CHAPTER VIII
A SPLENDID HAUL
When all were got on board, and the boats hoisted to the davits, Willconducted the ladies down to the cabin, which he handed over to them.Then, having ordered the cook to prepare some hot soup for the girl he hadrescued, he came on deck again and questioned the male passengers.
"We were all dressing for dinner," one said, "when we heard a shouting ondeck. Almost immediately there was a great bump, which knocked most of usoff our feet, and we thought that we had been run into, but directlyafterwards we heard a great tumult going on above us, and we guessed thatthe ship had been attacked by pirates. The clashing of swords and thefalling of bodies went on for two or three minutes, and then there was aloud savage yell that told us that the pirates had taken the ship. Nextmoment the ruffians rushed down upon us, took away any valuables we hadabout our persons, and then tied us up and threw us on the sofas. Afterscouring all the cabins they left us, and by the noise that followed weguessed that they had removed the hatches and were getting up the cargo.
"This continued all night, and some time this morning we heard the brutesgoing down to their boats, and thanked God that they had spared our lives.Presently all became still; but after a time we saw the water rising onthe floor, and the dreadful thought struck us that they had scuttled theship and left us to perish. One of us managed, in spite of his bonds, tomake his way up the companion and endeavour to open the door. He found,however, to his horror that it was fastened outside. Time after time heflung himself against it, but it would not yield. The water rose higherand higher, and we were waiting for the end when, to our delight, we hearda bump as of a boat coming alongside the vessel, then the sound of someonerunning along the deck and of the companion door being hurriedly opened.You know the rest. The ship was the _Northumberland_ of Bristol."
"Thank God we arrived in time!" Will said. "It was an affair of seconds.If we had been two minutes later you would all have been drowned."
"What has become of that terrible pirate?" asked one of the passengers.
"There he is, six miles away. I hope some day to avenge the murder of yourcaptain and crew."
"But his ship looks a good deal larger than yours."
"Yes," Will said, "but we don't take much account of size. We captured twopirates in one fight, both of them bigger than ourselves."
"And your ship looks such a small thing, too, in comparison with ourvessel!"
"Yes, your ship could pretty well take her up and carry her. Weightdoesn't go for much in fighting."
"And are you really her commander?"
"I have that honour. I am a midshipman, and before I got command of_L'Agile_ I was on board His Majesty's ships _Furious_ and _Hawke_. I hada great deal of luck in several fights we came through, and as a resultwas entrusted by the admiral with the command of this vessel. As you say,she is small, but her guns are heavy for her size, and are more than amatch for most of those carried by the pirates."
"Well, sir, in the name of myself and all my fellow-passengers I offer youmy sincerest thanks for the manner in which you saved our lives. How closea shave it was is shown by the fact that you were yourself unable to getoff the ship in time and were carried down with her."
"It was all in the way of business," Will laughed. "We were after thepirates, and when we saw the state of your vessel we reluctantly gave upthe chase in order to see if we could be of any assistance. I expect theschooner wouldn't have run away from us had she not been so full of thecargo she got from your ship. They could not have had time to stow it allbelow, and it would have hampered them in working their guns, besidesprobably affecting their speed. I shall know her again when I see her, andthen will try if these scoundrels are as good at fighting as they are atcold-blooded murder."
"Where are you going now, sir?"
"I am cruising at present, and am master of my own movements, so if youwill let me know where you are bound for, I will try to set as many of youdown at your destination as I can."
"Most of us are bound for Jamaica, sir, and the others will be able tofind their way to their respective islands from there."
"Very well, then, I will head for Jamaica at once. In the meantime mycabin and that of my second in command are at the service of the ladies.There are the sofas, too, in the saloon, and if these are not enough Iwill get some hammocks slung. I shall myself sleep on deck, and those ofyou who prefer it can do the same; for the others I will have hammocksslung in the hold."
