers of the _Plymouth Adventure_, s.n.a.t.c.hing at the chance of safety, implored the skipper to send his men away from the guns lest a rash shot might be their ruin.

They prayed him to respect the precious flag of truce and to ascertain the meaning of it. Mystified and wavering in his purpose, he told the mates to back the main-yard and heave the ship to.

Upon his own deck Blackbeard was stamping to and fro, bellowing at his crew while he flourished a broadsword by way of emphasis. The hapless company of the _Plymouth Adventure_ shivered at the very sight of him and yet there was something almost ludicrous in the antics of this atrocious pirate, as though he were play-acting upon the stage of a theatre. He had tucked up the tails of his military coat because the wind whipped them about his bandy legs and made him stumble. The flowing whiskers also proved bothersome, wherefore he looped them back over his ears by means of the bows of crimson ribbon. This seemed to be his personal fashion of clearing for action.

"There be pirates and pirates," critically observed Mr. Peter Forbes as he stared at the unpleasant Blackbeard. "This is a filthy beast, Jack, and he was badly brought up. He has no manners whatever."

"Parson Throckmorton would take him for the devil himself," gloomily answered the lad.

And now they saw Blackbeard raise a speaking-trumpet to his lips and heard the hoa.r.s.e voice come down the wind with this message:

"The ship ahoy! Steady as ye be, blast your eyes, or I'll lay aboard and butcher all hands."

He turned and yelled commands to the two sloops which now rolled within pistol-shot. In helter-skelter style but with great speed, one boat after another was lowered away and filled with armed pirates. They rowed toward the _Plymouth Adventure_ and there were enough of them to carry her by boarding. In addition to this, she was directly under the guns of Blackbeard's powerful ship. One valorous young gentleman pa.s.senger whipped out a rapier and swore to perish with his face to the foe, but Captain Wellsby kicked him into the cabin and fastened the scuttle. This was no time for dramatics.

"It looks that the old ruffian comes on a peaceful errand," said the skipper, by way of comfort. But the hysterical ladies below decks redoubled their screams and one substantial merchant of Charles Town scrambled down to hide himself among them. Mr. Peter Arbuthnot Forbes folded his arms and there was no sign of weakness in his pink countenance. His dignity still sustained him.