Yes, a heap of folks have admired that teapot. Hundreds of pounds we
must have been offered for it, first and last, since the night my wife's
grandfather, Captain John Tackabird--or Cap'n Jacka, as he was always
called--brought it into the family over the back-garden wall, and his
funny little wife went for him with the broom-handle. Poor souls, they
were always a most affectionate couple, and religious too, but not much
to look at; and when he took and died of a seizure in the Waterloo year
she wasn't long in following.
Ay, ay--very pleasant in their lives! though not what you would call
lovely. I've heard that, through being allowed by his mother to run too
soon, Tackabird's legs grew up so bandy, the other children used to
drive their hoops between them. And next, at fifteen, what must he do
but upset a bee-skip! A bee stung him, and all his hair came off, and
for three parts of his natural life be went about as bald as an egg.
To cap everything, he'd scarcely began courting when he lost his left
eye in a little job with the preventive men; but none of this seemed to
make any difference to the woman. Peters her maiden name was--Mary
Polly Peters; a little figure with beady black eyes. She believed that
all Captain Jacka's defects would be set right in another world, though
not to hinder her recognising him; and meantime the more he got chipped
about the more she doted on what was left of the man.
Everyone in Polperro respected the couple, for Mary Polly kept herself
_to_ herself, and Captain Jacka was known for the handiest man in the
haven to run a Guernsey cargo or handle a privateer, and this though he
took to privateering late in life, in the service of the "Hand and
Glove" company of adventurers. By and by Mr. Zephaniah Job, who looked
after these affairs in Polperro--free-trade and privateering both--
started a second company called the "Pride of the West," and put Captain
Jacka to command their first ship, the old _Pride_ lugger; a very good
choice, seeing that for three years together he cleared over forty per
cent. on the adventurers' capital.
The more was his disappointment when they built a new lugger, the
_Unity_, one hundred and sixty tons, and Job gave the command to a smart
young fellow called Dick Hewitt, whose father held shares in the concern
and money to buy votes beside. I've told you how Jacka swallowed his
pride and sailed as mate under this Hewitt, and how he managed to heap
coals of fire on the company's head. Well that's one story and this is
another. I'm telling now of the second boat, when Captain Jacka, or, as
you might say, Providence--for what happened was none of his seeking,
and the old boy acted throughout as innocent as a sucking-child--left
off shaming the company as honest men, and hit them slap in their
pockets, where they could feel.
The bottom of the quarrel was that Mr. Job, the agent, took a dislike to
Jacka. He was one of your sour, long-jawed sort, a bit of a lawyer,
with a temper like Old Nick, and just the amount of decent feeling that
makes a man the angrier for knowing he's unjust, especially when the
fellow that's hit takes it smiling instead of cursing; and more
especially still when he carries but one eye in his head, and be dashed
if you can tell whether its twinkling back at you out of pure sweetness
of nature or because it sees a joke of its own. I believe Captain Jacka
twinkled back on Mr. Job as he twinkled on the rest of the world,
willing to be friends and search for the best side of everyone, if he
might be allowed. But Mr. Job couldn't be sure of this, and I'm fain to
admit the old boy was a trial to him, with his easy-going ways.
Job, you see, was a stickler for order; kept his accounts like the Bank
of England, all in the best penmanship, with black and red ink, and
signed his name at the end with a beautiful flourish in the shape of a
swan, all done with one stroke--he having been a school-master in his
youth, and highly respected at it until his unfortunate temper made him
shy a child out of window, which drove him out of the business, as such
things will. In young Dick Hewitt he had a captain to his mind: soap
and tidiness and punctuality, and oil and rotten-stone for the very
gun-swivels; all the crew touching caps, and nerve and seamanship on top
of all. Jacka admired the young spark, for all his boastfulness; for
his own part he could do anything with a ship but keep her tidy.
