With Drake on the Spanish Main Part 18

"You be the ship-boy, Hugh, seeing you be the youngest of us," said Whiddon. "And you've a proper breast for a singing-boy."

"Now the last stanzo, Hugh," cried Turnpenny. "'If fortune then fail not,'--but my scrimpy voice murders it. Sing up, man."

"If fortune then fail not, and our next voyage prove, We will return merrily and make good cheer, And hold all together as friends linked in love, The cans shall be filled with wine, ale, and beer, l.u.s.tily, oh l.u.s.tily."

"'Tis not worth a crim," growled Jan Biddle, when the song was ended.

"'Wine, ale, and beer'--where is it? I'd give a week o' life for a gallon o' home-brewed."

"Ay, and what then!" said Gabriel Batten. "Sing the song of ale, Hugh."

"Back and side go bare, go bare, Both foot and hand go cold----"

"Nay, not that one; 'tis over long, and 'll make us too drouthy.

Seeing we have no ale, 't'ud be cruel to sing the praises of it so feelingly. Nay, sing the ditty that serves for warning; 'twill better fit our case."

Hugh Curder began:

"Ale makes many a man to make his head have knocks; And ale makes many a man to sit in the stocks; And ale makes many a man to hang upon the gallows--"

"Oh, shut his mouth!" cried Biddle testily. "We'll all be glumping if we list to such trash. Hallo for the wind to change, for with this nor'-easter blowing we'll never get clear of the coast."

The vessel was indeed making slow progress, beating out against the strong wind. Dennis, though elected Captain, had little to do with the actual handling of the ship: in those days the captain was not always a navigator. But the _Mirandola_ was in good hands. Both Whiddon and Batten were practised seamen, and in seamanship, as distinguished from navigation, Turnpenny was incomparable. They had found in the cabin a chart of the coast and the neighbouring sea, by means of which they avoided the shoals and made without mishap towards the mouth of the gulf. Dennis and Turnpenny examined the chart carefully to see if they could distinguish the island they had named Maiden Isle. Several small islands were marked on it as mere dots without names, and they could not for a long time decide which of them was Maiden Isle; but Turnpenny at last fixed on one of them, and his conjecture was proved to be correct in the evening. Whiddon had set the course by Turnpenny's suggestion, and just before dark the vessel skirted the south-eastern corner of the island where he and Dennis had met so strangely.

Looking at the chart, Dennis wondered how the _Maid Marian_ had escaped wrecking a dozen times during the hurricane that finally cast her up on the western sh.o.r.e. There was marked a good open channel for vessels of any draught south and south-east of the island, but, as he had guessed, the sea to the north and west was practically unnavigable except by small craft. The _Mirandola_ gave the island a wide berth in pa.s.sing; the wind was freshening, and there were signs of heavy weather. Dennis felt a little regret at leaving the island unvisited, and abandoning the relics of his friends which he had saved from the wreck; but, like every member of his party, he was eager to lose sight of this hostile coast, and to gain the wide ocean where, given good luck, they would be secure from Spanish molestation and have nothing to fear but the ordinary chances of a long voyage.

They made little headway that night. Anxious as they were to run out of the main track of Spanish commerce, they felt the necessity of choosing a safe rather than a short course, and especially of avoiding the network of reefs and islands to leeward. In the blackest hours of the night, indeed, they lay to, Turnpenny remarking that it was better to lose a little time than to run the risk of losing the vessel by a too bold navigation of unfamiliar seas.

This caution proved to be justified, for the wind shifted in the night; and when at break of day the _Mirandola_ again got under way they found that she had drifted dangerously near an island which, being very small, was not marked on the chart. A light haze lay over the sea, but it lifted soon, and then vast excitement was aroused on board when the look-out shouted that he descried, under the lee of the island, a vessel under full sail. Turnpenny took a long look at her, and declared that she was a bark somewhat larger than the Mirandola, though at the distance--near four miles, he thought--it was impossible to be sure.

"Of what nation is she?" asked Dennis.

"No mortal man could say," returned Amos; "but 'tis a hundred to one she be a Spaniard, and we must either fight or run."

"Think you she will see us, being so small a vessel?"

"None can tell that either. We must look to the worst. True, we have the weather-gage of her; but soon or late she will overhaul us if she gives chase. She has a look of speed, or I be no mariner. 'Tis certain we cannot fight her; our armament will not suffice; furthermore, from her size I reckon her crew be three or four times ours, and our men have no mind to be captured and cast again into a Spanish dungeon."

"We must e'en run then," said Dennis with a sigh. "That means we must put about?"

"True, and 'tis somewhat in our favour, for you perceive the wind has shifted in the night to west-sou'-west, and belike we can sail close-hauled better than she can."

Whiddon accordingly put the vessel about, and set the course so that she could keep the island between herself and the stranger. But in the course of the next hour it was clear that the _Mirandola_ had not escaped notice. The stranger had weathered the island and was manifestly standing in pursuit. The crew of the _Mirandola_ watched her anxiously. They were but twenty-two all told, five of them being French: and although they were all stout mariners with no lack of native courage, the remembrance of their past sufferings did not incline them to run risks. For some time it was doubtful whether the pursuing vessel was or was not gaining; but as the day wore on it became clear that the _Mirandola_ was being outsailed.

