Part 11

But, we gained three weeks’ respite by reason of this last bit of parsimony. The men worked fairly, after a fit of insubordination which brought six of them to the whipping-post the very day after Dawkins left. The agent stood by with a pistol in each hand and had three dozen well laid on, and there was but little trouble with them after that salutary example.

The Indians of those parts, a brown and peaceable folk, came out of the woods and trafficked fresh meat, hog’s flesh and turtle, yams and green stuff, for knives and beads and such toys. They made an encampment near by, and with their huts of branches and palm-leaves and our tents of sailcloth, and the camp-fires burning night and day, we made quite a settled little colony by the still waters of the great lagoon. As for Brandon Pomfrett, he followed Morgan Leroux like her shadow, greedily snatching a certain feverish pleasure in her society, though it is likely that the suspense in which we lived--except when we forgot all in the present, which happened oftener than you might suppose--infused a deal of discomfort into those tantalising relations. Soon or late, the inevitable Dawkins would come merrily back to us, with all his crew; ever the shadow of Murch menaced us from afar; there was the mysterious visitation at night of the strange boat, with its answering challenge, “_Dead or alive_,” still unexplained; and, looming ahead of us, the problem of the return voyage, sure to be long, hazardous, difficult, and very likely fatal. True, there was one solution, one way of escape, that Morgan Leroux urged us to follow--to set sail there and then in the _Blessed Endeavour_, with the crew we had, for the nearest port in English possession, fill up the complement, and away to England. But Pomfrett would not have it. He was bound, he said, to respect his compact with Dawkins.

“And do you suppose,” said Morgan, “that he won’t break faith with you, as soon as he gets a chance? I thought you had more sense.”

But the agent was firm. “Very well,” said Morgan, “you must even stay and be damned, if you’re so squeamish. But it’s hard on me, I’m bound to say, it’s hard on me. I never swore a silly oath to a treacherous old dog that couldn’t keep his word if he tried.”

“And what, in God’s name, does it matter _who_ you swore to, if you did swear,” cried the wretched Pomfrett. And then they began to wrangle, and I left them to settle it between themselves. Be warned, ye bachelors, by this example; and when you ride with fortune, do not take a lady on the crupper. I think it likely that, if Morgan had persisted in her expostulations, Brandon would have yielded at last. Had she made a direct issue of the matter, and challenged him to choose between herself and Dawkins, between Morgan Leroux and his plighted word, I am sure he would have whistled his pledges down the wind and taken the lady; and I, for one, would not blame him. But Morgan never went so far; it was a temptation that must have allured her constantly, yet she never yielded. She had a good heart, this Morgan, as I always said. So we stayed, and in good time we were damned, even as Morgan had prophesied.

Dawkins and his party had been absent for three weeks; the _Blessed Endeavour_, all sound and seaworthy once more, had been warped off at high water, and lay out in the lagoon, moored fore and aft; and we were hoisting her heavy cargo in against Dawkins’s return, which we were hourly expecting. There was no watch kept; we were all extremely busy; and so, when there came the sudden boom of a heavy gun, fired somewhere close at hand, the echoes ringing from rock to rock, we were properly alarmed.

There, lying off the lagoon, was a great ship, the sun shining on her tower of canvas, turning her to a full-sailed ship of pearl. As we looked, the little black ball of a flag ran up the main halliards, broke free, and flew broad and black at the mast-head, flaunting its white device of the figure of death. It was the _Wheel of Fortune_. Murch had come at last.

