This trim little snow was making to the southward in fancied security, having picked up a landfall, as the marooned pirates conjectured. No doubt her master had failed to receive warning that Blackbeard was in these waters and he was running his risk of encountering other marauders. He must have seen that there were people in distress on the tide-washed strip of sand. The snow shifted her helm and fired a gun. The marooned wretches could scarce credit their amazing good fortune but a grave, slow-spoken fellow who had been a carpenter's mate in the Revenge thought the rejoicing premature.
"When that God-fearin' skipper takes a look at us, he will sheer off and clap on sail, lads. For shipwrecked sailors you are a pizen lot o' mugs. The only blighted one of ye what's the leastwise respectable is me."
Here was a terrible misgiving which clouded the bright anticipations. They were, indeed, an unlovely cargo for the little trading vessel to take on board. One of them whipped out a pair of scissors and hastily sawed at his unkempt whiskers while his comrades stood in line and waited their turn. Others discarded gaudy kerchiefs and pistol-belts, or kicked off Spanish jack-boots. Scraps of gold lace were also unpopular. But they could not get rid of scarred faces and rum-reddened noses and the other hall-marks of their trade.
To their immense relief, the snow displayed no signs of alarm but sailed as close as the shoaling water permitted and dipped her colors. The pirates flattered themselves that they were not as frightful as the carpenter's mate had painted them. And this New England shipmaster was a merciful man who would not leave his fellow mortals to perish. They saw a boat lowered from the snow and into it jumped half a dozen sailors, soberly clad in dungaree, with round straw hats on their heads. With a gush of gratitude, the pirates swore to deal courteously by these noble merchant mariners and to repay them in whatever manner possible.
Out into the murmuring surf rushed the mild-mannered rascals, eager to grasp the boat and haul it up. It was Joe Hawkridge, hovering in the background, who raised the first cry of astonishment. His voice was so affrighted that it quavered. Before the boat was half-way from the vessel, he perceived that these were no sedate seamen from the Massachusetts Colony, even though they were in dungaree and round straw hats. He was gazing at some of Ned Rackham's evil pirates whom he had last beheld on the shattered deck of the Plymouth Adventure where they had been left to build a raft for themselves!
The devil had looked after his own. They had floated away from the stranded ship and instead of landing on the beach had been rescued by this unfortunate snow whose crew had been disposed of in some violent manner. This much Joe Hawkridge comprehended, although his mind was awhirl. He was better off marooned. He had helped to turn the guns of the Plymouth Adventure against these very same men when they had been blown out of the after cabin and the ship retaken by Captain Jonathan Wellsby.
Whatever other plans they had in store, the first business would be to kill Joe Hawkridge. This was painfully obvious. He retreated still farther behind his companions and had a confused idea of digging into the sand and burying himself from view. The discovery that these were Blackbeard's pirates in the boat created general confusion but there was no fear of instant death. It was a situation excessively awkward for the marooned company but nevertheless open to parley and argument.
By hurried agreement, the carpenter's mate, Peter Tobey by name, was chosen as spokesman. Before he began to talk with the men in the boat, Joe Hawkridge called to him in piteous accents and begged him to step back in rear of the crowd for a moment. Tobey shouted to the boat to wait outside the surf and not attempt a landing.
"What's the row, Joe?" he asked, with a kindly smile. "'Tis a disappointment for all of us,—this tangle with Rackham's crew,—but why any worse for you?"
"I can't tell it all, Peter, but my life is forfeit once they lay hands on me."