THE THIRD DAY
JACK was awakened the next morning by Dred stirring about. The sun had
not yet arisen, but the sky, mottled over with drifting clouds, was
blue and mild. “Well,” said Dred, “I’m going over to the sand-hills
now. You and the young lady can get some breakfast ready ag’in’ I get
back.”
“Don’t you mean to take me along with you, then?” Jack asked.
“No,” said Dred, “‘twould be no use. You can do more by staying here
and getting ready a bite to eat, for I want to make as early a start as
may be.”
Jack watched him as he walked across the little sandy hummocks covered
with the wiry sedge grass that bent and quivered in the gentle wind.
“How long will you be gone, Dred?” he called after the departing figure.
The other stopped and turned around. “About a half hour,” he called
back, and then he turned and went on again.
Jack got together some wood for the fire, and presently had a good
blaze crackling and snapping. The young lady was stirring, and in a
little while she came to the door of the hut and stood looking at him.
“Where’s Mr. Dred?” she asked.
“He’s gone across to an observation tree over yonder,” Jack said,
pointing in the direction with a bit of wood. “He says he’ll be back
within half an hour, and he wants that we should get breakfast ready
against that time.”
The young lady stood looking about her. “‘Twill not storm again to-day,
will it?” said she.
“No,” said Jack, “the weather’s broken now for good.” He felt a
curiously breathless constraint in being thus alone with her with no
one else near them, but she was clearly altogether unconscious of any
such feeling, and her unconsciousness abashed him all the more. He
busied himself studiously about his work without speaking, the young
lady standing watching him, and the breakfast was cooked and spread out
upon a board some time before Dred returned. His impassive face looked
more than usually expressionless. “Did you see anything?” Jack asked.
He did not reply to the question. “We’ll not eat here,” he said; “we’ll
just take it aboard the boat and eat it there as we sails along.”
And then it flashed upon Jack that he must have seen something. “Ye
might ha’ roasted two or three o’ them taties we fetched with us,”
Dred continued. “We hain’t touched them yet, and this is like enough
to be the last chance we’ll get to do so now, for we ben’t like to go
ashore—leastwise this side of the inlet—and arter that we’ve got to
make straight to Virginny.” Then he caught Jack’s eye with a meaning
glance, and presently led the way around to the other side of the hut.
There he leaned with his back against the side of the house, his hands
thrust deeply into his breeches pockets. “Well,” he said, in a low
voice, “I been and took a lookout astern.”
“Well,” Jack said breathlessly, “what of it?”
“Why,” said Dred, “I see a sail off to the south’rd a-making up Croatan
way.”
Jack felt a sudden, quick, shrinking pang about his heart. “Well,” he
said, “what of it? Was it the sloop?”
Dred shook his head. “I don’t know that,” he said, “and I can’t just
say as ‘twas the sloop—but I can’t say as ‘tweren’t the sloop,
neither. It may have been a coaster or summat of the sort; there’s no
saying, for ‘twas too far away for me to tell just what it was. But
I’ll tell you what ’tis, lad, we’ve just got to get away as fast as may
be, for the craft I see ben’t more than fourteen or fifteen knot astarn
of us, and, give her a stiff breeze, she may overhaul that betwixt here
and the inlet if we tarries too long.”
Jack was looking very fixedly at Dred. “Well, Dred,” he said, “suppose
’tis the sloop, and it does overhaul us, what then?”
Dred shrugged his shoulders, and there was something in the shrug that
spoke more voluminously than words could have done. “’Tis no use axing
me what then,” he said, presently. “We just sha’n’t let her overhaul
us, and that’s all. We’ll not think on anything else.”
The sense of overshadowing danger in the possibility of the boat that
Dred had seen being the sloop, and the further possibility of its
overhauling them, loomed larger and larger in Jack’s mind the more his
thoughts dwelt upon it, swelling up almost like a bubble in his bosom.
For a time it seemed as though he could not bear the bigness of the
apprehension growing so within him. He wondered that Dred could appear
so indifferent to it. “Why, Dred,” he cried, “how can a body help
thinking about such a thing?”
Dred looked at him out of his narrow, black, bead-like eyes, and then
shrugged his shoulders again. His face was as impassive as that of a
sphinx.
Jack stood thinking and thinking. The growing apprehension brought to
him for a moment a feeling almost of physical nausea. He believed that
Dred believed that the sloop was really Blackbeard’s, and that it was
overhauling them. He heaved an oppressed and labored sigh. “I wish,”
he said, “we’d only sailed straight ahead instead of stopping over
night—first, down yonder at Gosse’s in the swamp, and now here.”
