Part 12 (1/2)

”Yes,” Pearce continued, ”I don't like the look of it, sir, and I shouldn't like to take the responsibility of advisin' of you to send the boats away. For, ye see, Mr--”

”Yes,” I interrupted, cutting ruthlessly in upon the man's speech, ”I see quite clearly, boatswain, that you and I are of one mind upon that point, therefore there is no need to discuss it further, and we will at once proceed to action. Call all hands if you please, Mr Pearce.”

The next moment the shrill chirruping of Pearce's pipe and his gruff bellow of ”All hands ahoy!” resounded throughout the little vessel, and our decks at once became a scene of animation. The galley fire was extinguished, although the cook was by this time busy upon the preparation of the men's dinner; screens were fastened up round the hatchways, the magazine was opened, powder and shot were pa.s.sed up on deck, and the guns were cast loose and loaded, the men dancing about the decks with the glee and activity of schoolboys preparing for a day's amus.e.m.e.nt. Then, as soon as we were all ready for action, the heavy sweeps were rigged out, four men to each sweep, and the schooner's bows were pointed straight for the stranger. To overcome the inertia of the little vessel, and get way upon her, was laborious work, and the men, stripped to their waists, were soon streaming with perspiration; but after the first five minutes' toil, during which we worked up a speed of about three knots, it proved a comparatively easy matter to keep her going.

It soon became evident that a keen watch upon our movements was being maintained by the pirates; for no sooner had it been made apparent that we intended to close with the strangers than all attempts at further concealment were abandoned, the s.h.i.+p's courses were clewed up, her yards were squared; to facilitate the hoisting out of cargo, additional tackles were got aloft, and all the signs of greatly increased activity on board her at once became manifest. It now also became apparent that some means had been resorted to for the purpose of keeping her broadside presented to us and her hull interposed between us and the pirate vessel, and that these means had now been abandoned as of no further avail; for within the next ten minutes she swung stem-on to us, and we saw that there was indeed another craft alongside her--a slas.h.i.+ng big topsail schooner, immensely beamy, with all her canvas clewed up and furled, and her decks c.u.mbered with bales and packages of all sizes and descriptions, which were being hoisted out of the big s.h.i.+p's hold and lowered over the side with feverish activity. As the two craft swung round, revealing the presence of the second vessel, our lads gave a cheer of delight and exultation, and applied themselves with such fierce energy to the toil of working the heavy sweeps that they churned the gla.s.sy surface of the ocean into a long double row of miniature whirlpools, that went swirling and frothing away from the blades of the sweeps into the wake of the schooner, to the distance of a full quarter of a mile.

Fortunately, however, they were not compelled to toil very long at this exhausting labour; for when we had progressed about a mile a few catspaws came stealing along the surface of the water from the westward, while a dark line gradually extended along the western horizon and advanced steadily in our direction, the catspaws meanwhile multiplying and spreading until, within a quarter of an hour of their first appearance, the sails of the strange s.h.i.+p were wrinkling and flapping to quite a pleasant little breeze. The moment that this happened the pirate schooner cast off and made sail with the rapidity and precision of a man-o'-war, thus demonstrating that she was manned by an exceptionally strong and efficient crew. As soon as she was clear of the s.h.i.+p she was brought to the wind, under an enormous spread of exquisitely cut canvas, and away she went, close-hauled on the port tack, heading to the northward at a pace which made us gape with astonishment; while the s.h.i.+p, with squared yards, gathered stern-way and first fell broadside-on to us, then gradually paid off until she was before the wind, when down she came driving toward us, yawing so broadly to port and starboard that it was easy to see she had n.o.body at her helm, which seemed to point pretty clearly toward the presumption of tragedy. A quarter of an hour later the catspaws were ruffling the surface of the water here and there all round us, and stirring our canvas at rapidly decreasing intervals, with the true breeze coming fast and close behind them; we, therefore, laid in our sweeps, put the helm up, trimmed our sheets on the port tack, took a long pull and a strong pull upon the halliards all round, and paid off just in time to receive the first of the true breeze into the hollows of our canvas, when, heeling over to the extent of a strake or so, away we too went, with a merry buzzing and seething of water under our bows and along our bends.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

THE WASP FIGHTS THE PIRATE SCHOONER.

