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Paradise. And was not a Spanish ship fair prey for the most law- abiding of English mariners?
There was a hubbub of talk as they sat there, and there was no doubt but they were of one mind to turn their backs on the
bleak northern coast and seek a golden fortune in the south. But the council arrived suddenly at an end when down from the
deck came the lingering call, "A sa-i-l! A sa-i-l! "
Up, then, the Old One leaped, and he raised his hand. "A sail is cried. What say you?"
"Let us not cast away what God hath offered us! "
"Yea, Yacob!"
"Up, you dogs in the steerage! A hall, a hall!"
One fell over on the table in drunken torpor. Another rushed out the door and tumbled over a sleeper at the threshold.
"Up, you dogs! How stands he'"
They poured out of the cabin to the deck.
"He stands on the lee bow! "
"Bear up the helm! A fresh man at the helm!" the Old One thundered. He squinted across the sea. "Come, Harry -- here on the
poop -- and tell me if she be not a ketch. Now she lifts -- now she falls. 'Twill be a chase, I take it."
The round little mate came nimbly up the ladder.
"Helm a-luff!" said he in his light, quick voice, which at first the helmsman failed to hear. "Helm a-luff! A-luff, man! Art
deaf? The courses hide her. There she lifts! Yea, a ketch. Let us see. it is now an hour to sunset. if we stand across her bows
and bear a sharp watch we shall come up with her in early evening and a very proper moment it will be."
His light, incisive speech, so unlike the boisterous ranting of the Old One, in its own way curiously influenced even the Old
One himself. A man who has a trick of getting at sound reasons, unmoved by bluster or emotion, can hold his own in any
company; and many a quiet voice can fire a ship's crew to action as a slow match fires a cannon.
"Now, young men," Martin roared, "up aloft and loose fore and main topsails. And oh that our stout mizzenmast were
standing yet! "
"No, no, no!" cried Harry Malcolm and he almost raised his voice. "Thy haste, thou pop-eyed fool, would work the end of us
all. Think you, if they see us fling every sail to the wind, they will abide our coming with- out charging their guns and
stationing every gunner with linstock and lighted match? Nay, though she be but a ketch, let us go limping across her bows as
lame as a pipped hen."
"True, and with every man lying by the side of his gun, where they shall not see him until \lie haul up the ports and show the
teeth of the good ship." It was Jacob who spoke thus as he climbed to Harry Malcolm's side.
The Old One, looking down at the deck below, touched his mate's arm.
"Yea, I see them. What do you want?"
"It seems," said the Old One, "that our boatswain hath a liking for the fellow."
"And that the fellow hath a liking for our boatswain, think you?"
"Well? "
Jacob thrust his long nose between them. " 'Well,' you say, by which you mean 'not well.' It proves nothing that a man will
not drink damnation to a king."
The three heads met, high on the poop, and now and again they glanced down at the two lads who stood by the waist and
watched the distant sail, which grew black as the sun set behind it.
The sun set and the sea darkened and a light flamed up on board the chase, which appeared to show her good faith by
standing toward the Rose of Devon.
There was a rumble of laughter among the men when they perceived she had changed her course. The sober wrung oaths
from the drunk by dashing bucketfuls of cold water in their faces. The gunners moved like shadows among the guns. And
high on the poop, three shadows again merged into one.
"Master Boatswain," the Old One called, but softly, "do thou take it upon thyself, although it lies outside thine own province,
to make sure that powder and balls and sponges and ladies and rammers are laid ready."
Hunching his bent shoulders, Mate Malcolm came nimbly down the ladder and from the chest of arms drew forth muskets
and pistols.
"Come, my bullies below there, knock open your ports!" It was the Old One's voice, but so softly and briskly did he speak
that it might have been Harry Malcolm.
As the dim figures on deck moved cautiously about, the subdued voice again floated down to them:
"Let all the guns be loose in tackles and stand by to run them out when the word is given. Port your helm! Every man to his
quarters. Now, my hearts, be ready to show your courage and we'll have this wandering ketch for a consort to our good Rose
of Devon."
Then Harry Malcolm came in haste along the deck. "Who's to this gun? And who to this' Nay, you've a man too many there.
Here, fellow, come hither! Here a man is lacking. You there, who are playing the part of gunner, have you ever heard these
bulldogs bark? And understand you the business! Good, good!" And he passed on up the deck. Nought escaped him. In the
silence they heard the sound of his voice and the quick pattering of his feet when they could see no more than that he was still
moving among the guns.
They had come so near the stranger that they must soon hail or be hailed, when a figure emerging from the steerage room in
the darkness came upon Phil Marsham by the quarter-deck ladder and gave a great start. As Phil turned, the fellow whispered,
"God be thanked it is thou! I thought it was another. Come with me to the side -- here by the shrouds."
The two stepped lightly under the shadow of the quarter-deck to the waist, where the carpenter had nailed in place new planks
not twelve hours since, and together they raised a bundle. It was on the larboard side, and since all had gathered for the
moment to starboard to watch the strange ketch, there was no man to observe them. Some one moved above them and they
hesitated, then they heard slow steps receding and thick undertones that they recognized as Jacob's. When he had gone, the
one who had brought the bundle whispered, "Heave it far out," and together they hove it.
Still in the shadow of the quarter-deck, the two slipped silently back, unseen, and when Harry Malcolm came hurrying from
one side, and Jacob from the other, to see what had made the splash, there was no one there nor could any man answer their
questions.
"Have you done as you said?" Phil asked in a breathless whisper.
"That I have." And it was Will Canty who spoke.
"Then we shall like enough be hanged; but thou art a tall fellow and I love thee for it."
There came over the water a voice distinctly calling, "Whence your ship?"
"Back to your guns, ye dogs!" cried Mate Malcolm in a voice that could be heard the length of the deck, yet that was not loud
enough to be heard on board the stranger.
"Of England," the Old One called from the quarter- deck. "And whence is yours?" There was a space of silence, in which the
two vessels came nearer each other, and I would have you know that hearts ever so courageous were thumping at a lively
pace.
"And yours?" the Old One cried the second time.
There came voices and a hoarse laugh from the stranger, then, "Are you merchants or men of war?"
"Of the sea," cried the Old One in a voice so like thunder that a man would not think it could have come from his lean throat.
"Run out your guns, O my hearts! Let him have the chase guns first. The chase guns -- the chase guns!"
Now one bawled down the main hatch, and another below echoed his cry, then there sounded the quick boom-boom from the
bows. The guns had spoken and the fight was on.
"Up your helm -- up your helm! Hold your fire now, my hearts, and have at them!" the Old One cried.
And now the voice came again over the restless sea. "Our ship is the Porcupine ketch and our quills are set."
The dark sea tossed and rolled between the vessels and little that happened on board either was visible to the other, so black
was the night; but the light of the sky, which the water reflected, made of each a black shape clear-cut as of jet but finer than
the most cunning hand could carve, in which a man might trace every line and rope. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]