XIV

CAPTAIN MURCH TAKES COMMAND

Those of Mr Murch’s men who were of our party set up a cheer for the _Wheel of Fortune_, but we ourselves were far from any such demonstration. Mr Murch was a dangerous enigma; we lay at his mercy; there was not a gunner left aboard, and there was no question of resistance. But pirates never fight for fun, and we did not anticipate bloodshed. We ran up English colours in response to their salute, and we saw them lowering a boat, which glided towards us across the intolerable glitter of the water, silent, save for the splash of oars, with Murch’s great figure sitting immobile in the stern-sheets. Morgan Leroux clasped Pomfrett’s arm. It was the first sign of dependence I had remarked in that courageous lady. The boatswain piped all hands to the side as she drew near, and Murch stepped aboard between the files of saluting men, as stately as an admiral. He greeted us with his customary solemn courtesy; his large and solemn countenance, netted all over with fine lines, betrayed no more emotion than a bronze mask; and, though he must have known of Morgan’s escape in _La Modeste_, yet, for all we knew to the contrary, he had supposed that the agent and his clerk were still ranging the woods by Porto-Bello. And here we were, a little family party on the quarterdeck of the _Blessed Endeavour;_ and I leave you to imagine which of us felt the less at ease on that occasion.

“I am glad, Mr Pomfrett, to perceive you have found your ship again,” said Mr Murch, politely.

“I think,” retorted Pomfrett, “I can scarce thank you for carrying out that part of your agreement, Mr Murch.”

“You think not?” says Murch. “Well, well, I would not be too hasty, neither, sir. Youth is prone to be hasty. But we’ll talk of that, too, among other matters. I’ll have no knots in the cable--all shall be clear before we’ve done, Mr Pomfrett, be sure of that.”

I own that, for my part, my heart sank to hear the old spider closing upon us once more with his web of fine speeches, that seemed, as I fancied, to answer in some mysterious way to the net-work of hieroglyphics on his sombre countenance. We went down, then, to finish our talk in the privacy of the great cabin, which Mr Dawkins had left in a wretched disorder: books, charts, and instruments tossed pell-mell on the lockers, empty bottles rolling on the floor, and a heavy reek of tobacco.

“Mr Dawkins keeps a dirty ship, it seems,” quoth Murch. “But you and I will soon alter that, Mr Pomfrett.”

The owners’ agent fixed his blue eyes on the speaker. His glance had lost its look of mild and innocent enquiry of late; it was hard, even menacing, the eyelids drawn obliquely at their outer corners. Mr Pomfrett was beginning to know his own mind, you see.

“I stop not to enquire how you came hither,” continued Murch, returning look for look. “I make it a rule to deal with a situation as I find it; and I may tell you, we have no time at present to be swapping stories of adventure. They will serve for our amusement when we are fairly on the high seas, with Mr Dawkins hull-down on the lee. It’s with Dawkins we are first concerned, Mr Pomfrett--dead or alive, you know, dead or alive,” says Murch, with a peculiar intonation.

“Then it was your boat paid us a visit by night, under Cape Gracias?” said Pomfrett.

“Did you take us for ghosts, sir? Well, I may tell you, I have a singular belief that the grave would not hold me--no, nor the deep sea--had I a duty left undone. I have the highest opinion of your integrity, Mr Pomfrett; as a guardian of youth, your qualifications are, I doubt not, superior to my own; but even that belief cannot absolve me from my trust to a dead friend; nor can a similar confidence pretermit the obligations of my ward.”

He glanced sternly at Morgan Leroux, who was seated in her usual attitude, chin on hand, regarding him composedly, though she had gone, I thought, a little pale.

“But I accuse no one of such ingratitude,” Murch went on, “for, had you desired to escape me indeed, you would surely not have left two or three plundered ships to mark your way, broad as sign-posts, when it were so easy to scuttle them. No, no. I prefer to believe that you did but anticipate my plans a little, and to save time, the while I was engaged in Porto-Bello, you went to find Mr Dawkins for me. I thank you. You have found him. And so have I--in Cartagena. Of course, all the inhabitants had taken to the woods, with their possessions; it is singular how a man of Dawkins’s experience will never learn to close the earths before he bolts the prey; but there it is, and I was able to save him the trouble of collecting their dues from them. I have a bag or two of diamonds aboard the _Wheel of Fortune_, Mr Pomfrett, as to which I should like your opinion.”

