“Very well,” says he, “if that’s what she wants, by God! she shall
have it.” It was not, exactly, what Morgan Leroux wanted, although, no
doubt, she desired that too; but Brandon was to know more of the ways
of women before he had done. Meanwhile, he went to her, and they talked
together.
The prime point was settled, at any rate. Brandon Pomfrett was
commander of _La Modeste_. And a modest ship she was--for a pirate--if
ever there was one. Captain Pomfrett laid to his duties with a will.
Prayers were read on the quarterdeck morning and evening; profane
language was punished by stoppage of grog; flogging was the penalty for
dicing or drunkenness; for striking an officer, or attempted mutiny,
the offender would be incontinently hanged at the yard-arm. The nine
men of Murch’s ship, the _Wheel of Fortune’s_ crew, whom we had brought
aboard, were divided into port and starboard watches, with double
spells to keep, since we had but half the complement required to work
the ship. Crowby, the boatswain, was made pilot and sailing-master; I,
Harry Winter, was promoted to owners’ agent. The men had no thought but
that we were sailing under Murch’s orders, as tender to the _Wheel of
Fortune_, and the terror of his name helped to keep them within these
strait bounds. They supposed he had appointed Pomfrett to the command
of the stolen ship, and expected the _Wheel of Fortune_ to rejoin
us very soon. We, too, expected her appearance, and we kept a sharp
lookout for her top-masts rising on the sky-line. As for Morgan Leroux,
the crew still regarded her as the pretty young gentleman-adventurer,
in which character she had shipped at first. It seems strange that her
disguise should have availed her for so long, but I can only record the
fact. That there are cases upon record of women serving for years in
the guise of men, both as soldiers and sailors, is notorious.
Captain Brandon Pomfrett is now, you see, committed to chivalric
action. He is rescuing the lady from all sorts of perils, so she
declared, and she ought to have known; he is appointed the guardian and
trustee of her maiden honour. The position restored his self-respect,
something damaged hitherto by the contemplation of his obligation
to Morgan Leroux. She had saved him from being bought and sold as
a slave, at first; she came to our aid in Porto-Bello; and, for my
part, I believe that she persuaded Murch to attack that town, and took
her share in the business, in the hope of finding Brandon Pomfrett
again--Brandon, who would have none of her, sending her back to the
ship when she would have marooned herself along with the supercargo.
Then she stole the ship in which we were now all sailing together, and
gave it to Pomfrett. And for all these benefits he had returned nothing
until now, when the lady cast herself upon his protection. Until now,
the more she did for him the less he had liked her. The obligation had
galled him; besides, Brandon Pomfrett had no notion of dangling about
a petticoat; he had other ends in view. Do you think Morgan Leroux had
no perception of these things, when they are plain to common persons
like you and me? At any rate, affairs took on another complexion aboard
_La Modeste_.
From the moment Captain Pomfrett assumed command, Mistress Morgan found
herself waited on hand and foot. The captain, you see, considered it
his duty to pay the extreme of nice attention to one in his protection.
Morgan, too, became less aggressively masculine in appearance; she
wore doublet and hose, indeed, but over these she disposed the fine
cloak of crimson damask which came from the house of the Governor of
Porto-Bello, so that she really went clad in a loose gown. Moreover,
her talk insensibly changed its note. She was less loud and downright,
no longer boisterous, but falling into placid silences, in which her
dark eyes, shining beneath the straight brows, like lights in still
water overhung by cliffs, met Brandon’s glance and held it, and dropped
away again. These little signs served to indicate the course and rising
of that invisible stream that makes the real history of life. As for
the other, the procession of shows, that passes with a great noise and
clamour: the life of eating and drinking, fighting and folly, getting
and losing; kept its indifferent way with even pace.
Its chronicle, so far as our little voyage on the Ship of Modesty be
concerned, began in a report from the cook that there were but a few
days’ provisions in store. Whereupon Captain Pomfrett encouraged the
watch to vigilance, promising to the man who first sighted a ship the
pick of the small-arms aboard her. And the second day at sea we sighted
a small snow, flying French colours. Our colours were French, too--a
coincidence of which we made use. We overhauled the snow, fired a shot
across her bows, summoned her to surrender, and sent a boat aboard
to take possession. There was but small resistance, soon put down.
These little ships speculate on the chance of running the gauntlet of
pirates and privateers, rather than trust to their powers of defence.
