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The Fatal Cord, and The Falcon Rover

Mr Afton loudly pronounced his maledictions against such “half-way” courses; and there were at first some dark scowls seen among the men.

“I welcome you into our gallant service, Captain Coe,” said Captain Marston, with much cordiality in his manner, “and am sure that no one member could be a greater addition to our company. As to the terms which Captain Coe makes,” continued the pirate chief, addressing the men, “no one can object to them; any man has the right to resign at any time any office which he holds among us. The main thing is that Captain Coe is now a member of our band, and we all know how forcibly, in an instance of this kind, applies the old adage, ‘In for a penny, in for a pound!’ Shipmates welcome our new comrade.”

These remarks of Captain Marston, intended to counteract what had been said by Afton, and to satisfy the crew with regard to the reservation made by Coe, were well-timed, and their new comrade was welcomed with loud cheers.

The company of marines was at once formed, and “Captain” Coe, as they called him, immediately commenced the performance of his new office, by taking his men through such a preparatory drill as the short remaining time of daylight would allow. It was his determination to make himself as popular as he could among those who were placed under his command, with the view of using his influence for such good purposes as might hereafter present themselves. He was eminently successful in his endeavours to obtain popularity, his men already entertaining great admiration of his courage and resolute demeanour.

The Sea-bird continued for some days to run a southerly course, impelled by a moderate breeze from the west. Her prow was then turned towards the south-east, it being the intention of Captain Marston to get into the track of vessels trading between the West Indies and the Spanish Main, and the different European ports. While on this course certain changes were made in the appearance of the brig. The white stripe along her bends, just below the guards, was covered with a strip of black canvas; like strips, on which were painted the words the Falcon, were placed on each of her bows, and on her stern, over the name the Sea-bird, and the carved image of one bird was substituted for that of another as her figure-head. Other alterations were made in her rigging and elsewhere, so that the vessel’s appearance was almost entirely changed.

Story 2-Chapter X.
The Chase

 
The western breeze is fresh and free;
Before its power the vessels fleet,
And, bounding o’er the flashing waves,
Like lovers haste to meet.
 

Isobel – A Ballad.

 
And sweep through the deep,
While the stormy tempests blow;
While the battle rages loud and long,
And the stormy tempests blow.
 

Mariners of England.

 
By each gun a lighted brand,
In a bold, determined hand.
 

Battle of the Baltic.

Day after day the wind continued to blow mildly from the west, and the brig still made regular but slow progress before it, on her south-eastwardly course.

One morning, before sunrise, a strange sail was espied upon the larboard bow. It was during Mr Afton’s watch that this discovery was made. The second-lieutenant pronounced the stranger to be a merchant ship. This fact, with the opinion of the officer of the watch, being communicated to the commander of the brig, who was still in his hammock, and whom we must now call Captain Vance, orders were given by him to crowd all sail on the Falcon, and to pursue the stranger ship.

Hour after hour passed away, and still the pirate vessel continued to gain on the chase, which had in the meanwhile been discovered to be a large and heavily-laden ship.

Mile after mile the brig gained while the wind lasted; but towards two o’clock the light breeze, which had been blowing from the same point so many days, began to die away, and by noon there was an absolute calm. The brig was at this time still many miles distant from the ship. For more than an hour each vessel remained, except as affected by that unceasing swell (in this instance scarcely perceptible) which never allows the water to be perfectly tranquil, as motionless as —

 
“A painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.”
 

Between one and two o’clock, clouds, in masses at first comparatively light, but which grew dense and denser, began to move overhead from the east towards the west; these were evidently impelled by a wind travelling in the same direction, and light flaws of which occasionally made faint shadows over the ocean by slightly stirring its waters, and sometimes gave a soft pulsation to the sails of the two vessels.

Shortly after two o’clock, lightning flashes gleamed in rather quick succession, from below the eastern horizon; but no thunder was heard. At length a small portion of densely black cloud showed itself in the same direction, above the line dividing the ocean and sky. This cloud rapidly rose, spreading itself as it ascended, while flashes of lightning, followed, after fast-diminishing intervals, by grand and grander thunder-burst, flamed forth more and more frequently, from the dark and threatening mass of vapour.

Soon blasts of wind, heavily laden with moisture, and each more powerful than that which preceded it, came with rapidly decreasing lulls, from the west, until the breeze, having at length become continuous, had grown almost to a storm. Both vessels had prepared for this increased force of the wind by shortening sail. The chase, however, urged by the necessity of escaping as well from the brig which pursued her as from the storm, still carried all the canvas which she could bear under the heavy pressure of the wind, almost directly before which both vessels were now steering an east-north-east course. Still the brig, built after the Baltimore clipper model, so famed for fleetness, continued to gain rapidly upon the ship.

