As we turned, he dropped below the rail. Pomfrett cried out “Who’s that?” and we all ran to the side to see a boat, manned by eight or ten men, shoving off from under the counter. Pomfrett challenged, and the same voice answered across the swiftly widening space of water, “Dead or alive, shipmate, dead or alive—ho, ho, ha!”
Pomfrett roared for the watch below, and, the men tumbling up in a hurry, he had a boat lowered and went himself in pursuit. But lowering boats and such evolutions are not performed in a ship of the private account as they are in Her Majesty’s navy. By the time our boat struck the water the stranger had a fair start, and Pomfrett must needs return before very long, having lost all trace of her in the dark.
“That’s Dawkins, for a ducat,” says Morgan; and we supposed that she was right, and that the ship which had chased us three days since was the Blessed Endeavour at last. The watch on deck had no information to give; it was clear the man had been asleep, and he was duly sentenced to a flogging. Then we held a council. If Dawkins were near by, we should hear from him again before long. In that case, were we to fight? Run away we could not, for the wind had dropped. Now, buccaneers do not risk their skins in fighting unless there is a distinct advantage to be gained thereby, and Dawkins stood in very little danger from us. We were too small a force to harm him. All things considered, the captain (whose decision is final in all questions of fighting, chasing, or being chased) decided to clear for action and sit still. It was true that the boat might not have come from Dawkins, but from a strange ship, or even from Murch himself; but, even so, we had no alternative.
Yet I think we had made up our minds that it was Dawkins who had found us out—I hardly know why. Morning dawned in a windless calm, and I went ashore with a perspective glass and Morgan Leroux, who insisted on accompanying me, to climb the headland. We came to a bare place in the ridge, where the trees fell away, and there, looking northward, stretched a big lagoon, and on the shore a tall ship lay careened. Tents were pitched, the smoke of fires lifted light against the dark woods, and men were clustering like ants about the ship. That was the Blessed Endeavour, sure enough; I could tell her lines among a thousand.
“So there’s the long-lost bark,” says Morgan, staring through the glass. “She’s not far off, and yet she might as well be an ocean away, for all the use she is. I’ve a month’s mind to pay this Dawkins of yours a visit, Harry. Shall I ask him to dinner?”
In vain I adjured this obstinate girl to return. She laughed me to scorn.
“Your Dawkins does not know me,” said she. “Why should he harm me? I’m a brother skipper, d’ye see, out on the account, like himself. Oh, I’ll spin the man a yarn, never fear. Take your long face back to the captain with my compliments, Harry, and bid him prepare a dinner for Mr Dawkins by six o’clock. Adieu, my friend.” And she plunged into the wood.
Here was a quandary. It was my business to return to the ship and make report; yet how could I let this wild quean go alone into Dawkins’s camp? But supposing I went with her, what could I do against near a hundred pirates? Moreover, I had no longer any doubt but that our visitor of last night was sent by Dawkins, who must therefore be aware of our neighbourhood; and I reflected that Morgan could go on her errand alone with a much better face than if I were to accompany her. Besides, she was not running any great risk.
On the whole, it was better I should go back to the ship; and back I went, but ill at ease.
Captain Brandon Pomfrett fell into a violent passion when I gave him Morgan’s message.