The Pirate Story Megapack: 25 Classic and Modern Tales

by Robert E. Howard

  “Bring me the spy-glass out of the cabin, somebody!” hailed Farmer from the forecastle. The glass—a very powerful one and a favourite instrument with the murdered captain—was handed him by one of the quarter-masters, and he applied it to his eye. A breathless silence now prevailed fore and aft for the stranger had all the look of a British man-of-war, and everybody was waiting to hear what Farmer’s verdict would be. The inspection was a long-sustained and evidently anxious one. At length, dropping the glass into the hollow of his arm Farmer turned and said:

  “Bring Mr Southcott on deck, and let us hear his opinion of yonder hooker.”

  In a few minutes the master was escorted on deck by a couple of armed seamen, and led forward to where Farmer was standing.

  “Mr Southcott,” said the mutineer, turning toward the individual addressed, and perceptibly shrinking as their glance met, “be good enough to take this glass, and let me know wha’ you think of the stranger yonder.”

  “Stranger!” ejaculated Southcott. “Where away? Ah, I see her!” and he took the glass from Farmer’s extended hand.

  “Well, what think you of her?” asked Farmer impatiently, after the master had been silently working away with the glass for some two or three minutes.

  “One moment, please,” answered Southcott with his eye still glued to the tube; “I think—but I am not quite sure—if she would only keep just the merest trifle more away—so as to permit of my catching a glimpse—”

  “Sail ho!” shouted a man in the fore-top; “two of ’em, a brig and a ship on the starboard beam, away in under the land there!”

  Farmer unceremoniously snatched the glass away from the master and levelled it in the direction indicated.

  “Ay, ay, I see them,” said he. “That is the Drake nearest us, and the Favourite inshore of her. They are all right; we have nothing to fear from them. It is this stranger here ahead of us that bothers me. Come, Mr Southcott,” he continued, “you ought to know something about her by this time—you have been looking at her long enough; do you think you ever saw her before?”

  The master took the glass, had another long squint at the ship ahead, then handed the instrument back to Farmer, with the answer:

  “I decline to say whether I have or not.”

  “That is enough,” said Farmer; “your answer but confirms me in my conviction as to the identity of yonder frigate. It is the Mermaid. Speak, sir, is it not so?”

  “You are right, Farmer, it is the Mermaid, thank God! and you cannot escape. See! she is already hauling up to speak us; and in another twenty minutes will be alongside. Now, sir, resign to me the command which you have with so much violence and bloodshed usurped; and you, men,” he continued, turning round and in a loud voice addressing the rest of the crew, “return at once to your duty. Support and assist me in recovering the command of the ship, and I promise—”

  “Silence!” roared Farmer, striking the master a heavy blow full in the mouth with his clenched fist. “Seize him, you two,” he continued to the men who had charge of the prisoner, “and if he offers to speak again to the men clap a belaying-pin between his teeth. My lads, you now know the truth; yonder frigate is our old acquaintance the Mermaid. Mr Southcott proposes that I should surrender the command of this ship to him; and if I do so we all know what will follow. Most of us will dangle at the yard-arm; and though, through the royal clemency,” (with a bitter sneer), “a few may be allowed to escape with a flogging through the fleet, with left-handed boatswains’ mates to cross the lashes—think of that, men, and compare it with the mere two or three dozen at the gangway which most of you have tasted since you joined the Hermione—where is the man among you, I ask, who can point to himself and say, ‘I shall be one of the fortunate few?’ No, no, my lads! after last night’s work there must be no talk of surrender; the ropes are already round our necks, and as surely as we ever find ourselves beneath the British flag again, so surely will those ropes be hauled taut and ourselves bowsed up to the yard-arm. And, even if our lives could be assured to us, what inducement is there to us to serve under British bunting again? I say there is none. We must choose, then, between two alternatives; we must either fight or fly. Which is it to be?”

  The rest of the mutineers huddled together, evidently irresolute; each man eagerly sought his neighbour’s opinion, the pros and cons of Farmer’s question were hurriedly discussed, and I saw with inexpressible delight that a good many of the men were more than half disposed to fall in with the master’s suggestion.