“Suppose, captain,” said Afton, addressing Marston, “we range the ‘Long Tom’ to bear upon her, and give her a shot?”

“There is no chance of hitting her,” answered the captain, “with the brig beginning to pitch in the way she is now; it will be but waste of powder. Besides, the distance is too great.”

“If we wait,” objected the second-lieutenant (so-called), “until we get within range of her two cannon, she will have the advantage of us in the number of her guns. If we fire at her from a distance, on the contrary, her cannon will be of no use to her.”

The intelligent reader, of course, already understands that the ship pursued was the Duchess, which, with her passengers and captain, was introduced to his attention in a previous chapter.

“In the present condition of the weather,” replied the captain to the objections of his second officer, “we shall have to lose the advantage of the longer range of our gun, or lose our hoped-for prize. At the rate at which we are now gaining on her, it will be nearly sunset when we overtake her. The sky is already darkened by clouds, and if the rain – which is threatening to fall every moment – should continue into the night, we may lose sight of her altogether, and she may make her escape in the darkness. If she offers to resist, therefore, we shall have to fight at close quarters.”

“I hope that she may be worth the trouble she is likely to give us,” muttered Afton, with his usual maledictions.

“And I hope, Afton,” retorted the captain, with a jesting smile, “that you have no intention of getting nervous about the matter?”

“A pretty time of day,” rejoined Afton, “for anybody to be doubting my courage. You know well enough that I was only wishing that we should make a good haul in capturing her.”

“We cannot tell what she is worth,” said the captain, “until we get on board of her. This we know – that she is a large ship, and appears to be well laden. Others might give up the hope of capturing her on account of the state of the weather; I never give up what I undertake.”

“It is very evident,” said Lieutenant Seacome, “from the manner in which she is handled, that the man who has charge of her is a thorough seaman.”

“Yes,” assented the captain. “And there is something about the man’s movements, as I note him through the telescope, which convinces me that he will make a fight of it before he yields. Captain Coe, you must see to it that your men are ready with all their side-arms. They evidently have men enough to manage both their cannon; and they will, therefore, have the advantage of us, unless we board them, or lay so closely alongside of them that our small-arms will tell. I am determined to board, however, if it be possible to do so in such a sea.”

“My men are prepared to act at a minute’s notice,” said the captain of Marines.

Young Coe had made much progress in the last few days in perfecting his men in their drill. He had already gained their confidence in his capacity for command, his courage and skill, and his possession of all his faculties in moments of danger. Notwithstanding the language in which he had so promptly answered Captain Vance’s (as we must call him now) inquiry, he entertained not the slightest intention of taking any part in the commission of crime; he was determined, on the contrary, to use his influence with his men to prevent it. For the manner in which he should carry out this latter determination he was compelled to trust to contingencies.

On board the pirate-brig every preparation was made for a conflict. In the meantime the hours advanced, and at length the two vessels were within short cannon range of each other. It still wanted more than an hour to sunset, and notwithstanding the dense clouds which still covered the sky (the rain which had fallen heavily for a while had soon ceased) the daylight was still clear enough to distinguish objects on board of one ship from the other, whenever the upheaving and subsidence of the waves allowed the deck of the lower to be seen from that of the higher.

As the brig overhauled the chase, Captain Vance directed his helmsman to steer to the larboard of the chase, on a line as near as it was safe to approach her; by this course he would not only take the weather-guage of the ship, but would also make his position more convenient to “speak” her.

“Mr Bowsprit,” said the captain to the officer who had charge of the cannon, “fire a shot across her bows. That is the best way to open the conversation.”

The shot was immediately fired; and the reverberation was deafening, in the damp, heavy atmosphere.

The vessels were now not more than a hundred yards apart; so near were they to each other, that the shadow of the brig – the outlines of which were defined clearly by the light which came from the western sky, where the clouds were somewhat broken – fell almost aboard the ship.

The shot brought immediately a hail from the deck of the Duchess.

“Brig ahoy!” came through a speaking trumpet in stentorian tones from Captain Johnson.

“Ay, ay,” was the answer.

“Who are you, and what do you want?” was the retort from the deck of the ship.

“The Falcon, free rover,” replied Captain Vance, “and we want you to surrender.”

“We will never surrender to pirates,” answered Captain Johnson.

“If you surrender without resistance, we will spare the lives of all on board,” said the captain of the Falcon.

“I would rather sink the ship,” replied the captain of the Duchess.