Most of the ladies soon came up, but the girl Will had saved did notappear till the next morning. She was very pretty, and likely to be moreso. If he had allowed her she would have overwhelmed him with thanks, buthe made light of the whole affair. He learned from the other passengersthat she was the daughter of one of the richest merchants in Jamaica. Atthe death of her mother, when she was five years old, she was sent home toEngland in charge of the governess who had been drowned in the_Northumberland_, and when this catastrophe occurred had been on her wayto rejoin her father. Although saddened by the death of her old friend,she soon showed signs of a disposition naturally bright and cheerful. Shebantered Will about his command, and professed to regard _L'Agile_ as atoy ship, expressing great wonder that it was not manned by boy A.B.'s aswell as boy officers.
"It must surely seem very ridiculous to you," she said, "to be givingorders to men old enough to be your father."
"I can quite understand that it seems so to you," he said, "for it does tome sometimes; but custom is everything, and I don't suppose the men givethe matter a thought. At any rate they are as ready to follow me as theyare the oldest veteran in the service."
Will carried all the sail he could set, as he was anxious to get the craftfree from passengers and to be off in search of the schooner that hadescaped him. He was again loaded with thanks by the passengers when theylanded, and after seeing them off he went and made his report to theadmiral.
"How is this, Mr. Gilmore?" the admiral said as he entered the cabin; "noprizes this time? And who are all those people I saw landing just now?"
Will handed in his report; but, as usual, the admiral insisted on hearingall details.
"But your uniform looks shrunk, Mr. Gilmore," he said when Will hadfinished. "You said nothing about being in the water!"
Will was then obliged to relate how he had rescued the girl from thecabin.
"Well done again, young sir! it is a deed to be as proud of as thecapturing of those two pirates. Well done, indeed! Now I suppose you wantto be off again?"
"Yes, sir, I should like to sail as soon as possible; in the first place,because I am most anxious to fall in with that schooner and bring thecaptain and crew in here to be hanged."
"That is a very laudable ambition. And why in the second place?"
"Because I want to get off before a lot of people come to thank me forsaving their relatives, and so on, sir. If I get away at once, then I mayhope that before I come back again the whole thing will be forgotten."
"It oughtn't to be, for you acted very wisely and gallantly."
"Well, sir, I don't want a lot of thanks for only doing what was my duty."
"Very good, Mr. Gilmore, I understand your feelings, but I quite expectthat when you do return you will have to go through the ordeal of beingpresented with a piece of plate, and probably after that you will have toattend a complimentary ball. Now, you can go back to your ship at once.Here is a letter to the chief of the store department instructing him tofurnish you with any stores you may want without waiting for mysignature."
"Thank you very much, sir! I hope, when I return, that I shall bring thatpirate in tow. Can I have three months from the present time?"
"Certainly, and I hope you will be able to make good use of it."
Returning to his ship, Will at once made out the list of the stores herequired, and sent Harman on shore with it, telling him to take two boatsand bring everything back with him. At five o'clock in the afternoon thetwo boa
ts returned, carrying all the stores required. The water-tanks hadalready been filled up, and a quarter of an hour later the cutter wasunder sail and leaving the harbour.
Will, of course, had nothing whatever to guide him in his search for theschooner beyond the fact that she was heading west at the time when helast saw her. At that time they were to the south of Porto Rico, so heconcluded that she was making for Cuba. Every day, therefore, he cruisedalong the coast of that island, sometimes sending boats ashore to examineinlets, at other times running right out to sea in the hope that thepirate, whose spies he had no doubt were watching his movements, mightsuppose he had given up the search and was sailing away. Nevertheless, hecould not be certain that she would endeavour to avoid him should shecatch sight of him, for with a glass the pirate captain could have madeout the number of guns _L'Agile_ carried, and would doubtless feelconfident in his own superiority, as he would not be able to discover theweight of the guns. Will felt that if the pirate should fight, his bestpolicy would be at first to make a pretence of running, in the hope thatin a long chase he might manage to knock away some of the schooner'sspars.