We pressed six of her crew, negroes and half-castes, took her cargo of
wine, brandy, flour, and cocoa, and let her go; but not before Captain
Brandon had pillaged her great cabin for dainties to grace the board
of his own. Two days later we took, in like manner, another small ship,
laden with marmalade, jars of gunpowder, some bar silver, muskets, and
bags of bullets.
Meanwhile, there was no sign of Mr Murch. It was to be supposed that he
was delayed in Porto-Bello. And, meanwhile, was no sign of Mr Dawkins,
either. We were sailing north, but Dawkins might have gone south for
all we knew, save that Murch was ranging to the southward, and Dawkins
would have little lust to meet him. So we held on, with plans somewhat
indeterminate. We could not sail after Dawkins for ever; if for no
other reason, because our crew would certainly break into mutiny before
long. They came out for plunder, and plunder they would have, sooner
or later. Failing Dawkins, we might set a course for Bristol, and keep
the crew in a good humour by picking up what ships we could on the way.
What would happen when we fetched up in Bristol was a question never
at this time debated. Persons in a doubtful situation often avoid a
discussion, for, so long as a matter is not talked of, you may, if you
like, pretend that it does not exist. But it was clear enough, without
any words, that we were in a feeble case. We had but four guns and
twenty-odd men, against Mr Dawkins’s eighteen guns and ninety men, or
Murch’s eight guns and sixty men. Either pirate could blow us out of
the water, if he had a mind.
Meanwhile, we held on steadily before the jolly trade-wind, shepherding
its white cloud-flocks upon the blue illimitable fields of heaven. A
great part of the captain’s day was occupied in taking the sun and
working out the ship’s position; no dead reckoning or rule-of-thumb for
Captain Pomfrett; the rest of his time he spent with Morgan Leroux.
The skipper would have had the voyage to last for ever on these terms,
I think. So we cruised warily among the group of little islands,
Albuquerque Cays, Saint Andrew’s Island, Old Providence Island, and
Serrana Cays, spying in every harbour, creek, and inlet for our old
ship, the _Blessed Endeavour_, captained now by Dawkins. For we
reckoned that she would need cleaning by this time, and we hoped to
light upon the bark in some sequestered bay, careened and helpless. But
we worked through the islands in vain, and steered north-west for Cape
Gracias à Dios, at the outflow of the River Coco, where we would take
in wood and water. So expert was the captain becoming at the art of
navigation, that we did not miss the Cape by more than fifteen miles--a
trifling error, easily amended by two or three hours’ tacking about
and about, to which evolutions we owed the sight in the offing of a
tall ship steering due west. Perceiving that the stranger altered her
course as though to speak with us, we went about, and soon showed that,
on a wind, we had the heels of her, whoever she might be. Before long
she altered her course again, steering for the mainland. But when we
fetched up in the shadow of Cape Gracias à Dios that evening there was
no ship to be seen, and we thought no more of her for the time, being
busied for the next two or three days in getting wood and water for the
ship, overhauling her, and making good defects.
Upon the third night after our arrival in this snug anchorage we had
been supping late, and came upon deck about midnight--the skipper, and
Morgan Leroux, and the writer of these memoirs. The moon had gone
down behind the rocky headland, which loomed upon the silver dimness
like a huge couchant beast; fire-flies sparkled in the vast shadows
of the shore, and out to seaward the smoothly rolling plains of water
stretched away and away, glimmering mysterious. Save for the eternal
thunder of the surf, which ran so continually in our ears that we
ceased to hear it, the night was very still.
“This is a pleasant life,” said Captain Pomfrett. “It’s a pity it must
end so soon.”
“Why so soon, then?” asked Morgan Leroux.
“Owners at home, and pirates abroad,” Brandon answered.
“I am so tired of your talk about owners,” said Morgan. “What have you
to do with owners, when it was their ship’s company that sold you in
Barbadoes? Why, they set Dawkins on to do it, very likely.”
“You wouldn’t say so if you knew my uncle, not to mention aunt,”
returned the captain, lazily. “But it was I that brought Dawkins to
them in the beginning, and it’s me that has to bring him back in the
end--dead or alive.”
“Dead or alive, ho, ho!” came, like an echo, and with a chuckle, close
beside us; and there were the head and shoulders of a man, risen above
the rail of the bulwarks, black upon the moonlight.
As we turned, he dropped below the rail. Pomfrett cried out “Who’s
that?” and we all ran to the side to see a boat, manned by eight or ten
men, shoving off from under the counter. Pomfrett challenged, and the
same voice answered across the swiftly widening space of water, “Dead
or alive, shipmate, dead or alive--ho, ho, ha!”