“Woe be to you then,” exclaimed Captain Vance. “Your blood and that of those under your control be upon your own head.”

All this conversation between the vessels had been carried on through speaking-trumpets.

“Mr Seacome,” said Captain Vance to his first lieutenant, “display the flag.”

The pirate flag of those days, having a black ground with white skull and cross-bones displayed upon it, was immediately run up to the main mast-head of the brig.

The gale still continued to blow with great force, and the waves were running higher and higher. Though I have said that the vessels were about a hundred yards apart, it is not to be supposed that there was any regularity in the distance between them. Now one vessel would be far below, then far above the other, as she sank into the trough of a sea, or rose upon the crest of a wave. Now the surging waters would drive them farther apart, and now closer together. Meanwhile, near and far over the sea, the fiercely-labouring winds and billows loudly roared in wild unison their stern and complaining songs.

“Had we not better, captain,” asked Seacome, “keep as near as we can to the ship until this gale has fallen, and then make the assault? We could scarcely board in such a wind as this, even should she surrender.”

John Coe wished sincerely that this proposition should be adopted. Only in case of boarding the ship could he hope to carry out his plans; and it did not seem to him possible that boarding could be done in such a state of the weather. Should muskets be used, while the vessels were thus running side by side, his men – acting under his orders too – would, like the rest of the pirate-brig’s crew, do all the damage they could to those on board the ship; and he would have no means of preventing them.

“It is not the wind that is in our way,” answered Captain Vance to Mr Seacome, “so much as the waves; and seas will run higher and higher while this gale continues. Our best chance is now. Mr Bowsprit,” he exclaimed, turning to that officer, “have you reloaded your gun?”

“Ay, ay, sir,” was the answer.

“Then fire into them,” said the captain, “and do them all the damage you can.”

The Long Tom again pealed a savage note. But the only damage done to the Duchess was a small hole made through one of her sails.

The shot was immediately returned; it was fired by Captain Johnson’s own hand. The ball passed through the guards and swept across the deck of the Falcon, killing one man, and wounding two more by the splinters which it tore from the timbers through which it had forced its way. The loud peal of the cannon had not died away, when another shot from the Duchess came almost upon its track, again killing one and wounding two more.

“This will never do, Mr Bowsprit,” said Captain Vance. “Is your gun loaded again?”

“Yes, sir,” was the reply.

“Let me manage her this time,” said the captain.

His shot was well aimed; it struck the guards of the Duchess, scattering the splinters far and wide.

“I’ll guarantee that did them some damage,” remarked Captain Vance.

Scarcely had he spoken, when two cannon-shots came in quick succession from the Duchess. The one struck the deck of the Falcon, tearing up the splinters; the other again struck the guards, scattering fragments of timber. One sailor was killed directly beside Captain Vance; three others were slightly wounded.

“Furies!” exclaimed the pirate chief, “that fellow knows his business. But this will never do. Give them a volley of musketry.”

The loud roar of the Long Tom, and the rattling peal of the muskets immediately blended into one tremendous sound. That sound was instantly echoed from on board the ship; two cannon-shots and a dozen musket-loads again poured devastation upon the deck of the brig.

“We must come to close quarters,” exclaimed the pirate chief; “we are fast losing the advantage of superior numbers. The terrible skill of that devil with his cannon is destroying our superiority in that respect. Give me a loaded musket.”

He waited until a partial lifting of the smoke-cloud gave him a glimpse of the stout, manly figure of Captain Johnson, then, in an instant, taking aim, he fired. The ceaseless motion of the vessels destroyed the effect of his aim; and the man who was fired at escaped unharmed.

“Pistols and cutlasses!” exclaimed Vance, much excited. “Prepare to board. Forward with your men, Captain Coe. Helmsman, put us alongside of that vessel at once.”

“That’s the way to talk,” said Afton. “We’ll give the whelps no mercy now.”

“We may sink both vessels by collision,” said Seacome, “in such a sea as this.”

“Then let them sink,” cried the pirate chief, all of whose evil passions were now aroused. “Lay us aboard quickly, helmsman.”

The helmsman did his work skilfully; the starboard-bow of the brig was brought to bear gradually towards the larboard bow of the ship; and the two vessels approached each other in such a manner that their sides when they touched formed, at the point of contact, a very acute angle. The guards of the ship were above those of the brig; yet grappling-irons were cast from the latter and the vessels were made fast together. But the independent rolling and pitching of each of them, which caused them sometimes to “yaw” asunder, sometimes to come together with a crash that sounded like thunder, made the passage from one to the other very dangerous.

Story 2-Chapter XI.
The Boarding Attack

Together they came with a crashing and rending,

While the sounds of the battle and tempest were blending.