"What's the use of giving yourself on-necessary work?" he'd say in his
mild manner, if he saw one of his hands coiling a rope or housing a sail
neatly. "We may be wantin' it any minute, and then you'll be sorry for
labour thrown away." The dirtiness of his decks was a caution, and this
was the queerer because in his own parlour you might have eaten your
dinner off the floor. "I reckon," he'd explain, "when the Lord made sea
and land He meant there should be a difference, and likewise when He
made man and woman," and stuck to his untidiness afloat because it made
him the gladder to be at home again. Mary Polly, though she lived
within forty yards of the sea, and was proud of her husband as any
mortal woman, would never step on board a boat. The sight of one
(she declared) turned her stomach, and she married their only child to a
house-decorator.
All this untidiness was poison to Mr. Job, and it worked inside the man
until he was just one simmering pot of wrath, and liable to boil over at
the leastest little extra provocation.
One day--it was the tenth of July in the year 'nine; Peter's Tide, and
the Upper Town crowded with peep-shows and ranter-go-rounds, and folks
keeping the feast--Mr. Job takes a stroll down the quay past the
sweet-standings, and cocks his eye over the edge, down upon the deck of
the old _Pride_ that was moored alongside and fitting out for a fresh
cruise. And there, in the shade of the quay wall, sat old Captain Jacka
with a hammer, tap-tapping at a square of tinplate.
"Hullo!" Mr. Job hailed. "Where's the crew?"
"Up riding the hobby-horses, I b'lieve," answered Jacka, as friendly as
you please.
"And in thirty-six hours you've engaged to have the _Pride_ ready for
sea!"
"She's about ready now," said Jacka, stopping to put a peppermint in his
mouth. He had bought a packet off one of the sweet-standings, and
spread it on the deck beside him. "Feast-day doesn't come round more
than once a year, and I haven't the heart to deny them, with the work so
well forward, too." The old fellow fairly beamed across his deck, the
raffle of which was something cruel. "There's a fat woman up there,
too. I'm told she's well worth seeing."
"You call that dirty mess 'being fit for sea'?" asked Mr. Job, nodding
down, but bottling up his anger after a fashion. "Look here, Captain
Tackabird, you're a servant of the company; and I'll trouble you to
stand up and behave respectful when the company's agent pays you a visit
of inspection."
"Cert'nly, Mr. Job." Jacka scrambled up to his feet as mild as milk.
"Beg your pardon, sir, I thought you'd just strolled down to pass the
time of day."
"And don't flash that plaguey thing in my eyes, as you're doing."
For Jacka was standing in the sunshine now, with the tinplate in his
hands blazing away like a looking-glass.
"Very well, sir. Perhaps you'll allow me to fetch a hat out of the
cabin; for my head feels the heat powerful, being so bald. They do say
it twinkles a bit, too, when the sun catches it the right way."
So down he went to the cabin, and up he came again to find Mr. Job with
his best coat-tails spread, seated on the carriage of the _Pride's_
stern-chaser.
"Oh, Lord!" he couldn't help groaning.
"What's the matter?"
"Nothing, Mr. Job, nothing." The fact was, Jacka had smeared a dollop
of honey on that very gun-carriage to keep the wasps off him while he
worked. The sweet-standings, you see, always drew a swarm of wasps on
feast-days, and the old man never could abide them since his accident
with the bee-skip.
Mr. Job sat there with his mouth screwed up, eyeing the whole length of
the lugger.
"I'd like to know why you were hammering out that tinplate?" said he.
"I can see with my own eyes you've been knocking dents in the deck; but
I s'pose that wasn't your only object."
"I reckoned to tack it over this here hole in the bulwarks where the
tide swung her up against the quay-end." Captain Jacka showed him the
place.
"I'd have let you have a fresh plank if you'd only reported the damage
in time."
"Oh," said Jacka, "a scrap of tin will answer just as well--every bit."
"I can't think, Captain Tackabird, how it comes that you've no more
regard for appearances. Just look at the _Unity_, for instance, and how
young Hewitt keeps her."
"Born different, I suppose."
"Ay, and if you don't look out you'll end different. Patching a boat
with tin!" Mr. Job let out a rasping kind of laugh. "But that's
Polperro, all over. Do you know what they tell about you, down to St.