Pomfrett roared for the watch below, and, the men tumbling up in a
hurry, he had a boat lowered and went himself in pursuit. But lowering
boats and such evolutions are not performed in a ship of the private
account as they are in Her Majesty’s navy. By the time our boat struck
the water the stranger had a fair start, and Pomfrett must needs return
before very long, having lost all trace of her in the dark.
“That’s Dawkins, for a ducat,” says Morgan; and we supposed that she
was right, and that the ship which had chased us three days since was
the _Blessed Endeavour_ at last. The watch on deck had no information
to give; it was clear the man had been asleep, and he was duly
sentenced to a flogging. Then we held a council. If Dawkins were near
by, we should hear from him again before long. In that case, were we to
fight? Run away we could not, for the wind had dropped. Now, buccaneers
do not risk their skins in fighting unless there is a distinct
advantage to be gained thereby, and Dawkins stood in very little danger
from us. We were too small a force to harm him. All things considered,
the captain (whose decision is final in all questions of fighting,
chasing, or being chased) decided to clear for action and sit still.
It was true that the boat might not have come from Dawkins, but from
a strange ship, or even from Murch himself; but, even so, we had no
alternative.
Yet I think we had made up our minds that it was Dawkins who had found
us out--I hardly know why. Morning dawned in a windless calm, and I
went ashore with a perspective glass and Morgan Leroux, who insisted
on accompanying me, to climb the headland. We came to a bare place in
the ridge, where the trees fell away, and there, looking northward,
stretched a big lagoon, and on the shore a tall ship lay careened.
Tents were pitched, the smoke of fires lifted light against the dark
woods, and men were clustering like ants about the ship. That was
the _Blessed Endeavour_, sure enough; I could tell her lines among a
thousand.
“So there’s the long-lost bark,” says Morgan, staring through the
glass. “She’s not far off, and yet she might as well be an ocean away,
for all the use she is. I’ve a month’s mind to pay this Dawkins of
yours a visit, Harry. Shall I ask him to dinner?”
In vain I adjured this obstinate girl to return. She laughed me to
scorn.
“Your Dawkins does not know me,” said she. “Why should he harm me? I’m
a brother skipper, d’ye see, out on the account, like himself. Oh,
I’ll spin the man a yarn, never fear. Take your long face back to the
captain with my compliments, Harry, and bid him prepare a dinner for
Mr Dawkins by six o’clock. Adieu, my friend.” And she plunged into the
wood.
Here was a quandary. It was my business to return to the ship and make
report; yet how could I let this wild quean go alone into Dawkins’s
camp? But supposing I went with her, what could I do against near
a hundred pirates? Moreover, I had no longer any doubt but that our
visitor of last night was sent by Dawkins, who must therefore be aware
of our neighbourhood; and I reflected that Morgan could go on her
errand alone with a much better face than if I were to accompany her.
Besides, she was not running any great risk.
On the whole, it was better I should go back to the ship; and back I
went, but ill at ease.
Captain Brandon Pomfrett fell into a violent passion when I gave him
Morgan’s message.
“God do so to me, and more also, but you shall answer for every hair of
her head that’s injured. Why did you let her go? Why didn’t you stop
her? Why didn’t you go with her?”
Thus Pomfrett, and much more to the same effect. I never saw him in so
deplorable a condition of rage and distress. But, after a while, he
consented to wait until six o’clock before setting out with the whole
ship’s company to rescue the damsel.
“I know,” he said, at last, “it’s her doing. You couldn’t help it--I
couldn’t myself. And perhaps she’ll come back safe--she’s very clever,
Harry,” says the captain, wistfully.
And, meantime, as you shall hear, Morgan Leroux stood in no danger at
all, save in the captain’s excited imagination. The occurrence marks a
stage in the relations of these two.
XII
THE OLD BUCCANEER AND THE NEW
So our quest of the stolen ship promised to issue, in no tragical
adventure but, a simple dinner-party. When there’s a lady in the case,
the schemes of men are commonly disposed quite otherwise than they had
planned.
Pacing the quarterdeck, sitting down, getting up again, trying to
smoke and forgetting to keep the tobacco alight, now neglecting all
oversight of the men, and again turning upon some luckless seaman
like a tiger--who now so uneasy as the captain, deprived of his
gentleman-adventurer?
“And what in the wide world am I to do with Dawkins, should he come
aboard?” says he.
“Put him in irons, take over the _Blessed Endeavour_, then maroon him;
simple as you stand there.”
“Don’t you see, you fool, I can’t touch the man so long as he’s aboard?
He’s my guest.”
“Morgan’s, you mean.”
