The Lady and the Pirate by Emerson Hough (best new books to read txt) 📕

venomously. “I’ll spank the life outen him if I ever get the chance—” I raised a hand.

“Enough of all this noise,” I said. “I am in charge now, Peterson. Go to the wheel. Break out the anchor and get under way. At once, man! I have no time to argue.”

Peterson had never in his life heard me speak in this way before, but now, for what reason I do not know—perhaps from force of habit, perhaps because he knew I was owner of the boat, perhaps in awe of the naked kris of Jean Lafitte, still presented menacingly at his abdomen—the old skipper obeyed.

I heard the faint jangle of bells in the engine-room below. Obviously, Williams, the engineer, was responsive to his sense of duty and routine. The power came pulsing through the veins of the Belle Helène and I heard her screws revolve. I, myself, threw in the donkey winch as she forged ahead, and so broke out the anchor. It still swung, clogging her bows as she turned in the current. The bells again jangled as she got more speed and as the anchor came home. Our search-light swept a wide arc along the foot of Natchez Hill, as our bows circled about and headed down the great river. And now we picked in full view, hardly sixty fathoms distant, the dingey, pulled furiously toward us. My friend, the varlet Cal Davidson, half stood in the stern of the stubby craft and waved at us an excited hand.

“Ahoy there, Peterson!” he cried. “Stop! Hold on there! Wait! Where are you going there!”

Peterson turned toward me an inquiring gaze, but I only pointed a hand down-stream, and he obeyed me! I reached my hand to the cord and gave Peterson, Davidson, Natchez and all the world, the salute of a long and vibrant whistle of defiance. It came back to us in echoes from the giant bluffs, swept across the lowlands on the opposite side.

“Full speed ahead, Peterson,” said I quietly.

“Where are we going, Mr. Harry?” he demanded anxiously.

“I don’t know,” said I. “It all depends—maybe around the world. I don’t know and I don’t care.”

“I’m scared about this—it don’t look right. What’s come into you, Mr. Harry?” asked the old man solicitously.

“Nothing, Peterson,” said I, “except that the bird of time is on the wing. I am a pirate, Peterson——”

“I never knew you so far gone in drink before, Mr. Harry,” said he, as he threw over the wheel to pick up the first starboard channel light.

“Yes, I have been drinking, Peterson,” said I. “I have been drinking the wine of life. It oozes drop by drop, and is all, too soon, gone if we delay. Full speed ahead, Peterson. I am in command.”

“Jean!” I called to my able lieutenant. “Reach over into the long boat and bring Partial on board. He is my friend. And bring also our flag. Run it aloft above our prize.”

“Aye, aye, Sir,” came the reply of Jean Lafitte. And a few moments later our long boat was riding astern more easily. Jean Lafitte on his return busied himself with our burgee. And at that moment, Partial, overjoyed at also having a hand in these affairs, barked joyously at his discovery of the neglected end of the cook’s cue projecting through the hinges of the door. On this he laid hold cheerfully, worrying it until poor John shrieked anew in terror; and until I freed him; and ordered tea.

I next went over to the hatches of the engine-room, and having opened them, bent over to speak to Williams, the engineer.

“It’s all right, Williams,” said I. “I am going to take her over now and run her perhaps to the Gulf. We hadn’t time to tell you at first. There has been a legal difficulty. Peterson is on deck, of course.”

“All right, Mr. Harry,” said Williams, who recognized me as he leaned out from his levers to look up through the open hatch. “At first I didn’t know what in hell was up. It sounded like a mutiny——”

“It was a mutiny, Williams,” said I, “and I am the head mutineer. But you’re sure of your pay, so let her go.”

He did let her go, smoothly and brilliantly, so that before long she was at her top speed, around fifteen knots an hour. I was familiar with every detail of the Belle Helène, and now I looked in both the generating plant and the storage batteries, so that four thousand candle-power of electric light blazed over her from bow to fantail. The steady purr of the Belle Helène’s double sixties—engines I had had made under my own care—came to me with a soothing rhythm where I stood near by the wheel. Her search-light made a vast illumination far ahead. Brilliant enough must have seemed the passing spectacle of our stanch little ship to any observer, as we now swept on down the tawny flood of the great river. Who would deny me the feeling of exultation which came to me? Was I not captor and captain of my own ship?

I turned to meet L’Olonnois, my blue-eyed pirate. He stood at my side as one glorified. The full swing of romance had him, the full illusion of this,—imagination’s most ardent desire—now gripped him fully. He was no boy, but a human being possessed of all his dreams. His second self, once oppressed, now free, stood before me wholly satisfied. I needed not to ask whether he had been faithful to his trust.

“I locked the door on ’em, Black Bart,” said he, “and bade them cease a idle remonstrancing. ‘Little do you know,’ say I to them, ‘that Black Bart the Avenger is now on the trail. Let any oppose him at their peril,’ says I to them. She give me candy, the fair captive did, but I spurned her bribe. ‘Beware,’ says I to her. ‘Little do you know what lies before you.’”

