CHAPTER XVI
_In Which Archie Armstrong Joins a Piratical Expedition and Sails Crested Seas to Cut Out the Schooner "Heavenly Home"_
It was quite true that Archie Armstrong could speak French; it wasjust as true, as Bill o' Burnt Bay observed, that he could jabber itlike a native. There was no detecting a false accent. There was nohint of an awkward Anglo-Saxon tongue in his speech. There was notelling that he was not French born and Paris bred. Archie's Frenchnurse and cosmopolitan-English tutor had taken care of that. The boyhad pattered French with the former since he had first begun toprattle at all.
And this was why Bill o' Burnt Bay proposed a piratical expedition tothe French islands of Miquelon which lie off the south coast ofNewfoundland.
"Won't ye go, b'y?" he pleaded.
Archie laughed until his sides ached.
"Come, now!" Bill urged; "there's like t' be a bit of a shindy thatSir Archibald hisself would be glad t' have a hand in."
"'Tis sheer piracy!" Archie chuckled.
"'Tis nothin' of the sort!" the indignant Skipper William protested."'Tis but a poor man takin' his own from thieves an' robbers."
"Have you ever been to Saint Pierre?" Archie asked.
"That I has!" Skipper Bill ejaculated; "an' much t' the grief o' SaintPierre."
"They've a jail there, I'm told."
"Sure 'tis like home t' me," said Skipper Bill. "I've been in it; an'I'm told they've an eye open t' clap me in once more."
Archie laughed again.
"Jus' t' help a poor man take back his own without troublin' thejudges," Bill urged.
The lad hesitated.
"Sure, I've sore need o' your limber French tongue," said Bill. "Sure,b'y, you'll go along with me, will you not?"
"Why don't you go to law for your own?" Archie asked, with a littlegrin.
"Law!" Bill o' Burnt Bay burst out. "'Tis a poor show I'd have in acourt at Saint Pierre. Hut!" he snorted. "Law!--for a Newfoundlanderin Saint Pierre!"
"My father----" Archie began.
"I'll have the help o' no man's money nor brains nor influence in abusiness so simple," Bill protested.
The situation was this: Bill o' Burnt Bay had chartered a schooner--hisantique schooner--the schooner that was forever on the point ofsinking with all hands--Bill had chartered the schooner _HeavenlyHome_ to Luke Foremast of Boney Arm to run a cargo from Saint Pierre.But no sooner had the schooner appeared in French waters than she wasimpounded for a debt that Luke Foremast unhappily owed Garnot & Cie,of Saint Pierre. It was a high-handed proceeding, of course; and itwas perhaps undertaken without scruple because of the unpopularity ofall Newfoundlanders.
Luke Foremast protested in an Anglo-Saxon roar; but roar and bellowand bark and growl as he would, it made no difference: the _HeavenlyHome_ was seized, condemned and offered for sale, as Bill o' Burnt Bayhad but now learned.
"'Tis a hard thing to do," Archie objected.
"Hut!" Bill exclaimed. "'Tis nothin' but goin' aboard in the dark an'puttin' quietly out t' sea."
"Anyhow," Archie laughed, "I'll go."
Sir Archibald Armstrong liked to have his son stand upon his own feet.He did not wish to be unduly troubled with requests for permission; hefancied it a babyish habit for a well-grown boy to fall into. The boyshould decide for himself, said he, where decision was reasonablypossible for him; and if he made mistakes he would surely pay for themand learn caution and wisdom. For this reason Archie had no hesitationin coming to his own decision and immediately setting out with Bill o'Burnt Bay upon an expedition which promised a good deal of highlydiverting and wholly unusual experience.
Billy Topsail and Jimmie Grimm wished the expedition luck when itboarded the mail-boat that night.
