The last buccaneer

There was no doubt that John Gamaliel had his profit out of the business. As Pomfrett’s assistant, the indents for stores and victuals passed through my hands; and Gamaliel’s signature became pretty familiar to me. The Jew, it presently appeared, supplied the most of the crew as well as the provisions. Tinkers, vagabonds, strolling fiddlers, country loobies, out-at-elbows clerks, negroes, and salted mariners: of such are the crews of ships; and all these did Gamaliel produce in due season. Going to and fro in Bristol, as I must in the first weeks of preparation, the Jew often accompanied me, beguiling me with endless stories of deep-sea voyagings. He told of the illimitable spaces of the sea, of a solitude inconceivable to the landsman, where the ship steals onward, day by day, for many weeks, until the faces of all on board are changed; “for they know,” said the Jew, “they are strangers in the secret places of the Almighty;” of the fated man in the ship’s company, the Jonah who brings bad luck, and who must be flung overboard, sooner or later; of the danger of having a clergyman aboard, for “God is jealous, he will have no priests on His sea;” of water-snakes, and sea-cows, and cannibal savages; of the casting away of vessels, beaten out of sight with a single wave, flung upon lee-shores, foundering on hidden rocks; of crews dying of thirst and scurvy, and eaten alive of worms; of derelict barks floating in mid-ocean, furnished with good water and provisions, and never a soul on board. He spoke with a kind of serious wonder, like a child; and I had to keep saying to myself that here was no untaught poet, but an agent-victualler of doubtful probity and a known crimp.

For convenience of transacting business, I lodged with Brandon Pomfrett at his uncle’s house; and to escape the tedium of Mr Pomfrett’s conversation, and the subtle irritation of Mrs A.’s dogmatism, we used to repair to the inn where Captain Shargeloes was lodging. I cannot say that I ever saw our skipper definitely drunk; on the other hand, I could not state, with any certainty, that he was ever sober. The captain was the easiest and most good-humoured of men; would drink and yarn with you for ever; but, at a certain point of intoxication, the word plot would invariably creep into his talk. Never, to be sure, was a poor seaman so plotted and caballed, by his account; owners, agents, officers, and crew—all were in a conspiracy, at one time or another. We learned to take leave of Captain Shargeloes at the word. I do not know how the notion became embedded in his mind; he had seen mutinies enough, and longshore conspiracies to cheat the guileless mariner of his own in plenty; but so had every skipper afloat. The truth was, I suppose, that he knew himself to be a simple man, destitute of natural cunning; so that he found himself, to his continual chagrin, no match for the sharks.

The notion of some plot a-foot began to stick in my own head, presently. Moreover, there was a certain unwholesome facility about the beginnings of our enterprise which I did not like. It was too easy to be altogether natural. A roystering mariner in a tavern, a glass bottle, a scrap of paper, a Jew fatally fluent of speech—and there were a tall ship fitting for sea, Mrs A.’s money shot into her, and Brandon and myself cut loose from our tedious, but safe, employments, and despatched to the ends of the earth. “Really, I am a lucky fellow,” says Brandon. “I know it, and am grateful for it. Everything’s in my favour, and there’s no doubt, as Mrs A. says—though I don’t care about her way of saying it—that it’s a great chance for a young man.” Well, I was uneasy; but I couldn’t for the life of me discover anything tangible to justify disquiet; unless it were the affair of the ship’s chaplain, which presently befell.

The clergyman was picked out from his native obscurity by the advice of Mrs A., who knew quite as much as was good for her about holy men. He was a thick, red-haired, hog of a man, was the Reverend Jeremiah Ramsbottom; a stupid, good-natured fellow, I thought him, when Brandon the younger brought him aboard the Blessed Endeavour, about three days before we sailed.

“What’s this?” says Mr Ramsbottom, catching up a handspike, and balancing the heavy bar like a walking-cane in his huge hand. “One could knock a man on the head with this,” says he, with a foolish grin. I saw Mr Dawkins eying the big man with unmistakable disfavour.

“Who’s that, then?” Dawkins asked me, when Brandon had taken the parson away. I told him, Mr Ramsbottom was appointed ship’s preacher.

