Porto Bello gold E-Book

Arthur D. Howden Smith

• Herausgeber: Librorium Editions
• Kategorie: Abenteuer, Thriller, Horror
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

I was in the counting-room, talking with Peter Corlaer, the chief of our fur-traders—he was that very day come down-river from the Iroquois country—when the boy, Darby, ran in from the street.
"The Bristol packet is in, Master Robert," he cried. "And, oh, sir, the watermen do say there be a pirate ship off the Hook!"
I remember I laughed at the combination of awe and delight in his face. He was a raw, bog-trotting bit of a gossoon we had bought at the last landing of bonded folk, and he talked with a brogue that thickened whenever he grew excited.
"For the packet, I do not doubt you, Darby," I answered. "But you must show me the pirate."
Peter Corlaer chuckled in his quiet, rumbling way, his huge belly waggling before him beneath his buckskin hunting-shirt, for all the world like a monster mold of jelly.
"Ja, ja, show us der pirates," he jeered.
Darby flared up in a burst of Irish temper that matched his tangled red hair.

Leseprobe

 

 

 

 

 

 

Porto Bello Gold

BY

ARTHUR D. HOWDEN SMITH

1924

© 2023 Librorium Editions

ISBN : 9782385741082

Oh, Tusitala, you who lie "Under the wide and starry sky" On that Samoan hill, Think not this wretched, miswrought tale Is meant to breast the thundering gale Of your great art and skill— As well the humble trading bark Might sail to cloudland with the lark! Be patient, sir, until We meet on some far height of dreams And I explain just why it seems John Silver's with us still, And all the raffish, ruffian crew That you and young Jim Hawkins knew— They burst Time's dungeon-grill!

FENLEY HUNTER, Esq., Flushing, N. Y.

DEAR FEN:

You are responsible for some of the incidents in this roaring yarn, and for that and other reasons it should be inscribed to you—who, in your own person, lead a life as swaggeringly varied from the existence of office, home and country-club as any character I have created between these covers. If it detains you from the out-trail for a night or two, persuades you to sample the pleasures of the sheltered hearth, I shall be rewarded.

Yours, KING ARTHUR.

Babylon, N. Y., Feb. 9, 1924.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I My Father's Secret II The One-Legged Man and the Irish Maid III A Caller in the Night IV An Inkling of the Plot V Aboard the Brig VI Tall Ships and Lawless Men VII Murray's Plan VIII A Wicked Old Man's Dream IX The Island X Hostages XI Peter Plays at Bowls with Destiny XII The Treasure Ship XIII Trouble Boards the Royal James XIV The Dead Man's Chest XV Suspicions XVI Treachery XVII The Storm XVIII Disaster XIX The Attack on the Stockade XX Prisoners XXI Flint's Way XXII "Fetch aft the Rum, Darby McGraw!" XXIII Cap'n Bill Bones XXIV Home

PORTO BELLO GOLD

CHAPTER I MY FATHER'S SECRET

I was in the counting-room, talking with Peter Corlaer, the chief of our fur-traders—he was that very day come down-river from the Iroquois country—when the boy, Darby, ran in from the street.

"The Bristol packet is in, Master Robert," he cried. "And, oh, sir, the watermen do say there be a pirate ship off the Hook!"

I remember I laughed at the combination of awe and delight in his face. He was a raw, bog-trotting bit of a gossoon we had bought at the last landing of bonded folk, and he talked with a brogue that thickened whenever he grew excited.

"For the packet, I do not doubt you, Darby," I answered. "But you must show me the pirate."

Peter Corlaer chuckled in his quiet, rumbling way, his huge belly waggling before him beneath his buckskin hunting-shirt, for all the world like a monster mold of jelly.

"Ja, ja, show us der pirates," he jeered.

Darby flared up in a burst of Irish temper that matched his tangled red hair.

"I would I were a pirate and had you at my mercy, you butter-tub!" he raged. "I'll warrant you'd tread the plank!"

Peter gravely unsheathed his hunting-knife, seized Darby's flaming locks and despite his wriggles went through the motions of scalping him.

"If I tread der plank, first I take your hair, ja," he commented.

"Not if I had my growth," snapped Darby.

"T'ree growths you must get to fight me, Darby," rejoined Peter placidly. "You better ask Mr. Ormerod dot he let you come with me into the Iroquois country. We make a forest-runner out of you—ja! Dot's better than a pirate."

Darby contemplated this, drawing a circle on the floor with the toe of one boot.

"No," he decided finally. "I'd rather be a pirate. I know nothing of your forest, but the sea—ah, that's the life for me! And sure, a pirate has more of traveling and adventure than a forest-runner, with none but red savages and wild beasts to combat. No, no, Master Peter, I am for the pirates, and I care not how soon it may be."

"It will be long, not soon, Darby," said I. "Have you done the errands my father set you?"

"Every one," answered he.

"Very well. Then get you into the store-room and sort over the pelts Peter fetched in. Even a pirate must work."

He flung off with a scowl as I turned to Peter.

"My father will wish to know the packet has arrived," I said. "Will you go with me to the Governor's? The Council must be on the point of breaking up, for they have been sitting since noon."

Peter heaved his enormous body erect. And I marveled, as always after a period of absence, at his proportions. To one who did not know him he seemed a butter-tub of a man, as Darby had called him—a mass of tallow, fat limbs, a pork-barrel of a trunk, a fat slab of a face upon which showed tiny, insignificant features grotesquely at variance with the rest of his bulk. His little eyes peered innocently between rolls of fat which all but masked them. His nose was a miniature dab, above a mouth a child might have owned.

But under his layers of blubber were concealed muscles of forged steel, and he was capable of the agility of a catamount. The man had not lived on the frontier who could face him bare-handed and escape.

"Ja," he said simply. "We go."

He stood his musket in a corner and slipped off powder-horn and shot-pouch the while I donned hat and greatcoat, for the air was still chilly and there was a scum of snow on the ground. We passed out into Pearl Street and walked westward to Hanover Square, and there on the farther side of the Square I spied my father, with Governor Clinton and Lieutenant-Governor Colden.