  Mr Southcott must have seen this too, for he wheeled round upon Farmer and exclaimed:

  “Surely, Farmer, you are not mad enough to entertain the idea of fighting the Mermaid? Why, man, you could not stand up before her for five minutes with the men in their present undisciplined state and no one but yourself to direct operations. Your defeat under such circumstances is an absolute certainty; and think what would be the fate of yourself and your misguided followers if taken in arms against the flag under which they have sworn to serve. At present some at least of them may hope for mercy if they will but—”

  “Away with him! Take him below!” shouted Farmer, “and if he attempts to open his mouth again put a bullet through his brains. Now, shipmates,” he continued, as the master was hurried below, “make up your minds, and quickly too; which will you have, the yard-rope or a pitched battle?”

  “What occasion is there for either?” inquired a burly boatswain’s-mate. “There’s more ways of killing a cat than choking of her with cream. Let’s square dead away afore it and set stunsails alow and aloft, both sides. I’ll lay my life we run far enough away from the Mermaid afore sunset to dodge her in the dark.”

  “No good,” dissented Farmer. “The Mermaid could beat us a couple of knots off the wind in this breeze.”

  “Ay, ay; that’s true enough; she could so,” assented a topman. “But we have the heels of her on a taut bowline; so why not brace sharp up on the starboard tack, pass between the islands, and then make for Porto Rico?”

  “What! and run the gauntlet of those two cruisers inshore there, as well as take our chance of falling in with the Magicienne and the Regulus, which we know are knocking about somewhere in that direction! Is that the best counsel you can give, Ben?”

  “Well, then, let’s haul close in with the land, set fire to the ship, and take to the boats,” answered Ben.

  “And what then?” sneered Farmer.

  “Why, land, to be sure, and take sarvice with Jack Spaniard,” was the reply.

  “Why, man, do you suppose they would welcome us if we went to them empty-handed?” asked Farmer. “No, no, that will never do. If we join the Spaniards we must take the ship with us to ensure a welcome; and I’m half inclined to think that will be the best thing we can do. But not now; that must be thought over at leisure. Meanwhile, what is to be done in the present emergency? We have no time for further argument. Will you stand by me and obey my orders?”

  “Ay, ay, we will, every man Jack of us, sink or swim, fight or fly,” was the reply from a hundred throats.

  “That’s well, my lads,” exclaimed Farmer exultantly; “it shall go hard but I will bring you through somehow. Starboard your helm, there,” to the man at the wheel; “let her come to on the larboard tack; to your stations, men; let go the larboard sheets and braces, and round in on the starboard. Smartly, my bullies; let’s have no bungling, now, or Captain Otway there will at once suspect that something is amiss. That’s well; ease up the lee topgallant and royal-braces a trifle; well there of all; belay! Afterguard, muster your buckets and brushes and wash down the decks. Roberts, go below with a gang and rouse the hammocks on deck; and quarter-masters, see that they are snugly stowed. Where’s the signal-man? Bend the ensign on to the peak-halliards and our number at the main; and main-top, there I stand by to hoist away the pennant. Gunner, muster your crew; go round the quarters with them; and see that everything is ship-shape in case we should have to make a fight of it.”

  I was su
rprised to see how, as Farmer issued his orders in a tone of authority, the instinct of discipline asserted itself; the men sprang to their stations as nimbly and executed their several duties as smartly as though Captain Pigot himself had been directing their movements. The Hermione was braced sharp up on the larboard tack and heading as near as she would lay for the Mermaid, which was now about a point and a half on our weather bow, about four miles distant, and nearing us fast; whilst the Favourite and the Drake were stretching out from under the land to join her.

  Presently a string of tiny balls went soaring aloft to the Mermaid’s main-royal mast-head, to break abroad as they reached it and stream out in the fresh morning breeze as so many gaily coloured signal flags.

  “There goes the Mermaid’s bunting, sir!” sang out the signal-man, “she is showing her number.”

