Part 11

“I am very sorry to see you so angry,” he replied in his softest tones, “very sorry, indeed; and I pardon you for your violent language. I shall now bid you a very good morning, madam. When your nephew returns from his delightful excursion down the river, I hope that I shall have the pleasure of seeing him.”

Miss Woodbury did not reply. She looked at the man with absolute contempt, and his retreat from the room was far from dignified. She stood rigid until she heard the front door slam, and then slipped upon her poor old knees and buried her head in a sofa pillow and wept; she who could have faced an army but a minute before.

The Deacon stalked down the long passage between the great elms, revolving black thoughts in his heart. The bruises on his forehead and nose were very painful and the incident had thrown together all his old enmities against these his neighbors into a crystallized hate.

XIII

The _Chesapeake_ lay in the upper harbor in the still June twilight, her lofty spars and rigging traced against the sky. The unlucky frigate was all bustle and confusion.

Even at this late hour, with her antagonist cruising in the lower harbor, fresh levies were being put aboard of her, and the old _Constitution’s_ men shook their heads as they saw the dark-browed, scowling Portuguese and the raw youths picked up at random to piece out the crew.

But Lawrence had sent a taunting challenge to the _Bonne Citoyenne_, and he could not afford to baulk a British ship of a fight at the very gates of the Puritan mother-town. Down this harbor, in 1776, the British fleet had sailed, bearing the last evidence of King George’s power over the Massachusetts Bay Colony. It should never be said that a Yankee ship had faltered when the meteor flag of Britain waved defiance at the very mouth of the famous “tea-pot.”

“Then all cavaliers who love honor and me,” was the burden of the gallant Lawrence’s song. Honor it was indeed to win; honor even to lose in this duel on the sea.

Everywhere the officers were busy assigning men to the guns and appointing temporary warrant officers. Cheever, an old hand, if somewhat of a free lance, had been assigned to the mizzen-top under Midshipman Berry, a handsome young fellow who would in less stirring times have been playing “rounders” in the school-yard; but was now set to command grown men in a desperate contest.

Before the fair-haired youngster were standing the foretop men, going through a hurried setting-up drill and instruction in the use of the musket. A lieutenant came up, followed by a young sailor.

“Mr. Berry,” said the officer, “here is a greenhorn to complete your squad.”

The sailor saluted and took his place in the squad. As Berry handed him a musket, Cheever looked at the newcomer from the corner of his eye, and recognized his nephew. The boy looked up and caught his eye and started as he saw who was looking at him.

“What has brought him here?” Cheever asked himself as he mechanically obeyed the orders of the midshipman.

Presently the squad was dismissed and Cheever drew his nephew aside out of the hurly-burly of warlike preparation.

“How now, lad!” he asked, “what does this mean? How come you here?”

The words came out with difficulty from his convulsed throat.

“I have been walking from Oldbury for the last two days. I--”

“You’re in trouble on my account. The silver,--tell me.”

“I returned it as I promised you.”

“You found it then under the lilac-bush?” asked Cheever.

James nodded assent.

“While I was putting it back upon the sideboard, the old man came down from his chamber and fired at me with a pistol.”

“Did he recognize you?”

“I don’t know. As he fired, I heaved the heavy tankard at him, and it hit him and he fell like a log.”

“Ay, that’s the ticket, lad,” said Cheever. “I have always said that. I wouldn’t give a red cent for pistol in a fight. There’s not one chance in five of hitting your man. Your hand will shake when you are excited unless a cooler head than mine is on your shoulders. The slightest tremor will make you lose your aim. But for accidental killing, recommend me to the pistol. ’Twill always fail to meet your expectation. If you think it is not loaded, it will be, and while it will not protect you from your enemy, it will be sure to hit your friend.”

“I ran out of the house as fast as I could and made right over the hill, back of his house to the Boston turnpike.”

“You don’t know whether you really hurt him, then?”

“I think now that I could only have knocked him senseless. At the time, though, I was chased by fears and walked all the rest of the night as fast as I could. I had no idea except to escape from Oldbury--and my father is lying there ill,” exclaimed the boy, with a sudden twinge of conscience. “I have been on the road ever since, sleeping in haymows; and I have eaten what the farmers’ wives would give me; but the weather was fine, and if I could have shut out recollection, I should have enjoyed it.”

“However did the whim to have the silver returned come into my head?” said Cheever. “I would not have had this happen for the world, boy. I seem to bring misfortune on all I touch--and your father ill. He will have a big tally to put on my old score. But it may not be as black as it looks. Perhaps the old Deacon’s crown is not cracked and he will rejoice more over the return of his silver than he will grieve over his bruises. But you shouldn’t have run away. That will arouse their suspicions. They know that you have been at home, that you are not there now, and that you have taken no place on any coach leaving Oldbury. Hence, they will conclude that you have taken French leave, and that, too, on the night of the breaking and entering of the Deacon’s house.”