And it made my heart warm to see how these and several other gentlemen hung upon his words. There had been those who slandered him during the uproar over the '45, for he was known to have been a Jacobite in his youth; but his friends were more powerful than his enemies, and I joy to think that he was not the least influential of those of our leaders who held New York loyal to King George when many were for casting in our fortunes with the Pretender.

He saw Peter and me as we approached and waved us to him, but at the same moment there was a slight disturbance on the eastward side of the Square, and another little group of men came into view surrounding a grizzled, ruddy-cheeked old fellow, whose salt-stained blue coat spoke as eloquently of the sea as did his rolling gait. I could hear his hoarse, roaring voice clear across the Square—

"—ran him tops'ls down; —— my eyes, I did; and when I get to port what do I find, but not a King's ship within——"

My father interrupted him:

"What's this, Captain Farraday? Do you speak of being chased? I had thought we were at peace with the world."

Captain Farraday discarded the listeners who had attended him so far and stumped across the Square, bellowing his answer in tones which brought shopkeepers to their doors and women's heads from upper windows.

"Chased? That I was, Master Ormerod, by as ——, scoundrelly a pirate as flouts the King's majesty i' the ——"

Here he perceived who accompanied my father. Off came his hat, and he made an awkward bow.

"Your sarvent, your Excellency! My duty, Master Colden! But I have no words to withdraw, for all I did not see who was near by to hear me. Aye, there is more to be said, much more; and matters have come to a pretty pass when the rascals come north to these ports."

Peter Corlaer and I joined the little group of merchants who were with the Governor, and the other curious persons hovered as close as they dared.

"But I find this hard to give credence to, captain," said Governor Clinton pleasantly enough. "Pirates? In these latitudes? We have not been bothered by such of late."

Captain Farraday wagged his head stubbornly.

"That's true enough, I grant your Excellency; and since the peace we have not been bothered by French privateers, neither. But the day'll come we fight the French again, and then the letters of marque will be scouring the Atlantic north and south. And by the same token, sir, I bid you remember the pirates are always with us, and clever devils they are, too; for if they find their trade falling off in one part they are away at once elsewhere. And the first you know of them is a score of missing ships and a mariner like myself lucky enough to give them the slip."

"You may be right," acknowledged the Governor. "Tell us more of your experience. Did you have sight of the ship which pursued you?"

"Sight? Marry, that I did; and uncomfortable close, your Excellency. She came up with a so'easter two days past, and at the first I made her out for a frigate by the top-hamper she carried."

"A frigate?" protested Master Colden. "So big as that?"

"Aye, sir, my master! And if I have any eye for a ship's lines and canvas she was none other than the Royal James that chased me three days together when I was home-bound from the West Indies in '43."

"That would be the vessel of the fellow known usually as Captain Rip-Rap," spoke up my father, and there was a quality in his voice which led me to regard him closely.

It was manifest that he labored in the grip of some strong emotion; but the only indication of this in his face was a slight rigidity of feature, and none of the others marked it. I was the more amazed because my father was a man of iron nerves, and also, though his earlier years had been starred with a series of extraordinary adventures, so far as I knew, he had had nothing to do with the sea.

"True for you, Master Ormerod," answered Captain Farraday; "and since Henry Morgan died there hath not lived a more complete rogue. One of my mates was taken by him off Jamaica ten years gone and cites him for a man of exquisite dress and manners that would befit a London macaroni, God save us! And moreover, is as arrant a Jacobite as ever was. Witness the name of his ship."

"I have heard he sails usually in company," remarked my father.

"He works with John Flint, who is no less of a rascal, albeit rougher, according to those unfortunates who have fallen in his path. Flint sails in the Walrus, a tall ship out of Plymouth that was on the Smyrna run before she fell into his hands. Betwixt them they are a pretty pair.

"Did you ever hear, gentles, how they sank the Portuguese line-ship off Madeira for naught but the pleasure o' destruction? Aye, so they did. They ha' the metal to hammer a brace of King's ships. But they are wary of such.

"Portuguese, Frenchies, Spaniards or Barbary corsairs they will assail, but they will not stop for a powder-blow with his Majesty's people. Why? I know not, save 'tis never for lack o' daring. Mayhap they know if they ever did my Lords of the Admiralty, that take small account of the sufferings of us poor merchantmen—always saving your Excellency's presence—would be stirred to loose a fleet of stout frigates against 'em."

Captain Farraday stopped perforce for breath, and Governor Clinton seized the opportunity to ask with a smile:

"Captain Rip-Rap did you call your pursuer? What manner of name is this?"

The merchantman shrugged his shoulders.

"Nobody knows, sir. But 'tis the only name he goes by. I ha' heard that years past—oh, it may be twenty or more—he stopped a home-bound Chesapeake packet, and when the master was haled aboard the first question he asked was 'did he have any rip-rap in his cargo?' For it seems he is singularly partial to that mixture of snuff. And now, I ha' been told, his own men give him this name, for even they do not know for certain that to which he was born.

"'Tis said he was a gentleman who suffered for his political convictions, but that is as like to be a lie as the truth. All I know is that he chased me in past the Hook, though the Anne showed him a clean pair o' heels and had run him tops'ls down wi' sunrise this morning. And when I made the harbor, 'twas to find there was not a King's ship to send after him."

"Yes," nodded the Governor; "the Thetis frigate sailed for home with dispatches a week ago. But I will send express to Boston where Commodore Burrage lies and bid him get to sea without loss of time. I sympathize with your feelings, Master Farraday, and certes, 'tis beyond toleration that such scoundrels as Rip-Rap and Flint should be permitted to flout his Majesty's Government so openly. Doubt not, our good commodore will make them rue the day."

"But doubt it I must, your Excellency," returned Captain Farraday with sturdy independence. "An express to Boston, say you? Humph! That will require two days or three. Another day to put to sea. Two days, or it may be three, to beat south. Why, my masters, in a week's time Rip-Rap and Flint will have wrought whatever fiendish purpose they have in view and be off beyond reach."