Ann's?"--Mr. Job came from St. Ann's--"They say, down there, that every
man-child in Polperro is born with a patch in the seat of his--"
Mr. Job stood up and cast a hand behind him, to explain. . . .
"I put it there to keep off the wopses," said Captain Jacka.
"But what did he say?" asked Mary Polly, when her husband brought home
the tale.
"First he said, 'I'll make you pay for this.' Well, that was fair
enough, for I ought to have warned him; but when I asked the price, and
where the stuff could be matched--for 'twas his best suit, you
understand--all of a sudden he stamps his foot and lets fly with the
most horrible oaths. It fairly creamed my flesh to hear him.
He's a man of wrath, my love, and the end of him will be worse than the
beginning."
"I daresay; but he'll give you the sack before that happens."
The two poor old souls looked at one another; for Job had control of all
the privateering companies in Polperro, and influence enough to starve a
man out of the place.
"Lev us take counsel of the Lord," said the old boy, as she knew he
would. So down on their knees they went, and prayed together.
Jacka even put up a petition for Mr. Job, but Mary Polly couldn't say
"Amen" to that.
The next morning Captain Jacka went down to the _Pride_ at the usual
hour, but only to find his crew scrubbing decks and Mr. Job ready for
him. "There's your marching orders," says the enemy, handing him a
paper; "and if you want a character at any time, just come to me, and
I'll give you a daisy."
Well, the old chap said no word, but turned about then and there, and
back along the quay like a man in a dream. All the way he kept fumbling
the document without daring to open it, and when he reached his own door
he just sat down on the little low wall outside, laid the cursed thing
on his knee, pulled a bandanna out of his breeches pocket, and polished
the top of his poor head till it fairly blazed in the eye of the sun.
He was sitting there, dazed and quiet, when the door opened and out came
Mary Polly with a rag-mat in her hand, meaning to bang it against the
wall, as her custom was.
"Hullo!" says she, stopping short on the threshold. "Back again, like a
bad penny?"
"Bad enough, this time," says her husband, without turning round; and
drops his head with a groan.
I must say the woman's behaviour was peculiar. For first of all she
stepped forward and gave his head a stroking, just as you might a
child's, and then she looks up and down the street, and says,
"I'm ashamed of 'ee, carryin' on like this for all the public to see.
Stick your hands in your pockets," says she.
"What's the use of that?" But he did it.
"Now whistle."
"Eh?"
"Whistle a tune."
"But I can't."
"You can if you try; I've heard you whistlin' 'Rule Britannia' scores of
times, or bits of it. Now I'm goin' to beat this mat and make believe
to be talkin' to 'ee. At the very first sound old Mrs. Scantlebury'll
poke her head out, she always does. So you go on whistlin', and don't
mind anything I say. There'll be no peace in life for us after she gets
wind you've been sacked; and just now I want a little time to myself to
relieve my feelin's."
So Jacka started to whistle, feeling mighty shy, and Mary Polly picked
up the mat.
"I wish," says she to the mat, "you was Mr. (whang) Zephaniah (whang)
Job (whang). I do dearly wish for my life you was Mr. (whang) Zephaniah
(whang) Job (whang). I'd take your ugly old head with its stivery grey
whiskers and I'd (bang, whang)--I'd (bang, whang)--I'd treat you like
this here mat, and lay you down for folks to wipe their shoes upon, Mr.
(whang) Zephaniah (whang) Job (whang)."
"When Britain first at Heaven's command," whistled Jacka; and the Widow
Scantlebury, two doors up the street, was properly taken in. An hour
later, when the news of Jacka's dismissal was all over the town, she had
to sit down and consider. "I see'd him come up the street"--this was
how she told the story, being the sort of woman that never knows where
the truth ends--"just as Mary Polly was shaking out her mat. He came up
like a whipped dog, stuck his hands in his pockets and started to
whistle, for all the world like a whipped dog, you understand? Any fool
could see the man had something on his mind and wanted to break it
gentle. But not she! Went on banging the mat, if you'll believe me,
till my flesh ached to see a woman so dull-minded. Of course it wasn'
no business of mine, tho' you _would_ think, after living with a man
thirty years--" and so on, and so on.
