If the Spanish vessel had aught of fear of the English brig, she did not show it. The sound of trumpets had proclaimed that she had called her gun-crews, but she shifted her helm not a quarter-point of the compass and came steadily on.
Bras-de-Fer lost no time sending the English colors aloft and firing a shot from his forward guns, as a test of distance. This brought the Spaniard speedily to himself, for he shortened sail and came upon the wind to keep the weather-gauge. When he had reached easy gunshot distance, the Sally began firing a gun at a time with great deliberation, and so excellent was her aim that few of these failed to strike her huge adversary. Cornbury, who had taken a particular fancy for great-gun exercise, practised upon the rigging to such advantage that he brought the mizzen topsail and cross-jack yard in a clatter about the ears of the fellows upon the poop. As the Frenchman suspected, the Spaniards’ gun-play was of the poorest, and the glittering hordes of harnessed men upon his decks availed him nothing. Then the San Isidro, with true concern, and thinking to end the matter, eased her sheets in the effort to close with her troublesome antagonist. Bras-de-Fer kept all fast, and, braving a merciless broadside which churned the ocean in a hundred gusts of water all about him, went jauntily up to windward with no other loss than that of the main top-gallant yard, the wreck of which was quickly cut away.
For two hours the roar of the battle echoed down the distances. The Sally presented a forlorn appearance with her main topsail torn to shreds. Two guns of her broadside had been dismounted and ten of her men had been killed and injured; but upon the Spaniard the wreck of yards and spars hung festooned with the useless gear upon her wounded masts, like tangled mosses or creepers upon a dying oak.
At last a lucky shot of the unremitting Cornbury carried away her pintle, rudder, and steering-gear, so that she lay a heavy and lifeless thing upon the water. Bras-de-Fer called for boarders, and, firing a broadside pointblank, lay the Sally aboard, and with a wild cry for those who dared follow, himself sprang for the mizzen chains of his adversary. In the light of the dying day, like a hundred wriggling, dusky cats, they swarmed over the sides of the luckless San Isidro, springing through the ports and over the bulwarks upon the deck with cries that struck terror to the hearts of their adversaries, many of whom threw down their weapons and sprang below. A few men in breast-pieces, who gave back, firing a desultory volley, made a brief stand upon the forecastle, from which they were speedily swept down into the head and so forward upon the prow and into the sea.
Bras-de-Fer and Cornbury sprang into the after-passage. Two blanched priests fell upon the deck, raining their jewels like hailstones before them and chattering out a plea for mercy from the pirato. Indeed, Bras-de-Fer looked not unlike the pictures of the most desperate of those bloody villains. A splinter-cut upon the head had bathed him liberally with blood, and the wild light of exultation glowed from eyes deep-set and dark with the fumes of dust and gunpowder. His coat was torn, and his naked sword, dimmed and lusterless, moved in reckless circles with a careless abandon which spoke a meaning not to be misconstrued.
The priests he pushed aside, and burst through the door into the cabin. It was almost dark, but the glow in the west which shone in the wide stern ports shed a warm light upon the backs of a dozen persons who had taken refuge there, and were now gazing wide-eyed upon him. By the table in the center two or three figures were standing, and an old man with streaming gray hair drew a sword most pitifully and put himself in posture of defense. Several women thereupon fell jibbering prone upon the deck, and two figures in uniform crouched back in the shadow of the bulkhead. But the shedding of blood was done. Cornbury took the weapon from the patriarch, and Bras-de-Fer, seeing no further resistance, bowed in his best manner and begged that the ladies be put to no further inquietude. It was then for the first time that he noticed the figure of one of them, tall, fair, and of a strange familiarity, standing firm and impassive, her hand upon a small petronel, or pistolet, which lay upon the port sill. The splendid lines of the neck, the imperious turn of the head, the determination in the firm lines of the mouth, which, in spite of the ill-concealed terror which lurked in the eyes and brows, betrayed a purpose to defend herself to the last. Bras-de-Fer stepped back a pace in his surprise to look again; but there was no mistake. He had seen that same figure, that same poise of the head, almost that same look out of the eyes, and, deep as he had steeped his mind in the things which brought forgetfulness, every line of it was written upon his memory. The lady was Mistress Barbara Clerke.
[CHAPTER XI]
THE ENEMY IN THE HOUSE
In the first flood of his astonishment the Frenchman lost countenance and fell back upon the entrance of the cabin. He forgot the efficiency of his disguise. In London he had worn the mustachio, smooth chin, and perruque; and the deft touches of poor Vigot had given him a name for a beau which no art of the tailor alone could have bestowed. All of these were lacking in the rough garments that he wore. When last my lady had seen him it had been in the laces, orders, and all the accouterments of a man of fashion, as befitted his station. Now the deep shadows which the fog of battle had painted under his brows and eyes served a purpose as effectual as the growth of his hair and beard. For no sign passed the lady’s features, though she looked fair at him. A momentary wonder there was, as the Frenchman paused; then a mute and pallid supplication. Two Spanish women fell heavily upon their knees before him, demeaning themselves in every conceivable manner for a look or a word that would lull their apprehension and alarm.