The Lost Ship.

We will be true to you, most noble sir.

Avator.

Oh, spare my daughter! Take my wealth – I care not;

But spare my daughter.

Old Play.

Villain, forbear!

Throw down your arms – surrender.

The Assault.

The last fire from the Falcon had made sad havoc among the crew of the merchant vessel; two men were killed and three badly wounded by it. Hence it was that, when the pirates were thronging the brig’s side, preparing to spring on board the ship, Captain Johnson had but nine men to aid him in resisting the assault, the tenth being at the wheel. The odds were fearfully against him, being more than three to one; the pirate chief, leaving ten men to take care of the brig, had still thirty-one men, besides those who had been placed hors de combat, with whom to board the ship.

While John Coe was standing by the starboard guards of the brig, prepared to spring on board of the ship, with every nerve wrought up to its highest tension, he ejaculated prayers to the Almighty to guard him from sin and guide him to goodness in this terrible crisis of his fate. Just as the vessels were coming together, he felt his arm touched, and turning, saw Ada by his side.

“For heaven’s sake, madam,” he said, in low but earnest tones, “what are you doing here? Do go into the cabin and seek out its safest corner. You are almost certain to lose your life here. This is no place for a helpless woman.”

“How can I stay there,” she said, “while these horrible scenes are taking place? I am inured to danger, and put no value on my life. Besides, I feel impelled by a power within me, and which I cannot resist, to take part in the scenes about to occur on board of that ship. I put myself by your side, both because my husband would drive me away from his, and because, of all who are about to board that vessel, you alone have no evil in your heart, but are seeking to prevent it; and I wish to aid you in that good work. See! I also am armed.”

She showed a cutlass in her hand, and pointed to two double-barrelled pistols in a belt round her waist.

“Keep closely by my side, then,” said John, seeing her determination. “I will do all that I can to protect you.”

“Thank you,” she replied.

John turned towards his other side; there, near to him, stood Billy Bowsprit.

“Bowsprit,” he said, in a low voice, “keep near to me; and do not forget your pledge to give all the aid in your power to prevent, to such extent as we can, the shedding of innocent blood.”

“Mr Coe,” answered Billy, earnestly and emphatically, yet in a whisper, “I am with you, heart and hand, I am yours in life and death.”

“And see, too,” said Coe, in the same low tones, “that the five men of my band, who are with us, keep near to us, and that you and they follow me wherever I go.”

“They are here, sir,” whispered Billy, “just behind you and me. Every man of them can be relied on; they are all devoted to you.”

“And you and they,” replied John, still in the same undertones, “may depend upon my fulfilling my promise, should I escape with life and freedom from the perils of this night.”

Thus the thirty men of the Falcon’s crew detailed for the boarding-party, stood by the guards of the brig upon that side of her towards the ship, waiting for the moment when the upheaving and subsidence of the waters should uplift the former and depress the latter, that they might seize the opportunity to leap down upon the deck of the Duchess.

Captain Johnson was also waiting for the same moment. He had stationed eight men each with a cutlass in his right hand and a pistol in his left, in a position to meet the pirates should they gain his deck. He had so carefully balanced and trained his two guns that, when they should be fired, the balls would come together at a short distance from the muzzles of the cannon. By one of these guns stood Captain Johnson himself, by the other one of his mates, upon whose coolness he could thoroughly depend. Each of these two resolute men held a lighted match in his hand.

By this time the sun had been half an hour below the horizon, and the short twilight of that southern latitude was fast darkening into a night of storm and of unusual gloom; for although there was one clear spot in the western sky, all the rest of the face of heaven was veiled in heavy clouds.

In his anxiety to gain as soon as possible the deck of the ship, Captain Vance had not noted all the dispositions made on board the Duchess; his attention had been given mainly to the ordering of his own men, and to the eight men arranged for the reception of his assaulting party.

The critical moment, upon the results of which so much of vital importance to the combatants depended, arrived. The brig rose high upon the summit of a huge billow, while the merchant ship descended into the valley between that and another monster wave. At that instant the pirates sprung towards the deck of the Duchess, the eight men of the latter, who had been placed to meet this assault, fired their pistols, and Captain Johnson and his mate applied the matches to the cannon.

Three of the pirates fell upon the ship’s deck, two killed and one mortally wounded by the pistol-shots of their enemies; five made the leap too late, of whom two were crushed between the vessels, and fell into the sea, and three struck against the guards of the now rising ship, and were thrown back with violence upon their own deck. Captain Vance himself received a pistol-shot through the brain at the moment when he was about to spring from the guards of the Falcon to the deck of the Duchess; he disappeared between the two vessels and sunk into the sea.