"Mayhap, mayhap," said the Governor with a touch of impatience. "But 'tis the best I can do."

And with Lieutenant-Governor Colden and the rest he made to move off. Only my father lingered.

"You have letters for me, Captain Farraday?" he asked.

"Aye, indeed, sir—from Master Allen, your agent in London. I was on my way to deliver 'em. And a goodly store of strouds, axes, knives, beads, tools, flints and other trade-goods to your account."

"I will accept the letters at your hands, and even save you the trip to Pearl Street, captain," replied my father. "My son, Robert, here, will visit you aboardship in the morning and take measures to arrange for transshipping your cargo."

"I ha' no quarrel with such terms," rejoined Captain Farraday, fishing a silken-wrapped packet from his coat-tail pocket. "Here you are, Master Ormerod. And I'll be off to the George Tavern for a bite of shore food and a mug of mulled ale."

My father fidgeted the packet in his hands for a moment.

"You are certain 'twas Captain Rip-Rap who chased you?" he asked then.

"I'd swear to his foretops'ls," answered Farraday confidently. "Mark you, my master, when I first sighted him I made sure he was a King's ship, and I lay to until he was abeam. Then I saw he showed no colors—and moreover, there was that about him, which I'll own I can not put a name to, made me suspicious. So I hoisted colors. And still he showed none. I fired a gun, and wi' that he bore up for me, and I made off, wi' every sail set; aye, until the sticks groaned. For I knew he was up to no good purpose, and I made certain that he was Rip-Rap.

"As I said afore, he chased me once in '43, and Jenkins he took off Jamaica in the snow Cynthia out o' Southampton, when Flint was for drowning the lot o' them; but Rip-Rap, in his cold way, says there was no point to slaying without purpose, and they turned 'em loose in the longboat. And there's none left 'on the Account' that sail in a great ship fit to be a King's frigate, save it be Rip-Rap—Flint's Walrus is a tall ship and heavy armed, but hath not the sail-spread o' the Royal James. Jenkins says she was a Frenchman, and 'tis to be admitted she hath the fine-run lines the Frenchies build."

My father was hard put to it to make head against this flow of talk, but at last he succeeded.

"It was my understanding," he said, "that Captain Rip-Rap disappeared from the West Indies during the late war."

Captain Farraday shrugged his shoulders.

"Like enough. There were too many cruisers o' both sides at large in those seas to suit him. But now he knows we ha' back the piping times of peace—and when nations are at peace your pirates reap their harvest. You may lay to that, Master Ormerod."

"'Tis not to be questioned," assented my father. "I give you thanks, captain. Pray call upon me at your leisure, and if I can be of any service to you I am at your command."

Captain Farraday stumped off toward the George, a tail of the curious at his heels, and I grinned to myself at thought of the strong drink they would offer him in return for his tale. There was no chance of his being sober inside the twenty-four hours.

My father nodded absently to Peter, who had stood throughout the entire conversation, his flat face sleepily imperturbable.

"I like it not," he muttered, as if to himself.

Peter gave him a quick look but said nothing.

"Is there anything wrong, father?" I asked.

He frowned at me, then stared off at the housetops in a way he had, almost as if he sought to peer beyond the future.

"No—yes—I do not know."

He broke off abruptly.

"Peter, I am glad you are here," he added.

"Ja," said Peter vacantly.

"You have not looked at your letters yet," I reminded him.

"I have no occasion to," he retorted. "There is that which—But the street is no place for such conversation. Come home, my boy; come home."

We set off over the snowy ground, and the people we passed bowed or bobbed their heads to my father, for he was a great man in New York, as great as any after the Governor; but he walked now with his eyes upon the ground, immersed in thought. And once again as we turned into Pearl Street he muttered—

"Nay, I like it not."

Darby McGraw met us at the door, and from his wild gaze I knew him to be half-expecting to behold the pirates hot-foot at our heels.

"Have you performed your tasks, Darby?" questioned my father as the lad backed into the counting-room on the right of the entrance hall.

"Yes, master."

"Be off with you, then. I wish not to be disturbed."

"See can you find us late news of the pirates, Darby," I added as he slipped by.

He answered me with a merry scowl, but my father spun on his heel.

"What mean you by that, Robert?" says he.

I was nonplussed.

"Why, naught, sir. Darby is daft on pirates. He——"

Peter Corlaer shut the room-door upon the Irish boy and came toward us, moving with the swift stealth that was one of his most astonishing characteristics.

"Ja, he does not know," he said.

"What?" challenged my father.

"What you andt I know," returned the Dutchman calmly.

"So you know too, Peter?"

"Ja."

I could restrain my impatience no longer.

"What is this mystery?" I demanded. "I thought I knew all the secrets of the business; but sure, father, I never thought to hear that we were concerned as a firm with pirates!"

"We are not," my father answered curtly. "This is a matter of which you know nothing, Robert, because until now there has been no occasion for you to know of it."

He hesitated.

"Peter," he went on, "must we tell the boy?"

"He is not a boy; he is a man," said Peter.

I flashed my gratitude to the fat Dutchman in a smile, but he paid me no attention. My father, too, seemed to forget me. He strode up and down the counting-room, hands under the skirts of his coat, head bowed in thought. Tags of phrases escaped his lips:

"I had thought him dead— Strange, if he bobs up again— Here is a problem I had never thought to face— Mayhap I exaggerate—it cannot have significance for us— Certes, it must be accident——"

"Neen, he comes for a purpose," interrupted Peter.

My father stayed his walk in front of Peter by the fireplace wherein blazed a heap of elm logs.

"Who do you fancy this Captain Rip-Rap to be, Peter? Speak up! You were right when you said Robert is no longer a boy. If there is danger here, he deserves to know of it."

"He is Murray," replied Corlaer, his squeaking voice an incongruous contrast with his immense bulk.