“I’ll have no preachers aboard my ship,” says Dawkins, with an oath.

“You’ll have to talk to the captain about that,” I said.

“Ah, but it’s me that has to sail the ship,” returned Dawkins. “I’m sailing-master. I been shipmates with a clergyman before, and never again, says I to myself. Cross-currents, squalls, baffling winds, dead calms, water rotten—why, time and again, I would as lief as not a-run the blessed ship nose under, just to fetch up at the Golden Gates with my two hands on that there preachers’ neck-band. ‘Lord God,’ I’d say, humble on the quarterdeck, ‘I am but a sinful man, but grant me to take this Thy servant and toss him overboard off of a good lofty star, and I’ll go out of heaven quiet and orderly—ay, and glad to go.’”

“Well, why didn’t you, Mr Dawkins?”

“We keelhauled the holy man, and I reckon that was a surer way,” said Dawkins.

Now, to keelhaul a man is to lower him from the yard-arm on one side of the ship, haul him under the keel, and hoist him on the other side, several times. If he lose his senses, his executioners kindly wait until he recovers them, lest he should miss the full benefit of the discipline. After these expressions of animosity, I was surprised to remark Mr Dawkins consorting with the Reverend Jeremiah, apparently on the most friendly terms; and, with less astonishment, that upon several occasions the clergyman came aboard with a glazed eye and an uncertain footstep. But when, upon the day we were to sail, he was nowhere to be found, I understood. And Mr Dawkins kindly volunteered to take a search-party round the taverns, and if the parson were still undiscovered, the churches of Bristol city.

“What, and lose the tide?” quoth the captain. “And to-morrow Friday? No, sir. I’ve never cut sail on a Friday yet, and I wouldn’t do it for the Archbishop of Canterbury. With a Bible and a flag and the Church of England Prayer-Book, we’ll try to make out, Mr Dawkins.”

So that zealous officer had his way; we sailed without Mr Ramsbottom.

At eight o’clock of a fine summer evening the bells were chiming in the steeple of the great church, the town was wrapt in a golden haze, and the quays were moving with people, as we dropped down the river with the tide. Suddenly, the old city, changing its aspect and gesture as we receded, put on an expression of home. It was as though a piece of herself were detached and sent floating away—away to the inhospitable wilderness of the sea. The little group on the wharf that watched our departure dwindled to an indistinguishable blot, their waving kerchiefs tiny specks of white; the sound of the bells fell fainter and farther, rose and sank, and died away; the Blessed Endeavour was forth to seek her fate.

The second day out, a council of officers was held, to determine the port of call on the way to Yucatan. Our instructions were to proceed directly thither, leaving all attempt to take prizes until the question of the hidden silver was settled. Dawkins broke out at once, in his loud, domineering manner.

“I vote for Hispaniola,” says he. “For why? The provisions is rotten, I reckon, and there we can get the boucan and ruff-dried beef from the hunters.”

“I have had no complaint of the provisions, master,” says the captain, in a sudden heat of anger.

“Ah, well, you will,” returned Dawkins, composedly. “And a mutiny too, I shouldn’t wonder.”

“Where’s the agent?” shouted the captain. “Where’s Mr Pomfrett?”

“Sick in his berth,” said someone.

“Sick! I’ll have no officer sick aboard my ship,” fumed the captain. “Fetch Mr Pomfrett.”

We were lifting and dipping over the long swell of the Channel mouth. Brandon shot into the cabin on the back of a roller, and crumpled down into his chair, white and dizzy.

“What’s this I hear of the provisions, Mr Agent?”

“I haven’t seen any provisions since I came aboard,” Brandon answered, faintly.

The captain made a movement of impatience. “You said mutiny, I think, Mr Dawkins,” said he. “Mutiny! Let me tell you, sir, I have a short way with mutineers. I know how to deal with a plot.”

“That’s it,” said Dawkins. “On’y, if you feed the beasts with sound victual and plenty of it, why, they don’t think of nothing but their bellies. And so, d’ye see, they don’t mutiny. Therefore I says Hispaniola.”