One day he saw the boats, which had gone up a deep inlet, coming back atfull speed.
"We saw a schooner up there," Harman reported; "I think she is the one weare in search of. When we sighted her she was getting up sail."
"That will just suit me. We will run out to sea at once; that will makehim believe we are afraid of him."
Scarcely had the boats been got on board, and the cutter's head turnedoffshore, when the schooner was seen issuing from the inlet. Will orderedevery sail to be crowded on, and had the satisfaction of seeing theschooner following his example. He then set the whole of the crew to shiftthe long-tom from the bow to the stern. Its muzzle was just high enough toproject above the taffrail, and in order to hide it better he had hammocksand other material piled on each side of it so as to form a breastworkthree feet high.
"They will think," he said, "that we have put this up as a protectionagainst shot from his bow-chasers."
After watching the schooner for a quarter of an hour, Will said:
"I don't think she gains upon us at all; lower a sail over the bow todeaden her way. A small topsail will do; I only want to check her half aknot an hour."
It was an hour before the schooner yawed and fired her bow-guns.
"That is good," Will said to Dimchurch; "it shows that she doesn't carry along-tom. I thought she didn't, but they might have hidden it, as we havedone. Don't answer them yet; I don't want to fire till we get within halfa mile of her; then they shall have it as hot as they like."
The schooner continued to gain slowly, occasionally firing herbow-chasers. When she had come up to within a mile of _L'Agile_ the cutterwas yawed and two broadside guns fired; they were purposely aimed somewhatwide, as Will was anxious that the pirates should not suspect the weightof his metal, and did not wish, by inflicting some small injury, to deterher from continuing the chase. The schooner evidently depended upon thevastly superior strength of her crew to carry the cutter by boarding, andso abstained from attempting to injure her, as the less damage shesuffered the better value she would be as a prize.
"They are not more than half a mile off now, I think, sir," Dimchurch saidat last.
"Very well then, we will let her have it."
The gun was already loaded, so Dimchurch took a steady aim and applied thematch. All leapt upon the bulwarks to see the effect of the shot, and acheer broke from the crew as it struck the schooner on the bow, about fourfeet above the water. In return the schooner yawed so as to bring herwhole broadside to bear on the cutter, and six tongues of flame flashedfrom her side. At the same moment _L'Agile_ swung round and fired her twostarboard guns. Both ships immediately resumed their former positions, andas they did so Dimchurch fired again, his shot scattering a shower ofsplinters from almost the same spot as the other had struck.
"You must elevate your gun a little more, Dimchurch," said Will, "andbring a mast about their ears. Get that sail on board!" he shouted; "Idon't want the schooner to get any nearer."
The order was executed, and the difference in the speed of the cutter wasat once manifest. Again and again Dimchurch fired. Several of the shotwent through the schooner's foresail, but as yet her masts were untouched.
"A little more to the right, Dimchurch."
This time the sailor was longer than usual in taking aim, but when hefired the schooner's foremast was seen to topple over, and her head flewup into the wind, thus presenting her stern to the cutter.
"She is a lame duck now," Will said, "but we may as well take her mainmastout of her too. Fire away, and take as good aim as you did last time."
Ten more shots were fired, and with the last the pirate's mainmast wentover the side.
"Well done, Dimchurch! Now we have her at our mercy. We will sailbackwards and forwards under her stern and rake her with grape. I don'twant to injure her more than is necessary, but I do want to kill as manyof the crew as possible; it is better for them to die that way than to betaken to Jamaica to be hanged."
For an hour the cutter kept at work crossing and recrossing herantagonist's stern, and each time she poured in a volley from twobroadside guns and the long-tom. The stern of the schooner was knockedalmost to pieces, and the grape-shot carried death along her decks.
"I am only afraid that they will blow her up," Will said; "but probably,as they have not done so already, her captain and most of her officers arekilled, for it would require a desperado to undertake that job."