"Andrew Murray!" mused my father. "Aye, 'twould be he. I have suspected it all these years—held it for certainty. But I made sure when he failed to show himself after the last war that Providence had attended to him. It seems I was wrong."

"Whoever he is, this pirate can not do harm to us in New York," I made bold to say.

"Be not too sure, Robert," adjured my father. "He happens to be your great-uncle."

He reached up to the rack over the fireplace and selected a long clay pipe, which he stuffed with tobacco the while I was recovering from my astonishment.

"Your uncle?" I gasped then.

Corlaer hauled forward a couple of chairs, and we all sat in the circle of the firelight, my father on one side of me and Peter on the other. The evening was drawing on apace, and the room was aswarm with shadows a few feet from the hearth. My father stared long into the leaping heart of the flames before he answered me.

"No; your mother's," he said finally.

"But he was the great trader who conducted the contraband trade with Canada!" I cried. "I have heard of him. 'Twas he established the Doom Trail to enable him to supply the French fur-traders with goods to wean the far savages from us! You have told me of him yourself, as hath Master Colden. 'Twas he whom you and Corlaer and the Iroquois fought when you broke down the barriers of the Doom Trail and won back the fur-trade for our people. Why, 'twas then you—you——"

I knew the deep feeling my father still had for my long-dead mother, and I scrupled to stir his memories. He himself took the words from my lips.

"Yes, 'twas then I came to love your mother. She—she was not such as you would expect to find allied by any ties with so great a scoundrel. But she was his niece—past doubt, Robert. She was a Kerr of Fernieside; her mother had been Murray's sister. Kerr and Murray were out together in the '15; Kerr fell at Sheriffmuir. His widow died not long afterward, and Murray took poor waif Marjory.

"He did well by her—there's no denying that. But he always intended to use her to further his own designs. He had a cold eye for the future, with no thought except of his own advantage, and if I— But there's no need to go into that. You know, Robert, how Corlaer and the Seneca chief, Tawannears—he who is now the Guardian of the Western Door of the Long House—and I were able to smash the vast power Murray had built up on the frontier.

"We smashed him so utterly, discrediting him too withal, that he was obliged to flee the province; and even his friends, the French, would have none of him—at least, aboveboard. I have always fancied he still served their interests at large; for he is at bottom a most fanatical Jacobite, and eke sincere in a queer, twisted way. Aye, there is that about him which is difficult to understand, Robert. Himself, he hath no hesitation in believing he serves high purposes of state in all he does."

"But a pirate!" I exclaimed.

"Oh, that is nothing to him!"

"Not'ing," agreed Peter. "He was a pirate on der landt."

"Only a madman could lay claim to serving the State as a pirate," I objected.

"You speak with overconfidence," rebuked my father. "There are men alive today who can remember when Morgan and Davis and Dampier and many another brave fellow of the same kidney lived by piracy and served the King at one and the same time. Some of 'em were hung in the end, and Morgan died a knight. It can be done."

"How?"

"Consider, my boy! Murray—your great-uncle, mind you!—is a Jacobite. For our present Government he hath only hatred and contempt. Any means by which that Government was undermined would seem to him justifiable as aiding to bring about its downfall. Look to the fantastic humor of the man in naming his ship the Royal James!"

"If he be, indeed, the man you think he is," I returned, none too well pleased with the thought of having a pirate for a great-uncle. My father laughed kindly, and tapped me on the knee with his free hand.

"I know how you feel, dear lad," he said. "'Twas so identically your mother talked. Bless her heart! We were fresh married when the precious rascal sent us by one of his tarry-breeks that necklace which lies now in my strong-box—the loot of some Indian queen mayhap. Afterward—after she had died—when you were scarce breeched—he sent again; those silver plates upon the sideboard in the dining-room. Dishonestly come by, of course; but what was I to do? I could not cast them in the river, nor did I know how to return them to him. And after that again came a third messenger, this time with no more than a letter in which he condoled with me upon the loss of her whom we had both reverenced above all others!

"Then, I admit, I could have strangled him, for had he been successful in his plans he would have mated her with a Frenchman who was servant to the Foul Fiend. Yet in his way he cared for her, and he took much interest in all she did. By hook or crook he had word of us, however far he wandered. He knew when you were born. He knew when she died. And now that you have reached manhood he shows his sails outside Sandy Hook. I do not know what it means, Robert, but I like it not! I like it not!"

"But we are not at sea," I protested. "We are in New York. There are soldiers in Fort George. Commodore Burrage will be down from Boston anon. What can a pirate ship, what can two pirate ships, effect against us? Why, the city train-bands——"

"'Tis not force I dread," my father cut me off. "'Tis the infernal cleverness of a warped mind."

"Ja," agreed Peter.

My father thrust the stem of his pipe toward him.

"You feel it, too, old friend?" he cried then.

"If Murray is here he means no goodt," the Dutchman answered ponderously. "No pirate comes nort' in der coldt weather for just fun. Neen! Here is too much danger; no places to run andt hide."

"Aye, you have the right of it," assented my father. "And there have been those who claimed New York town was not so innocent of pirates as might appear upon the surface. Murray and his like must sell the goods they steal, and to that end they require connections with traders here and elsewhere. In Governor Burnet's time we used to watch the Whale's Head Tavern and other like hang-outs of the more desperate sort, but I am bound to admit we caught no bigger game than an occasional mutineer or deserter. Yet I know there are merchants in the town none too particular in their dealings, and not every ship that makes port is as peaceful as she seems by any means."

"At the least, sir, we are on the alert," I said.

My father laughed, and Corlaer's ridiculous, simpering giggle echoed his grim mirth.

"An intelligent foe discounts so much upon launching his venture," my father answered. "Let us hope we have a modicum of luck to aid us. Whatever plan Murray hath in trend 'twill come to us unexpected and adroit in execution. But tush. There's the dinner-bell. A truce to foreboding!"