“It’s a French island,” said the captain. “We don’t want to make a present of the ship to the enemy, sir.”

“I reckon,” said Dawkins, “the hunters would sooner sell beef than try to take a ship which they couldn’t do nothing with if they had it. But you know best, Mr Shargeloes, not a doubt about it.”

“Well, sir,” says the captain, mollified, “I vote for Barbadoes, as an English island. What do you think, Mr Agent?”

Mr Agent, being incapable of thought, chanced to side with the captain. When the votes were counted, it was Brandon’s vote that turned the scale. We were to go to Barbadoes.

“And as to mutiny, Mr Dawkins,” said the captain, harping on his dread aversion, “I should tell you that I do not like the word. It’s a dangerous word—an unlucky word at sea—eh?”

“I don’t value the word a penny,” says Dawkins. “Any word will do for me, Mr Shargeloes. I seen a many such”—thus did Mr Dawkins clear the sunken rock—“maroonings, knives going, and what not, but I never see much gained by it. It don’t frighten me. There’s things which frighten a man, and things which don’t, d’ye see? I reckon what scares me most,” said Mr Dawkins, simply, “is a poor old age a-drawing nigh with no money and no rations.”

Whether the captain liked it or not, there was discontent in the air. The salt pork was rotten, the stock-fish putrid, the biscuit worm-infested, and—worst of all—the beer was sour. Pomfrett cursed Gamaliel for a thief, as he was; but he might have discovered a fraud so gross and palpable before the victuals were shipped. Mr Brandon Pomfrett got his first lesson in the business of his office at the expense of the crew. For, in the cabin, we had store of hams, beef, tongues, cheese, and wine to last us nearly to the West Indies.

We had been a week at sea, when the boatswain came aft at the head of a deputation of some dozen seamen. He carried a steaming pannikin, which reeked like carrion.

“It ain’t our way,” said the boatswain, after presenting the mess to the captain, “to complain of the ship’s rations. But as to this here—well, there, we only asks you, sir, kindly to taste of it.”

The captain, holding the pannikin in his hand, continued to gaze silently at the boatswain and the uneasy, sullen mob behind that plaintive officer.

“Men,” said he, presently, “you know as well as I do that I have nothing to do with the victualling. You know that while we’re at sea we must eat what there is, good or bad, simply because there’s nothing else to be got. When we fetch up in port, I can promise you fresh provisions. Now go forward—and take this with you.” He would have returned the stinking tin to the boatswain, but the boatswain put his hands behind him and backed a step or two.

“Captain Shargeloes,” said he, “what you say is true and fair, when the whole ship’s company goes on short allowance. But now it is not so. Let the officers mess aft the same as what the seamen mess forward, is what we says, and we’ll go back to our duty, and say no more about it.”

“You’ll go back now, and smart,” says the captain, darkening. “This is a plot. I knew it. I see what you would be at, you——”

The boatswain made a rush forward, but Dawkins was too quick for him, striking him heavily on the head with a pistol-butt, so that he tumbled sideways. The rest of the mutineers hesitated a moment; the watch on deck, their wavering minds decided, probably, by the fall of the boatswain, came running aft; there was a scuffle, and the thing was over, the deputation being hustled below into irons. The captain was still holding the pannikin in his hand. He looked at it, hove it over the rail, and spat after it. Then he invited the intrepid Dawkins to drink with him, and the two, going below, stayed there a long time.

The boatswain and his following were flogged. They had six dozen apiece, and were disabled for a fortnight afterwards. When their backs were healed enough to bear their coats, they were had upon the quarterdeck, where they made humble submission; and the captain forgave them.

“I knew there was a plot brewing,” says he, “before ever we were clear of the river. You can’t hide it from me, my men—don’t hope to do it. I can smell it—smell it in the air, like a dashed thunderstorm. Now all’s clear again—I know that without your telling me. I would have every jack-rabbit of you swinging at the yard-arm else, as sure as sunrise.”