Again Dred shrugged his shoulders. “Well,” he said, “you be hale and
strong enough to stand sailing four or six days on end in an open
boat. But you don’t seem to think as how the young lady can’t stand
it—saying naught of myself. If I hadn’t took care of myself, and
had ‘a’ been took sick on your hands, you’d be a deal worse off than
you are now. And, arter all,” he added, “’tis a blind chance of that
there craft being the sloop. She may be a coaster. Well, ’tis no use
stopping here to talk about that there now. The best thing for us to
do is to make sail as quick as may be. I don’t see how they got track
on us anyhow,” he said, almost to himself, “unless they chanced to get
some news on us at Gosse’s, or unless they ran across Gosse hisself.”
He slapped his thigh suddenly. “’Tis like enough, now I come to think
on it, Gosse went off som’ers to buy rum with the sixpence I gave his
mistress, and so ran across the captain in the sloop, som’ers, maybe
down toward Ocracock way.”
To all this Jack listened with the heavy oppression of apprehension
lying like a leaden weight upon his soul. “Then you do think the sail
you saw was the sloop?” said he with anxious insistence, and once more
and for the third time Dred shrugged his shoulders, vouchsafing no
other reply.
Never for any moment through all that long day did Jack’s spirit escape
from that ever-present, dreadful anxiety. Always it was with him in
everything that he saw or did or said, sometimes lying dull and inert
behind the vivid things of life, sometimes starting out with a sudden
vitality that brought again that sickening nausea, as a sort of outer
physical effect of the inner distress of spirit.
The breeze had grown lighter and lighter as the day advanced, but by
noon they had run in back of a small island, and by three or four
o’clock were well up into the shoal water of Currituck Sound. During
the time they were crossing the lower part of Albemarle Sound Dred
would every now and then stand up to look back; then again he would
take his place, gazing out ahead. Each time he had thus stood up, Jack
had looked at him, but could learn nothing of his thoughts from his
expressionless face.
Suddenly Dred glanced up overhead, the bright sunlight glinting in his
narrow black eyes. “The wind be falling mightily light,” he said, and
then again he stood up and looked out astern, stretching himself as he
did so. This time when he sat down he exchanged one swift glance with
Jack, and Jack knew that he had seen something. After that he did not
rise again, but he held the tiller motionlessly, looking steadily out
across the water that grew ever smoother and smoother as the breeze
fell more and more away. By and by he said suddenly: “Ye might as well
get out the oars and row a bit, lad; ‘twill help us along a trifle.”
The cloud of anxiety was hanging very darkly over him as Jack went
forward and shipped the oars into the rowlocks. The sun had been warm
and strong all day, and, without speaking, he laid aside his coat
before he began rowing. They were skirting along now well toward the
eastern shore of Currituck Sound. There was a narrow strip of beach,
a strip of flat, green marsh, and then beyond that a white ridge of
sand. Flocks of gulls sat out along the shoals, which, in places, were
just covered with a thin sheet of water. Every now and then they would
rise as the boat crept nearer and nearer to them, and would circle and
hover in clamorous flight. Presently, as Jack sat rowing and looking
out astern, he himself saw the sail. The first sight of it struck him
as with a sudden shock, and he ceased rowing and resting on his oars
looking steadily at it. He felt certain that Dred believed it to be the
pirate sloop; he himself felt sure that it must be, for why else would
it be following them up into the shoals of Currituck Sound? Then he
began rowing again. Suddenly, in the bright, wide silence, the young
lady spoke. “Why, that is another boat I see yonder, is it not?”
“Yes, mistress,” said Dred, briefly. He had not turned his head or
looked at her as he spoke, and Jack bowed over the oars as he pulled
away at them.
After that there was nothing more said for a long time. The young lady
sat with her elbow resting upon the rail, now looking out at the boat
astern, and now down into the water. She was perfectly unconscious of
any danger. A long flock of black ducks threaded its flight across the
sunny level of the distant marsh, and there was no cessation to the
iterated and ceaseless clamor of the gulls. Now and then a quavering
whistle from some unseen flock of marsh-birds sounded out from the
measureless blue above. Jack never ceased in his rowing; he saw and
heard all these things as with the outer part of his consciousness;
with the inner part he was thinking, brooding ceaselessly upon the
possibility of capture. He looked at Dred’s impassive face, and now and
then their eyes met. Jack wondered what he was thinking of; whether he
thought they would get away, or whether he thought they would not, for
the other gave no sign either of anxiety or of hope.