CHAPTER II THE ONE-LEGGED MAN AND THE IRISH MAID

The next morning I was occupied for several hours in checking over the needs of our trading-stations with Peter Corlaer, so that it was the middle of the forenoon before I was able to leave the counting-room to go aboard Captain Farraday's ship and concert with her people the lightering of that portion of the cargo which was destined for our warehouse.

Darby McGraw eyed me so wistfully when I took my hat that I sent him to the kitchen to secure a bag of fresh-killed chickens and Winter greens, knowing such food would be welcome to sailors after a long voyage, and bade him carry it to the dock. He was as pleased as if he had been presented with his freedom, and skipped along whistling like a skylark.

We walked down Pearl Street to Broad Street, where the landing-basin indents the land; and I was passing on, with intent to secure a wherry from the foot of Whitehall Street to row me out to the Bristol packet, when Darby drew my attention to the soaring masts and tangled cordage of a great ship lying at anchor in the East River anchorage.

"'Tis a frigate, Master Robert!" he exclaimed.

There was no mistaking the rows of painted gun-ports and the solid bulwarks; and for a moment I fancied Commodore Burrage had anticipated our needs. Then the flag at her mizzen truck rippled out, and I beheld the red-and-gold banner of Spain.

"D'ye suppose he hath come after the pirate?" whispered Darby, all agog.

"Not he," I answered, laughing. "'Tis a Spaniard, and he and his kidney are not hungry for pirate gore, Darby."

"Whisht, but if he would only make to shoot off a cannon or two!" sighed Darby. "Or maybe hang a poor soul at the yardarm the while we watched. Oh, Master Robert, wouldn't it be grand?"

"Go to," said I, laughing again at the quaint fancies of the lad. "You are as bloodthirsty as any pirate that sails the Spanish Main."

"I'll warrant you I am," returned Darby sturdily. "I'd be a grand pirate, I would—and I'd make naught of frigates, be they Spaniard or King's ship; aye, or Frenchies. I'd take 'em all!"

"Certes, you would," I agreed. "But look, Darby! There's another strange vessel—beyond the frigate."

I pointed to a battered little brig with patched and dirty sails and a spatter of white showing in her black-painted hull where a roundshot had sent the splinters flying.

"And he hath seen the pirates, or I am amiss," I added. "His escape must have been exceeding narrow."

Darby's eyes waxed as large as a cat's in the dark.

"Whurra, whurra, do but look to the shot-hole in the side of him! 'Tis he will have made a noble prayer. And now will ye mock me for saying there are pirates abroad, Master Robert?"

"Not I, Darby. Yon fellow has been closer to death than I like to think of," I answered.

"Now there was as true a word as ever was heard spoke," proclaimed a pleasant voice behind me. "And shows most unaccountable understanding and humanitee, so it do, seeing as there's precious few landsmen as stop to figger out the chances a poor sailor must take and never a thankee from his owners nor aught but curses from his skipper, like as not. True as true, young gentleman. I makes you my duty, and says as how, seeing I was one of them vouchsafed a miraculous salvation, I hopes you'll permit me to offer my most humble thanks."

I swung around to scrutinize the owner of the voice and saw a handsome, open-faced man in the prime of life, big and strong of his body, but with only one leg. The other, the left, had been lopped off high up near the hip, and he supported himself upon a long crutch of very fine-carved hardwood—mahogany, I afterward discovered. This crutch he employed with all the dexterity of his missing limb. A thong from a hole under the armpiece was looped around his neck, so that when he chose to sit down his support could never fall out of his reach; and in its butt was set a sharp spur of steel to give it a grip upon rough ground or slippery decks.

While I looked at him and he was first speaking he hopped up beside me with a confidential air that was very flattering to a young man and impressed Darby even more than it did me.

"Are you from the brig yonder?" I asked curiously.

"Aye, aye, young gentleman, I am; and one of the miserable sinners as was saved by an inscrootable Providence as takes no account o' men's deserts, just or unjust, as the preachers' sayin' is. Out of Barbaders, I am, in the brig Constant. Name o' Silver, sir—John, says my sponsors in baptism.

"But my mates most generally calls me 'Barbecue' 'count o' my being held a monstrous fine cook. And there's a tale to that, young sir. Ah, yes! This weren't the first time I suffered at the hands o' them pirates that scourge and ravage the seas to the despite of poor, honest sailormen."

He lowered his voice.

"D'ye see this lopsided carcass of mine now? You do, says you. Yes, yes; there ain't no mistakin' a one-legged man. And how do you suppose I lost my left stick, eh? Can't say, says you—nor it ain't strange, seein' as we've never met afore this.

"Well, I'll tell ye, sir. You ha' a young face, and kind, and I can see you take an interest in an unfortunate sailor-man's sorrows—aye, and this good lad wi' ye, too—from Ireland, ain't ye, my hearty? I knowed it, I knowed it!

"But what was I a-sayin'? Oh, yes, to be sure. I was tellin' ye of my lost leg—and glad I am it wasn't my flipper as went. 'Cause why, says you? 'Cause a man can set himself to makin' good a lost leg, which ain't no use for nothin' except walking.

"But a hand now? Figger it out, my master! No hand, and ye can't work, ye can't fight, ye can't scarcely eat. That's why I says I'm lucky."

The man attracted me by his originality, and I own frankly I would have pressed him for further information whether Darby had been with me or not; but 'twas Darby brought him back to the main point of interest.

"Did ye see the pirates?" panted the lad in excitement.

John Silver drew himself erect upon his crutch and frowned out at the shot-scarred brig.

"See 'em?" he repeated. "Well now, my lad, that depends. Aye, aye, it all depends.

"This last time, d'ye mean? No, I can't conscientiously say I seen 'em this time. In the matter o' my leg 'twas different—and the time Flint marooned me."

"You know Flint then?" I broke in upon him.

He shook his head.

"Know him? Oh, no, young gentleman; I don't know no bloody villains like that. I ha' seen 'em, yes—a sight too many of 'em, as ye might say. And suffered most terrible at their hands; but I make no doubt the Lord is decided I ha' suffered my portion, seein' that this last time He delivered me safe and sound out o' the scoundrels' hands."

