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THE LADY AND THE
PIRATE
_Being the Plain Tale of a Diligent Pirate
and a Fair Captive_
_By_
EMERSON HOUGH
_Author of_
THE MISSISSIPPI BUBBLE, 54-40 OR FIGHT
THE PURCHASE PRICE, JOHN RAWN, ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY
HARRY A. MATHES
INDIANAPOLIS
THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY
PUBLISHERS
[Illustration: Thus the heartless jade stood, unable to
meet my eagle eye]
COPYRIGHT 1913
EMERSON HOUGH
PRESS OF
BRAUNWORTH & CO.
BOOKBINDERS AND PRINTERS
BROOKLYN, N. Y.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I IN WHICH I AM A CAITIFF 1
II IN WHICH I HOLD A PARLEY 6
III IN WHICH I AM A CAPTIVE 14
IV IN WHICH I AM A PIRATE 23
V IN WHICH WE SAIL FOR THE SPANISH MAIN 34
VI IN WHICH I ACQUIRE A FRIEND 44
VII IN WHICH I ACHIEVE A NAME 52
VIII IN WHICH WE HAVE AN ADVENTURE 60
IX IN WHICH WE TAKE MUCH TREASURE 75
X IN WHICH I SHOW MY TRUE COLORS 90
XI IN WHICH MY PLOT THICKENS 97
XII IN WHICH WE CLOSE WITH THE ENEMY 102
XIII IN WHICH WE BOARD THE ENEMY 110
XIV IN WHICH IS ABOUNDING TROUBLE 122
XV IN WHICH IS CONVERSATION WITH THE CAPTIVE MAIDEN 131
XVI IN WHICH IS FURTHER PARLEY WITH THE CAPTIVE MAIDEN 143
XVII IN WHICH IS HUE AND CRY 154
XVIII IN WHICH IS DISCUSSION OF TWO AUNTIES 158
XIX IN WHICH I ESTABLISH A MODUS VIVENDI 166
XX IN WHICH I HAVE POLITE CONVERSATION, BUT LITTLE
ELSE 175
XXI IN WHICH WE MAKE A RUN FOR IT 184
XXII IN WHICH I WALK AND TALK WITH HELENA 192
XXIII IN WHICH IS A PRETTY KETTLE OF FISH 205
XXIV IN WHICH WE HAVE A SENSATION 213
XXV IN WHICH WE MEET THE OTHER MAN, ALSO ANOTHER WOMAN 224
XXVI IN WHICH WE BURN ALL BRIDGES 244
XXVII IN WHICH WE REACH THE SPANISH MAIN 258
XXVIII IN WHICH IS CERTAIN POLITE CONVERSATION 267
XXIX IN WHICH IS SHIPWRECK 285
XXX IN WHICH IS SHIPWRECK OF OTHER SORT 299
XXXI IN WHICH WE TAKE TO THE BOATS 312
XXXII IN WHICH I RESCUE THE COOK 324
XXXIII IN WHICH WE ARE CASTAWAYS 333
XXXIV IN WHICH IS NO RAPPROCHEMENT WITH THE FAIR CAPTIVE 349
XXXV IN WHICH I FIND TWO ESTIMABLE FRIENDS, BUT LOSE
ONE BELOVED 357
XXXVI IN WHICH WE FOLD OUR TENTS 375
XXXVII IN WHICH IS PHILOSOPHY; WHICH, HOWEVER, SHOULD NOT
BE SKIPPED 384
XXXVIII IN WHICH IS AN ARMISTICE WITH FATE 395
XXXIX IN WHICH ARE SEALED ORDERS 400
XL IN WHICH LAND SHOWS IN THE OFFING 414
XLI IN WHICH IS MUCH ROMANCE, AND SOME TREASURE, ALSO
VERY MUCH HAPPINESS 426
THE LADY AND THE PIRATE
CHAPTER I
IN WHICH I AM A CAITIFF
I was sitting at one of my favorite spots engaged in looking through
my fly-book for some lure that might, perhaps, mend my luck in the
afternoon's fishing. At least, I had within the moment been so
engaged; although the truth is that the evening was so exceptionally
fine, and the spot always so extraordinarily attractive to me--this
particular angle of the stream, where the tall birches stand, being to
my mind the most beautiful bit on my whole estate--that I had
forgotten all about angling and was sitting with rod laid by upon the
bank, the fly-book scarce noted in my hand. Moreover, a peculiarly
fine specimen of Anopheles, (as I took it to be) was at that very
moment hovering over my hand, and I was anxious to confirm my judgment
as well as to enlarge my collection of mosquitoes. I had my other hand
in a pocket feeling for the little phial in which I purposed to
enclose Anopheles, if I could coax him to alight. Indeed, I say, I
was at that very moment as happy as a man need be; or, at least, as
happy as I ever expected to be. Imagine my surprise, therefore, at
that moment to hear a voice, apparently intended for me, exclaim,
"Halt! Caitiff!"