“Well, the scoundrel’s _a_ guest, at any rate,” says the skipper,
angrily.
“All’s fair in love and piracy. But, of course, if you’re going to
stand on scruples with a pirate----”
“And pray what would you do yourself, Harry?”
“I should do what Mistress Morgan bid me,” I answered, promptly.
Brandon had nothing to say to that. “The question is,” he began again,
“does he know we’re aboard? If that was his boat came sneaking in the
dark, why, he does. If it wasn’t, he doesn’t know, but someone else
does. And who may that be? Can it be Murch?”
“If you’ll take a humble clerk’s advice,” I said, “you’ll sit quiet
instead of asking riddles; you’ll say your prayers, and keep your
powder dry. This is Morgan Leroux’s affair. We have only to look on. If
Dawkins doesn’t know we’re aboard, it were a pity to enlighten him. So
keep dark, _I_ say.”
The captain condescended to approve this counsel, and we made
arrangements accordingly. The dinner--the notion of the dinner struck
the skipper as so monstrous absurd, he could not bring himself to
instruct the cook, and I had to do so--the dinner was to be served in
the captain’s cabin. Next to the captain’s cabin was the great cabin,
occupied by Morgan Leroux. We bored spy-holes in the bulkhead between
the two, and then, there was no more to be done but to wait. The
ship rolled at her moorings, blocks banging and clattering, cordage
creaking; the brazen sunlight lapped ship and sea and shore in a
blinding glare; the everlasting rumour of the breaking surf, unheeded
in the ordinary course of occupation, began to wear upon the mind. All
day long the shadows crept or receded upon the white beach, the rocks,
piled or scattered, the lofty barrier of forest; all day long the far
sea-line, joining the horns of the wide bay, lay vacant of the smallest
blur; all day long the sea-birds screamed and dived about the ship,
and rode on the heaving water. The shadows lengthened, and the heat
lessened sensibly; the men had finished their work, and lay and lounged
about the waist and forecastle, smoking and talking, while a savoury
smell of cooking meats was diffused from the galley.
If we were but cruising for pleasure, now, with hearts at ease, what a
good hour would this be: the day’s work done, the aromatic breath of
the woods blown off-shore by the cool land-breeze, the stars beginning
to shine in the quiet sky, the great peace of the night descending upon
us; whereas, under the prick of hidden circumstance, the tightening
cord of suspense, we could neither stand nor lie, and the shining calm
about us served but to increase discomfort. But time must go, drag
his feet as he may; and there came at last a little sound of music,
as of drums and fifes, and the white triangle of a sail came round
the point. It was a yawl, filled with people, and drummers and fifers
making melody. We stayed until we distinguished Morgan Leroux sitting
in the stern-sheets, alongside Mr Dawkins, then dived below, while the
boatswain piped all hands to the side. We heard the familiar voice of
Dawkins roaring out the stave of a nonsensical sea ditty, as his boat
drew near, and from the sound, we took that eminent commander to be
half-seas over.
“Oh, lay the helm a-starboard, and round on t’other tack!
There’s many a seaman on this cruise what never will go back.
So crowd every stitch upon her, and the devil care for the spars!
And cry good-bye to earth and sky, for we’re sailing to the stars.
“All a-sailing to the stars,
Ye gentlemen Jack-tars;
We’ll meet again at Fiddler’s Green,
All up among the stars.”
The boat’s crew joined in the chorus, very much out of time,
and ceased; we could hear the sea-birds, disturbed from their
nesting-places among the rocks, crying and calling overhead, as the
party came aboard; then Dawkins struck up again, as he came stumbling
down the companion-ladder.
“Oh, up with the Jolly Roger to mizen and peak and main!
There’s many a mess of swabs afloat what’s spoiling to be slain--
So double-shot the guns, my lads, and ram ’em very tight,
And heave a kiss to Bet and Sis, for we’re out on the chase to-night.”
“Chorus! Cap’n Morgan Leroux, hey? Why, your namesake, my old
commander, God bless him, would a loved that song like his very own.
I mind one day, he--why, now, split _me_,” said Mr Dawkins, sitting
down with a drunken chuckle, “if I rec’lect what in the deep sea I _do_
rec’lect.”
Ensconced in the adjoining cabin, we had our eyes glued to the
spy-holes, you may be sure. Morgan Leroux fetched out bottle and
glasses from the locker.
“A tot of rum, Mr Dawkins, now, to set you fair for dinner?”