The pirate schooner--a craft of apparently two hundred tons or more, very long and low on the water, painted dead black, with immensely tall, wand-like masts, and an enormous spread of canvas--was now slipping along fast through the water, heading to the northward, and some six miles dead to windward of us. It was a long start, and I foresaw that, fast as the little _Wasp_ undoubtedly was, unless something quite unforeseen occurred, a good many things might happen before we could get alongside the enemy. Why such a big powerful vessel--she showed seven ports of a side, and there was something suspiciously like a long 32-pounder on her forecastle--should turn tail so ignominiously and run from a little shrimp of a craft like the _Wasp_ I could not imagine, though I was to receive enlightenment upon that point before long. Our immediate business, however, was not with her, but with the big s.h.i.+p that was coming yawing down the wind toward us.

She was now about five miles distant, and as she came driving along, now stem-on, with her square canvas full, and anon sweeping round until she presented one or the other of her broadsides to us, with only her fore-and-aft canvas drawing, we were enabled to get a very good view of her. She was a big craft, of from nine hundred to a thousand tons, perhaps, and at a distance might very well have been mistaken for a man-o'-war. But she was evidently not that, for she showed only four guns of a side upon her upper-deck, and they were but small, apparently not more than 6-pounders. She was very heavily rigged, with a wide spread to her lower yards, but the heads of her square sails narrowed away to such an extent that her royal-yards looked to be scarcely more than ten feet long. Her hull was painted bright yellowish-brown, with a broad white ribbon round it, and her bottom was painted white, with a black stripe between it and the brown, but below the water-line the white paint was foul with barnacles and sea gra.s.s, as we could see when she rolled. She carried, by way of figurehead, the image of a female saint, very elaborately painted and gilded, with a good deal of gilded scroll-work round about it, and her stern and quarters were also elaborately carved and gilded. Her topsides tumbled home enormously, her width on deck being little more than half that at her water-line.

Surmounting her stern there was a great p.o.o.p lantern, almost big enough for a man to stand in. A rough painting of the Crucifixion adorned her fore-topsail. She showed no colours; but she was Spanish, beyond a doubt, and most probably, as I had at first surmised, a West Indiaman.

We manoeuvred the _Wasp_ in such a manner as to close with the stranger, as nearly as possible without incurring the risk of being run into and sunk by her in one of her wild sheers, and at the proper moment the schooner was hove-to, the quarter-boat lowered, and with four hands in her, armed with pistols and cutla.s.ses, I jumped in and pulled away for the other craft.

Carefully watching her movements, we contrived to get alongside and hook on without very much difficulty; and then all hands of us swarmed up her towering side and tumbled in on deck, with our drawn pistols in our hands, for there was never any knowing what ghastly trick a pirate might play, or what fiendish trap he might set--they were capable of anything and everything--therefore it behoved us to be wary; but nothing happened. There was not a soul on deck to interfere with us, or to demand our business; and the first thing we did was to put the helm hard over and lay the mainyard aback as she came to the wind. Then I ascended to the p.o.o.p and took a comprehensive glance round me.

The circ.u.mstance that thrust itself most obtrusively forward, demanding immediate notice, was that the main hatchway was gaping wide-open, with a tackle dangling down it from the main-stay, evidently for the purpose of hoisting cargo out of the hold. All round the hatchway the deck was littered with bales and cases of every description, some of them intact, as they had come up out of the hold, while others had been ripped or wrenched open and their contents scattered hither and thither about the decks. There was a cask lying on its bilge, its head knocked out, and perhaps a gallon or so of port wine still in it, while all round about it the deck was dark, wet, and reeking with the fumes of the spilt wine.

But there were other and more sinister stains than those of wine on the planks--there were great splashes of blood here and there on bulwarks and deck, much of which was partially hidden by the scattered cargo; but the scene was not nearly so sanguinary or revolting as I had expected to find it, for there were no ensanguined, mutilated corpses to shock the eye, or harrow the imagination, by the sight of their hurts.

