By Conduct and Courage Part 19

"That is good," Will said to Dimchurch; "it shows that she doesn't carry a long-tom. I thought she didn't, but they might have hidden it, as we have done. Don't answer them yet; I don't want to fire till we get within half a mile of her; then they shall have it as hot as they like."

The schooner continued to gain slowly, occasionally firing her bow-chasers. When she had come up to within a mile of _L'Agile_ the cutter was yawed and two broadside guns fired; they were purposely aimed somewhat wide, as Will was anxious that the pirates should not suspect the weight of his metal, and did not wish, by inflicting some small injury, to deter her from continuing the chase. The schooner evidently depended upon the vastly superior strength of her crew to carry the cutter by boarding, and so abstained from attempting to injure her, as the less damage she suffered the better value she would be as a prize.

"They are not more than half a mile off now, I think, sir," Dimchurch said at last.

"Very well then, we will let her have it."

The gun was already loaded, so Dimchurch took a steady aim and applied the match. All leapt upon the bulwarks to see the effect of the shot, and a cheer broke from the crew as it struck the schooner on the bow, about four feet above the water. In return the schooner yawed so as to bring her whole broadside to bear on the cutter, and six tongues of flame flashed from her side. At the same moment _L'Agile_ swung round and fired her two starboard guns. Both ships immediately resumed their former positions, and as they did so Dimchurch fired again, his shot scattering a shower of splinters from almost the same spot as the other had struck.

"You must elevate your gun a little more, Dimchurch," said Will, "and bring a mast about their ears. Get that sail on board!" he shouted; "I don't want the schooner to get any nearer."

The order was executed, and the difference in the speed of the cutter was at once manifest. Again and again Dimchurch fired. Several of the shot went through the schooner's foresail, but as yet her masts were untouched.

"A little more to the right, Dimchurch."

This time the sailor was longer than usual in taking aim, but when he fired the schooner's foremast was seen to topple over, and her head flew up into the wind, thus presenting her stern to the cutter.

"She is a lame duck now," Will said, "but we may as well take her mainmast out of her too. Fire away, and take as good aim as you did last time."

Ten more shots were fired, and with the last the pirate's mainmast went over the side.

"Well done, Dimchurch! Now we have her at our mercy. We will sail backwards and forwards under her stern and rake her with grape. I don't want to injure her more than is necessary, but I do want to kill as many of the crew as possible; it is better for them to die that way than to be taken to Jamaica to be hanged."

For an hour the cutter kept at work crossing and recrossing her antagonist's stern, and each time she poured in a volley from two broadside guns and the long-tom. The stern of the schooner was knocked almost to pieces, and the grape-shot carried death along her decks.

"I am only afraid that they will blow her up," Will said; "but probably, as they have not done so already, her captain and most of her officers are killed, for it would require a desperado to undertake that job."

At last the black flag was hoisted on a spar at the stern, and then lowered again. When they saw this the crew of _L'Agile_ stopped firing, and sent up cheer after cheer.

"Now we must be careful, sir," Dimchurch said; "those scoundrels are quite capable of pretending to surrender, and then, when we board her, blowing their ship and us into the air."

"You are right, Dimchurch. They might very well do that, for they must know well enough that they can expect no mercy."

Bringing the cutter to within a hundred yards of the schooner, Will shouted:

"Have you a boat that can swim?" and receiving a reply in the negative, shouted back: "Very well, then, I will drop one to you."

He then placed the cutter exactly to windward of the schooner, and, lowering one of the boats, to which a rope was attached, let it drift down to the prize.

"Now," he shouted, "fasten a hawser to that boat; the largest you have."

There was evidently some discussion among the few men gathered on the deck of the pirate, and, seeing that they hesitated, Will shouted:

"Do as you are ordered, or I will open fire again."

This decided the pirates, and in a short time the end of a hawser was tied to one of the thwarts of the boat. The boat was then hauled back to _L'Agile_, and when the cable was got on board it was knotted to their own strongest hawser.

"That will keep them a good bit astern," Will said; "otherwise, if the wind were to drop at night, they might haul their own vessel up to us, and carry out their plan of blowing us up."

"It is wise to take every precaution, sir," Harman said; "but I don't think any trick of that sort would be likely to succeed. You may be sure we should keep too sharp a watch on them."

While the hawsers were being spliced, Will shouted to the pirates to cut away the wreckage from their ship, and when this was done he started with his prize in tow. As soon as they were fairly under weigh he hailed the prisoners through his speaking-trumpet and questioned them about their casualties. They replied that at the beginning of the engagement they had had one hundred and twenty men on board. The captain had been killed by the first volley of grape, and the slaughter among the crew had been terrible, all the officers being killed and eighty of the men. The remainder had run down into the hold, and remained there until, after a consultation, one of them crawled up on deck and hoisted and lowered the black flag.