“I know all that,” replied James. “I have thought it over a thousand times as I walked along the turnpike and keeping my eyes well out for the Oldbury coach. But it is too late to turn back now. I am an apprentice on a Yankee frigate and it’s the day before an action.”

“How came you to ship?”

“I had hardly been in Boston five minutes before my eye fell upon one of the posters calling for sailors for the _Chesapeake_. I found the officer willing enough to take me. Indeed, I was put on board within an hour of my going into the shipping office.”

“And a bad lookout it is for us both. A half of the crew are good hands, but there are mutinous Dagoes aboard, who care no more for the Stars and Stripes than they do for an old sail, and the rest are a pack of youngsters like you, full of pluck and anxious to fight, but too green for much use. But the old man has his dander up, and by to-morrow night there may be such happenings that I may as well arrange my affairs decently and in good order to-night. We may both get out of this alive or one of us may be killed. If it’s I, I wish to tell you what to do. I have made a will which will give you all I have left. Isaac Tenney, who keeps the Bell-in-Hand tavern in Boston, has all the papers.

“I had rare luck in the privateering, James. Dame Fortune seems to have wearied of turning the cold shoulder upon me, and during the last year the sum which your father sent me has waxed as fast as a sailor’s wages wane when he first strikes a port. It’s all deposited in the bank, and that’s all for you if I don’t come out of the fight. If I do, you’ll never be the better for it. Good luck won’t stick to me long, I fear. I don’t know whether it would be good or ill fortune to be knocked on the head to-morrow. The money might give me a chance again. Nearly ten thousand dollars! What do you think of that for a man who had only a slim leather bag a year ago when he came up from the brig _Tempest_ to your father’s house?”

James was not listening to his uncle’s monologue. He was by his father’s bedside and he was saying to himself, “I have brought his gray hairs in sorrow to the grave.”

“The Deacon has started the hue and cry before this,” said James.

“When it is known that you were returning the silver, the charge will drop to the ground,” replied Cheever.

“And the blow with the tankard!”

“That would never kill him, and, by the same token, he shot at you first. You have, after all, done well in shipping on this frigate. If we take the _Shannon_, we shall be the heroes of the day, and any little faults will be forgiven.”

“And if they take us?” said James.

“Then most of us will be summoned before a Higher Court, my boy, and will at least die fighting for our country. You’ve not forgotten where to go if you come out alive? The tavern Bell-in-Hand.”

“For your money, uncle? I don’t want it.”

“It’s yours, my boy, whether I live or die. You have earned all you wish to take of it. I have brought you into these toils and perhaps ruined your life, and have exposed you to awful danger, and you a minister to be. I was once to be a parson, too, and your grandfather was proud of me. I was quick at my books, too. He kept a tight hand on me, did your grandfather. On the surface I was pious; and I learned my catechism and went to Sabbath-school and to prayer-meetings and to church. They did everything for me that they could to make the holiest of ministers, and I--”

He laughed a little bitter laugh.

“I was not all bad, though, my boy; nobody is. There are oases in every desert, fresh, cool places where seeds grow to be plants and the birds sing. I have a natural taste for making sermons, you see. I have heard enough in my day. But the discipline was too rigid, and no allowance was made for the devil in me.”

For human nature did not change when it crossed the Atlantic with our Puritan forefathers, and it crops out even in ministers’ sons. “They brought me up piously,” continued Cheever, “but they did not cast the devil out. I went to church with due regularity, but the chances were that I had been cock-fighting on the Saturday night before, and I went to the tavern far oftener than I went to prayer-meetings. I was daft when I took that silver. I was not naturally a thief, but I was weak and owing money, and gave way to the temptation. I might as well have stolen an old Revolutionary cannon. I could not dispose of the stuff after I had possession of it. And I fled and lost everything.”

“As I have,” said James.

“No, you only run the risk of the fight. If you come out unhurt, you will go back crowned with glory, and tell the town just what happened. It’s not a serious crime to return a man’s property. You did it in an odd way, and at a late hour, but you had no evil intent, and if you did keel the old man over with the tankard, he had fired upon you first. Oh, you will get into no trouble on that account. We will show the British what a Yankee ship and a Yankee crew can do to-morrow, and you will go home with your pockets full of prize-money.”

“Or not at all,” said James.

Cheever looked grave.