At last the black flag was hoisted on a spar at the stern, and thenlowered again. When they saw this the crew of _L'Agile_ stopped firing,and sent up cheer after cheer.
"Now we must be careful, sir," Dimchurch said; "those scoundrels are quitecapable of pretending to surrender, and then, when we board her, blowingtheir ship and us into the air."
"You are right, Dimchurch. They might very well do that, for they mustknow well enough that they can expect no mercy."
Bringing the cutter to within a hundred yards of the schooner, Willshouted:
"Have you a boat that can swim?" and receiving a reply in the negative,shouted back: "Very well, then, I will drop one to you."
He then placed the cutter exactly to windward of the schooner, and,lowering one of the boats, to which a rope was attached, let it drift downto the prize.
"Now," he shouted, "fasten a hawser to that boat; the largest you have."
There was evidently some discussion among the few men gathered on the deckof the pirate, and, seeing that they hesitated, Will shouted:
"Do as you are ordered, or I will open fire again."
This decided the pirates, and in a short time the end of a hawser was tiedto one of the thwarts of the boat. The boat was then hauled back to_L'Agile_, and when the cable was got on board it was knotted to their ownstrongest hawser.
"That will keep them a good bit astern," Will said; "otherwise, if thewind were to drop at night, they might haul their own vessel up to us, andcarry out their plan of blowing us up."
"It is wise to take every precaution, sir," Harman said; "but I don'tthink any trick of that sort would be likely to succeed. You may be surewe should keep too sharp a watch on them."
While the hawsers were being spliced, Will shouted to the pirates to cutaway the wreckage from their ship, and when this was done he started withhis prize in tow. As soon as they were fairly under weigh he hailed theprisoners through his speaking-trumpet and questioned them about theircasualties. They replied that at the beginning of the engagement they hadhad one hundred and twenty men on board. The captain had been killed bythe first volley of grape, and the slaughter among the crew had beenterrible, all the officers being killed and eighty of the men. Theremainder had run down into the hold, and remained there until, after aconsultation, one of them crawled up on deck and hoisted and lowered theblack flag.
"I suppose," Will said, "your intention was to blow the ship andyourselves and us into the air
as soon as we came on board."
"That is just what we did mean," one of them shouted savagely; "if wecould but have paid you out we would not have minded what became ofourselves."
"It is well, indeed, Dimchurch, that you suggested the possibility oftheir doing this to us. But for that we should certainly have lost nearlyall our number, for, not knowing how many of the crew survived, I couldnot have ventured to go on board without pretty nearly every man. It willbe a lesson to me in future, when I am fighting pirates, to act as if theywere wild beasts."
"Well, sir, I don't know that they are altogether to be blamed; it is onlyhuman nature to pay back a blow for a blow, and with savages like these,especially when they know that they are bound to be hanged, you couldhardly expect anything else."
"I suppose not, Dimchurch, and certainly for myself I would rather beblown up than hanged. I suppose the reason why they did not blow up theship when they found their plan had failed was that they clung to lifeeven for a few days."
"I expect it is that, sir; besides, you know, each man may think thatalthough no doubt the rest will be hanged, he himself may get off."
"Yes, I dare say that has something to do with it," Will agreed. "I don'tthink it likely, however, that any one of them will be spared after thataffair of the _Northumberland_, and very probably that was only one of adozen ships destroyed in the same way.
"Now, Harman, we will put her head round and sail back."
"Sail back, sir?"
"Certainly; I think there is no doubt that that inlet is the pirates'head-quarters, and that they are certain to have storehouses therechoke-full of plunder. Some of their associates will in that case be onshore looking after it, and if their ship doesn't return they will dividethe most valuable portion of these stores among themselves, and set fireto all the rest. We have done extremely well so far, but another big haulwill make matters all the pleasanter."
"But what will you do with the prize?" asked Harman.