He paused, thrusting his lower jaw a little forward, so that the semicircular wrinkles curving from nostril to chin deepened; his narrow eyes roved from face to face with a sort of stealthy derision, highly disagreeable to his audience. The old beast of prey had tracked us leisurely across the trackless sea, kept his ship out of sight while we lay under Cape Gracias à Dios, where he spied upon us with boats, and waited until we had settled with Dawkins for peace or war, as we were bound to settle soon or late. Had we fought with Dawkins, both sides would have been weakened, to Mr Murch’s advantage; but, as we concluded a treaty together, Mr Murch bided his time a little longer, until we were separated from Dawkins. Then, having us safely on the beach, Murch followed Dawkins up the River Coco and swept up the plunder of Cartagena while Dawkins did the fighting. Evidently, it were better to have Murch on our side than against us.

“Is Dawkins returning?” Pomfrett asked, curtly.

“I reckon Mr Dawkins is on the road,” answered Murch. “That is, unless the Spaniards have cut off his retreat, which they might have done, for Dawkins mislaid his boats. It was a pity they should be lost, so I even brought them down-stream myself; you can’t have too many boats, as a general rule.”

Pomfrett considered this intelligence; then he turned sharply upon Murch.

“Come, Mr Murch,” says he, “let us be clear, and no misunderstanding at all, as you might say yourself. You took Dawkins’s boats, you say. Was there any fighting?”

“I’m always charmed to answer questions when they bear to the point,” says Murch. “If you mean, was there any collision betwixt Dawkins and myself, I may tell you that the two parties never saw each other, with the exception of a trifling few men Mr Dawkins left to guard the boats.”

“Then I may take it that Dawkins, having captured the town and driven the inhabitants into the woods”--Pomfrett was conscientiously mastering the situation, as usual--“you robbed them and then came away in Dawkins’s boats, leaving him----”

“To pad the hoof, sir, like the old cut-purse he is,” Murch concluded, with a grave nod. “Now, are you satisfied, Mr Pomfrett? Very well. Then I have a proposal to make to you two gentlemen, to which I beg your serious attention.”

He leaned forward, rapping the table once or twice with the knuckles of his clenched fist, and glowering upon us like a thunderstorm.

“You and me have got to square accounts, Mr Pomfrett,” says he. “Now, I’m not a man that wastes two words where one will serve, and so I’ll ask but this question: Are you prepared to take my ward here, Morgan Leroux, in lawful and honourable marriage? Yes or no?”

“Yes.” Pomfrett answered prompt as an echo.

Mr Murch, his arm outstretched, the great corded hand resting on the table, stared at Pomfrett, quiet as a man of stone, for perhaps five seconds. Then, without moving any other part of him, he turned his eyes on Morgan Leroux.

“And what do you say, wench?”

Morgan’s wide black eyes blinked swiftly once or twice. “Yes,” said she, and closed her mouth and sat composedly watching, as before.

Murch’s whole figure relaxed, and he slowly drew himself upright. Then he nodded again, two or three times, very solemnly.

“I notice, Mr Pomfrett,” said he, “that you have not, at present, made any reference to myself in this matter.”

“Do you wonder at that, Mr Murch?” said Brandon.

“Ah,” said Mr Murch. “Hasty, hasty--hot and hasty, Mr Pomfrett, never got to church. If I am willing to forget the past, sir, surely you should be. I would have marooned you for reasons of my own, which figure well enough in the account betwixt my Maker and myself, let me tell you. But you have stolen away my ward, Mr Pomfrett--you took advantage of the ignorance and credulity of an innocent girl, unused to the world’s ways.”

“Let it go at that, uncle,” Morgan put in. “You’ll not better it. Cry quits, now.”

Murch was just a hair taken aback. “Here’s too much talk altogether,” he cried roughly. “Come. Yea or nay, and be done. Will you sail to-night for England, Mr Pomfrett?”

“With you?”

“Under me,” Mr Murch corrected him.