"Was it off Sandy Hook they attacked you?" I inquired.

"Off Sandy Hook?" he repeated. "Maybe 'twas so, young gentleman. We took small reckoning o' where we were. Our one thought was to make port whole and safe."

"But I see they hulled you?" I pressed him.

"That?" he answered. "Oh, yes; but— May I make bold to ask, sir, ha' other vessels been chased off New York port, do you know?"

I pointed to where Captain Farraday's craft swung at her anchor a scant quarter-mile above the brig.

"That Bristol packet ran the notorious Captain Rip-Rap tops'ls down but yester-morning," I told him.

His brows knit together in a frown, apparently of thought.

"Captain Rip-Rap you says it was! Blister me, young gentleman, but that's dreadful news. Well, well, well! A fortunate escape as ever was. And 'tis good hearing that others was ekal lucky. But I dare say the King's ships will be after him by now?"

"No, there's none nearer than Boston," I answered. "'Twill be a week at the least before we can hunt the scoundrels hence."

He wagged his head dolefully.

"Blister me, but that's ill news. Fortunate, indeed, I was to draw clear. He was after me till darkness and sheered off more in fear o' the sands than for aught else, I dare swear."

"So it was yesterday he chased you?" I asked.

"To be sure, young sir. Wasn't that what I told ye? Yesterday, about the noon glass, he came a-thunderin' up, and towards dusk he could bring his bow-chasers to bear, and was for droppin' a spar to hinder us. But we took his shot in the hull, as ye see, and got off safe in spite of all he could do."

One of the wherrymen was sculling toward us along the shore, and I waved to him to pull under the piling on which we stood.

"I must be off," I said. "I congratulate you, Master Silver, on your escape. Whatever dangers you may have encountered in the past, your good luck was with you yesterday."

He bobbed his head and pulled at his forelock.

"Thank'ee kindly, young gentleman. Here, sir, let me catch the painter. Right! Will ye ha' the basket on the thwart by ye? And this nice lad here, doesn't he go, too? No?

"Maybe then ye'd add a mite to your kindness and let me borry his time for a half-glass or so for to show me a couple o' landmarks I must make in the town. I wouldn't ask it of ye, sir, only as ye see, I'm half-crippled in a manner o' speakin', and this is a strange port to me, as plies usual to the West Injies."

"Use the lad by all means," I answered. "Darby, take Master Silver wherever he wishes to go."

Darby's freckled face gleamed at the prospect of more of the company of this one-legged sailorman, who talked so easily of pirate fights and flights.

"Oh, aye, Master Robert," says he. "I'll help him all I know."

"O' course he will," spoke up Silver. "I never seed a boy wi' a kinder face. A kind face means a kind heart, I always says, young gentleman."

My wherryman was on the point of laying to his oars when a sudden thought caused me to check him.

"By the way, Master Silver," I called, "it occurs to me that perhaps Darby may be unable to serve you in all that you wish. Do you seek any one in especial?"

He hesitated for just the fraction of a minute.

"Why, not especially in particklar, sir," he answered at last. "I am for the Whale's Head Tavern, if ye happen to know o' such a place."

I nodded.

"'Tis in the East Ward close by. Darby can show you."

He shouted renewed thanks and stumped off agilely on his crutch, Darby strutting beside him with a comical pride.

Aboard the Anne I found all in confusion. Captain Farraday, as I had expected, had not returned since he landed the preceding afternoon and undoubtedly was sleeping off an accumulation of divers liquors in the George Tavern. The mate had gone ashore that morning to search for him, and would probably take advantage of the opportunity to emulate his skipper's example. Master Jenkins, who had missed drowning at the red hands of the redoubtable Rip-Rap and Flint, was in charge of the ship. He was a melancholy, sour-visaged East-countryman, who moved with a deliberation as pronounced as Peter Corlaer's, and inspecting the manifests with him was a tedious business. I accepted an invitation to share his midday meal, and the afternoon was gone when we concluded our work, agreed upon the time of arrival of the lighters on the morrow and returned to the deck.

My wherry had been dismissed long ago, and he bade the bosun muster a crew to row me ashore. Standing by the gangway, I commented idly upon the two ships which had come in since morning.

"The brig had a close go of it with your friend Rip-Rap," I remarked.

"Aye," returned Jenkins glumly. "'Tis passing queer a Barbadan should be fetching sugar and rum to New York. They leave that mostly to the Yankees."

"True," I admitted; "yet there's an exception to every rule."

A silvery whistle-blast sounded on the deck of the Spanish frigate up-stream.

"Too bad that's not one of ours now," I commented. "Rip-Rap should have a dose of his own medicine."

Master Jenkins expressed utter disapprobation without a wrinkle on his features.

"They Spaniards!" he snorted. "What are they a-doin' here anyway, I'd like to know?"

"He may have been blown north on his crossing," I hazarded.

Master Jenkins snorted a second time.

"He hasn't started a rope. Mischief they're up to. Never knowed it to fail."

"What kind of mischief?" I inquired.

He shrugged his shoulders.

"Not knowin', can't say. But no good ever came from they Spaniards, Master Ormerod, and ye may lay to that."

Before I could answer him the bosun reported the small boat all clear and lying at the ladder-foot, and I bade Master Jenkins a hasty good evening, for his stolid pessimism became mighty irksome upon close acquaintance.

As my boat straightened away from the Bristol packet's side a barge shot around the hull of the Spaniard and pulled after us, a dozen brawny fellows tugging at the oars. A single cloaked figure sat in the stern sheets beside the officer in command. The two boats made the Broad Street slip almost together, and I leaped ashore, tossed several coins to the sailors who had rowed me and started to walk off, bent upon reporting to my father, who, I knew, would be provoked by the length of time my errand had consumed. But I had not walked far when a man called after me from the wharf-head.

"Señor! Sirr-rr-rah!"