John Coe – to avoid confronting the eight defenders of the ship – had taken his station with Ada, Billy Bowsprit, and the rest of the small party devoted to him, on the extreme left of the boarding-line of pirates. The next officer on his right was Lieutenant Afton, who was separated from him, however, by several men. At the extreme right of the whole line had been Captain Vance; Lieutenant Seacome being left in charge of the brig.

Thus, when young Coe, holding Ada by the hand, alighted on the deck of the Duchess, he found the second-lieutenant of the Falcon– with a party of five men under his immediate command – between himself and the defenders of the ship. He saw the wretch Afton, ever intent upon spoil – after making, with all the assaulting party to his right, a rush against the ship’s crew, which forced the latter to give back a space – detach himself with four men from the rest of the pirates, and, crossing the deck, hurry along the starboard side of the ship towards the entrance to the cabin.

It had been the first intention of Coe to throw himself, with his small force, between the contending parties, and to insist upon the pirates retiring to the brig; or, in case of their refusal to do so, to take sides against them in the fight. But, seeing that the odds against the ship’s crew was now not so great, Captain Johnson and his mate having joined them, he determined, with his followers, to pursue Afton, and to prevent such mischief as he might be bent upon.

Captain Johnson, when he saw so many of the pirate crew hastening towards the cabin, was also anxious to follow them; but he was too hard pressed by his enemies to allow him to do so. He hoped, moreover, that the tenants of the cabin had had the forethought to barricade the door, in which case the pirates might be prevented from breaking in upon Mr Durocher and his family until he could overpower the force immediately before him, and then, turning upon those who had gone towards the cabin, might thus be able to overcome his enemies in detail.

The door of the cabin had been barricaded by Mr Durocher, as well as he could do so, with the aid of his daughter and the quadroon girl, but the fastenings scarcely withstood for one moment the violent assault of Afton and his men.

They passed in without further opposition – the illness of Mr Durocher preventing him from offering even a moment’s resistance. An instant of silence ensued, and then, above the noise of conflict without arose the cries of distress from the cabin – the shrieks of women! That was the cry most agonising to young Coe.

“Here, my brave fellows!” he shouted, “follow me, and remember your own mothers and sisters at home!”

He dashed off down the deck, past the assailants and assailed still struggling there, and, followed by Ada and his men, sprung into the cabin to confront Afton and his men in their fiendish scheme. Afton, having penetrated to the state-rooms, had seized Miss Durocher, and was trying to drag her forth, preparatory to removing her to the brig. “Unhand that lady, villain!” shouted Coe. “Villain yourself?” roared Afton. “Who made you my master, I should like to know?”

Afton was a strong man, but young Coe was both stronger and more active, and when he was aroused and inflamed by a righteous anger the pirate was but a child in his hands. He said not another word, but releasing the lady from the grasp of the ruffian by a sudden and dexterous exertion, he seized the pirate with both hands and swung him with tremendous force through the state-room doorway into the saloon. So violently did the latter strike the floor, that he lay at once without sense or motion.

One of Afton’s men, drawing a pistol, had pointed it at the head of the infuriated rescuer; but ere he could pull the trigger, Ada, who already had a pistol in her hand, fired, and broke his right arm, which fell powerless to his side. He stooped to pick up the weapon which he had dropped with the hand of his uninjured arm, but Ada drew another pistol from her belt and presented it at his head.

“If you attempt to take up that weapon again, Joe,” she said, with firmness of purpose expressed in her tones, “you are a dead man.”

The man yielded at once, and stood motionless and silent before the pistol which she continued to hold with the muzzle towards him.

At the same time when these scenes were occurring in the state-room, others were taking place in the saloon.

“Unhand that gentleman,” said Bowsprit, to two men who held the sick Mr Durocher prisoner.

“We are acting under the orders of the second-lieutenant,” replied one of the men.

“Point your pistols at those men,” said Bowsprit, addressing those under his command, himself presenting at them a weapon in each hand.

His orders were at once obeyed.

“We have pistols, too,” gruffly said one of the men who held Mr Durocher.

“Now,” said Billy, “release your prisoner at once, or I’ll warrant you’ll never disobey orders again.”

At this moment the body of Afton came rushing head-foremost out of the state-room.

Seeing the condition of their officer, the two men unhanded Mr Durocher, and sullenly threw their weapons upon the floor.

The fourth of the men who had accompanied Afton, and who had stood at the state-room door through all these scenes, apparently stupefied by surprise, quietly handed his pistols and cutlass to Bowsprit.