“If that is the case, he is not the fellow we are in search of,” answered Mr Norton. “A pirate would have his eyes about him.”
“Perhaps, as he is becalmed and cannot get away, he hopes, by apparent indifference to our approach, to deceive us as to his character,” suggested Linton; “or he may have mistaken us for a merchantman, and expects to make a prize of us.”
“He’ll find he’s caught a Tartar,” said Saltwell; “but he must be blind not to see by the cut of our canvas what we are, even at this distance.”
“Perhaps, he trusts to a fleet pair of heels, and we shall have him showing them to us before long,” said Linton. “I do not think there is anything yet to prove that he is not the pirate we are looking for. That fellow Zappa is a bold and crafty scoundrel, as his late visit to Malta and his successful attack on the Austrian brig sufficiently proves. He may have a mind to engage us, perhaps.”
“You don’t know the Greeks, if you think so,” said Saltwell. “Why, you must have pictured him to yourself like one of the heroes in the romances you are so fond of, who fight alone for love and glory, and whose greatest delight is to lay their ships alongside an enemy of greater force, in order to prove how superior knaves are to honest men. Depend upon it, Signor Zappa will keep clear of us, if he can.”
“Well, but what do you say to his attacking an Austrian man-of-war, and capturing her?” urged Linton. “That looks something like the chivalry of piracy.”
“As to that, in the first place, he discovered, by some means or other, that she had specie on board; and she was also of much less force than his vessel. He carries, it is said, sixteen guns, and she had but eight,” answered Saltwell. “So he followed her for some time, till he surprised her one dark night, and captured her before her crew had time to go to quarters. It did not say much for Austrian naval discipline, though it was not an enterprise Zappa had any great reason to boast of, either.”
“If the account I heard is true, he acted, however, the part of a magnanimous conqueror; for, after he had rifled the brig, and taken everything he wanted out of her, he allowed her and her officers and crew to go free, without murdering a soul of them, which, at all events, speaks in his favour,” said Linton.
“Well, if that is his vessel, we shall soon know more about him and her,” observed Saltwell. “We are nearing her fast. I shall go aloft, and try if I can make out what her hull is like.”
They drew nearer and nearer the stranger, who still continued her course to the northward under the same easy sail.