  “Ay, ay, I see it,” exclaimed Farmer. “And, by Heaven,” he added, “it never struck me until this moment that Pigot was senior captain. Hoist away your ensign and pennant! up with the number! We are all right, my hearties; I know how to trick them now.”

  He raised the telescope to his eye and brought it to bear upon the Mermaid.

  “All right,” he exclaimed a few seconds later, “she sees our number—haul down! Now signal her to chase in the north-eastern quarter. Hurrah, my hearties, that’s your sort! There goes her answering pennant; and there she hauls to the wind on the starboard tack. That disposes of her at all events. Now signal the Favourite and Drake to chase to the nor’ard; that will send them through the Mona Passage, and leave us with a clear sea.”

  A quarter of an hour later the three cruisers which had caused the mutineers so much uneasiness were thrashing to windward under every rag they could spread; when Farmer bore up and ran away to the southward and westward with studding-sails set on both sides of the ship.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  La Guayra

  After breakfast that morning the men were mustered on the quarter-deck; and Farmer, with some half a dozen of the other mutineers, discussed in their presence and hearing the question of what should be done with the ship now that they had her. There was, of course, a great deal of wild talk, especially among the foreigners—of whom, most unfortunately for the ill-fated officers of the ship, there were far too many on board—and at one period of the discussion it seemed by no means improbable that the frigate would be converted into a pirate, in which event there can be no doubt but that, for a time at least, she would have proved a terrible scourge to all honest navigators in those seas. Farmer, however, was strongly in favour of going over to the Spaniards; and in the end his counsels prevailed, though he met with a great deal of opposition.

  This point settled, the ship’s head was laid to the southward; and sunrise on the fourth morning succeeding the mutiny found us off La Guayra, with a flag of truce flying. The signal was duly observed and answered from the shore; upon which the gig was lowered, and, with a white flag floating from her ensign staff, her crew in their holiday rig, and Farmer with three other ringleaders of the mutiny in her stern-sheets, she shoved off for the harbour. She was absent for the greater part of the day, it being seven bells in the afternoon watch before she was observed pulling out of the harbour again; and when she made her appearance it was at once observed that she was accompanied by several heavy launches full of men. It took the flotilla fully an hour to pull off to us, and when they reached the frigate it was seen that the occupants of the shore-boats were Spanish seamen, with a sprinkling of officers among them. On coming alongside the entire rabble at once boarded; the ship was formally handed over by Farmer to an officer in a resplendent uniform, whose first act was to direct one of his aides to strike the white flag and hoist the Spanish ensign at the peak; and the surviving officers—five of us in number—were then mustered and ordered into one of the boats alongside. We were compelled to bundle down over the side just as we were, without a single personal belonging, or article of clothing except what we stood in; and, the boat being manned by some twenty as bloodthirsty-looking desperadoes as I ever clapped eyes on, we were forthwith pulled ashore and at once marched off to prison.

  It was dark by the time that we reached the harbour; we were consequently unable to see much of the place that night beyond the fact that it lay at the base of a lofty range of hills. We were received at the landing-place by a party of soldiers with fixed bayonets, who had evidently been awaiting our arrival, and, escorted by them, we arrived—after a march of about a mile—at the gates of a most forbidding-looking edifice constructed of heavy blocks of masonry, and which had all the appearance of being a fortress. Passing through the gloomy gateway—which was protected by a portcullis—we found ourselves in a large open paved courtyard, across which we marched to a door on the opposite side. Entering this door, we wheeled to the right and passed along a wide stone passage which conducted us to a sort of guard-room. We were here received by a lanky, cadaverous-looking individual with a shrivelled yellow parchment skin, hands like the claws of a vulture, piercing black eyes, and grizzled locks and moustache, who, with but scant courtesy, took down the name and rank of each of us in a huge battered volume; after which we were conducted through another long echoing passage, and finally ushered into a sort of hall, about sixty feet long by forty feet wide, with a lofty stone groined roof, and six high, narrow, lancet-shaped windows in each of the two longer walls. These windows we subsequently found were closely grated on the outside with heavy iron bars. The moment that we crossed the threshold the heavy oaken door was closed and barred upon us, and we were left to shift for ourselves as best we could.