“We have opened the wine, James,” he replied; “it must be drunk. Write your aunt now, tell her the whole story. Don’t mention that I am on board here. Tell the truth; for that will hold together against the world, and a lie is like a rat dead in a wall, sure to be found out before long.”

XIV

The two ships of war were manœuvring that June afternoon in awful silence, on the blue waters of Massachusetts Bay. Each crew stood at quarters ready to send the deadly broadsides at the rival frigate when the word was given. No land was in sight, Boston Light being six leagues away, and the two ships in the centre of the circle of rippling water were watched only by the sea-gulls and the broad eye of the sun. The _Chesapeake_ was coming down very fast on the _Shannon_, under top-sails and jib, and the British ship was lying to under top-sail, top-gallant sails, jib, and spanker. Cheever and James, high perched in the mizzen-top, clutched their muskets tightly as they watched the great white ensign of the ship float on the breeze, bearing the legend “Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights.”

The ill-assorted crew of the _Chesapeake_ had taken their stations and every man was ready for the fight, which must be sharp and murderous, whether the meteor flag of England or the starry banner was to be struck. It was late in the afternoon now, and the hours which had passed since the _Chesapeake_ weighed anchor at noon, seemed like ages to the boy in the mizzen-top.

Midshipman Randolph, in command, was cheery enough, and had told James, as they sailed down Boston Bay, of his service on the _Constitution_, of her victory over the _Guerrière_, and her marvellous escape from the British fleet in the Sound.

“The _Shannon_ is keeping a close luff,” cried Randolph. “See her maintop-sail shiver. We can get the weather-gauge on her easy enough. Look, now we are getting up our foresail and going straight for her starboard quarter; Lawrence will go under her stern, rake her, and engage her in the quarter. In a quarter of an hour you’ll see the splinters fly, my boys.”

On the Yankee ship tore before the fresh breeze, with the great ensign flying, while the _Shannon_ waited doggedly the attack. Even the midshipman stopped his chatter as the moment of the first broadside approached.

The _Chesapeake_, when within fifty yards of her opponent’s starboard quarter, luffed up and squared her main-yard, and now the two rivals were almost alongside. A few minutes more of awful silence, while the two ships forged ahead together, and then James saw a flame shoot out from the starboard side of the _Shannon_, and at once the broadsides of both ships roared at each other. The boy felt every nerve in his body tingle, as the storm broke the awful calm.

Below him was a cloud of smoke and splinters, and as the smoke cleared away he saw the men working their guns, and dark forms lying by the wheel in ghastly pools of blood. And so the cannons thundered at each other gloriously for five minutes, “hot gun-lip kissing gun,” when the damage to the _Chesapeake’s_ rigging caused her to come up into the wind somewhat, so as to expose her quarter to a terrible broadside, which beat in her stern posts and swept the men away like flies from the after guns. Then came a loud explosion on the American ship’s quarter-deck, and the flames swept along the deck from the foremast to the mizzen-mast. The dense smoke blinded and choked the men in the tops.

Meanwhile the crippled ship had stern-way on and began to pay off, and the two frigates fell aboard of each other, the _Chesapeake’s_ quarter pressing on the _Shannon’s_ side just forward the starboard main chains, and the ships were kept in this position by the _Shannon’s_ anchor catching in the _Chesapeake’s_ quarter-post.

“We are going to board them,” cried Randolph.

“Most likely they will us,” said a surly seaman; “we have had the worst of it so far.”

“Silence!” shouted Randolph.

The seaman was right; Captain Broke, when the _Shannon_ exposed her quarter, ran forward, and seeing his foes flinching from the quarter-deck guns, ordered the ships to be linked together, the firing to cease, and the boarders to be called.

His boatswain set about fastening the vessels together, though his right arm was hacked off by a blow from a Yankee cutlass.

Just then Lieutenant Ludlow fell mortally wounded on the _Chesapeake_, and Lawrence himself on the quarter-deck, fatally conspicuous in his full-dress uniform and commanding stature, was shot down. He fell down and was carried below, exclaiming, “Don’t give up the ship!”

Now from the tops of both vessels the fire became hot, and as the smoke blew away from the two linked ships, James saw the British Captain Broke at the head of his men, stepping from the _Shannon’s_ gangway rail on to the muzzle of the _Chesapeake’s_ after carronade. The boy aimed at the British captain and fired; but missed. In a second Captain Broke, followed by about twenty men, jumped on the _Chesapeake’s_ quarter-deck, and some of the crew of the American vessel, the foreign mercenaries and some of the raw natives, deserted their quarters. The Portuguese boatswain’s mate removed the gratings of the berth-deck and ran below, followed by many of the crew.