"I will cast her off eight or ten miles from the shore; they have noboats, and the schooner is a mere log on the water. When we see whatplunder they have collected I shall be able to decide how to act. Thecutter can hold a great deal, but if we find more than she can carry wemust load the schooner also."
"But what would you do with the pirates in that case, sir?"
"I should try to make them come off in batches, and then iron them; but ifthey would not do that, I should be inclined to tow the schooner to withinhalf a mile of the shore, and so give all that could swim the chance ofgetting away. Those of them that are unable to do so would probably manageto get off on spars or hatchways. They have been richly punished already,and I fancy the admiral would be much better pleased to see the schoonercome in loaded with valuable plunder than if she carried only fortyscoundrels to be handed over to the hangman."
"But if we were to let them escape we should have to take great care onshore while we were rifling the storehouse."
"You may be sure that I should do that, Harman. The fellows couldcertainly take no firearms on shore, and I should keep ten men with loadedmuskets always on guard, while those who are at work would have theirfirearms handy to them."
They towed the schooner to within seven or eight miles of the shore, andthen cast her off and made for the creek from which the pirates had comeout. As they entered the inlet, which was two miles long, they could seeno signs of houses, so they sailed as far as they could and anchored. Willthen landed with a party of ten well-armed men, and at once began to makea careful examination of the beach. In a short time they found awell-beaten path going up through the wood. Before following this,however, Will took the precaution to have fifteen more men sent ashore, asit was, of course, impossible to say how many of a guard had been left atthe head-quarters. When the second party had landed, all advancedcautiously up the path, holding their muskets in readiness for instantaction. They met, however, with no opposition; the pirates were evidentlyunaware of their presence. They had gone but a very short distance whenthey came to a large clearing, in the middle of which they saw severallarge huts and three great storehouses. They went on at the double towardsthem, but they had gone only a short distance when they heard a shout anda shot, and saw a dozen men and a number of women issue from the backs ofthe huts and make for the wood.
"Now, my lads," shouted Will, "break open the doors of those storehouses;there is not likely to be much that is of value in the huts. You hadbetter take four men, Dimchurch, and set fire to them all; of course youcan just look in and see if there is anything worth taking before youapply a light."
Will himself superintended the breaking open of the storehouses. When heentered the first he paused in amazement; it was filled to the very topwith boxes and bales. The other two were in a similar condition.
"There is enough to fill the cutter and the prize a dozen times," Willsaid. "I expect they trade to some extent with the Spaniards, but theyevidently had another intention in storing these goods. Probably theyproposed, when they had amassed sufficient, to charter a large ship, fillher up to the hatchways, and sail to some American port or some otherplace where questions are not usually asked."
There was a safe in the corner of one of the storehouses; this they blewopen, and when Will examined its contents he found that they consisted ofthe papers and manifests of cargoes of no fewer than eleven ships.
"My conjecture was right," he said. "They intended, no doubt, to keep somelarge merchantman they had captured, fill her with the contents of theirprizes, and then with the papers and manifests of cargo they could goalmost anywhere and dispose of their ill-gotten goods."
"I have no doubt that is so, sir," Dimchurch said; "I only wonder they didnot set about it before."
"It is quite possible they have done so already," Will said, "but they mayhave taken prizes quicker than they could dispose of them, which wouldaccount for this immense accumulation. Now, Dimchurch, I will sit down andgo through those bills of lading and pick out the most valuable goods. Wewill then take these off to begin with, and can leave it to the admiral tosend a man-of-war or charter some merchantman to bring the rest. Theschooner should carry between two and three hundred tons, and we couldmanage to cram eighty or a hundred into our hold. If we get all thatsafely to Jamaica, we need not grieve much if we find that the rest of thegoods have been burned before the ships can come to fetch them."