Nor, for that matter, were there any living people on board the s.h.i.+p, either in cabins or forecastle, although there was abundant evidence that both had had their full complement of occupants. The forecastle, for example, was lumbered up with the chests of the seamen, boots, caps, and various other articles of clothing lying scattered about the deck, while oilskins, sou'westers, and more clothing hung from pegs and nails driven into the timber walls; the bedding in the bunks also was disarranged, as though the men had just rolled out of them; and a large copper slush lamp, suspended from a deck beam, still burned, smoking and flaring to the roll of the s.h.i.+p upon the swell. The confusion here was merely normal, and such as is always to be found in a s.h.i.+p's forecastle; but the grand saloon presented a very different and terribly suggestive appearance. The whole place was a scene of dreadful disorder and violence, a carouse seeming to have been succeeded by a life and death struggle. For the ma.s.sive mahogany table was bare, while the cloth that should have covered it lay upon the carpeted deck in a confused heap in the midst of a medley of smashed decanters, gla.s.ses, and viands of various descriptions, while the reek of spilled wine, mingled with the odour of gunpowder and tobacco smoke, filled the air; one or two of the handsome mirrors that adorned the cabin were smashed, the cracks radiating from the point of fracture right out to the frame; two or three discharged pistols and a broken sword lay among the debris on the carpet; some of the rich velvet cus.h.i.+ons had been torn off the locker and then kicked under the table; and a number of men's, women's, and children's garments lay scattered about the apartment. Nor was this all. The doors of the staterooms on either side of the saloon stood wide-open, hooked back to the bulkheads; and here again the bedding was all in disorder, as though the occupants had leapt hurriedly from the bunks under the influence of some sudden alarm; trunks and boxes were standing open--some of them overturned--and their contents scattered all over the cabin, as though the receptacles had been rummaged in search of jewellery or money, or both. And the soft white linen sheets that formed part of the bedding in one of the cabins was deeply and horribly smeared with scarcely dry blood, with which also the mattress underneath seemed to be soaked! The captain's cabin--or what I took to be such-- had likewise been rifled, the charts having been taken from the racks, the chronometer from its padded well in the book-case, and the s.e.xtant had vanished, as well as the s.h.i.+p's papers. But we were able to ascertain her name and port of registry, for it was engraved upon the broad bra.s.s rim of her steering wheel, and upon her bell: ”_Santa Brigitta_, Santander.”

It was evident that there were no living persons on board this fine but ruthlessly despoiled s.h.i.+p, or if there were, they must be in hiding; and with the view of testing this latter point I now swung myself down through the open hatchway leading to the lazarette, believing that that would be the part of the s.h.i.+p wherein a person might most successfully hide and evade capture. I was no sooner down in this gloomy receptacle, devoted to the stowage of the s.h.i.+p's cabin stores, than I saw that it too had been rummaged, if not actually rifled; but I could detect no sign indicative of the presence of a person, or persons, in hiding; and although I shouted until I was hoa.r.s.e, no sound save the furtive scurrying of rats reached me by way of reply. But presently, as I stood listening, and my ears became accustomed to the subdued creaking and groaning of the vessel's framework and cargo, another sound came to me-- the sound of gurgling, bubbling water; and making my way toward it as best I could down between the casks and cases that c.u.mbered the place, I suddenly dropped down into a void, and found water--salt water, surging and was.h.i.+ng to and fro with the movements of the s.h.i.+p, to the height of my knees. I tried to find the source of the inflow, but I was now down in the s.h.i.+p's run, standing upon her steeply sloping side, and I speedily realised that the points of influx were already so far beneath the surface as to be entirely beyond my reach; and the water was coming in fast, too, for even as I stood there I could feel it creeping insidiously up my legs. The scoundrels had evidently followed their usual custom and had scuttled the s.h.i.+p, in order that no tangible evidences of their crime might remain.