"'Tis a piece of rare good luck we had the wind against us last night,"

said Turnpenny, "for in a straight chase in the open we should have no chance against the critter, whereas if we get back among these islands we may give her the slip."

"If we do not strike a reef and founder," replied Dennis.

Here Turnpenny tried a device that he had often seen practised on the _Anne Gallant_. He ordered two men to go up to the cross-trees with a pulley-block; they rove a line through, and, hoisting up buckets of water, saturated all the canvas. Then he put all the men on to the lee braces, and so got the vessel to lie a point nearer the wind.

The two manoeuvres considerably increased her speed, but in spite of all that seamanship could do or devise the gap between the vessels sensibly diminished; the pursuer loomed ever larger down to leeward.

Then Jan Biddle began to show himself in his true colours. Dennis had noticed that the man had attached to himself a group of the wilder spirits among the crew, who with an ill grace went about the duties a.s.signed to them by Whiddon, and upon whom, indeed, the mate called as seldom as possible. When it became clear that the _Mirandola_ was being surely overhauled, these men were observed in close talk beneath the break of the p.o.o.p. By and by Biddle swaggered forward, followed by seven or eight of his comrades, to where Whiddon and Turnpenny stood, forward of the mainmast. Batten was at the helm.

"Art mad, Ned Whiddon?" cried Biddle in a hectoring tone. "Dost think thou'rt a mariner? Crymaces! if we trust to thee we'll be laid by the heels in the hold of yonder craft ere night."

"Couldst do better, think 'ee?" asked Whiddon quietly.

"Better? Who but a slin-pole would have done as 'ee have done?

There's but one way to scape out of the clutches of the Spaniards, and that is to put the helm down, come about, and run for it. This craft is better running free than close-hauled."

"Know a fool by his folly," said Turnpenny. "Rule your saucy tongue, Jan Biddle, and offer not to teach your betters."

"Who be you to talk of betters, Amos Turnpenny--a sluddering rampallian like you? An you will take no counsel we'll e'en see to the manage of the vessel ourselves. Here, comrades, this be enough of these joulter heads; let go the sheets; I will put the helm down and we'll go round on the other tack: we'll have no fools over us, to bring us to harm."

But before one of the malcontents could step forward to do his bidding, Turnpenny threw his arms around Biddle, lifted him clean off his feet, and flung him against the bulwarks, where he lay stunned.

"And I'll serve any man likewise that dares to raise his voice in mutiny. Get about, you villains, and 'ware lest you be clapped in irons and set awash in the bilge."

Dennis had hastened to Turnpenny's side at the first sign of altercation.

"When the chase is over we will deal with these fellows," he said quietly. "Meanwhile, Amos, is not that our Maiden Isle on the lewside ahead?"

"Surely it is, sir."

"Think you not 'twould serve us best to run in among the reefs thereabouts? The bark could not follow us."

"True, but we might strike and run aground any moment, and lose our vessel and our lives withal."

"Ay, but we are being surely overhauled, and meseems 'twere better to take the risk of running aground than to fall into the hands of the Spaniards. There is a chance of our threading a way through, whereas the stranger, being of greater draught, would not venture her bottom among these uncharted shoals."

"Verily 'tis a wise thought--if there be time. What think 'ee, Ned?

Yonder, mark 'ee, is the isle whereon Master Hazelrig and I lived secure for a matter of weeks, with food in plenty. Think 'ee there be time to make the shallows afore the Spaniard comes within shot of us?"

"Ay, there be time enough, but I fear me we should wreck our craft."

"There be no other way, Ned. And I warrant me I could make a shift to steer a safe course insh.o.r.e, because 'twas on the south side of the isle we landed from the timber ship, and there, i' f.e.c.ks, be her masts--see, Ned, standing out a little above the sea."

"Then do 'ee take the helm, Haymoss, and G.o.d save us all."

Clearly the course of the _Mirandola_ was being closely watched on the pursuing vessel, for when, tacking in obedience to the helm, she made direct for the south of the island, there came a puff of smoke from the side of the bark, and a shot plumped into the sea about two cable-lengths astern.

"'Twas over hurrisome, master don," said Turnpenny with a chuckle; "and call me a Dutchman if 'ee ever get to closer range."

He ran the little vessel cleverly insh.o.r.e and steered past the wreck of the timber ship. Then it occurred to Dennis that there must be a practicable channel not far to the west, or the _Maid Marian_ would have gone aground in the hurricane long before she did. At his suggestion the _Mirandola_ was kept on her course for half a mile beyond the southernmost point of the island. Then, as there was no time to take soundings, she was put before the wind, with the object of gaining the north of the island, where Dennis knew that if the pursuer drew as much water as from her size seemed likely, there was little chance of her being able to follow.

The confident bearing of Dennis and Turnpenny had a cheering influence on the crew. Even Jan Biddle, who had now recovered from his blow, and his cronies seemed no longer inclined to quarrel with the handling of the vessel. The pursuer was now out of sight, hidden by the bend of the sh.o.r.e. The _Mirandola_ was making excellent sailing before the wind, and Dennis hoped that if she could elude the Spaniard until dark, there might be a good chance of her escaping any further attentions.