I looked up, more annoyed than displeased or startled. It is not often
one sees so fine a specimen of Anopheles; and one could have sworn
that, but for my slight involuntary movement of the hand, he must have
settled; after which--_crede experto!_--he would have been the same as
in my phial, and doomed to the chloroform within the next hour.
Besides, no matter who one may be or how engaged, it is not wholly
seemly to be accosted as a caitiff, when one is on one's own land,
offending no man on earth, owing no debt and paying no tribute,
feudal, commercial, military or personal, to any man on earth.
The situation seemed to me singular. Had the time been some centuries
earlier, the place somewhere in the old world, such speech might have
had better fitting. But the time was less than a year ago, the place
was in America. I was on my own lands, in this one of our middle
states. This was my own river; or at least, I owned the broad acres on
both sides of it for some miles. And I was a man of no slinking habit,
no repulsive mien, of that I was assured, but a successful American
of means; lately a professional man and now a man of leisure, and not
so far past thirty years of age. My fly-rod was the best that money
can buy, and the pages of the adjacent book were handsomely stocked by
the best makers of this country and each of the three divisions of
Great Britain; in each of which--as well as in Norway, Germany, or for
the matter of that, India, New Zealand, Alaska, Japan or other
lands--I had more than once wet a line. My garb was not of leather
jerkin, my buskins not of thonged straw, but on the contrary I was
turned out in good tweeds, well cut by my London tailor. To be called
offhand, and with no more reason than there was provocation, a
"caitiff," even by a voice somewhat treble and a trifle trembling,
left me every reason in the world to be surprised, annoyed and
grieved. For now Anopheles had flown away; and had I not been thus
startled, I should certainly have had him. Yet more, no fish would
rise in that pool the rest of that evening, for no trout in my little
stream thereabout ever had seen a boat or been frightened by the plash
of an oar since the time, three years back, when I had bought the
place.
I looked up. Just at the bend, arrested now by hand anchorage to the
overhanging alders, lay a small boat, occupied by two boys, neither
of more than fourteen years, the younger seemingly not more than
twelve. It was the latter who was clinging with one hand to the
drooping bushes. His companion, apparently the leader in their present
enterprise, was half crouching in the bow of the boat and he,
evidently, was the one who had accosted me.
A second glance gave me even more surprise, for it showed that the
boat, though not precisely long, low and rakish of build, evidently
was of piratical intent. At least she was piratical in decoration. On
each side of her bow there was painted--and the evening sun, shining
through my larches, showed the paint still fresh--in more or less
accurate design in black, the emblem of a skull and cross-bones. Above
her, supported by a short staff, perhaps cut from my own willows, flew
a black flag, and whatever may have been her stern-chaser equipment,
her broadside batteries, or her deck carronades--none of which I could
well make out, as her hull lay half concealed among the alders--her
bow-chaser was certainly in commission and manned for action. The
pirate captain, himself, was at the lanyard; and I perceived that he
now rested an extraordinarily large six-shooter in the fork of a short
staff, which was fixed in the bow. Along this, with a three-cornered
gray eye, he now sighted at the lower button of my waistcoat, and in a
fashion that gave me goose-flesh underneath the button, in spite of
all my mingled emotions. Had I not "halted," as ordered, to the extent
of sitting on quietly as I was, he no doubt would have pulled the
lanyard, with consequences such as I do not care to contemplate, and
mayhap to the effect that this somewhat singular story would never
have been written.
"Halt, Sirrah!" began the pirate leader again, "or I will blow you out
of the water!"
I sat for a moment regarding him, my chin in my hand.
"No," said I at last; "I already am out of the water, my friend. But,
prithee, have a care of yonder lanyard, else, gadzooks! you may belike
blow me off the bank and into the water."
This speech of mine seemed as much to disconcert the pirate chieftain
as had his me. He stood erect, shifting his Long Tom, to the great
ease of my waistcoat button.
"Won't you heave to, and put off a small boat for a parley?" I
inquired.