University of Virginia Library

7. CHAPTER VII.
THE CUTTER.

`Flag ahoy!' shouted the Englishman through his trumpet; having first said
to his lieutenant in an under tone, `I will be first to hail and so not let them
suspect we fear them or want their flag to fly for us.'

`Ho, the corvette!' called Freemantle without regarding the hail; `ho, the
corvette.'

`Well, the devil!' exclaimed the English captain, to the officers around him,
`that is cool enough. I should think he was hailing me from a three-decker.
The fellow has no beard. The Privateer captain has sent his clerk. I'll
teach him how to hail one of his majesty's ship in this fashion.—Ho, the cutter
ahoy! Pull along side,' he commanded in an authoritative tone.

`I have only to say to you, sir Englishman,' answered Freemantle in a clear
tone of voice that was distinctly heard—every syllable of it, `I have pulled up
to you only to say that, seeing your guns command the merchantman, if you
dare to fire into her I will sink you.'

`The deuce you will!' answered the captain of the sloop looking pale, but
laughing derisively. `Go back and tell your captain or skipper that I shall
fire into the ship and into his schooner just so soon as I get my guns clear.'

`I am the master of that schooner, sir, and I repeat the words,' answered the
young man in the same resolute tone. My gun is now trained on you; and
you have already felt its effects. The moment I strike this flag, that instant
you will receive another one of my agreeable visiting cards. I give you thirty
seconds to make up your mind.' Here the Privateersman took out his
watch.

`Cool very! confound him!' answered the captain turning with surprise to
look into the faces of the officers.

`We are certainly at the mercy of the schooner,' said his first lieutenant,
Everby. `One more shot like that last would do for us.'

`I shall have to give the promise not to fire. What a decided villain he is,
and not even a beard. Flag ahoy!'

`Corvette!'

`I would first know if you are the commander of that schooner?'

`Yes. Are you ready to give the promise not to fire?' he asked holding up
his watch.

`Yes, if you will promise on your part to cease firing.'

`That I promise. You are to make no further efforts to take possession of
the merchantman.'

`I am not? That is not in the bargain!' answered the Englishman angrily

`But I make it in the bargain. It is my request that you cease all further
hostilities towards the ship.'

`A very modest request,' answered the captain with an oath.

`Yes, and one I shall enforce. I know that you lie at my mercy, wrecked
as you are. Either make the promise to cease all hostile acts towards the ship,
or in less than five seconds I shall make the signal which will bring another
one of my shot into your cabin windows.'

`There is no alternative, captain Duncanlee,' said two or three of his elder
officers, seeing him hesitate, as if half resolved to let his vessel be destroyed
before giving a promise that showed so plainly his own weakness and the other's
power. To be conquered as it were, and have his prize taken from before
his eyes by a little schooner commanded by a mere youth, seemed to him a
degredation that no British officer could survive with honor.

`I have no time to lose, sir,' called out the young privateersman imperatively;
and as he spoke he elevated the flag in his hand as if about to depress it
to the water as the signal for firing the sixty-four pounder.

`I promise, then, you infernal Yankee!' shouted the English Captain.

Freemantle bowed and smiled, waved his hand in polite adieu, and re-placing
the flag in the stern of his boat he gave the order to pull on board the
merchantman, which lay directly abeam of the corvette, about three cables'
length or a third of a mile distant.

`I have not been too prompt, Hebert,' said Freemantle smiling as he reealled
the fury and chagrin of the English captain, whose tremendous oaths followed
him and his boat; `you see they have got seven of their guns clear from
the sails and rigging that overhung the side, and before we reach the merchantman,
her broadside will be gaping wide open upon us.'

`If he had had his ports clear when you first hailed him, I believe his reply
would have been the discharge of his whole broadside into the prize,' said
Hebert gazing back upon the dismasted vessel of war.

`I think it more than likely. But as he could not fire them, the delay enabled
me to bring him to terms. He well knows that, as he lays, he is in my
power.'

`Yet if he could bring his guns to bear upon the schooner, there is no question
but he would riddle her like a seive. See, sir, he is getting out two boats
ahead. That can be only to tow her head round to take the schooner.'

`That is quite likely his intentions. I made him give no promise not to fire
upon my vessel, nor did I care to. I can take care of my own craft! Yet he
is pulling his ship round to square her on the schooner, there is now no doubt.

`And will you let him fire into her? If he gets the schooner abeam he wont
mind her big gun so much: and you lose your power.'

Freemantle mused an instant, then ordered the men to back-water; and
seizing his trumpet he hailed the Englishman:

`Call your boats aboard, sir!'

`I'm d—d if I do!' thundered back the Captain of the corvette.

`You see your crippled condition! I can improve it with one motion of my
hand towards my schooner. If you chose to haul off as you are and take care

of yourself, you are at liberty to go unmolested. But touch fire to one of your
guns aimed either at the schooner or ship, and I will see that you never get
clear of this bay. There are three or four heavy privateers in Boston harbor
and Salem, which the noise of all this cannonading will bring down here. Nay,
if you will look to the northward you will see a topsail schooner already rounding
the point of that island two leagues to the north! I give you good advice,
and you will do well to take it. It is true you may do me mischief, but you
will be paid back with interest before you can get your ship, crippled as she
is, off soundings.'

`It must be done, or it will be as he says,' said Captain Duncanlee, turning
to his officers. `What do you make of that schooner in the northern board,
Mr. Everby, with the glass?'

`An armed schooner filled with men! and to windward of her heaves in
sight a schooner-brig, that from her square canvass and rake is a privateer!'

`The fellow told the truth. A bee isn't much of a bird, but when they begin
to sting they are troublesome. These fellows are small but they carry
stings that do an infernal sight of mischief. We must do now as boys do
when they put their foot into a hornet's nest, turn backs and run for it!'