Pomfrett glanced at Morgan Leroux. There was no mistaking the look in her eyes.

“See, now, how simple stands the matter,” Murch went on, with his weighty deliberation. “We sail in this ship, this very _Blessed Endeavour_, that has cost us so much endeavour, blessed or not; transfer the cargo from the _Wheel of Fortune_, take her to Barbadoes, and sell her there; the Governor will be glad to have her back again, for I may tell you, Mr Pomfrett, to show how fenced by the law is an enterprise, that his Excellency hath a share in the adventure. We will take your little bark as a tender, and sell her or not, as we find convenient. After Barbadoes, we cut sail for England, sir.”

Pomfrett sat silent, with his eyes on the floor. Morgan was steadfastly regarding him, with a distressed, appealing look that I could never have withstood for a moment, myself.

“Perhaps you think it strange in me to propose this arrangement,” continued Murch. “But if you will so consider the matter, ’tis entirely natural. My motive is pure self-interest--the mainspring of man’s actions here below. There is no other worth mentioning that influences any one; therefore, why deny it? I want to see my ward settled in marriage; the single estate is dangerous for females. I want to settle myself, in a manner which shall enable me to move in the society of my equals--a society,” says Murch, with dignity, “from which I have been too long estranged. I see in you, Mr Pomfrett, a respectable gentleman who shall serve me to both these ends. I need not, I think, say more.”

Still the owners’ agent sat silent, frowning at the floor. He was inly writhing on the horns of a most savage dilemma. All he valued in life drew him to close with Murch. On the one hand, he could see his owners satisfied and himself married and wealthy, all his troubles done. And on the other, only poor old Dawkins and a famine-stricken crew struggling down the river-banks, through the forest, with nothing in the world to hope for save the agent’s word of honour--the good faith of the supercargo with whom Mr Dawkins had dealt so crookedly. And why should a man keep faith with that treacherous old person, Dawkins? Perhaps in this painful crisis Mr Pomfrett recalled his own proud words: “What does it matter whom you swore to, if you did swear?” And, again, what use to Dawkins in refusing to take advantage of Murch’s offer. Murch, with his men and guns, had us all in the hollow of his hand. Still, the fact remained, that Mr Dawkins was rightful captain of the _Blessed Endeavour_, ostensibly commanding her for the owners; and for the owners’ agent to acquiesce in Murch’s suggestion were nothing less than to make terms with a thief and a robber. In some such guise must the problem have framed itself in the agent’s mind while he sat with his face averted from Morgan’s burning eyes. He broke silence at last, raising his head and turning to Murch, without looking towards Morgan.

“It seems to me, Mr Murch, I’ve no more choice in the matter than any skipper of an unarmed merchant ship you choose to lay aboard.”

“Why, there’s always the beach, Mr Pomfrett,” Murch returned. “I shall be glad to have you with me, sir, but God knows I’ll force my kindness on no man living, and there you have it, once for all. Now, I would not hurry you, sir, but time presses. Which is it to be?”

“I’ll sail under you, Mr Murch,” said Pomfrett, and the face of Morgan Leroux lightened like a breaking sky. Murch never altered a line of his countenance--that great dark face, which began to oppress me, like some monstrous visage seen in a dream.

“And really, Mr Pomfrett, I think you are well advised,” said Murch; and for my part, I agreed with the old buccaneer. I did not guess, as you will see, the extent of the supercargo’s mental reservations.

And that evening, before sunset, three ships sailed from Caratasca Cays. Mr Murch and his ward sailed in his ship, the _Wheel of Fortune_, Murch’s first mate had charge of ours, the _Blessed Endeavour_, while the owners’ agent, all forsworn, and his accomplice, Harry Winter, had command of his _Modesty_ ship, with her original crew. But, before these arrangements were complete, I have a little episode to relate, of a nature so tender that it demands a chapter to itself.

