I thought it a strange thing to be placed a prisoner under the hatches of an old schoolfellow; but the assurance that he and I had trembled under the same birch, and played on the same hill-side together, gave me, with his promise of safety, some consolation. My hands were permitted to be at liberty, but my feet were ordered to be kept in irons; and when I went upon the deck I could not step more than six inches at a time. I knew not how my fellow-prisoners fared, for I never saw them.
One day I was requested, or rather I ought to say, ordered, to dine with the pirate-captain.
"Your name is Robert," said he to me; and I answered that it was.
"Well," he continued, "I wish to save your life, and if it were possible I would spare also your comrades. But there would be danger in doing so, and my fellows, whom I must sometimes humour, are to a man against it. I will try however, either to place you on board a vessel that is not worth shot, or on some island where you are certain of being picked up. In the meantime, here is a purse for you, which, you will find will do you more good on shore than any services of mine. A father and a mother's care," he added, "I have never known, and from rumour only do I suppose who my parents were. I owe mankind nothing for the kindness they have shewn me; and the same love and mercy which I have received from them, I have measured out to them again. Farewell!" he said, and left me.
I knew that he was the reputed son of a gentleman who had held extensive possessions in Cumberland, but that something of mystery hung over his birth, and that it was reported cruel and unjust means had been resorted to, to deprive him of his lawful inheritance.
His words produced no pleasant feeling in my mind. I found myself in the situation of a person who was pinioned to a certain spot, with a sword suspended over his head by a single hair. But while he spoke I fancied that I heard the sighs of a female in distress. When he left me they were repeated more audibly. I went towards a door in the cabin, which led to an apartment from whence the sound seemed to proceed. I attempted to open the door of the chamber, which was unlocked, and I entered it. Before me sat a lady whose age appeared to be below twenty. She raised her eyes towards me as I entered, and tears ran down her cheeks. Till then I had never seen a face so beautiful, and, I will add, or felt beauty's power—I felt as if suddenly ushered into the presence of a being who was more than mortal.
Our interview I will not describe. We spoke little; and the words which we did speak were in low and hurried whispers. For we heard the sound of our tyrant's feet pacing over our head, and to have found us in conversation together might have been death to both. Almost without knowing what I said, or for lack of other words, I spoke of the possibility of our escape. A faint smile broke through her tears, and she twice waved her hand silently, as if to say, "It is hopeless!—it is hopeless!"
From that moment she was present in all my thoughts, when awake she became the one idea of my mind, and in sleep she was the object of my dreams. As I was indulged with some degree of liberty, we met frequently, and although our interviews were short, they were as "stolen water," or as "bread eaten in secret." Their existence was brief, but their memory long. I had informed her of my early acquaintance with the pirate commander, and of all that passed between us from the time of my becoming his prisoner. And when she had heard all, even she indulged in the dream that our escape might be possible.
It was about a week after my discovery of the fair captive, that I ascertained that two of those who had become prisoners with myself had joined the pirates, and the others had been cast into the sea. My fate their captain still left undecided. My anxiety to escape increased tenfold; but how it was to be accomplished, was a question which for ever haunted me, but which I could never answer.
One day we came in contact with a Dutch lugger, laden with Hollands. The pirates boarded her, but they only bled the vessel, as they termed it; they did not take the whole cargo. With what they did take, however, they made a merry carousal; they first became uproarious in their mirth, and eventually they sobered down into a state in which a child might have bound them. I observed the change that was wrought upon them—I saw the advantage I had gained. My thoughts became fixed upon how to profit by it.