I turned to face the coxswain of the frigate's barge and a farrago of Spanish gibberish of which I understood not a word. And upon my saying as much, a second person stepped forward into the yellow glow of an oil lanthorn which hung from a bracket upon a warehouse wall hard by. 'Twas the cloaked figure of the barge, and instead of a midshipman or under-officer the scanty light revealed a young woman whose lissome grace was vibrant through the cumbersome folds of her wrap. A single ejaculation of sibilant Spanish, and the coxswain was hushed.

"Sir," said she then in English as good as my own, "can you direct me to the Whale's Head Tavern?"

I could bring forth no better than a stammer in answer. She was the second stranger that day to ask for the Whale's Head, which my father had remarked the previous evening for a noted resort of bad characters; and certes, she appeared to be the last sort of woman who might be expected to have anything to do with the kind of roistering wickedness which went on there. Also, I could not forbear asking myself how came so fair a maid aboard a Spanish frigate.

In the soft lanthorn-light she was anything but Spanish in her looks. Dark, yes, with hair that shone a misty-black, but her eyes were as blue as Darby McGraw's, and her nose had the least suspicion of a tilt to it. Her mouth was wide, with a kind of twist at the ends that quirked up oddly when she laughed and drooped with a sorrow fit to crack open your heart if she wept. And she was little more than a child in years, with a manifest innocence which went oddly with the question she had asked me.

A slim foot tapped impatiently upon the cobbles as I stared.

"Well, sir," she said coldly, "does it happen you do not know English better than Spanish?"

"N-no," I managed to get out. "But—but the truth is, the Whale's Head is no place for such as you, mistress."

Her eyes narrowed.

"I do not catch your meaning, perhaps," she answered. "It is my father I go to meet there."

"But he would never favor your coming there at this hour," I protested.

She permitted herself a trill of laughter.

"You speak as if you had full knowledge of his ways," she admitted. "But the nuns at St. Bridget's were telling me oft and oft how I was going out into the wicked world, and sorra a look at wickedness have I had yet. So I decided this evening I should have some savor of adventure to make up for being cooped all these weeks in that horrid, dirty old ship; and I made Don Pablo, who was officer of the deck, call away a boat for me—and he wringing his hands and pleading would I bring about his ruin."

I laughed, myself, at the wonderful spontaneity of her mood. Faith, I could imagine how the young dons aboard the frigate philandered themselves sick over her.

"But that has naught to do with your going to the Whale's Head tonight," I reminded her. "Indeed, you should never think of it."

"I will be the judge of that," she retorted, instantly haughty. "And if my father is there I can come to no harm."

"If he is," I said. "I doubt you have mistaken his ordinary."

"No, no," she said decidedly. "I heard him speaking with them of it. But it may be you are right, sir, and I will not be so ungrateful as to flout a kindly stranger's well-meant advice. Juan can go into the tavern when we come to it, and I will bide outside. But somewhere I must walk, for my feet are all dancey with the sway of the sea, and we shall be away again with the tide in the morning. This is the last dry land I shall tread in many a week."

"If you will allow me, I'll put you on your way for the Whale's Head," I offered. "I must walk in that direction."

"Sure, sir, it is a great favor you offer," she answered. "I can not but thank you."

And she gave an order in Spanish which fetched the under-officer she called Juan and one of his men out from the shadows. They fell in behind us as we walked off along the line of the warehouses.

"You are upon a long voyage?" I ventured.

"You may well say so," she cried. "From here to the Floridas, and after that on to the Havana and the cities of the Main."

"You will soon have no need to regret a lack of adventures," I said. "There are few men, let alone maids, who fare so far afield."

"Ah, sir, that is what I like to think upon! I was near mad with delight when my father came to the convent and took me from the sisters. Until the ship's decks were under my feet I could not believe it was true that I was really free."

"But you are never Spanish!" I said. "I ask not in idle curiosity, though——"

Her laughter was like a chime of bells.

"Sure, they say I am as Irish as the pigs in the Wicklow hills where I was born."

And all of a sudden she was grave again.

"I am not knowing your politics, sir, but there's maybe no harm in just telling you my father was of those who opposed the Hanoverian and fought for King James and Bonnie Charlie. And because his own King can not employ him, he serves Spain."

"It is not pleasant for an Englishman to think of all the brave gentlemen must serve foreign monarchs," I acknowledged. "But I hope you will be happy in the Indies, mistress."

"Oh, we shall not be staying there long," she answered blithely. "My father is an engineer officer, and he must inspect the fortifications on the Main and elsewhere. We shall be returning to Spain within the year. But look, sir! Is not that sign intended to be a whale's head?"

"Yes," I said. "This is the tavern."

One look at its flaring windows and the cut-throat gentry who swaggered in and out of the low door convinced my companion that I had not misrepresented the character of the place. She drew back to the curb, and the corners of her mouth drooped sadly.

"Glory, what an ill hole!" she murmured. "Now for why would the padre come hither? Business, says he; but——"

And she shook her head with a vague doubting emphasis.

"I would not seem to be thrusting myself upon you, mistress," I said, "yet I am fearful your Spaniards can not make themselves understood. Will it please you that I inquire within for your father?"

She considered, catching a corner of her lip betwixt white teeth.

"Troth, sir," she answered finally, "I see not how I can avoid going the deeper in debt to you."

There was a moment's pause.

"And how shall I——"

"Ay de mi!" she exclaimed with a bubble of laughter. "How stupid of me to be forgetting I am just a maid off the sea to you. Ask for Colonel O'Donnell, sir, and tell him his daughter waits without."

And as I started toward the door she added gayly:

"It is not every girl could step upon a strange shore and find a cavalier waiting to aid her. But what would Mother Seraphina say to such brazenness? Ah, I can see her now! The blessed saints preserve us, Moira! Have ye no manners or modesty into yourself at all? A hundred Aves and the Stations of the Cross twice before you sup."

Her voice was still ringing in my ears as I shouldered a drunken sailor from my path, lowered my head to pass under the lintel of the tavern's entrance and so gained the hazy blue atmosphere of the taproom, cluttered with tables, foul with smoke and stale alelees, abuzz with rough voices bawling oaths and sea-songs.