But when Mary Polly had relieved her feelings, and the two old souls
were in the kitchen with the door shut behind them, they came very near
to breaking down. You see, Captain Jacka had followed the trade in
Polperro all his days, and his heart was in it till Mr. Job pulled him
up by the roots. He and Mary Polly had saved a little, and looked
forward to leaving it to their only child--my wife's mother, that was;
and anyway it wasn't enough to maintain them, let be that to touch a
penny of it would have burnt their fingers. No; Captain Jacka must find
a new billet.
But in a month or so, when folks had given up sympathising--for Mary
Polly hated to be pitied, and gave them no encouragement--he saw plain
enough that there was no billet for him in a small place like Polperro
where Mr. Job ruled the roost. Before Christmas his mind was made up;
and early in Christmas week he said good-bye to his wife, marched up to
Four Turnings with his kit on his back, and shipped on board Boutigo's
Two-Horse Conveyance for Falmouth.
There was a Mr. Rogers living at Falmouth who had been a shareholder in
the old "Hand and Glove" company, but had sold out over some quarrel
with Mr. Job; and to him Jacka applied.
"I'm told that seamen are scarce, sir," says he. "I was wondering if
you could find me a berth anywhere, for I've 'arned forty per cent. for
my employers before now, and could do it again, but for a man of my
unfortunate looks 'tis hard to get a start."
Mr. Rogers tapped the desk with his ruler, like one considering.
"Why have they turned you out?" he asked. "Anything professional?"
"How could _I_ help Mr. Job's sitting down on a lump of honey?
I put it to you, sir, as a business man."
"I'm sure I don't know," said Mr. Rogers. "Let's have the story."
So out it all came. "He's a man of wrath," said Captain Jacka,
"and he'll be sorry for it when he comes to die."
"There's one or two," said Mr. Rogers, "would like to hurry that
reckoning a bit. Well, well, I can make shift to fit you up with
something for a week or two, and maybe by that time there'll be an
opening aboard one of the Packets. Just now, in Christmas week,
business is slack enough, but what do you say to going mate on a vessel
as far as the Downs?"
"Nothing I should like better," says Jacka.
"You'd better have a look at her first," says Mr. Rogers.
So he takes Jacka off to the Market Strand, calls for a waterman's
wherry, and inside of ten minutes they were being pulled out to the
Roads.
"There's your ship," says Mr. Rogers, as they pushed out beyond the old
dock into Carrick Roads.
Jacka opened first his eyes and then his mouth. The vessel was a kind
of top-sail schooner, but with a hull there was no mistaking, the more
by token that the tide was swinging her stern-on, and showing him a pair
of windows picked out in red paint, with shutter-boards and brass hinges
shining.
"Mr. Rogers," he said, "I han't read the _Sherborne Mercury_ lately,
but is--is the war over?"
"No, nor likely to be."
"But, Mr. Rogers, sir, either that there ship is a Dutchman or else I
be."
"Look at her flag, you old fool."
"Never see'd the like of it."
"That's the flag of the Principality of Nibby-Gibby. Ever heard of it?"
"Can't say I have."
"No more did I till the day before yesterday, and I won't swear I've got
it right yet. But 'tis somewhere up the Baltic I understand.
That there ship--her name, by the way, is the _Burgomeister Van der
Werf_--is bound up Channel with sugar from Jamaica--with a licence.
Maybe you folks up to Polperro don't know what that means?"
"I only know that, if I'd ran across her in the old _Pride_, I'd have
clapped a crew on board and run her into a British port and no questions
asked."
Says Mr. Rogers, "If that's the way you Polperro men keep abreast of
Board of Trade regulations, it strikes me you might have done worse than
lose your billet with the _Pride of the West_."
