“I know a good deal about it,” the sergeant replied gravely. “It's a tale as there ain't many as knows; but you are a sort of lad as one can trust, and so I don't mind if I tell it you. Though you wouldn't think it, I have sailed under the black flag myself.”
“You, sergeant!” Jack exclaimed incredulously; “do you mean to say you have been a pirate?”
“Just that, my boy. I don't look like it, do I? There ain't nothing buccaneering about my cut. I looks just what I am, a tough old sergeant in a queen's regiment; but for all that I have been a pirate. The yarn is a long one, and I can't tell it you now, because just at present, you see, I have got to go below to look after the dinners of the company, but the first time as we can get an opportunity for a quiet talk I will tell it you. But don't you go away and think till then as I was a pirate from choice. I shouldn't like you to think that of me; there ain't never no saying at sea what may happen. I might tumble overboard tonight and get drowned, or one of the convoy might run foul of us and sink us, and tomorrow you might be alive and I might be dead, and I shouldn't like you to go on thinking all your life as that Sergeant Edwards had been a bloody pirate of his own free will. So you just bear in mind, till I tells you the whole story, as how it was forced upon me. Mind, I don't say as how I hadn't the choice of death or that, and maybe had you been in my place you would have chosen death; but, you see, I had never been brought up as you were. I had had no chances to speak of, and being only just about your age, I didn't like the thought of dying, so you see I took to it, making up my mind secret at the same time that the first chance I had I would slip away from them. I won't tell you more now, I hain't time; but just you bear that in mind, in case of anything happening, that if Sergeant Edwards once sailed under the black flag, he didn't do it willing.”
The sergeant now hurried below, leaving Jack wondering over what he had heard. Some days elapsed before the story was told, for a few hours later the sky clouded over and the wind rose, and before next morning the vessel was laboring heavily under double reefed topsails. The soldiers were all kept below, and there was no possibility of anything like a quiet talk. The weather had hitherto been so fine and the wind so light that the vessels had glided over the sea almost without motion, and very few indeed of those on board had experienced anything of the usual seasickness; but now, in the stifling atmosphere between decks, with the vessel rolling and plunging heavily, the greater part were soon prostrate with seasickness, and even Jack, accustomed to the sea as he was, succumbed to the unpleasantness of the surroundings.
On the second day of the storm Sergeant Edwards, who had been on deck to make a report to the captain of the company, was eagerly questioned on his return below on the condition of the weather.
“It's blowing about as hard as it can be,” he said, “and she rolls fit to take the masts out of her. There don't seem no chance of the gale breaking, and none of the other ships of the fleet are in sight. That's about all I have to tell you, except that I told the captain that if he didn't get the hatches lifted a little we should be all stifled down here. He says if there's a bit of a lull he will ask them to give us a little fresh air, and in the mean time he says that any who are good sailors may go up on deck, but it will be at their own risk, for some of the seas go pretty nearly clean over her.”
CHAPTER IV: THE SERGEANT'S YARN
Jack Stilwell and a few of the other men availed themselves of the permission to escape for a time from the stifling atmosphere below, and made their way on deck. For a time the rush of the wind and the wild confusion of the sea almost bewildered them. Masses of water were rushing along the deck, and each time she rolled the waves seemed as if they would topple over the bulwarks. Several of the party turned and went below again at once, but Jack, with a few others, waited their opportunity and, making a rush across the deck, grasped the shrouds and there hung on. Jack soon recovered from his first confusion and was able to enjoy the grandeur of the scene.
Small as was the canvas she was showing, the vessel was traveling fast through the waves, sometimes completely burying her head under a sea; then as she rose again the water rushed aft knee deep, and Jack had as much as he could do to prevent himself being carried off his feet. Fortunately all loose articles had long since been swept overboard, otherwise the risk of a broken limb from their contact would have been serious.