It took him three hours to go through the bills of lading, making a markagainst all the most valuable goods. Then some of the men were set to sortthese out. There was no great difficulty about this, as the goods had beenvery neatly stored, those belonging to each ship being separated by narrowpassages from the rest. The remainder of the men except two were meanwhilebrought from the cutter. Sentries were then placed to watch all theapproaches to the storehouses, and while ten men got out the bales andboxes, the remaining twenty-six carried them down the path. At night halfthe men remained in the storehouses, the other half returning to thecutter.
Before sunset Will went with a small escort to the top of a neighbouringhill to see that all was well with the hulk of the schooner. With the aidof his telescope he could see her plainly, and to his great satisfactionnoted that she had made but little drift.
The next morning the work was resumed, and was carried on all day withonly short breaks for meals, and so on the following two days. At the endof that time as much had been put on board the cutter as she could carry.Ten men were then left to guard the stores, and the rest, going on board,sailed out to the schooner and towed her in. They did not, as was at firstintended, stop a mile outside the inlet, but came right into it andanchored opposite the path, as the labour of continually loading thecutter and then transferring her cargo to the hulk would have been verygreat. The next morning a party of twelve men went on board her, andfound, as Will had expected, that she was entirely deserted.
"They will be too happy at having made their escape to do anything for thenext day or two," Will said, "so we can go on working as usual.Fortunately the fe
llows who were left in the huts were taken so completelyby surprise that they bolted at once and left their guns behind. If,therefore, they are joined by their friends from the schooner, and attackus, they will have no firearms with them, for, as the hulk is anchoredabout two hundred yards from shore, it would require a marvellously goodswimmer to carry his musket and ammunition ashore with him. In future,however, we will leave twenty men to guard the storehouses at night; thereis no boat in the inlet by means of which they could attack the cutter,and they are not likely to try to do so by swimming. At any rate, Harman,I will place you in command of her, and shall therefore feel perfectlyconfident that we shall not be taken by surprise."
"You can trust me for that, sir; I promise you that I will sleep with oneeye open, though I don't think they would be likely to attempt such anenterprise. They are much more likely to attack you at the stores. I thinkit would be advisable to take twenty-five men with you and leave me withfifteen, which would be ample. I should divide them into two watches, sothat there would always be seven on deck. Jefferson, who is an uncommonlysharp fellow, would be in charge of one of the watches, and Williams ofthe other; and as I should myself be up and down all night, there would beno chance of our being caught napping." Will agreed to this arrangement.
The prize was now brought close inshore, the water being deep enough toallow of this. It was a great advantage, as the goods could be put onboard direct, and the work was thereby greatly accelerated.
Behind a pile of goods another safe was discovered, and this was found tocontain L8500 in money, nearly a hundred watches, and a large amount ofladies' jewellery. Many watches had also been found in the huts beforethese were burned. The bales and boxes contained chiefly spices, silks andsateens, shawls, piece-goods, and coffee.
On the night of the fourth day after the escape of the prisoners one ofthe sentries perceived a dark mass moving from the wood. He at once firedhis musket, and in a minute Will and Dimchurch, with their five-and-twentymen, were all in readiness.
"Now, my men," Will said, "these fellows will attempt to rush us. We willdivide into three parties and will fire by volleys; one party must notfire till they see that all are loaded. In that way we shall always havesixteen muskets ready for them. I have no fear of the result, and even ifthey close with us our cutlasses will be more than a match for theirknives. Here they come! Get ready, the first section, and don't fire tillI tell you."
The enemy, fully sixty strong, came on with fierce cries, knowing that thegarrison were on guard, although they could not see them in the shadow ofthe storehouses. When they got within fifty yards Will gave the order tofire, and the first eight muskets flashed out. The second eight firedalmost immediately after, and the third eight, waiting only till the firstsection had reloaded, followed suit. Nearly every shot told, and the shockwas so great that it caused the advancing enemy to hesitate for a moment.This gave the second and third sections time to reload, so that, when thepirates again advanced, three more deadly volleys were poured into them inquick succession. The effect of these was instantaneous. Fullyfive-and-thirty had been brought to the ground by the six volleys; theremainder halted, swayed for a moment, then turned and fled at full speed,pursued, however, before they reached the wood, by another generaldischarge.