  The first thing of which I was distinctly conscious on entering the hall was the volume of sound which echoed from the walls and the groined roof. Singing, laughter, conversation, altercation were all going on at the same moment at the utmost pitch of the human voice, and apparently with the whole strength of the assembled company, which, after winking and blinking like an owl for several moments, I succeeded in dimly making out through the dense cloud of suffocating smoke which pervaded the place, and which appeared to emanate from a wood fire burning on the pavement at the far end of the hall, and from some three or four flaring oil lamps which were suspended from nails driven into the walls between the joints of the masonry.

  It was a minute or two before any of the noisy company appeared to notice us. At length, however, one man, rising to his feet and shading his eyes with his hand as he looked in our direction, ejaculated:

  “Who have we here? More companions in misfortune?”

  Then advancing with outstretched hand he exclaimed uproariously:

  “What cheer, my hearties? Welcome to Equality Hall!”

  Then, as he for the first time noticed our uniforms, he muttered:

  “Why, dash my old frizzly wig if they ain’t navy gents!” adding in a much more respectful tone of voice: “Beg pardon, gentlemen, I’m sure, for my familiarity. Didn’t notice at first what you was. Come forward into the range of the light and bring yourselves to an anchor. I’m afraid you’ll find these but poor quarters, gentlemen, after what you’ve been used to aboard a man-o’-war. And you’ll find us a noisy lot too; but the fact is we’re just trying to make the best of things here, trying to be as happy as we can under the circumstances, as you may say. Here, you unmannerly lubbers,” he continued, addressing a group who were sprawling at full length on a rough wooden bench, “rouse out of that and make room for your betters.”

  The men scrambled to their feet and made way for us good-naturedly enough; and we seated ourselves on the vacated bench, feeling—at least I may answer for myself—forlorn enough in the great dingy, dirty, comfortless hole into which we had been so unceremoniously thrust. Our new friend seated himself alongside Mr Southcott, and, first informing that gentleman that the company in which we found ourselves were the crews of sundry British merchantmen which had been captured by the Spaniards, and that he was the ex-chief mate of a tidy little Liverpool barque called the Sparkling Foam, proceeded to in
quire into the circumstances which had led to our captivity. The account of the mutiny was received by the party, most of whom had gathered round to listen to it, with expressions of the most profound abhorrence and indignation, which were only cut short by the appearance of a sergeant and a file of soldiers bearing the evening’s rations, which were served out raw, to be immediately afterwards handed over to a black cook who answered to the name of “Snowball,” and who had good-naturedly constituted himself the cook of the party. The rations, which included a portion for us newcomers, consisted of a small modicum of meat, a few vegetables, a tolerably liberal allowance of coarse black bread, and water ad libitum. The little incident of the serving out of rations having come to an end, and the sergeant having retired with his satellites, our friend of the Sparkling Foam—whose name, it transpired, was Benjamin Rogers—resumed his conversation with us by proceeding to “put us up to a thing or two.”

  “I’ve no doubt, gentlemen,” he said, “but what you’ll be asked to give your parole tomorrow, if you haven’t already—you haven’t, eh? well, so much the better; you’ll be asked tomorrow. Now, if you’ll take my advice you won’t give it; if you do, you’ll simply be turned adrift into the town to shift for yourselves and find quarters where you can. If you’ve got money, and plenty of it, you might manage to rub along pretty well for a time; but when your cash is gone where are you? Why, simply nowheres. Now, this is a roughish berth for gentlemen like you, I’ll allow; but within the last few days we’ve been marched out every morning and set to work patching up an old battery away out here close to the beach, and we’ve been kept at it all day, so that we get plenty of fresh air and exercise, and merely have to ride it out here during the night. There’s only some half-a-dozen soldiers sent out to watch us; and it’s my idea that it might be no such very difficult matter to give these chaps the slip some evening, and at nightfall make our way down to the harbour, seize one of the small coasting craft which seem to be always there, and make sail for Jamaica. At least that’s my notion, gentlemen; you are welcome to it for what it’s worth, and can think it over.”