"I am a dreadful, wicked girl to be thus in league with pirates," sighed Mistress Dorothy, "but I confess to you, Jack dear, that it would grieve my heart to see this charming pirate wear a hempen halter."
"My rival, is he? So I have found you out," flared Jack, pretending vast indignation. "Nevertheless, I shall still be true to him."
"And to me, I trust," she fondly replied. "Oh, I feel so thankful that faithful Trimble Rogers is keeping tryst. He will hear the soldiers blundering about in time to make Captain Bonnet take heed and shove off."
Jack walked home with her, very glad of the excuse, but with jealousy rankling in his bosom. It was not a lasting malady, however, and he had forgotten it next morning when he went early to the tavern to look for Trimble Rogers. There he found the major of the detachment at breakfast with an extraordinary story to tell. He had made a landing on Sullivan's Island after dark and deployed some of his men to patrol the beach that faced the ocean. The squad which remained with him had surprised a man lurking amongst the trees. Pursued and fired at, he had led them an infernal chase until they burst out upon the open beach. There they heard the sound of oars and voices in a boat which was making in for the shore. The hunted man raised his voice in one stentorian shout of:
"Pull out to sea, Cap'n Bonnet. And 'ware this coast. The soldiers are on my heels. Old Trimble Rogers sends a fare-ye-well."
The boat was wrenched about in a trice and moved away from the island, soon disappearing in the direction of the bar. The major's men had shot at it but without effect. When they had rushed to capture the fugitive who had shouted the warning, they found him prone upon the sand. There was not a scratch on him and yet he was quite dead. The prodigious exertion had broken his heart, ventured the major, and it had ceased to beat. His body would be prepared for Christian burial because of the esteem in which he was already held by many of the townspeople.
To Jack Cockrell and Joe Hawkridge it was sad news indeed but tender-hearted Bill Saxby mourned like one who had lost a parent. He closed the shop for a day and hung black ribbons on the knob. They agreed that the end had come for Trimble Rogers as he would have wished it, giving his life in loyal service to a friend and master. And perhaps it was better thus than for the creeping disabilities of old age to overtake him.
"He knew he was liable to pop off," said Bill, "with the rheumatism getting closer to his heart all the time. And he told me, did Trimble, that his share of the treasure was to go to the poor and needy of the town. Orphans and such was Trimble's weakness."