"I suppose," Will said, "your intention was to blow the ship and yourselves and us into the air as soon as we came on board."

"That is just what we did mean," one of them shouted savagely; "if we could but have paid you out we would not have minded what became of ourselves."

"It is well, indeed, Dimchurch, that you suggested the possibility of their doing this to us. But for that we should certainly have lost nearly all our number, for, not knowing how many of the crew survived, I could not have ventured to go on board without pretty nearly every man. It will be a lesson to me in future, when I am fighting pirates, to act as if they were wild beasts."

"Well, sir, I don't know that they are altogether to be blamed; it is only human nature to pay back a blow for a blow, and with savages like these, especially when they know that they are bound to be hanged, you could hardly expect anything else."

"I suppose not, Dimchurch, and certainly for myself I would rather be blown up than hanged. I suppose the reason why they did not blow up the ship when they found their plan had failed was that they clung to life even for a few days."

"I expect it is that, sir; besides, you know, each man may think that although no doubt the rest will be hanged, he himself may get off."

"Yes, I dare say that has something to do with it," Will agreed. "I don't think it likely, however, that any one of them will be spared after that affair of the _Northumberland_, and very probably that was only one of a dozen ships destroyed in the same way.

"Now, Harman, we will put her head round and sail back."

"Sail back, sir?"

"Certainly; I think there is no doubt that that inlet is the pirates'

head-quarters, and that they are certain to have storehouses there choke-full of plunder. Some of their a.s.sociates will in that case be on sh.o.r.e looking after it, and if their ship doesn't return they will divide the most valuable portion of these stores among themselves, and set fire to all the rest. We have done extremely well so far, but another big haul will make matters all the pleasanter."

"But what will you do with the prize?" asked Harman.

"I will cast her off eight or ten miles from the sh.o.r.e; they have no boats, and the schooner is a mere log on the water. When we see what plunder they have collected I shall be able to decide how to act. The cutter can hold a great deal, but if we find more than she can carry we must load the schooner also."

"But what would you do with the pirates in that case, sir?"

"I should try to make them come off in batches, and then iron them; but if they would not do that, I should be inclined to tow the schooner to within half a mile of the sh.o.r.e, and so give all that could swim the chance of getting away. Those of them that are unable to do so would probably manage to get off on spars or hatchways. They have been richly punished already, and I fancy the admiral would be much better pleased to see the schooner come in loaded with valuable plunder than if she carried only forty scoundrels to be handed over to the hangman."

"But if we were to let them escape we should have to take great care on sh.o.r.e while we were rifling the storehouse."

"You may be sure that I should do that, Harman. The fellows could certainly take no firearms on sh.o.r.e, and I should keep ten men with loaded muskets always on guard, while those who are at work would have their firearms handy to them."

They towed the schooner to within seven or eight miles of the sh.o.r.e, and then cast her off and made for the creek from which the pirates had come out. As they entered the inlet, which was two miles long, they could see no signs of houses, so they sailed as far as they could and anch.o.r.ed. Will then landed with a party of ten well-armed men, and at once began to make a careful examination of the beach. In a short time they found a well-beaten path going up through the wood. Before following this, however, Will took the precaution to have fifteen more men sent ash.o.r.e, as it was, of course, impossible to say how many of a guard had been left at the head-quarters. When the second party had landed, all advanced cautiously up the path, holding their muskets in readiness for instant action. They met, however, with no opposition; the pirates were evidently unaware of their presence. They had gone but a very short distance when they came to a large clearing, in the middle of which they saw several large huts and three great storehouses. They went on at the double towards them, but they had gone only a short distance when they heard a shout and a shot, and saw a dozen men and a number of women issue from the backs of the huts and make for the wood.

"Now, my lads," shouted Will, "break open the doors of those storehouses; there is not likely to be much that is of value in the huts. You had better take four men, Dimchurch, and set fire to them all; of course you can just look in and see if there is anything worth taking before you apply a light."

Will himself superintended the breaking open of the storehouses. When he entered the first he paused in amazement; it was filled to the very top with boxes and bales. The other two were in a similar condition.

"There is enough to fill the cutter and the prize a dozen times," Will said. "I expect they trade to some extent with the Spaniards, but they evidently had another intention in storing these goods. Probably they proposed, when they had ama.s.sed sufficient, to charter a large ship, fill her up to the hatchways, and sail to some American port or some other place where questions are not usually asked."

There was a safe in the corner of one of the storehouses; this they blew open, and when Will examined its contents he found that they consisted of the papers and manifests of cargoes of no fewer than eleven ships.

"My conjecture was right," he said. "They intended, no doubt, to keep some large merchantman they had captured, fill her with the contents of their prizes, and then with the papers and manifests of cargo they could go almost anywhere and dispose of their ill-gotten goods."