In the time left before the waterman brought them alongside, Mr. Rogers
explained, as well as he could, the new system (as it was then) of
licences; by which the Government winked at neutral vessels carrying
goods into the enemy's ports, in spite of the blockade, and bringing us
back Baltic timber for shipbuilding.
"But a Dutchman isn' no neutral," Captain Jacka objected.
"I did hear," said Mr. Rogers, stroking his chin and looking sideways,
"that these licences have their market-price, and that in Amsterdam just
now it's seven hundred rix-dollars."
"Well-a-well, if the Board of Trade's satisfied," says Jacka, "it's not
for the likes of me to object. But if I was a Christian ruler I should
think twice afore invitin' such a deal of hard swearin'."
"You'll find Captain Cornelisz a Lutheran," Mr. Rogers assured him,
"and a very sociable fellow, with the little English he can muster."
Well, to make my story short, Jacka stepped on board and found the Dutch
skipper monstrous polite and accommodating, though terrible sleepy, the
reason being that, his mate falling sick at Kingston of the yellow
fever, he had been forced to navigate his vessel home single-handed.
He owned up, too, that he had a poor head for ciphering, so that 'twas
more by luck than good management he'd hit off the Channel at all.
At any rate he was glad enough of a chance to shift off responsibility
and take a sound nap, and inside of half an hour the bargain was struck
over a glass of hot schnapps. Mr. Rogers shook hands and put off for
shore again, and a boat went with him to fetch Jacka's kit, which he'd
left in the office.
At six o'clock the _Van der Werf_ weighed anchor and headed out under
easy canvas. The wind outside was almost dead contrary, E. by N. and
half E., and blowing a little under half a gale, but the skipper seemed
in a hurry, and Jacka didn't mind.
"She's a good boat by all seeming," said he as they cleared St.
Anthony's light; "but she wants a sea-way. I reckon, sir, you'd better
stay on deck for a tack or two, till I find how she comes about.
I'm accustomed, you see, to something a bit sharper in the bows, and
just at first that may tempt me to run it too fine."
"Who wants you to run it fine at all?" asked Captain Cornelisz.
"Well, naturally you'll work it in short tacks and hug the English side
pretty close."
"Short tacks? Not a bit of it; tide'll be running up strong by time
we're out in deep water. Put her right across for France, keep her
pretty full--she won't bear pinching--and let her rip."
"Risky."
"How's that?"
"_Chasse-marees_ are pretty thick, I'm told, once you get near t'other
side, 'specially between Morlaix and Guernsey, let alone a chance of
dropping across a French cruiser."
"My good man, I've been stopped twice on this voyage already by French
cruisers: once off Brest, and the second time about fifty miles this
side of Ushant."
"You don't tell me!" says Jacka. "How the dickens did they let you go?"
"Well," answers the Dutchman, "I took the precaution of fitting myself
_with two sets of papers_. Oh," says he, as Jacka lets out a low
whistle, "it's the ordinary thing in our line of business. So you just
do as I tell you and make the boards as long as you please, for I'm
dropping with sleep in my boots. Keep the ship going, and if you sight
anyone that looks like trouble just give me a hail down the companion,
for I can talk to any frigate, British or French."
With that he bundled away below, and Jacka, after a word or two with the
man at the helm, to make sure they understood enough of each other's
lingo, settled down with his pipe for the night's work.
The wind held pretty steady, and the _Van der Werf_ made nothing of the
cross-seas, being a beamy craft and fit for any weather in a sea-way.
Jacka conned her very careful, and decided there was no use in driving
her; extra sail would only fling up more water without improving her
speed. So he jogged along steady, keeping her full and by, and letting
her take the seas the best way she liked them. Towards morning he even
began to doze a bit, till warned by a new motion of the ship that she
wasn't doing her best. He opened his eyes and shouted--
"Up with your helm, ye lubber! Hard up, I tell ye, and keep her full!"