* * * * *
Archie Armstrong did not know until they were well started that Billo' Burnt Bay was a marked man in Saint Pierre. There was no price onhis head, to be sure, but he was answerable for several offenses whichwould pass current in St. John's for assault and battery, if not forassault with intent to maim or kill (which Bill had never tried todo)--all committed in those old days when he was young and wild andloved a ruction better than a prayer-meeting.
They determined to make a landing by stealth--a wise precaution, as itappeared to Archie. So in three days they were at La Maline, a smallfishing harbour on the south coast of Newfoundland, and a port of callfor the Placentia Bay mail-boat. The Iles Saint Pierre et Miquelon,the remnant of the western empire of the French, lay some twenty milesto the southwest, across a channel which at best is of uncertain mood,and on this day was as forbidding a waste of waves and gray clouds asit had been Archie's lot to venture out upon.
Bill o' Burnt Bay had picked up his ideal of a craft for thepassage--a skiff so cheap and rotten that "'twould be small loss, sir,if she sank under us." And the skipper was in a roaring good humour aswith all sail set he drove the old hulk through that wilderness ofcrested seas; and big Josiah Cove, who had been taken along to helpsail the _Heavenly Home_, as he swung the bail bucket, was not a whitbehind in glowing expectation--in particular, that expectation whichconcerned an encounter with a gendarme with whom he had had themisfortune to exchange nothing but words upon a former occasion.
As for Archie, at times he felt like a smuggler, and capped himself infancy with a red turban, at times like a pirate.
* * * * *
They made Saint Pierre at dusk--dusk of a thick night, with the windblowing half a gale from the east. They had no mind to subjectthemselves to those formalities which might precipitate embarrassingdisclosures; so they ran up the harbour as inconspicuously as mightbe, all the while keeping a covert lookout for the skinny old craftwhich they had come to cut out. The fog, drifting in as theyproceeded, added its shelter to that of the night; and they dared tomake a search.
They found her at last, lying at anchor in the isolation of governmentwaters--a most advantageous circumstance.
"Take the skiff 'longside, skipper," said Josiah.
"'Tis a bit risky, Josiah, b'y," said Skipper Bill. "But 'twould begood--now, really, 'twould--'twould be good t' tread her old deck fora spell."
"An' lay a hand to her wheel," said Josiah, with a side wink so broadthat the darkening mist could not hide it.
"An' lay a hand to her wheel," repeated the skipper. "An' lay a handto her wheel!"
They ran in--full into the lee of her--and rounded to under the stern.The sails of the skiff flapped noisily and the water slapped hersides. They rested breathless--waiting an event which might warn themto be off into hiding in the fog. But no disquieting sound came fromthe schooner--no startled exclamation, no hail, no footfall: nothingbut the creaking of the anchor chain and the rattle of the blocksaloft. A schooner loomed up and shot past like a shadow; thensilence.
Archie gave a low hail in French. There was no response from the_Heavenly Home_; nor did a second hail, in a raised voice, bring forthan answering sound. It was all silent and dark aboard. So Skipper Billreached out with the gaff and drew the boat up the lee side. Hechuckled a bit and shook himself. It seemed to Archie that he freedhis arms and loosened his great muscles as for a fight. With a secondchuckle he caught the rail, leaped from the skiff like a cat androlled over on the deck of his own schooner.
They heard the thud of his fall--a muttered word or two, mixed up withlaughter--then the soft fall of his feet departing aft. For a longtime nothing occurred to inform them of what the skipper was about.They strained their ears. In the end they heard a muffled cry, whichseemed to come out of the shoreward cloud of fog--a thud, as thoughcoming from a great distance--and nothing more.
"What's that?" Archie whispered.
"'Tis a row aboard a Frenchman t' win'ard, sir," said Josiah. "'Tis askipper beatin' a 'prentice. They does it a wonderful lot."
Five minutes passed without a sign of the skipper. Then he came forwardon a run. His feet rang on the deck. There was no concealment.<
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"I've trussed up the watchman!" he chortled.
Archie and Josiah clambered aboard.