The loss of Lawrence and Ludlow deprived the deck of leaders at the critical moment of the fight, and the mixed elements in the crew could not stand up without a leader, against the _élan_ of the enemy’s boarders.

At this despairing juncture, the church militant came to the front. The chaplain, Mr. Livermore, stood alone on the quarter-deck, in front of the boarders, and advancing, the parson fired his pistol into the boarding crew and in return nearly had his arm hewed off by a sword-stroke.

“My God, look at Livermore!” cried Berry. “Lawrence and Ludlow must be dead. Where’s the bugler, the coward? Is there no one to rally the men?”

The boarders, after the chaplain’s noble resistance, stopped for a moment until they were joined by the rest of the _Shannon’s_ boarders. “Now, let them have it,” cried Berry, “a volley!--are you ready,--fire!”

The volley told on the huddled mass of boarders and two officers fell. “That’s right,” cried the midshipman, “but it will be our turn next. Load your guns, my men, and give it to them before we are blown to bits. They are pointing a Long Tom at us from the _Shannon_. Pick off all you can before they fire it.”

As he spoke, the gallant officer, pierced by a bullet from the _Shannon’s_ maintop, plunged from the top and fell heavily over on the deck below. James instinctively assumed the command of the top. “Now, boys,” he cried, “the marines are making a stand in the upper deck.”

The next instant a shot from the _Shannon’s_ Long Tom crashed through the mizzen-top, and James and the survivors made for the shrouds, to descend to the upper deck. As they descended, several muskets were discharged at them, but without effect.

Below, Lieutenant Budd now for the first time learned that the English had boarded; from the upper deck men came crowding down.

“_Chesapeake’s_ men, follow me!” cried the gallant officer.

But, shame to say, the foreigners and the green hands held back, though a dozen brave fellows jumped to follow him. Up they rushed after the Lieutenant to the spar-deck, and fell, with the fury of brave men who break away from coward associates, upon the British as they came along the gangway.

This brave handful, reinforced by Cheever, James, and other mizzen-top men, held in check the victorious _Shannons_, killing two of them; and Cheever saw the Lieutenant pierced by a boarding-pike and thrown down the main hatchway. As the _Chesapeake’s_ survivors stood battling for their lives with the desperation of animals at bay, Lieutenant Ludlow, stricken to death, struggled upon deck, followed by three seamen.

“We shall not give up the ship,” cried the dying man.

A sabre descended upon his head and he spoke no more.

Hardly fifteen minutes had elapsed since the two gallant frigates had begun action, and the _Chesapeake_ was almost in the complete possession of the enemy. In the forecastle, a few seamen and marines stood fighting on the upper deck; the few survivors stood together, firm in their determination not to give up the ship before their lives.

In this desperate struggle, Tom Cheever, brandishing a pike, stood shoulder to shoulder with James. Next him, a marine with a clubbed musket in air, and on the other side James, with his midshipman’s cutlass, while behind stood eight seamen armed with pikes and cutlasses. After their slight repulse of the _Shannon’s_ boarding crew they fell back, and for a moment the fighting ceased as the determined little body of Americans stood closer together. Men there were among them who had helped to doff the _Guerrière’s_ royal ensign, and they were desperate at this awful disaster to their flag.

“Better to die with the ‘old man,’” they thought.

“It’s good-by, James, my boy,” hoarsely whispered Cheever. “I’ve dragged you down with me.”

Through the boy’s head the hot blood jumped bearing the joy of the fight. He grasped his dirk the firmer. “We shall die for our country’s honor,” he cried.

Then the overpowering force of the boarding crew, led by Broke, closed in about the devoted remnant of the Americans. With brilliant personal courage the Captain led his men; and James rushed to meet him. Behind Cheever followed close, thrusting himself in front of the boy to shield him as best he might.

“Surrender!” cried Broke.

“Never!” cried Cheever, thrusting at him with his pike.

Captain Broke parried the blow with his sword and cut at his opponent, laying open his head. James, seeing that his uncle was blinded by the blood, rushed in to save him, but Cheever thrust the boy back of him and stood in front of him as a lioness might do to save her whelp.

The little group of Americans were resisting stubbornly the attack; a tall marine crashed his musket’s butt upon a burly seaman who had rushed to Broke’s side, and at the same moment Cheever cut down the British captain, and would have killed him had not another cutlass pierced the American’s breast. He fell heavily backwards, and as he did so a heavy stroke of a British cutlass felled James to the deck.

The assailing party fell back for an instant before the wild courage of the Americans, and then closed in upon them. The twelve men lay in each other’s blood on the spot where they had rallied. A couple of shots were fired up from below, and the British fired a volley or two down the hatchway. All resistance was then at an end and the colors of the _Chesapeake_ were struck.