He knew nothing of the evil that he had done to his
new boon companion, for of his many victims how could he remember the
woman and the two boys whom he had slain with such levity so long ago!
When, therefore, he received a challenge to himself and to his
quartermaster for a carouse upon the last evening of their stay at the
Caicos Bank he saw no reason to refuse.
A well-found passenger ship had been rifled the week before, so their
fare was of the best, and after supper five of them drank deeply
together. There were the two captains, Birthmark Sweetlocks, Ned
Galloway, and Israel Martin, the old buccaneers-man. To wait upon them
was the dumb steward, whose head Sharkey split with a glass, because he
had been too slow in the filling of it. The quarter-master has slipped
Sharkey's pistols away from him, for it was an old joke with him to fire
them cross-handed under the table and see who was the luckiest man.
It was a pleasantry which had cost his boatswain his leg, so now, when
the table was cleared, they would coax Sharkey's weapons away from him
on the excuse of the heat, and lay them out of his reach.
The captain's cabin of the _Ruffling Harry_ was in a deck-house upon the
poop, and a stern-chaser gun was mounted at the back of it. Round shot
were racked round the wall, and three great hogsheads of powder made a
stand for dishes and for bottles.
Pages:
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87