CHAPTER XIV
BLACKBEARD APPEARS IN FIRE AND BRIMSTONE
HERE was a tragic predicament from which there was no release. Jack Cockrell was firmly convinced that Blackbeard must have recognized him that day in the swamp while Joe felt no less certain that he was marked for death because he had been one of the party of marooned mutineers. The hope of prolonging their existence by means of raiding the storeroom had ebbed after Joe's investigation. Such provisions as had been broken out of bulk were kept in lockers and pantries on deck where they were convenient to the galley and forecastle. It was realized also that their twittering nerves could not long withstand the darkness and suspense once the brig had put out to sea. Joe Hawkridge had nothing more to say about enduring it a month o' Sundays.
While the brig remained at anchor they clung to the thought that Captain Stede Bonnet might intervene in their behalf. It did bring them a gleam of solace to imagine him hoisting sail on the Revenge and crowding out to rake the brig with his formidable broadsides. And yet they were in doubt whether the Revenge was fit to proceed at once, what with all the work there had been to do, rigging a new foremast, caulking leaky seams, repairing the other ravages of the storm.
These pitiable stowaways had no means of telling one hour from another until, at length, they heard over their heads the faint, musical strokes of the ship's bell on the forecastle head. This led them to believe that the fog had cleared else Blackbeard would not have revealed the vessel's position. And lifting fog meant a breeze to sweep it away from the harbor.
"Eight bells she strikes, the first o' the forenoon watch," said Joe. "We have been cooped in this black pit a matter of three hours a'ready."
"No more than that?" groaned Jack. "It seems at least a week. We must divert ourselves in some wise. What say if I learn you a bit o' Latin? And you can say over such sea songs as come to mind, for me to tuck in my memory."
"Well said, my worthy scholar. 'Tis high time we bowled ahead with my eddication as a proper gentleman."
Jack began to conjugate amo, amas, amat, and the pupil droned it after him but the verb to love recalled a black-eyed lass who had stolen his heart in the Azores and he veered from the Latin lesson to confide that sentimental passage. So Jack hammered nouns of the first declension into him until they grew tired of that, and then the sea waif played his part by reciting such fo'castle ballads as "Neptune's Raging Fury; or The Gallant Seaman's Sufferings," and "Sir Walter Raleigh Sailing in the Lowlands."