On the Account. J. Allan Dunn
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Название: On the Account
Автор: J. Allan Dunn
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Документальная литература
isbn: 4064066436384
isbn:
“They vilify us, the scoundrels, when there is only this difference, they rob the poor under cover of law, forsooth, and we plunder the rich under the protection of our own courage. I am a free prince and I have as much authority to make war on the whole world as he who has a hundred ships at sea and an army of a hundred thousand men in the field.
“Shall I submit to be kicked about a deck at the pleasure of one who fancies himself my superior? Shall I, and you, free men all, give up our delights, the clunk of guineas and the clink of glasses, the kisses of women and our fellowhip, because, forsooth, Rogers says so?
“What if we leave the Swift Return behind us? I was a lad when first I ran away from the cursed merchantman to which they had bound me ’prentice. With six brave hearts we borrowed a canoe and stole away to the Grand Camanas, to go on the account. We took a turtling sloop and joined on other bullies until we gained an Irish brigantine. From that we took a Spanish trading stoop of six guns. From that, on the coast of Virginia, a New England brigantine bound for Barbados that yielded us a vessel of ten guns.
“Now there were eighty of us aboard. From the Bahamas to Guinea Coast and back we sailed, to Madagascar and the Arabian Gulf. We traded the brigantine for a galley of twenty-four guns and at the last we took a three-decker of Portugal, outbound from Brazil. Thirty-six guns she mounted but we took her, a hundred and eighty of us hearties, ripping off her upper deck, deep-waisting her by cutting down the gunwale and so made her the Swift Return. Shall we not start again in a sloop?
“I tell you, my bullies, that my star rises. Shall I screen it with the king’s parchment? Set me adrift with three logs, a palmetto sail and six good companions and within the year ye shall see me scattering gold in Puerto Rico and treading the deck of a ship that can fight and sail with any on the seas!
“Get out the pannikins and broach a keg of rum, boys. We have work before us.”
While the cabin-lads, dusky Bermudian natives, set out the liquor, Bane pressed home his arguments, made more potent by the effects of the strong, raw spirits.
“We will transfer into the sloop and be through the East Passage at daybreak and leaving these whining curs to await the governor’s pleasure. Follow me and I will undertake to shape a course that shall lead you to ease and plenty. Let the others lay down, they leave us the greater pickings. What is it, lads? The freedom of the seas—or will ye turn farmers?”
A red-headed ruffian, lacking one ear, cleft by a cutlass, roared out his answer as he drained his pannikin and passed it for more. The rest joined in his resolution.
“Aye, we’ll stand by you. A gold chain or a wooden leg!”
CHAPTER II
THROUGH THE EAST PASSAGE
IT WAS within an hour of daybreak when the crew of the Swift Return sweating with their labor and the liquor freely served to them, had transferred themselves to the little sloop of fifty tons, carrying with them the possessions they most valued, and stores, with all the ammunition they could stow aboard.
The guns of the Swift Return were charged with double, round and partridge and the vessel set afire. The sloop dropped slowly down towards the East Passage, the crooked, shallow channel of which could not be attempted before dawn.
The broader harbor mouth was still blocked by the fleet though there was now sufficient water for the deepest-drafted ship to cross and it was Bane’s hope that the vice-admiral would send in some ships or boats to investigate the blaze.
“If luck holds she will burn down to them,” he said, “and scatter a few of them to hell. Since we can not use her, we’ll sink her.”
Faint shouts came from Nassau where the thousand pirates were celebrating the advent of the king’s pardon. The low-lying island of Providence was a blur against the skyline. A faint breeze wafted the sloop closer to the tortuous passage that formed the backdoor of the harbor, through which Bane meant to achieve his freedom.
He had ordered lights out and silence, for fear they might be boarded, and the crew sprawled on the over-crowded decks talking in whispers, fired with excitement and Jamaica rum. Bane stood near the tiller, gazing back at the flaming Swift Return.
A cutter put out from the Rose man-of-war and was rowed swiftly toward the land with instructions to investigate the cause of the red glow that pulsed behind the head-land fringed with palmetto that hid the Swift Return from the view of the fleet. The fire had reached the gun-deck and the starboard and larboard batteries were scattering shot across an area brilliantly illumined by the blaze.
Bane swore through his beard at the failure of his plan. Then he saw the cutter come into the radiance, pause and swerve widely about the Swift Return in a course that would bring them close to the sloop.
He gave a swift order and two boats bristling with men were soon in the water, making with swift, choppy, noiseless oar-strokes toward the cutter.
“We need a messenger,” said Bane, with a chuckle. “We’ll take the king’s officer and send him back to the fleet after we clear the passage.”
The cutter, making for the shore, was intercepted by the two boats that swept up, one on either side, from the darkness. The odds were fifty to ten. The lieutenant, seeing the gunwales gripped by twenty pairs of hands while a voice to right and left hoarsely demanded his surrender, disgustedly gave the word and the freebooters returned aboard triumphantly as the sky began to gray and showed the sullen rollers slapping on the sand spits and coral bars that guarded the passage.
The breeze strengthened and the sloop, close-hauled, nosed her way through the winding channel. The sun rolled up, leaping clear from the rim of the sea and showing the fleet driving under half-sail across the bar into the harbor, nearly a mile away,
“Up with the Roger and fire a gun,” shouted Bane. A black flag slipped up to the masthead and broke out its sable defiance as a twelve-pounder roared, scaring the breakfast-hunting birds. The cutter trailed at the stern.
“Into her and back to the fleet with you,” said the buccaneer to the sulky lieutenant. “Tell your commander and Rogers, the king’s jackal, that Bane and his lads are away. If they want to test the speed of our heels or the gage of our guns, let them come after us. It is a fair wind for a race and clear weather for sighting. Cast off there, or we’ll cut you loose!”
The king’s men were in their craft, dragged with lifting stem behind the sloop.
“Give us our oars,” called the lieutenant.
“Scramble for them and be —— to ye,” cried Bane.
A cutlas-stroke severed the line as the oars were tossed into the sea and the pirates swarmed to the rail, mocking the crew of the cutter as they recovered, one at a time, their means of progress and, at last, setting a quick stroke, rowed back for the passage.
“Now lads, it’s ho, for Hispaniola!” cried Bane. “It will be an hour before those lubbers get after us. With the wind abeam and the good start we can laugh at them. It will not be long before we’ll take a better ship and then we’ll carry out what has СКАЧАТЬ