Until I made this discovery it had been my intention to put a prize-crew on board her and send her into Port Royal; but with one or more-- probably half-a-dozen--bad leaks below the water-level, and utterly beyond our reach, this plan was no longer feasible; and now the only thing to be done was to leave the unfortunate craft to her fate, proceed in chase of the authors of the mischief, and do our utmost to bring them to book. I therefore scrambled up out of the lazarette into the main saloon, made my way out on deck again, and, summoning my boat's crew, descended the deserted s.h.i.+p's side, and pushed off on my way back to the _Wasp_.

But it was with something akin to shock that I looked back at the _Santa Brigitta_, as the boat sped across the short s.p.a.ce of water that separated her from the schooner. For although we had only been aboard her a short half-hour, she had settled perceptibly during that time; so deeply, indeed, that as I looked at her I felt convinced she must have been scuttled forward as well as aft, and that the water must be pouring into her from at least a dozen auger-holes. At that rate she would sink long before we could get out of sight of her, although the breeze was now perceptibly stronger than it had been when I boarded the ill-fated s.h.i.+p.

By the time that I had regained the deck of the _Wasp_, and that craft was once more under way, the pirate schooner was hull-down on the north-western horizon, nearly ten miles away. But light breezes and smooth water, such as we had at the moment, const.i.tuted absolutely ideal weather for the _Wasp_; it was under precisely such conditions that her marvellous sailing powers showed to the utmost advantage, and, smart as the other schooner had revealed herself to be, I had very little doubt as to our ability to overhaul her and bring her to account. We therefore piled upon the little hooker every rag that we could find a spar or stay for, brought her to the wind, flattened-in her sheets until her mainboom was almost amids.h.i.+ps, and generally made all our preparations for a long chase to windward.

But although the weather was at the moment everything that could be desired, from our point of view, I did not by any means like the look of it; the hazy appearance of the atmosphere, far from clearing, was steadily increasing in density, the sun had by this time vanished altogether, and the appearance of gloom away down to the westward was now deepening and, at the same time, working round into the northern quarter of the heavens. Also, the mercury was dropping quite rapidly.

My chief anxiety now was to overhaul the pirate schooner and bring her to action before nightfall; for, with bad weather threatening, unless we could succeed in doing this, there was every likelihood of her giving us the slip during the hours of darkness. A stern-chase is proverbially a long chase, and a chase to windward is apt to be even longer, while a start of some ten miles, under such circ.u.mstances, must necessarily prove a heavy handicap to the pursuing vessel; nevertheless I was not without hope that, difficult as our task threatened to be, we might yet accomplish it. For it still wanted nearly an hour to noon, the _Wasp_ was slipping along through the water like a racer, and was looking up a full point nearer the wind than our antagonist, and, early as it yet was to form such a conclusion, I felt almost certain that we were head-reaching as well as weathering upon the chase.

As soon as it became apparent that some hours would probably elapse before we could go into action, I gave orders for the guns to be secured and the galley fire to be lighted again, in order that the men might not be deprived of their usual dinner; and this meal was just nicely over when, to our utter amazement, the chase suddenly hoisted the black flag, bore up, and with squared yards came running down with the obvious intention of coming to close quarters with us; whereupon we once more made ready for battle, at the same time shortening sail to our ordinary working canvas. At first I was distinctly puzzled to account for or understand this sudden change of tactics upon the part of the pirates; but a remark of Henderson's seemed to offer a tolerably plausible explanation of it.

”Depend upon it, sir,” he suggested, ”they only hauled off to give themselves time to stow away the plunder that c.u.mbered their decks when they shoved off from the Spaniard. They wouldn't want to go into action with a lot of bales and cases hamperin' their movements; but now that they've got everything snugly stowed under hatches, they're comin' down to try conclusions with us; and if they really mean business we've a very tidy little job afore us.”

”Ay,” I a.s.sented; ”that schooner will prove a very tough nut to crack, Henderson; she carries more than twice our weight of metal, even if I am mistaken in supposing that I saw a long gun on her forecastle; and she appears to be very strongly manned. Our only chance will be to engage her at close quarters, lay her aboard, and carry her by boarding.”

”D'ye think they'll be such fools as to let us do that, sir?”

caustically demanded the gunner, chewing hard upon his quid, in his evident perplexity.