“Spoken like your namesake,” said Dawkins, approvingly. “And you’ll
surely join me this time, so I shan’t be ashamed. No? Well, strike me
blind if ever I see a thing like this here. A gentleman of fortune, and
not drink--why, it ain’t in nature. Well, here’s plate and plunder,
full cargoes for every gentleman of fortune!”
Morgan Leroux opened the door between the cabins, and at sight of us
her eyes lighted and her cheeks flushed. Brandon caught her hand, as
she swiftly slipped the bolt.
“Lass,” he whispered, “I never thought to see you again.”
“All’s well,” said she, giving him both her hands. “I’ve caught the
thief for you; he’s properly trepanned. Leave him to me; he’ll drink
himself drunk hand to fist before the liquor’s done. Then you can
lay him by the heels. But listen,” she added, whispering very low,
“_Dawkins never sent that boat_. I found that out for certain. There’s
trouble in the wind; never a ship in sight outside; where could the
boat come from? Do you think it was Obeah work? Were they ghosts in the
boat, that called out ‘Dead or alive?’”
Morgan had been nurtured, you see, among the black people; she
believed in the Obeah magic, and hoodoo, and devils and spirits, quite
naturally. But, white or black, Eastern or Western, there are few,
indeed, who are not secretly credulous of the supernatural; and for a
moment we three stared upon one another in a foolish silence; while
Dawkins, in the next cabin, happily oblivious, began singing to himself
again.
“Ho, we’re out on the chase to-night,
Cracking-on for a bloody fight--
Ye fancy men now turn again,
And follow the prey to-night.”
“What ho, shipmate!”
“Have you pistols?--very well. Come when I call, but not a moment
before. Wait till you hear me say--what shall I say?--O, ‘Dead or
alive,’” whispered Morgan, and slipped from the cabin.
So the old buccaneer and the young decoy-duck, dressed in the drake’s
finery, set to at their victuals, Dawkins talking noisily the while.
“Now, I don’t ask--nor I haven’t never asked--for anything better than
this here,” says Dawkins. “Plenty of rations and plenty of rum and a
smart shipmate to keep the bottle rolling. Not that you shines in that
last, cap’n, much as I admire your parts and person--no, you don’t,
and it’s a sad pity. But there, I seen many a stout seaman gone to the
devil by way of this same liquor, and every man to his taste, says I.”
“It’s the sober man that gets the booty, Mr Dawkins,” Morgan put in, to
keep the old ruffian talking.
“But the drunk ones is the happiest,” retorted Mr Dawkins. “Look at
me! I’m happy--let no one deny it. Leastways, till the liquor’s out,
I wouldn’t change with kings on their golden thrones. Why, now, what
a thing it is, as a man what wants so little, like me, should have so
hard a job to get it--like I have. All my life it’s been the blessed
same, ever since I shipped as cabin-boy out o’ Bristol city, me
starving at the time. All the dirty work to do, a kick here, a clout
with a marlinspike there, the cat going, knives out, provisions running
short, and every man-jack with his little bit o’ luck except Dawkins,
poor old Dawkins, what only wanted to sit quiet on his beam-ends and
consume his victuals in due season.”
“What made you join the Brotherhood, Mr Dawkins?”
“It’s plain to see you’ve never sailed in a merchant bottom, nor yet
in the Royal Navy,” replied the buccaneer, with great meaning, “or you
wouldn’t ask the question. No, by the bones of the deep, you wouldn’t!
What’s the merchant service? Worms in the pork, weevils in the biscuit,
no wages, and what there is you’re robbed of. Set a litter of pigs
afloat in a coffin, and they’d make better weather of it. Ah, my David,
they would so! And talk of the Queen’s Navy--why, there,” said Mr
Dawkins, pausing to spit on the floor, “that’s what I think o’ that
degraded mess o’ swabs. Lord save you, Cap’n Morgan, you are but young,
and the world’s changed since my time; but when I was your age there
was but one way of going to sea, any sense, and that was the way of
Brotherhood of the Sea, as they called it. Now your namesake, good old
Harry Morgan--there was a man!”
“Oh, you sailed under Morgan, did you?”
“Here’s his health, and may you grow to his likeness,” cried Dawkins,
filling his glass to the brim and spilling a good deal as he raised it
to his lips. “Ah, I sailed under Morgan, and Captain Hansel and Captain
Bartholomew Sharp afterwards. Why, I was with Morgan when he took and
burned Panama, and that’s a thing not many has lived to brag of--not
many, no, no, not many, shipmate.”
Mr Dawkins had reached that stage of intoxication when the patient
keeps smiling to himself and repeating the same words over and over.