`Shall I call the boat in, sir?'

`Yes, Mr. Everby; and the curse of Cromwell light on this young Yankee.'

The boats which had been sent out with lines attached to the end of the jib-boom,
for the purpose of bringing her bows round, to square her against the
schooner, were now ordered along side, and Captain Duncanlee gave orders
for men to go to work to rig jury-masts. The head sails, her only canvass,
were braced up, and by means of a stay-sail bent upon a stay, which they
passed from the head of the foremast to the weather main chains, they succeeded
in a few minutes in getting the corvette under steering weigh before
the wind. Half of the crew were employed in rigging jury masts, and the
rest in lifting on board and saving the yards, topsails, top-gallant-sails and
coursers, which had been cut away from the guns, and now lay in the water
along side impeding her way.

As soon as Freemantle saw the boats called in he resumed his seat in the
stern-sheets of his boat, and gave the order for his men to pull again towards
the merchant-ship.

Hebert sat for a few moments gazing in silent astonishment upon the serene
face of the young privateersman, whose coolness and quiet daring had achieved
so much. He wondered as much at the indifference which he displayed to
his extraordinary acts of intrepidity, as at the acts themselves. Certainly,
thought he, he is the most extraordinary person I ever beheld; and as he gazed
on him a feeling of rivalry, a spirit of ambition took possession of his bosom;
and under its influence he spoke:

`Noble Freemantle, from this moment I cast my fortunes in with you. Your
life is such as I would love to lead. You know I have been dismissed from
the service; but it was because I loved too well! I am weary of this idle life
ashore; and if you will give me a position in the privateer I am yours.'

The young privateersman smiled slightly. It was neither an expression of

pleasure, nor was it exactly one of contempt; but it was a combination of two
emotions. Hebert did not see it, for at the same instant a cannon-ball flew,
whizzing over their heads and struck the water, dashing it high into the air,
not twenty yards ahead of them. Hebert had dodged involuntarily; but the
young privateersman betrayed no other emotion than a quick, stern glance in
the direction of the corvette, and a look upon his face as if waiting to see if a
second would be fired; at the same time he raised the flag of truce in the air
ready to dash it at his feet! The answering flag was waved several times
from the quarter deck of the corvette, and every port instantly closed.

`It was an accident, or else finding they missed their aim, they are willing
to be quiet again,' he said, resuming his seat. `You are welcome to sail with
me, Mr. Hebert,' he answered, as if nothing had occurred between the proposal
of the latter, and his reply. `But I have, as you have already seen, the
strictest subordination on board my vessel. It may not please you!'

`What birth will you give me?'

`That of my first officer, if you like it. Mine is about to leave me! I know
you are a brave man and good sailor; and I hope we shall agree.'

`I will go with you, sir!'

`Now?'

`I will come on board in Boston to-morrow, as you say you return there tonight.'

`Be it so!'

The movements of the boat had been watched from the merchantman with
the deepest interest and curiosity. The conference between the persons they
beheld standing up in her, and the captain of the corvette they had not heard;
but they witnessed the progress of things with the most painful solicitude.
Each moment they had feared that their captor might fire into them in revenge
for the damage done by the schooner to him; and the shout of pleasure with
which the sight of the toppling masts gave them, was checked by the fears of
retributive vengeance upon themselves.

Upon the quarter deck of the ship paced to and fro the captain, with his
glass in his hand, and his countenance full of sorrow and mortification. Amid
ships the mates were at work clearing away and repairing damages made by
the shot of the corvette, when she discharged her broadside into her across
the schooner. She had lost her fore-top-gallant mast and royal yard, received
three shot in her hull, and two or three through her main topsail as it lay back
to the mast; for all this while the merchantman was laying to, as at the first,
awaiting her destiny. She was a very large ship, quite as large as the corvette,
but her six guns were of small calibre and badly mounted; and one of
these lay across the main hatch, its carriage shivered to pieces by a shot that
entered the port and dismounted it. There was also several spots of blood
upon the decks, showing that death had been there as well as on board the
other two vessels.

Not far from the captain stood a tall slender man, of a gentlemanly presence.
He was about fifty years of age, with a dark Indian complexion, and an expression

of intelligence animating his fine face. His countenance was now anxious
and he was watching the advance of the little boat with intense interest.

`I should like to know who that privateersman is that has come in so gallantly
to my aid,' cried the captain of the merchantman, stopping and looking
over the quarter; `and I should like to know what he has been pulling under
the stern of the corvette for. He is a bold, brave fellow, but he did us a mischief
in coming between us and the enemy, and giving us the benefit of the
shot meant for him.'

`So long as it did us so little mischief, Captain Niles,' replied the gentleman,
`I am not sorry that we got it instead of the schooner. So near as she
was it would have sunk her; and he deserved to escape for his gallantry and
courage! Certainly no man could ever come up to another's rescue with more
skill and generosity than he has done, to say nothing of the cool intrepidity he
has displayed from the very first. But for him, we should have been now involuntary
guests on board the Englishman.'

`And we are likely to be still, Mr. Forrest,' said the Captain. `I have
struck, and the schooner can do us now no good; for we are as completely in
the power of the corvette as if she had not lost her masts! But I must see to
receiving this boat? Who is that youth on board, pilot?' he asked of the privateer's
pilot, whom Freemantle had sent in the boat which had been stove by
the cannon-ball and sunk.

`It is the captain of the schooner, sir.'

`That youth,' exclaimed Mr. Forrest.

`He is a man every inch of him, sir,' answered the pilot in a tone of pride.

The next moment the cutter was along side, and Freemantle stood upon the
deck of the merchantman.