Black’erchief Dick, his eyes flashing and his face showing bright and triumphant in the flickering lantern light, shouted the words over the side of Ben’s boat to a little knot of picked men of the Anny’s crew, who were ranged on the sand below.
They were present to witness their captain’s marriage to Anny Farran, and incidentally to carry the rum which was the price of his bride.
The worn deck of the Pet had been cleaned and partially cleared for the occasion. Dick had insisted on this, and, in spite of the protestations of the two old people, Ben and Pet, the work had been done and the place presented a fairly tidy aspect.
The empty kegs were ranged in neat rows round the gunwale, the clothes-line had been removed and the rest of the litter swept down the hatchway.
It was almost dark, and the cloudless sky was a pale blue shading off to rose and green in the west where the first two or three stars shone faintly.
On deck a big ship’s lantern stood on the stump of the main-mast while two smaller ones hung on each side of it; they showed sick and yellow in the half-light.
Standing before this improvised altar was a man dressed as a priest. He held a book in his hand and was mumbling to himself nervously in a foreign tongue. On either side of him were Blueneck and Noah Goody; their knives were drawn and their faces set like wooden masks.
Before them, in a gorgeous ill-fitting gown of yellow Lyons silk which Dick had brought and insisted on her wearing, stood Anny. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes dancing with excitement. Round her neck hung a great silver pendant studded with garnets, and every now and then her hand would stray up to this and her fingers caress it lovingly, half wonderingly. On the little brown hand shone a ring; it was an extraordinary jewel, consisting of a little gold hoop supporting a large flower, each petal of which was a different kind of stone: diamond, ruby, emerald, onyx, pearl, and sapphire, with a little piece of amber for the centre.
Dick had told her that it was very old when he had put it on her finger, and she looked at it with something very like awe.
Behind her stood Ben and Pet; the old man swayed to and fro drunkenly, taking little or no interest in the proceedings, but the old woman watched eagerly, half enviously, her bleared eyes following Anny’s every movement and each gleam of the jewels, her quick ears catching each word that was spoken. Nothing escaped her, and she noticed that the priest’s garments were made for a much larger man, and that his book was upside down, but she said nothing and merely smiled wickedly to herself as the ceremony went on.