The Englishmen were met by a very formidable party, which had evidently been told off to board the brig, and in an instant a fierce and sanguinary mêlée arose on the Aurora’s deck. The Spaniards—for such they proved to be—though taken by surprise, and greatly disconcerted by the unexpectedly warm reception which they had met with from the brig, fought with the fury and desperation of demons, and for perhaps five minutes the crew of the Virginie had all their work cut out to maintain their position on the deck of the barque. The pirates, with that sanguinary symbol floating over their heads, and believing that they had been entrapped into attacking a man-o’-war, felt that the halter was already about their necks, and that there was literally no alternative but victory or death for them; and they pressed forward with such recklessness and ferocity that the deck speedily assumed the aspect of a human shambles, and the planking grew so slippery with blood that it became difficult to retain one’s footing upon it. There was one Spaniard in particular who appeared to possess the gift of ubiquity; he seemed to be in all parts of the ship at the same time, notwithstanding the crowded state of the confined space wherein the fight was raging, and in him George speedily recognised the truculent-looking individual who had led the pirates on the eventful night of the Aurora’s capture, and who had so brutally ill-used poor Bowen on the morning of the sale in the square at Havana. There could be no possible doubt as to his identity. There was the same ferocious cast of countenance, the same mahogany-brown skin, even the same filthy red handkerchief—now more filthy than ever—bound about his ragged locks, apparently the same broad-brimmed straw hat, in short, every mark of identification; nothing was wanting. This individual dashed from point to point, apparently by a mere effort of his will, encouraging here, chiding there, and helping everywhere. The mere fact of his presence, the mere sound of his voice, appeared to endue the pirates with renewed life and courage, and George speedily saw that there would be little hope of victory until this man could be placed hors de combat. He therefore pressed in toward him, plying his cutlass vigorously with one hand, and laying manfully about him with the butt of his empty pistol with the other, and calling upon the fellow by every despicable epithet he could think of to turn and meet him. He had very nearly reached him—there were only some half-a-dozen people between the two—when another voice, that of Bowen, was heard, and the next instant the chief mate, his eyes literally blazing with fury, appeared, forcing his way into the thickest of the throng. With the strength of a madman he seized and dashed aside all who ventured to bar his path, and in a single moment, so it seemed to George, forced himself within reach of his especial enemy.
“At last—at last—you bloodthirsty scoundrel—you white-livered coward—you who were not ashamed to strike a chained man—at last we meet again, as I told you we should!—and the time has come for me to pay off part of the debt I owe you—no, you don’t,”—skilfully guarding a savage down-stroke from the Spaniard’s cutlass, “and take that,” he added, launching out a terrific blow with his left fist, catching the Spaniard fairly between the eyes, and felling him to the deck senseless, as neatly as a butcher fells an ox. In another moment George was at Bowen’s side, and, placing themselves back to back, these two managed to successfully defend themselves until the crew of the Virginie, inspired by their leader’s example, had pressed in to their assistance, when the pirates, becoming scattered, were driven irresistibly to opposite ends of the ship, and some were actually driven overboard. Then recognising that they were defeated, and suddenly losing heart, they threw down their weapons, and cried for quarter. But the worst passions of the Virginia’s crew were by this time fully aroused; they thought of nothing but the fact that their enemies were pirates, men steeped to the lips in crime of the vilest description, and guilty of unnumbered deeds of blood-curdling atrocity, and many of the Spaniards were ruthlessly slaughtered before George and Bowen could induce them to stay their hands. Then, when order and authority were once more restored, heads were counted, and it was found that, out of a crew of over eighty, twenty-three pirates only—their leader included—remained alive, and these were promptly clapped in irons and bundled unceremoniously below. Strange to say, notwithstanding the desperate character of the fighting, the Virginie’s crew had suffered but slightly in comparison—nine killed and thirteen wounded being the total of the casualties. A short breathing-space was allowed the men to recover themselves after their extraordinary exertions, and then all hands set to work to clear the decks of the sickening evidences of the contest; the crew were next divided equally between the two ships, and, with Mr Bowen in command of the Aurora, both craft then made sail to windward in company.
The third craft—the full-rigged ship—meanwhile was still in sight from aloft, dodging about under easy canvas, and evidently waiting for the Aurora to rejoin. There could be little doubt, therefore, that she was in the possession of a prize-crew of the pirates, and George earnestly hoped he might be able to reach her in time to save the lives of some at least of those to whom she rightfully belonged.
A couple of hours later they were alongside—the Virginie on the weather and the Aurora on the lee quarter—with ports open, guns run out, and the English ensign flying at the peak, the red flag having been allowed to remain aloft on board the Aurora until ranging alongside the strange ship, when it was hauled down, and the English flag run up on board the barque and the brig simultaneously.
The pirates in possession were completely paralysed by the turn events had taken; they had evidently been under the impression that the Aurora, and not the Virginie had proved victorious; and now that they found themselves under the guns of both ships their mistake was past rectification.
Accordingly, at George’s order, they backed the main-yard and hove-to the ship, upon which a strong party, armed to the teeth, proceeded on board and took possession.
The ship proved to be the Vulcan, of and from Liverpool, bound to Kingston with a valuable general cargo and several passengers. She was a noble ship, being of nearly a thousand tons register, and a regular clipper.
On boarding her, George found the state of affairs pretty much what it had been on board the Aurora after her capture by these same pirates, her crew and the male passengers being discovered scattered about the deck, lashed helplessly neck and heels together, or chained to ring-bolts in the deck and bulwarks, whilst the pirates had taken possession of the cabin and had held a regular saturnalia there, in the progress of which the unfortunate lady passengers had been subjected to the vilest outrages, and one poor little child had been cruelly murdered before its distracted mother’s face. The captain and the chief mate of the ship were both found in the cabin in a dying condition, they having been mutilated in a most cruel and horrible manner in an ineffectual effort to wring from them the secret of the hiding-place of a large amount of specie which the pirates had somehow ascertained was on board. A tall and burly negro, the identical one who had acted as lieutenant to the Spaniard in charge of the Aurora on the occasion of her first capture, was at the head of the gang, and had been the instigator and chief perpetrator in the many outrages which had followed the capture of the Vulcan.
No time was lost in freeing the passengers and crew from their exceedingly unpleasant situation; and this done, the pirates, ten in number, heavily ironed, were transferred to the Virginie and stowed carefully away below. The Vulcan then proceeded on her voyage, in charge of her second mate, by whom George forwarded a letter to the admiral at Jamaica, informing him of the capture of the now notorious Aurora.
George now felt that, with two ships and so many desperate men to look after, he had his hands full, and he therefore decided to make the best of his way to England forthwith. He accordingly hailed Bowen, requesting him to give the Aurora’s stores an overhaul, and to ascertain whether her provisions and water were sufficient in quantity to justify them in making a push across the Atlantic. In about an hour an answer was returned to the effect that not only was there an abundance of everything, but that the ship herself was more than half full of a varied and very rich cargo, the spoils, doubtless, from many a missing vessel. Upon the receipt of this intelligence, orders were at once given for both ships to fill and make the best of their way to the northward in company, and by nightfall they were clear of the Caycos Passage and standing to the northward on a taut bowline under a heavy press of canvas.