It was the chorus of one of these songs which first distracted my thoughts from the Irish girl outside—a wild, roaring lilt of blood and ribaldry:

"Fifteen men on the Dead Man's Chest— Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum! Drink and the devil had done for the rest— Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!"

I looked to the corner whence it came, and discovered the one-legged sailor, John Silver, thumping the time with a pewter mug on the table-top as he led the group around him, foremost amongst whom, after himself, was Darby McGraw, flaming red mop standing out like a buccaneer ensign, shrill voice carrying above the thundering basses of his companions—as villainous a crew, to outward seeming, as I had ever looked upon. I noted especially a pasty, tallowy-faced man, whose shifty eyes were masked by a skrim of greasy black hair, and a big, lusty, mahogany-brown fellow with a tarry pigtail, who evidently found as much satisfaction in the song as poor, fuddled Darby.

Silver saw me almost as soon as I spotted him, and with a quick word to the others, got to his feet and stumped across the room, dragging Darby after him by the arm. His large, good-humored features were wreathed in a smile tinged with mortification.

"So you come after him, Master Ormerod, did you?" he shouted to make himself heard in the confusion. "And ashamed o' myself I oughter be, says you, and with reason, too. But I'm not one to lead a likely lad astray, and all Darby's had was good, ripe ale and two earsful o' sea-gossip as'll give him things to dream o' for nights to come. I shouldn't oughter o' let him come back, sir, but when he stuck that red mop o' his in the door an hour past I hadn't the heart to send him away. He's come to no harm, so you won't hold it against him for a extry mug or two of ale; will you, sir?"

"I did not come after him," I answered; "but as I am here he had best return home with me. Where did you get my name, Silver?"

He pulled his forelock knowingly.

"Why, from Darby, o' course, sir—not that anybody on the water-front couldn't ha' told me, seein' what a kind-hearted, friendly young gentleman you are. But asking your pardon for the liberty, sir, can I serve you in any way?"

"I don't think so," I told him. "I am seeking a Colonel O'Donnell."

I fancied a flicker of surprise stirred the bluff friendliness mirrored in his face. He stared around the room.

"Never heard o' the gentleman, sir, which ain't surprizin', seein' I was never here before this morning, myself; but I ran into some old shipmates of mine as gave me the run o' the place, and it may be I can find out for you from one o' them. Just you wait here a shake, Master Ormerod, and I'll see what I can do."

This seemed the wisest course, inasmuch as it was apparent there was nobody in the taproom of the quality of Colonel O'Donnell, so I nodded assent; and as Silver stumped away, threading a nimble passage in and out of the crowded tables, I asked Darby what he had been doing. Somewhat to my astonishment, the boy lapsed into sullenness and answered in monosyllables. Only once he revealed a flare of interest, when I remarked:

"That was a sufficiently devilish song you were singing, Darby."

"That it was!" he exclaimed. "Whisht, whiles singing it ye can feel the blood a-dripping from your cutlass."

"And who were the others singing with you?"

The sullen look covered his face like a curtain.

"Oh, just shipmates."

"Of yours?"

"No, of Master Silver's."

"What are their names?"

"I know not."

"Oh, come now, Darby!"

"Well, the one he calls Bill Bones and the other Black Dog—but there's no meaning in nature in that last."

Silver had disappeared through a door at the rear in company with one of the drawers, and now he came swinging in again on his crutch, ahead of a tall, lantern-jawed man in a rich dress of black-and-silver, whose gold-hilted sword claimed the gentleman. This man Silver ushered to me with a crudely hearty courtesy.

"Here's luck, Master Ormerod," he called when he was within earshot. "My friend had heard tell the colonel was above-stairs. This here's the young gentleman I spoke of, your honor. My duty to ye both, sirs, and always pleased to serve."

And off he swung on his crutch again to be received with acclamations by his cronies in the corner.

The lantern-jawed man gave me a keen glance, almost a suspicious glance, I should have said. He had a nervous manner, and there was a kind of restless glow in his eyes.

"Well, sir?" he said. "I understand you desired speech with me?"

"If you are Colonel O'Donnell——"

He nodded curtly.

"—I am to tell you that your daughter awaits you outside," I concluded.

He was genuinely startled.

"My daughter? But who are you, sir, who act as her guardian?"

I was nettled, and did not hesitate to show it.

"She asked me the way hither when she came ashore," I retorted, "and, deeming it scarce probable that you would care to have her enter the taproom, I even offered my services to fetch you forth to her."

I saw now his resemblance to her, for the corners of his mouth twitched down in the same way her's had. And he muttered something like a curse in Spanish.

"It seems I am beholden to you, sir," he answered stiffly. "She is a child, and vastly ignorant of the world, and I must be both father and mother to her."

I bowed and stood aside to make room for him to pass out.

"Master Ormerod, the seaman called you, did he not?" continued O'Donnell. "Perhaps, sir, you will permit an older man to compliment you upon an honorable deportment."

A slightly pompous tone invaded his speech.

"I am not unfamiliar with the chief centers of our Old World society, Master Ormerod, and I have the honor to hold the office of chamberlain to a monarch, who, though he may not be named upon English soil, will some day recover the estate a usurper has deprived him of. I need say no more, I am sure."

"I understand, sir," I replied. "And may I suggest that Mistress O'Donnell is awaiting you?"

He brushed by me with a click of impatience, and Darby and I followed him to the street, Darby thrilled anew by the sight of his luxurious habit, the five-pound ruffles that covered his wrists and the worked hilt of his sword. As we all three emerged, Mistress O'Donnell darted up to her father and caught at the lapels of his coat.

"Ah, padre," she cried in a brogue that clotted and slurred her words, "you'll not be holding it against me because I wearied of the ship and would feel the earth crumbling underfoot, and me so lonely for lack of you I was near to weeping the while I sat in my cabin with naught to do but read my Hours!"

He wilted, as must any man have done, flinging his arm around her with a gesture that verged on the theatrical.