"Safe from every human eye Shalt this gold securely lie; When a mortal who has seen The treasure placed the grave within, Shall in the grave alive be thrown: This done, the spot shall ne'er be known. And finish'd then the rites will be, Mortal, thou hast sought from me!"
"If I had my doubts before about his being leagued with Beelzebub, not one have I left now," said Loff, with indignation. "I can see a fellow walk a plank or seized up to the yardarm, but I am too tender-hearted to see such a thing done as he hints at in his infernal rhymes."
The whole pirate crew seemed to be animated by the same feelings. At first general consternation prevailed; but, gathering confidence, they whispered together, casting the while revengeful looks towards the wizard. Suddenly, by one impulse, they laid their hands, without speaking, upon him, and cast him headlong into the grave; and then, acting as one man, filled it up with its living occupant in a moment of time. The first action of Kyd was to spring forward and rescue him; but the determined attitude of his men, whose minds were too highly wrought up to be held under control, checked the impulse. He stood by till the grave was smoothed over, so that not a vestige of it remained, and was then about to command them to return to the brig, which was seen through the trees lying at her anchor near the land; but ere he could give the order, the flame of a gun fired from her flashed upon his eyes, followed by a loud report, that echoed in many a deep, rumbling note along the wooded shore.
"A signal of alarm!" he cried; "to your boats all!"
He hastened forward to the verge of the promontory where the prospect was unobstructed, and, casting his eyes down the narrow strait that opens seaward between Staten Island and Sandy Hook, beheld not a mile off, coming round the headland, a large ship, her tall sails glancing like snow in the moonlight. Loud and clear rung his voice hastening his men to the brig, while gun after gun flashed and thundered from her, calling them on board to her defence. In less than five minutes three boats loaded with the pirates put off from the shore and pulled swiftly in the direction of the brig. Kyd stood up steering the foremost one. But the wind blew steadily and strong in from sea, and the strange ship came on so fast that she was soon no farther off from their vessel than they themselves. It was plain she knew what she was about.
"Strain every nerve, men!" he cried, in an even, determined voice that reached every ear, while its coolness was more effectual in inspiring confidence than loud shouts would have been. "Pull together and steadily! She must not reach the brig before us. Now, all together! Lively, lively! A few strokes and we shall reach her."
But they were yet several hundred yards from her, and the stranger came ploughing his way down without taking in a sail or altering his course, save just enough to enable him to cut off the boats, the approach of which, as well as the relative position of the brig with the shore, he was able to discern by the aid of the moon, which filled the atmosphere with brilliant light. In the mean while the brig cut her anchor, and, swinging round, with her diminished force directed a feeble and irregular fire towards her. But she kept on her course in majestic silence, without returning it and without apparent injury; and, ere the boats could reach their vessel, she sailed in between it and them, and poured a broadside into each. The brig felt the fire in every spar; but the boats, being so low in the water, escaped without injury, the shot flying high above the heads of the pirates, and crashing among the forests on the shore. The brig was now evidently in the power of the ship; and Kyd, finding that it would be impossible to reach her, shouted through the smoke, that settled thickly over the water, to his mate Lawrence whom he had left on board with but a dozen men,
"Let them not take her! Blow her up, and to your boat!"
His voice was distinctly heard by every man both in the brig and ship.
"Hard up! hard, hard!" was instantly heard in the clear voice of Fitzroy; and the ship, which was steering so as to lay the brig aboard, fell off and stood in towards shore. The moment afterward a small boat was seen to put off from the brig, which a few seconds afterward blew up with a terrible explosion, suddenly turning night, for many miles around, into broad day, and shaking the earth with the tremendous concussion. For an instant the air was filled with a shower of missiles, and trains of fire lighting up sea, forest, and boats with a momentary and wild glare; then all sunk into darkness, and the pale moon once more struggled to assert her right to the empire of her own gentle light, which had been so suddenly invaded.