"Black Pedro gave a moan, and then another bellow of rage.
"'Out of my sight, you miserable, sordid scoundrels,—out of my sight! What? You defy me, do you? This is mutiny! Take that! And that!'
"He snatched two pistols from his sash and commenced firing, right and left. The first shot hit Mike the Shark and doubled up the book-keeper like a jack-knife, and the second one did the same for Sandy Buggins.
"'Hold hard, Cap'n!' cried the old bo's'n, 'p'r'aps you'll tell us what all this pirating WAS for, if it wa'n't for money.'
"'It was for the joy of pirating, you old rascal, as you ought to know. It was for the pure love of the thing. And to think that all these years I have been leading a base gang of money-getters!'
"And he grabbed another couple of pistols out of his boots, and began firing once more. At this, the pirates lost their patience. They gave a deep roar, like a herd of angry buffalo, and closed in on their Captain. He jumped back, and continued to fire. They swarmed around him, and in a few minutes that group of pirates, who had always lived together like brothers, had changed into a blood-thirsty mob. Knives flashed and pistols cracked. Some of them hit each other in their excitement, and that made them so angry that they turned and fought amongst themselves. In the meantime, the Captain was firing his pistols and slashing with his cutlasses, and making terrible havoc amongst his followers. In ten minutes all was over. Of that proud band of pirates, once the terror of the Spanish Main, only two men were left alive. These were Black Pedro himself, slightly wounded in the leg, but still able to walk, and old Aaron Halyard, the bo's'n. Aaron was running at top speed toward the beach, trying to get to a small boat. A little way behind him came the Captain.
"'Don't you tech me! don't you tech me!' screamed old Halyard.
"Black Pedro stopped and took careful aim, with the last of his fourteen pistols. He pulled the trigger, but there was no report. Something had gone wrong with the priming. The bo's'n reached the boat, shoved off, and started to row for the ship. There was no other boat, and Pedro could only watch him. The old man rowed to 'The Angel of Death,' climbed aboard, and commenced, with the help of the boy, who had been left there, to get up the foresail. Then they hoisted the anchor, and the 'Angel' moved slowly out of the harbor. Black Pedro sat down on the beach, and watched it fade from sight. When night fell 'The Angel of Death' was only a speck on the horizon. Then the pirate chief returned to his cottage.
"On the following day a dreadful storm arose. Black Pedro knew that no ship, manned only by an aged bo's'n and a cabin-boy, could live through such a tempest. A few days later his worst fears were realized, for by the wreckage that was washed ashore, he knew that 'The Angel of Death' had gone to pieces in the storm. When The Plank itself, worn smooth on its upper side by the hundreds of feet that had passed over it, was tossed upon the shores of Rum Island, the pirate sat down on the sand and sobbed aloud. He knew that old Halyard and the cabin-boy must have perished, and the noblest crew of buccaneers on whom the sun had ever shone, were forever disbanded, and that he, their chief, was now the last of the pirates, alone and deserted on an undiscovered and unknown island.
"And there he lives to this day."