The captain’s words were bold enough; but there was something about the man that told another story. His long, lean neck, like a fowl’s, twisted uneasily at every sound as he paced the quarterdeck; his brown fingers were for ever hovering at his mouth; he was continually drinking. I believe Captain Shargeloes to have been as brave a man as ever stepped; but he was haunted by the ineradicable conviction that the world was in a conspiracy against him, and weakened by the suspicion that his wits were dull. I say that he was brave; I believe he never ceased to combat this fatal prepossession; it was the real Captain Shargeloes fighting the false. Liquor was his chief weapon—the worst he could have chosen. And, lest he should want encouragement, Mr Dawkins was ever at his elbow to suggest a tot of rum, a drop of French brandy, a glass of Schiedam. Dawkins had a head like the bitts; he was seldom the worse for liquor; but the captain grew as limp as a swab. You could see that his burden grew heavier upon him; but he stuck to it with a kind of hopeless patience.

“You young men should be happy,” he once said, addressing Pomfrett and myself. Pomfrett looked at him with his serious blue eyes. Brandon was asking himself, conscientiously, if he were happy, or not.

“You don’t command a water-logged ship,” continued Shargeloes, gloomily. “I mean,” he explained, “you have no wife and no nine children depending on you. Not that that would matter, if a man had a chance. But what chance do these owners give their captains?—saving your presence, Mr Agent. The ship stuffed with rotten provisions, the crew a set of mutinous rake-hells, nothing square, nothing aboveboard, the whole voyage a speculation, and the captain responsible for all.”

“What do you suspect, sir?”

“I? Nothing,” returned Shargeloes. “Who said I did? But I know what stuff I have to deal with, and, I tell you, I’m tired of it, tired to death. Well, I’ve done it before, and I’ll do it again,” he maundered. “And mark my words, five-and-twenty years I’ve been to sea, and this voyage is all or nothing; it’s fortune or a lee-shore for life this time.”

“How did Captain Shargeloes get the command?” I asked Brandon, when we were alone.

“He put money in the venture—all his savings, so he told my uncle. He has the name of a good sailor. I can’t think what’s wrong,” said Brandon. “As to being happy, what about the owners’ agent? There’s responsibility, if you like! The skipper’s only got to sail the ship, and Dawkins does that for him. Dawkins is all taut and trim,” says the agent, who was becoming nautical in his language. “His cargo doesn’t shift.”

Indeed, the master was a popular man aboard. The men said, openly, that Mr Dawkins was the only officer who had spoken for them at the council, advising the captain to put into port (at Hispaniola or elsewhere) for fresh victuals. He was free with his tongue, and very brisk with a handspike; but that was all in the way of business. The captain might swear as he pleased; the crew had small respect for their commander. “Dawkins, he’s a good bit o’ stuff. He oughter been captain, Dawkins ought. As for Charley-goes, he’s no better than bilge.” So went the talk in the forecastle.

When we reached the latitude of thirty-nine degrees and forty minutes, the customary dreary and ridiculous baptismal ceremonies were observed. The captain had fallen sick of a fever and taken to his bed. The master’s mate had blackened his face with soot from the galley, attired himself in a white gown made of an old sail patched upon with scarlet blotches, and a tall red cap. With a sword of lath in his hand and a pannikin of ink at his side, he called before him the green hands, one by one. They kneeled before him, while he made the sign of the cross upon their foreheads in ink, and struck them smartly over the shoulders with his wooden sword. A bucket of water was then flung over them, and the baptism was done. The regenerate must each give a bottle of brandy—or the price of one—for the benefit of the old seamen, standing the bottles round the mainmast. The rout was in full swing—the red cap of the executioner burning like a flame in the strong glare of the sun, amid the mob of glistening, grinning faces; the decks awash, cries, oaths, and laughter sounding out upon the empty sea—when, from my station on the poop, leaning on the rail, I saw a figure stealthily emerge from the cabin doors immediately beneath. It was the captain. Stripped to the waist, a naked cutlass in his hand, he stood for a moment in the shadow of the poop, staring at the tumult. Then he stole to the side, and before I could cry out to Dawkins, who was standing by the wheel, he had sprung upon the rail, dropping his cutlass, and dived overboard. The alarm was given, but in the disorder it was several minutes before a boat was lowered. They pulled about for an hour; but the captain was never seen again.