A pretty heavy spray at that moment came over the bow and took him fair
in the face, and he stumbled aft in none too sweet a temper. Then he
saw what had happened: the fresh hand at the wheel had dozed off where
he stood and let the _Van der Werf_ run up in the wind. The fellow was
little more than a boy, and white in the face with want of sleep.
Captain Jacka was always a kind-hearted man. Said he, as he flung the
spokes round, and the _Van der Werf_ began to pay off: "Look here, my
lad, if you can't keep a better eye open, I'll take a trick myself.
So go you forward and stow yourself somewheres within call."
With that he took the helm, and glad of it, to keep himself awake; and
so held her going till daybreak.
By eight in the morning, just as the light began creeping, and Jacka was
calculating his whereabouts, he lifted his eye over the weather-bow,
and--
"Hullo!" he sings out. "What's yonder to windward?"
The lad he'd relieved jumps up from where he'd been napping beside the
bitts, and runs forward. But, whatever he sang out, Jacka paid no
attention; for by this time his own one eye had told him all he wanted
to know, and a trifle more; and he clutched at the wheel for a moment
like a man dazed. Then, I believe, a sort of heavenly joy crept over
his face, mixed with a sort of heavenly cunning.
"Call up the crew," he ordered. "I'm going to put her about. The whole
crew--every man-Jack of them!"
By the time the men tumbled up, Jacka had his helm up, and the _Van der
Werf_, with sheets pinned, was leaning to it and knocking up the
unholiest sputter.
"All right, my lads. Don't stand glazing at me like stuck pigs.
Stand by to slacken sheets. I'm going to gybe her."
Well, they obeyed, though not a man of them could guess what he was
after. Over went the big mainsail with a jerk that must have pitched
Captain Cornelisz clean out of his bunk below; for half a minute later
he comes puffing and growling up the companion and wanting to know in
his best Dutch if this was the end of the world, and if not, what was
it?
"That's capital," says Jacka, "for I was just about stepping down to
call you. See that lugger, yonder?" He jerked his thumb over his
shoulder at a speck in the grey from which the _Van der Werf_ was now
running at something like nine knots an hour.
"Well?"
"I know that lugger, and we're running away from her."
"Pack of stuff!" says Captain Cornelisz, or Dutch to that effect.
"D'ee want to be told a dozen times that this is a licensed ship?"
And he called for his flag, to hoist it.
"Oh, drop your fancy pocket-handkerchiefs, and listen to reason, that's
a dear man! _O' course_ I know you carry a licence; but the point is--
the lugger don't know. _O' course_ I'm running away from her, by your
leave; but the point is--she can run and reach three miles to our two.
And lastly, _o' course_ you're master here, and can do what you please;
but, if you're not pressed for time, there's money in it, and you shan't
say I didn't give you the chance."
Captain Cornelisz eyed Jacka for a full minute, and then a dinky little
smile started in one eye and spread till it covered the whole of his
wide face.
"You're a knowing one," said he.
"Was never considered so," answered Jacka, very modest.
"She's put about and after us," said the skipper, after a long stare
over his right shoulder.
"She'll have us in less than three hours. There's one thing to be done,
and that's to stow me somewheres out of the way; for if anyone on board
of her catches sight of me, the game's up. S'pose we try the lazarette,
if you have such a place. I like fresh air as a rule, but for once in a
while I don't mind bein' squoze; and, as lazarettes go, yours ought to
be nice and roomy."
"You shall have a bottle of Hollands for company," promised Captain
Cornelisz.
So the hatch was pulled up, and down Jacka crept and curled himself up
in the darkness. The Dutchman provisioned him there with a bottle of
strong waters and a bag of biscuits, and--what's more--called down to
him so long as was prudent and kept him informed how the chase was
going.
By this time the lugger--which I needn't tell you was Mr. Zephaniah
Job's pet _Unity_, with Captain Dick Hewitt commanding--was closing down
on the _Van der Werf_, overhauling her hand-over-fist. Down in the
lazarette Jacka had scarcely finished prising the cork out of his bottle
of Hollands when he heard the bang of a gun. This was the lugger's
command to round-to and surrender; and the old boy, who had been vexing
himself with fear that some cruiser might drop in and spoil sport, put
the bottle to his mouth and drank Mr. Job's very good health.