Will was well pleased with the tremendously heavy punishment he hadinflicted.
"Out of the sixty men who attacked us," he said to Harman the nextmorning, "I calculate that forty belonged to the schooner. I don't supposethey were worse than the other twenty; but we had ourselves seen some ofthe crimes they had committed. We have accounted for forty in all, so ofthose who escaped from the schooner probably some five- or six-and-twentyhave been killed. After such a thrashing they are not likely to makeanother attempt."
He was right. The work now went on undisturbed, and at the end of afortnight the schooner was laden. All the hatches had been closed and madewater-tight; and so full was she that her deck was only two feet and ahalf above the water, although her guns had been thrown overboard orlanded.
"Now I think we are all ready to sail," Harman said.
"Ready to sail! We have a fortnight's hard work before us," said Will."You don't suppose I am going to leave all these hogsheads of sugar,puncheons of rum, and bales of goods to be burnt or destroyed by thosescoundrels."
"How can you prevent it?"
"Very easily. There are plenty of materials on the spot to form fourbatteries, one on each side of the storehouses. We will drag up eight ofthe schooner's guns and mount two on each battery; they shall be loadedand crammed to the muzzle with grape-shot. The batteries shall be builtclear of the storehouses and in echelon, so that if one is attacked it canbe supported by the others. As a garrison I will leave sixteen men underDimchurch."
Dimchurch was called up and the matter explained to him, and he readilyagreed to take charge.
"Two men," he said, "can be on watch in each battery while the otherssleep; so there will be no chance of being taken by surprise, and you maybe quite sure that, no matter how strong a mob may come down, they won'tstand the discharge of eight cannon loaded as you say. I suppose, sir, youmean to form the batteries of bales of cotton. There is a whole ship-loadof them."
"That is my intention, Dimchurch; I have had it in my mind all the time."
The whole strength of the crew, with the exception of two to watch onboard the cutter, now went up to the storehouses, and the men, delightedto know that all this booty was not to be lost, set to work with greatvigour. Will marked out the sites for the batteries, and the bales ofcotton were rolled to them and built up into substantial walls. It tookten days of hard labour to do this and haul up the guns.
When the work was completed Dimchurch chose sixteen of the crew. There wasan ample supply of provisions, which had been taken out of the huts beforethey were burnt; so it was not necessary to draw upon the stores of thecutter. When all was ready the two parties said good-bye, and, with amutual cheer, the cutter's crew went on board.
"It is a hazardous business, I admit," Will said, as, having got up sail,they moved down the inlet with the schooner in tow. "Of course I shall bea little uneasy until we can return from Jamaica and relieve Dimchurch;but I feel convinced that he will be able to hold his own and to giveanother lesson to the pirates if necessary. When they see us sail out theywill naturally conclude that no great number can be left to guard thestores. Still, we may be sure that they have kept a watch on our doingsfrom the edge of the forest, and that the sight of the guns will inspire awholesome dread in them. I cannot but think that eight discharges of grapeand langrage will send them to the right-about however strong they may be.Besides, we have given the men three muskets each, in addition to theirown, from those we found on board the schooner; so if the enemy press onthey will be able to give them a warm reception. And then, even if theattack is too much for them, they have still a resource, for we have leftan exit in the rear of each battery by which they can retire to thestorehouses. I have instructed them to carry all their muskets back withthem; sixteen men with four muskets apiece could make a very sturdydefence. As you know, I had the doors repaired and strengthened andloopholes cut in the walls. Still, I don't think they will be needed."
"How much do you think the prize will be worth?" Harman asked.
"I have really no idea, but I am sure that what we have got here and inthe schooner must be worth some thousands of pounds. What we have leftbehind must be the contents of about ten vessels, as all we have been ableto take is only a full cargo for one good-sized ship."