XV

WHICH CONTAINS THE ONLY OSTENSIBLE LOVE-SCENE IN THE BOOK

The conversation of lovers, as related by poet and romancer, is apt to raise a serious doubt in the mind of the reader. For, it is the very nature and rule of such intercourse that it be not carried on in presence of a witness, and that nothing concerning it be divulged by the parties themselves. How, then, did the chronicler gain the information he is so incontinent to impart, if not by hearing and observation? He might, indeed, write of his own experience, disguisedly; but, he should be ashamed to do that, and we can place little faith in the records of a gentleman so unscrupulous. He may, of course, paint from imagination, but, obviously, in that case, we are as far from the truth as ever. So difficult is this problem that some have even averred that the passion of love, as depicted by the said poet and romancer, is nothing but an invention of the ingenious artist--an unsubstantial paradise created by them for their pleasure. The mark of the true lover, say the precisians, is a contented silence. For my own part, I would not be taken to possess an opinion on the subject. But I have to record what did actually fall under my own observation; and if it be a rare distinction to have listened to a pair of lovers conversing, that distinction is mine. I did not seek the occasion; I could not avoid it; it came to me.

When the conversation related in the last chapter was ended, Mr Murch left the cabin and went on deck. We could hear his great voice booming out a string of peremptory orders. Now, you must understand that the declining sun, shooting a brilliant beam through the porthole, divided the cabin into dusky halves, so that, from where I sat humbly in the background, Pomfrett’s face, seen through the shaft of misty radiance, appeared as though floating bodiless in the brown shadow. He was staring at Morgan Leroux with a most tragical expression. Of the lady I could see no more than a shadowy apparition. So they sat, silent, for a long minute. Then Morgan spoke.

“Well, are you happy now?” she said. It was a new voice; the masculine tone had given place to an accent of such a caressing endearment that I behooved to remind them of the presence of a third party. But neither took any heed.

Pomfrett made no reply, gazing upon the lady with a look of such despair you would think he was under sentence of hanging, instead of promotion to matrimony. Then Morgan arose and came to him, and it was a woman, and no wild hoyden playing the gallant, who kneeled down beside him.

“Well, are you happy now?” she said, again.

Still Pomfrett answered nothing, nor did he lift his hand to touch the pretty head that was bowed upon his knee, but the muscles of his cheek twitched a little, and his mouth set hard. Poor owners’ agent! he was sore beset.

“Why don’t you speak to me?” said Morgan, lifting a face all melted and broken, as the thin ice on still water breaks and melts in the winter sun.

“My dear, my dear,” said Pomfrett, “I don’t know what to say.” He stopped.

“Say nothing, then,” quoth Morgan, contentedly.

“Ah, but I must,” groaned Pomfrett. “I must keep faith with my owners, and I must keep faith with you, and how to do both?”

“We’ll find a way, somehow,” Morgan answered, soothing him as though he were a child.

“But will you trust me, whatever I do--whatever I have to do?” he cried.

“That means you are going to do something foolish,” said Morgan. “What are you planning, my dear?”

“Ay, but will you?” said he, with what seemed to the listener a superfluous anxiety.

“You are but a foolish boy,” Morgan answered, and reached forth her hands to draw down his stubborn head. I rose and stole from the cabin.

And a little later, as I have said, the three ships stood out from Caratasca, and those lovers were parted. Murch would have his ward aboard with him, and very right. We found the _Modesty_ ship but a dismal craft without the gentleman-adventurer. But the two had had their time, the time and chance that come to all, they say; and never again were we three shipmates to sail in company.

XVI

MR DAWKINS GIVES US A LITTLE SURPRISE

Now, from Caratasca Cays to the island of Barbadoes is near eight hundred sea-miles; say a week’s voyage with a fair wind; and in about that time we entered the muddy water that for several leagues surrounds the island of Barbadoes. That evening Admiral Murch signalled to us to lay-to, since he would not make the harbour in the dark. Night came at a stride, and ere the other two ships had their riding-lights displayed Pomfrett had set sail, had gone about, and the _Modesty_ ship was heading back again for Caratasca.