"For I think," says he to himself, with a chuckle, "I can trust Cap'n
Dick Hewitt to put his foot into this little mess just as deep as it
will go."
With that, being heavy after his night's watch, he tied up his chin in
his bandanna handkerchief to keep him from snoring, curled round, and
dropped off to sleep like a babe.
Well, sir, Cap'n Dick Hewitt brought-to his prize, as he reckoned her;
and when he came aboard and sized up the cargo and the _Unity's_ luck,
as he reckoned it, his boastfulness was neither to hold nor to bind.
No such windfall had been picked up for the _Pride of the West_ during
the four years he'd been in the company's service. He scarce stayed to
give a glance at the _Van der Werf's_ papers, though Captain Cornelisz
was ready for him with the wrong set. "I guess," says he, "you'll spare
yourself the trouble to pretend you ain't a Dutchman"; and when the
skipper flung his arms about and began to jabber like a play-actor,
'twas "All right, Mynheer; we'll talk about that at Falmouth.
Look here, boys," he sings out to his boarding party, "we've something
here too good to be let out of sight. My idea is to reach back for
Polperro in company, and let Mr. Job and the shareholders have a view of
her before taking her round to Falmouth. It won't cost us three hours
extra," says he, "and a little bit of a flourish is excusable under the
circumstances."
So up for Polperro they bore, half a dozen men from the lugger working
the _Van der Werf_, and old Captain Jacka asleep in her lazarette till
roused out of his dreams by the rattle as they cast anchor half a
cable's length outside the haven. The tide was drawing to flood and the
evening dusking down, and in sails Captain Dick in the _Unity_ as big as
bull's beef, and shouts his news to all the loafers on the quay.
"But come and take a look at her for yourself," says he to Mr. Job, who
had stepped down with his best telescope.
Job put off that evening in something like a flutter of spirits; for to
tell the truth half a dozen of the shareholders had been cutting up
rough over his treatment of Jacka, and here was an answer for them, and
proof that he'd been right in preaching up Dick Hewitt to be worth ten
of the old man.
Alongside he comes in the _Unity's_ boat, steps aboard, and makes a
polite leg to Captain Cornelisz, with any amount of sham sympathy in his
eye.
"Dear, dear," says he, "this is a very unfort'nit business for you,
Cap'n What's-your-name! In time of war I s'pose such things must
happen; but I can't help feelin' sorry for you," says he.
"I was thinkin' to reckon the damage at six hundred pounds," says the
Dutch skipper, meek as you please.
"Hey?" says Mr. Job.
"Well, sir, I likes to be reasonable; but it's a question of missing the
convoy, and under the circumstances--case of illegal detention at the
best--you won't consider six hundred pounds out of the way. Of course,"
says he, "I haven't been allowed to study your lugger's papers, so it
may be flat piracy. But if your skipper had taken the trouble to study
mine--"
"What in thunder is he telling about?" demanded Mr. Job.
"Only this, sir," answered Captain Cornelisz, smiling very sweet, and
pulling out his licence from his side-pocket, he read, "'And the said
vessel has our protection while bearing any flag except the French, and
notwithstanding the documents accompanying the said vessel and cargo may
represent the same to be destined to any neutral or hostile port, or to
whomsoever such property may appear to belong.' The wording you see,
sir, is very particular, and under the circumstances I can't say less
than six hundred pounds; but, of course, if you oblige me to take it to
the courts, there's your papers to be considered, which may raise the
question of piracy."
Just an hour later, when Mr. Job had returned to shore in the devil's
own temper to call a hasty meeting of his shareholders--and Captain
Hewitt along with him, with his tail between his Legs--Captain Cornelisz
raised the trap of the lazarette.
"I'm thinking a little fresh air's no more than you deserve," said he.
"But where are we, in this world?" asked Jacka.
"So well as I can learn, 'tis a place called Polperro."