CHAPTER XV IN WHICH IS CONVERSATION WITH THE CAPTIVE MAIDEN

JEAN LAFITTE, who had so well executed the work assigned him in the boarding party’s plans, proved himself neither inefficient nor unobservant. He approached me now, with a salute, which probably he copied from Peterson.

“How now, good leftenant?” said I.

“If you please, Black Bart,” he began, “how are we headed, and what are our plans?”

“Our course on this river, Jean Lafitte, will box the compass, indeed box an entire box of compasses, for no river is more winding. Yet in time we shall reach its end, no doubt, since others have.”

“And what about our good ship, the Sea Rover, that we have left behind?”

“By Jove! Jean Lafitte,” I exclaimed, “that is, indeed, a true word. What, indeed? We left her riding at anchor just off the channel edge, and so far as I recall, she had not her lights up, in accordance with the law.”

“Shall we put about and take her in tow, Black Bart?”

“By no means. That is the very last of my intentions.”

“What’ll become of her, then?”

“That is no concern of mine.”

“But nobody’ll know whose she is, and nobody can tell what may happen to her——”

“Quite true. She may be stolen, or sunk. Why not?”

“But she cost a lot of money.”

“On the contrary, she cost only twelve hundred dollars.”

“Twelve hundred dollars!” Jean drew a long deep breath. “I didn’t know anybody had that much money in the world. Besides, look what you spent for them pearls. Ain’t you poor, then, Black Bart?”

“On the contrary, I have that much more money left, very likely. And I do not, to say truth, care a jot, a rap or a stiver, what becomes of the derelict Sea Rover now. Have we not taken a better ship for our own?”

“Yes, but suppose yon varlet boards the Sea Rover, an’ chases us the way we done him?”

“Again, by Jove! Jean Lafitte; an idea. But suppose he does? Much good it will do him. For, look you, good leftenant, the Belle Helène will not stop to send any man ashore for baseball scores. Such was not the practise of the old buccaneers, nor shall it be ours; whereas, no matter what the haste, yon varlet could in nowise refrain from that same folly which hath lost him his ship to us. Each hour will only widen the gap between us. Let him take our tub if he likes, and do as he likes, for ’twill be a long day before he picks up our masts over his horizon, Jean Lafitte.”

“Aye, aye, Sir!” rejoined my lieutenant, and withdrew. I could see he was not overjoyed at the abandonment of our earlier ship that had brought us so far in safety. All this luxury of the Belle Helène had the effect of oppressing a pirate who so short a time ago had started out on the high seas in a sixteen foot yawl, and who had seen that yawl, in a manner of speaking, grown into a schooner, the schooner comparatively grown into a full-fledged four-decker, richly fitted as any ship of the royal navy.

But these, all, were lesser things to me, for on my soul was a more insistent concern. I turned now, seeing that Peterson, wholly reconciled to the new order of affairs, was speeding the boat onward as though I never had left her; so that I knew she was safe in his hands, although I set Lafitte to watch him. Followed by my faithful friend Partial, who expressed every evidence of having enjoyed a most interesting evening, I presently made my way aft.

As I approached the door of the after-cabin suite, occupied by the ladies, I made my presence known at first discreetly, then more pointedly, and, at length, by a knocking on the door.

“Below, there!” I called, boldly as I could; for eager as I was to see Helena Emory, there were certain things about the interview which might be difficult. Lovers who have parted, finally, approach each other, even by accident, thereafter, with a certain reluctance. (Lovers, did I say? Nay, never had she said she loved me. She had only said she wished she did, wished she could.)

No answer came at first. Then, “Who is it?” in the voice of Aunt Lucinda.

“It is I, Mr. Henry—” but I paused: “—It is I, Black Bart the Avenger,” I concluded. “May I come in?”

Silently the door opened, and I entered the little reception-room which lay between the two staterooms of this cabin. Before me stood Helena! And now I was close to her, I could see the little curls at her temples, could see the double curves of her lips, the color in her cheek. Ah! she was the same, the same! I loved her—I loved her not the same, but more and more, more!

She held her peace; and all I could do was to stand and stare and then hold out my hand. She took it formally, though her color heightened. I saluted Aunt Lucinda also, who glared at me. “How do you do?” I said to them both, with much originality and daring.

“Black Bart!” snorted Aunt Lucinda. “Black Bart! It might be, from these goings on. What does it all mean?”

“It means, my dear Mrs. Daniver,” said I, “that I have taken charge of the boat myself.”

“But how?” demanded Helena. “We did not hear you were coming. And I don’t understand. Why, that rascally little nephew of mine, in the mask, frightened auntie nearly to death. And he said the most extraordinary things!

“Where is Mr. Davidson?” she added. “He didn’t tell us a word of this.”

“He didn’t know a word of it himself,” I answered. “Let me tell you, no self-respecting pirate—and as you see, I am a pirate—is in the habit