“Ay, that she will—if she doesn’t happen to be a man-o’-war—and I don’t believe she is,” I answered, as I again levelled my glass at her. “No,” I continued, “she is no man-o’-war, although I see she shows a set of teeth; but there are not many of them, they are all small pieces, and half of them may be quakers, for what we can tell to the contrary. She is a Spanish West Indiaman, I believe, bound, no doubt, to Cartagena, or some other port on the Main; and she has probably come in through the Handkerchief, or Turks Islands Passage. Well, there does not seem to be much chance of the wind coming just yet, Henderson, so you had better get your head-pump rigged and muster your scrubbers; meanwhile I will have my bath, as usual, and then get dressed, so as to be all ready by the time that the breeze comes.”
When eight o’clock and breakfast-time arrived there was no perceptible change in the aspect of the weather, which remained stark calm; while the heavy pall of cloud that had shrouded the night sky had thinned away to a kind of dense haze in the midst of which the sun throbbed—a great shapeless splotch of misty light that, notwithstanding its partial veiling, still contrived to impart a scorching quality to the breathless atmosphere.
As I ascended to the deck after breakfast I found Pearce, the boatswain, whose watch it now was, apparently waiting for my reappearance. He held the schooner’s glass in his hand, and had evidently spent practically the whole time since eight bells in watching the stranger.
“I’ve been thinkin’, Mr Delamere,” he began, “how would it be to get the boats out and go after that chap? We could do it quite comfortable—take possession of her, leave a prize-crew aboard her, and get back to the schooner again before dinner.”
“No doubt,” I agreed. “But why should we trouble to get the boats into the water and fatigue the men by a long pull in this sweltering heat? That ship can’t get away from us without wind; and if I am any judge of the looks of a vessel we shall walk up to her as if she were at anchor as soon as the breeze comes. She is a good seven miles away, a pull of an hour and a half at the least in this weather, and at the end of it the men would be too tired to face resistance effectively, if it were offered—as it very possibly might be. No, I really do not see any necessity to dispatch the boats, just yet at least; do you?”
“Well, ’pon my word, Mr Delamere, I don’t know,” answered Pearce, scratching his head with a puzzled air. “The way you puts it there don’t seem to be no sense at all in doin’ of it. And yet, I don’t know, sir. The fact is, I’m a bit puzzled about that there ship. Here are we, regularly boxin’ the compass, our jibboom pointin’ first this way, then that, and then t’other, while that ship haven’t veered nothin’ to speak of all the time that I’ve been on deck; she’ve pointed steady to the south’ard ever since I first set eyes on her, and it seems to me that she’ve altered her bearin’s a bit. I suppose it ain’t likely that she’ve got her boats into the water, towin’ on t’other side of her, have she?”
“Good gracious, man, no, surely not!” I ejaculated. “What in the world should they do such a mad thing as that for? What effect would two, or even three, boats have on a big heavy ship like that? They could never hope to tow her below the horizon and out of sight of us before the wind comes; and, if not, why should they tire themselves to death by making such an attempt? I admit that it is rather strange that her head should point so steadily in one direction while we are boxing the compass; but she probably draws twice as much water as we do, and that may have something to do with it.”
I took the telescope from Pearce’s hands and again levelled it at the stranger. She was still lying broadside-on to us, showing us her port side, and her yards were braced sharp up on the starboard tack, as though—assuming her to have come in through one of the passages—she had had a wind from the westward, while the breeze which had brought us where we were had been from the eastward. The peculiarity of this now struck me for the first time, but it carried no particular significance to my mind beyond the suggestion that possibly she might, after all, be homeward instead of outward bound. But as I stood scanning her through the lenses it gradually dawned upon me that her people seemed to be extraordinarily busy, for I could detect indications that quite a large number of men were actively moving about her decks; and presently, to my astonishment, I noticed that she had a tackle at her mainyard-arm; and while I was still wondering what this might be for, I saw a large case rise slowly above the level of her bulwark and then vanish again, apparently over her rail.
Then, in a second, illumination came to me and I understood everything. There was a craft of some sort alongside her, completely hidden from our view by her hull and canvas, braced as sharp up as possible, and undoubtedly there were boats in the water on the other side of her, employed to keep her broadside-on to us and thus keep the other craft hidden from us; moreover, certain portions of her cargo were being hoisted out and transferred to the hidden vessel. The inference was obvious: the hidden craft was a pirate which had somehow managed to sneak up alongside and surprise her in the pitchy darkness of the early hours of the morning—Henderson had actually caught a glimpse of the very act of capture—and now she was being plundered by the audacious scoundrels under our very eyes.
I laid down the glass and looked sharply round the horizon. The atmosphere was distinctly thickening, to such an extent, indeed, that the sun was now almost blotted out, and there was a greasy look about the sky that seemed to portend bad weather. The sea was still glass-smooth, not the faintest suggestion of a catspaw to be seen in any direction; but there was a certain gloomy, lowering appearance over the western horizon that appeared to promise a breeze before long. It might be hours, however, before it came, and we could not wait for it; for robbery, and very possibly violence, ay, even cold-blooded murder, was being perpetrated at that moment, and speedy intervention was imperative. I felt horribly vexed that we should all have allowed ourselves to be hoodwinked so completely; for although the device was undoubtedly quite clever, the conviction would insist upon forcing itself upon me that I had attached altogether too little importance to the gunner’s story of those mysterious flashes, seen “out of the corner of his eye.” I told myself that that story ought to have aroused my suspicions, ought to have conveyed a distinct suggestion to my mind; and that, if it had, we should have detected the ruse almost with the first appearance of daylight. This, however, was not the moment for reproaches, either of myself or others, it was the moment for action; and I turned sharply upon the boatswain.