V
All that night we kept watch. The next morning we were once more attacked, but successfully defended ourselves with boulders and our cutlasses. Yet one swarthy pirate succeeded in catching the leg of the remaining native soldier and bearing him away with them. With cessation of hostilities, we searched the top of the island for food and water. At one side of the tableland there was a break in its surface and a bench of some dozen acres lay perhaps twenty feet below our retreat. We cautiously worked our way down to this portion and there to our delight found a number of fan-shaped traveller’s palms and monkey-cups full of sweet water, which with two wild sago palms we calculated would keep us alive a few days at all events.
We were much encouraged at this discovery, and that night collected a lot of brush from the lower plain and lit a big fire on the most exposed part of the rocks. We did not care if it brought a thousand more pirates as long as it attracted the attention of a passing ship. Two good nine-pounders would soon send our foes in all directions. We relieved each other in watching during the night, and by sunrise we were all completely worn out. The third day was one of weariness and thirst under the burning rays of the tropical sun. That day we ate the last of our ship biscuit and were reduced to a few drops of water each. Starvation was staring us in the face. There was but one alternative, and that was to descend and make a fight for our boat on the beach. The bo’s’n volunteered with three men to descend the defile and reconnoitre. Armed only with their cutlasses and a short axe, they worked their way carefully down in the shadow of the rocks, while we kept watch above.
All was quiet for a time; then there arose a tumult of cries, oaths, and yells. The captain gave the order, and pell-mell down the rift we clambered, some dropping their muskets in their hurried descent, one of which exploded in its fall. The bo’s’n had found the beach and our boat guarded by six pirates, who were asleep. Four of these they succeeded in throttling. We pushed the boat into the surf, expecting every moment to see one of the praus glide around the projecting reef that separated the two inlets. We could plainly hear their cries and yells as they discovered our escape, and with a “heigh-ho-heigh!” our long-boat shot out into the placid ocean, sending up a shower of phosphorescent bubbles. We bent our backs to the oars as only a question of life or death can make one. With each stroke the boat seemed almost to lift itself out of the water. Almost at the same time a long dark line, filled with moving objects, dashed out from the shadow of the cliffs, hardly a hundred yards away.
It was a glorious race over the dim waters of that tropical sea. I as a boy could not realize what capture meant at the hands of our cruel pursuers. My heart beat high, and I felt equal to a dozen Illanums. My thoughts travelled back to New England in the midst of the excitement. I saw myself before the open arch fire in a low-roofed old house, that for a century had withstood the fiercest gales on the old Maine coast, and from whose doors had gone forth three generations of sea-captains. I saw myself on a winter night relating this very story of adventure to an old gray-haired, bronzed-faced father, and a mother whose parting kiss still lingered on my lips, to my younger brother, and sister. I could feel their undisguised admiration as I told of my fight with pirates in the Bornean sea. It is wonderful how the mind will travel. Yet with my thoughts in Maine, I saw and felt that the Illanums were gradually gaining on us. Our men were weary and feeble from two days’ fasting, while the pirates were strong, and thirsting for our blood.
The captain kept glancing first at the enemy and then at a musket that lay near him. He longed to use it, but not a man could be spared from the oars. Hand over hand they gained on us. Turning his eyes on me as I sat in the bow, the captain said, while he bent his sinewy back to the oar, “Jack, are you a good shot?”
I stammered, “I can try, sir.”
“Very well, get the musket there in the bow. It is loaded. Take good aim and shoot that big fellow in the stern. If you hit him, I’ll make you master of a ship some day.”
Tremblingly I raised the heavy musket as directed. The boat was unsteady, I hardly expected to hit the chief, but aimed low, hoping to hit one of the rowers at least. I aimed, closed my eyes, and fired. With the report of the musket the tall leader sprang into the air and then fell head fore-most amid his rowers. I could just detect the gleam of the moonlight on the jewelled handle of his kris as it sank into the waters. I had hit my man. The sailors sent up a hearty American cheer and a tiger, as they saw the prau come to a standstill.
Our boat sprang away into the darkness. We did not cease rowing until dawn,—then we lay back on our oars and stretched our tired backs and arms. I had taken my place at the oar during the night.
Away out on the northern horizon we saw a black speck; on the southern horizon another. The captain’s glass revealed one to be the pirate prau with all sails set, for a wind had come up with the dawn. The other we welcomed with a cheer, for it was the Bangor. Enfeebled and nearly famishing, we headed toward it and rowed for life. How we regretted having left our sails on the island. The prau had sighted us and was bearing down in full pursuit; we soon could distinguish its wide-spreading, rakish sails almost touching the water as it sped on. Then we made out the naked forms of the Illanums hanging to the ropes, far out over the water, and then we could hear their blood-curdling yell. It was too late; their yell was one of baffled rage. It was answered by the deep bass tones of the swivel on board the Bangor sending a ball skimming along over the waters, which, although it went wide of its mark, caused the natives on the ropes to throw themselves bodily across the prau, taking the great sail with them.
In another instant the red sail, the long, keen, black shell, the naked forms of the fierce Illanums, were mixed in one undefinable blot on the distant horizon.
And that was the skipper’s yarn.