The Corsair King Part 12

"You will hear it. You need not witness it; it is a stratagem of war which you could not learn from me. Go back to the ship and wait for my return."

This bold language surprised Barthelemy. A sort of intoxication arising from the bloodshed still held him in thrall, and he allowed himself to be persuaded to return to the Royal Fortune and let the doctor work his will. As soon as the captain was out of sight, Scudamore ordered the pirates to go to the deserted cabins and murder the families of the fugitives.

Shouting exultingly, the fierce crew, thirsting for revenge, obeyed; from the lofty cliff the blacks saw their wives killed, their children slaughtered, and when all were slain, their homes set on fire and destroyed amid clouds of smoke that rose to their eyrie.

Then Scudamore stepped forward and shouted:

"Now, you black scoundrels, you have seen how we served your families.

The same fate awaits you, down to the last man, if you don't submit and surrender our friends, whom you dragged away with you."

Kennedy saw through the stratagem and protested violently.

"Don't believe a word he says, the whole thing is a fiendish plot, we are no friends of his, we don't know one another."

"Kennedy, don't be a coward," said Scudamore reproachfully, "why should you deny that you agreed to lead these people astray so that they would run into the mouths of our guns? Be bold, and with the help of your stout comrades throw them down on our knives; I, a pirate, am worth a hundred negroes; don't disown me."

The negroes, with threatening gestures began to surround Kennedy and his men, who in great terror, tried to defend themselves.

"Brave friends, don't believe the words of that devil, we never saw him; those men are our worst enemies."

"Oh, Kennedy, you disgrace us, how can you disown us when you, too, sail under the black flag? If we had never seen each other how should I know that you have, on your left shoulder, the mark of a gallows, branded there when you were in the pillory?"

The negroes instantly seized Kennedy, stripped his coat from his shoulders and, as soon as they had convinced themselves that Scudamore's words were true, they flung him down and one, raising his copper axe, set his foot upon his victim's neck.

"Don't hurt a hair of his head!" shouted Scudamore, feigning fury. The next instant the axe fell, and Kennedy's head was hurled over the cliff.

The others followed.

When the half hour expired, Scudamore returned to Barthelemy and, pointing to the boat, said: "There are the heads of the traitors!"

Chapter III

Revenge

The time of the monsoons had come. News of shipwrecks arrived daily. The elements of the air and sea were ceaselessly contending in a strife before which the petty quarrels of men were ended. Nothing was heard at present of Barthelemy. The English and Dutch agencies were perfectly aware that his ships were anch.o.r.ed in the harbor of Cape Corso. Who would venture to tempt Providence by putting to sea in such weather? The heart of the boldest pirate trembles when he sees sky and water transformed into darkness, illumined only by flashes of lightning. It would be a devil and not a man who, amid this illumination, would risk a battle in the midst of peals of thunder and the howling of the gale.

Barthelemy was resting on the coast; his men were drinking, carousing and giving banquets. What else could they do in such terrible weather when, each morning, the sea flung fresh wrecks upon the strand?

Meanwhile the governments were quietly gathering their ships against the bold pirates who dared, single-handed, to a.s.sail a whole quarter of the globe; in the harbor of Mydaw alone there were eleven ships waiting only for the King Solomon with its eighty guns, and the Swallow with its hundred and ten, to set sail in pursuit of Robert Barthelemy as soon as the monsoons were over.

The tempest was raging, the sea tossed wildly, the black clouds hung so low that it seemed as if they nearly touched the waves, and the surges tossed their white foam upward toward the clouds.

The horizon was a dark violet blue, through which darted flashes of lightning. A ship was visible far away tossing on the billows, its closely furled sails and erect masts looking like black crosses.

It was the King Solomon, a proud warship, with three tiers of decks supplied with windows, which resembled a three-story house with wings; but windows and portholes were now tightly closed.

The rain was pouring, black and white stormy petrels fluttered around the vessel, and ever and anon the waves tossed aloft one of the sharks swimming around the ship, which looked down greedily a moment, with its cold, fixed eyes, at the trembling sailors.

Every man had his hands full; in the midst stood Captain Trahern; the boldest of the crew were in the rigging, trying to secure the sails; others were attempting to rig a jury mast in place of one which had been carried away. Another group toiled at the pumps, and four men were at the helm, straining every muscle whenever a wave stronger than usual dashed against the bow of the ship. In the intervals of rest the sailors at the helm talked with one another.

"What a gale! It's impossible for us ever to reach port again."

"We came near sticking fast in the clouds just now, the waves flung us up so high."

"Lord help us! The thunderbolts are falling like ripe pears, one of us will be hit presently."

"Hush, don't you see the St. Elmo's fire yonder at the mast-head?" asked Philip, the helmsman.

"St. George preserve us!" whispered the others in horror. "That means evil. The St. Elmo's fire usually appears only on ships devoted to destruction. See how it dances!"

"Mind your helm!" shouted the captain, but it was too late; while the men were staring at the electrical phenomena hovering around the mast-head, a huge wave approached the ship, a wave which resembled a transparent mountain-chain in motion. Every effort to put the ship about proved futile, the vast surge, higher than the highest mast-head, rolled nearer, its top crested with foam. The men clung to the rigging and bulwarks. Suddenly the King Solomon rose more rapidly, tossed upward on the towering wave, and the next moment lay on her side with her masts in the water and wave after wave sweeping over her decks. In a few minutes the ship righted again, the water rolling from her as it drips from the plumage of a swan, and the crew, drenched to the skin, returned to their tasks.

"See! The St. Elmo's fire is still shining at the mast-head!" cried Philip, "if it were not kindled by the devil, that flood of water would have put it out."

"Those stormy petrels suspect something wrong, too, they follow us everywhere."

"Jack says he saw the spectre ship last night."

"Is that true, Jack?"

"Why should I say so, if I hadn't seen it? You were all asleep, I stood alone at the helm. Suddenly, from the distance, the form of a ship moved toward us. It seemed scarcely to touch the water, and was sailing against the wind. Shadows that looked like men were moving about her deck as if pulling on the ropes, and a misty shape, like the captain, glided to and fro. Terrified, I hailed the apparition, and suddenly the whole vision vanished, but I heard distinctly, above the whistling of the wind and the plashing of the waves, the flapping of the ropes against the mast of the spectre ship."

"That means mischief."

The sailors gazed timidly at the cloud-veiled horizon, as they usually do when ghost stories are told in their presence.

"Look, look yonder!" said Philip, suddenly pointing into the gray mist, "I swear by St. George, I see the spectre ship!"

His messmates, panting for breath, followed the direction of his finger.

The lightning flashed and they all made the sign of the cross.

"There it is."

"What do you see there?" called the captain, noticing the surprise of his men.

"The spectre ship, sir," one of them answered at last, trembling.

Trahern began to scan the vessel through his spy-gla.s.s.

"That's no spectre ship," he said after a short pause.

"What else could she be, sir? Would any mortal man carry sail in such a tempest? See how fast she approaches us! She does not heed the shock of the waves, but flies like a bird."