The sail was hanging almost flat now. Only every now and then it
swelled out sluggishly, and the boat drew forward a little with a
noisier ripple of water under the bows. Jack pulled steadily away at
the oars without ceasing. It seemed to him that the sail of the boat
in the distance stood higher from the water than it had. At last he
could not forbear to speak. “She’s coming nigher, ain’t she, Dred?” he
asked.
“I reckon not,” said Dred, without turning his head. “I reckon ’tis
just looming to the south’rd, and that makes her appear to stand
higher. Maybe she may have a trifle more wind than we, but not much.”
The young lady roused herself, turned, and looked out astern. “What
boat is that?” she said. “It has been following us all afternoon.”
Dred leaned over and spat into the water; then he turned toward her
with a swift look. “Why, mistress,” he said, “I don’t see no use in
keeping it from ye; ’tis like that be Blackbeard’s boat—the sloop.”
The young lady looked steadily at him and then at Jack. “Are they going
to catch us,” she asked, “and take us back to Bath Town again?”
“Why, no,” said Dred, “I reckon not; we’ve got too much of a start on
‘em. It be n’t more than thirty knot to the inlet, and they’ve got
maybe six knot to overhaul us yet.” He turned his head and looked out
astern. “D’ye see,” said he, “ye can’t tell as to how far they be away.
It be looming up yonder to the south’rd. ’Tis like they be as much as
seven knot away rather than six knot.” Again he stood up and looked out
astern. “They’ve got a puff of air down there yet,” he said, “and they
have got out the sweeps.”
Jack wondered how he could see so far to know what they were doing.
The breeze had died away now to cat’s-paws that just ruffled the
smooth, bright surface of the water. Dred, as he stood up, stretched
first one arm and then the other. He stood for a while, resting his
hand upon the boom, looking out at the other vessel. Then he began to
whistle shrilly a monotonous tune through his teeth. Jack knew he was
whistling for a wind. Presently he took out his clasp-knife and opened
it as he stepped across the thwarts. Jack moved aside to make way for
him. He stuck the knife into the mast and then went aft again. The
young lady watched him curiously. “What did you do that for?” she asked.
“To fetch up a breeze, mistress,” said Dred, shortly.
All this time Jack was pulling steadily at the oars without ceasing.
The sun sloped lower and lower toward the west. “They ain’t gaining on
us now,” said Dred; but Jack could see that the sail had grown larger
and higher over the edge of the horizon.
The yellow light of the afternoon changed to orange and then to red
as the sun set in a perfectly cloudless sky. Suddenly, Jack felt his
strength crumbling away from him like slacked lime. “I can’t row any
more, Dred,” he said. “I’m dead tired, and my hands are all flayed with
rowing.” He had not noticed his weariness before; it seemed as though
it came suddenly upon him, its leaden weight seeming to crush out that
dreadful anxiety to a mere dull discomfort of spirit.
The palms of his hands were burning like fire. He looked at the red,
blistered surface; they had not hurt him so much until he stretched
them, trying to open them. His hands and arms were trembling with
weariness.
“You’d better take a drink of rum,” said Dred; “‘twill freshen you up a
bit. You’d better take a bite, too.”
“I don’t feel hungry,” he said hoarsely.
“Like enough not,” said Dred. “But ‘twill do you good to eat a bite,
all the same. The biscuits are aft here. By blood! we didn’t leave much
in the bottle down at Gosse’s, did we?” and he shook the bottle at his
ear. “Here, mistress, eat that,” and he handed a biscuit to the young
lady.
The sail in the distance burned like fire in the setting sun. The
three looked at it. “D’ye say your prayers, mistress?” said Dred.
She looked at him as though startled at the question. “Why, yes, I do,”
she said. “What do you mean?”
“Why, if you do say your prayers,” said Dred, “when you say ‘em
to-night just ax for a wind, won’t ye? We wants to make the inlet
to-night, as much as we wants salwation.”
The sun set; the gray of twilight melted into night; the ceaseless
clamor of the gulls had long since subsided, and the cool, starry sky
looked down silently and breathlessly upon them as they lay drifting
upon the surface of the water. “I’ll take a try at the oars myself,”
said Dred, “but I can’t do much. You go to sleep, lad, I’ll wake you
arter a while.”
Jack lay down upon the bench opposite the young lady. He shut his eyes,
and almost instantly he seemed to see the bright level of the water and
the green level of the marsh, as he had seen them all that afternoon;
he seemed to hear the clamor of the gulls ringing in his ears, and his
tired and tingling body felt almost actually the motion of rowing. At
last his thoughts became tangled; they blurred and ran together, and
before he knew it he was fast asleep—the dead sleep of weariness—and
all care and fear of danger were forgotten.