CHAPTER XXI
A PROJECTED MARRIAGE
Strange as it may appear, Dickory Charter was not a very unhappy youngfellow as he stood in his fine uniform on the quarter-deck of theRevenge, the fresh breeze ruffling his brown curls when he lifted hisheavy cocked hat.
True, he was leaving behind him his friends, Captain Bonnet and BenGreenway, with whom the wayward Blackbeard would allow no word ofleave-taking; true, he was going, he knew not where, and in the power ofa man noted the new world over for his savage eccentricities; and true,he might soon be sailing, hour by hour, farther and farther away fromthe island on which dwelt the angel Kate--that angel Kate and hismother. But none of these considerations could keep down the gladfeeling that he was going, that he was moving. Moreover, in answer toone of his impassioned appeals to be set ashore at Jamaica, Blackbeardhad said to him that if he should get tired of him he did not see, atthat moment, any reason why he should not put him on board someconvenient vessel and have him landed at Kingston.
Dickory did not believe very much in the black-bearded pirate, with hiswild tricks and inhuman high spirits, but Jamaica lay to the east, andhe was going eastward.
Incited, perhaps, by the possession of a fine ship, manned by a crewpicked from his old vessel and from the men who had formed the crew ofthe Revenge, Blackbeard was in better spirits than was his wont, and sofar as his nature would allow he treated Dickory with fair good-humour.But no matter what happened, his unrestrained imagination never failedhim. Having taken the fancy to see Dickory always in full uniform, heallowed him to assume no other clothes; he was always in navalfull-dress and cocked hat, and his duties were those of a privatesecretary.
"The only shrewd thing I ever knew your Sir Nightcap to do," he said,"was to tell me you could not read nor write. He spoke so glibly that Ibelieved him. Had it not been so I should have sent you to the town tohelp with the shore end of my affairs, and then you would have beenthere still and I should have had no admiral to write my log andstraighten my accounts."
Sometimes, in his quieter moods, when there was no provocation to sendpistol-balls between two sailors quietly conversing, or to perform someother demoniac trick, Blackbeard would talk to Dickory and ask allmanner of questions, some of which the young man answered, while some hetried not to answer. Thus it was that the pirate found out a great dealmore about Dickory's life, hope, and sorrows than the young fellowimagined that he made known. He discovered that Dickory was greatlyinterested in Bonnet's daughter, and wished above all other things inthis world to get to her and to be with her.
This was a little out of the common run of things among the brotherhood;it was their fashion to forget, so far as they were able, the familyties which already belonged to them, and to make no plans for any futureties of that sort which they might be able to make. Such a thing amusedthe generally rampant Blackbeard, but if this Dickory boy whom they hadon board really did wish to marry some one, the idea came into thecrafty mind of Blackbeard that he would like to attend to that marryinghimself. It pleased him to have a finger in every pie, and now here wasa pie in the fingering of which he might take a novel interest.
This renowned desperado, this bloody cutthroat, this merciless piratepossessed a home--a quiet little English home on the Cornwall coast,where the cheerful woods and fields stretched down almost in reach ofthe sullen sea. Here dwelt his wife, quiet Mistress Thatch, and here hisbrawny daughter. Seldom a word came to this rural home from the father,burning and robbing, sinking and slaying out upon the western seas. Butfrom the stores of pelf which so often slipped so easily into his greatarms, and which so often slipped just as easily out of them, came nowand then something to help the brawn grow upon his daughter's bones andto ease the labours of his wife.
Eliza Thatch bore no resemblance to a houri; her hair was red, her facewas freckled; she had enough teeth left to do good eating with when shehad a chance, and her step shook the timbers of her little home.
Her father had heard from her a little while ago by a letter she had hadconveyed to Belize. His parental feelings, notwithstanding he had toldBonnet he knew no such sentiments, were stirred. When he had finishedher letter he would have been well pleased to burn a vessel and make adozen passengers walk the plank as a memorial to his girl. But this notbeing convenient, it had come to him that he would marry the wench tothe gaily bedecked young fellow he had captured, and it filled hisreckless heart with a wild delight. He drew his cutlass, and with agreat oath he drove the heavy blade into the top of the table, and heswore by this mark that his grand plan should be carried out.
He would sail over to England; this would be a happy chance, for hisvessel was unladen and ready for any adventure. He would drop anchor inthe quiet cove he knew of; he would go ashore by night; he would be athome again. To be at home again made him shout with profane laughter,the little home he remembered would be so ridiculous to him now. Hewould see again his poor little trembling wife--she must be gray bynow--and he was sure that she would tremble more than ever she did whenshe heard the great sea oaths which he was accustomed to pour forth now.And his daughter, she must be a strapping wench by this time; he wassure she could stand a slap on the back which would kill her mother.
Yes, there should be a wedding, a fine wedding, and good old rum shouldwater the earth. And he would detail a boat's crew of jolly good fellowsfrom the Revenge to help make things uproarious. This Charter boy andEliza should have a house of their own, with plenty of money--he hadmore funds in hand than ever in his life before--and his respectableson-in-law should go to London and deposit his fortune in a bank. Itwould be royal fun to think of him and Eliza highly respectable and withmoney in the bank. A quart of the best rum could scarcely have madeBlackbeard more hilarious than did this glorious notion. He danced amonghis crew; he singed beards; he whacked with capstan bars; he pushed mendown hatchways; he was in lordly spirits, and his crew expected somegreat adventure, some startling piece of deviltry.
Of course he did not keep his great design from Dickory--it was tooglorious, too transcendent. He took his young admiral into his cabin andlaid before him his dazzling future.
Dickory sat speechless, almost breathless. As he listened he could feelhimself turn cold. Had any one else been talking to him in this strainhe would have shouted with laughter, but people did not laugh atBlackbeard.
When the pirate had said all and was gazing triumphantly at poorDickory, the young man gasped a word in answer; he could not accept thisawful fate without as much as a wave of the hand in protest.
"But, sir," said he, "if--"
Blackbeard's face grew black; he bent his head and lowered upon the paleDickory, then, with a tremendous blow, he brought down his fist upon thetable.
"If Eliza will not have you," he roared; "if that girl will not take youwhen I offer you to her; if she or her mother as much as winks aneyelash in disobedience of my commands, I will take them by the hair oftheir heads and I will throw them into the sea. If she will not haveyou," he repeated, roaring as if he were shouting through a speakingtrumpet in a storm, "if I thought that, youngster, I would burn thehouse with both of them in it, and the rum I had bought to make a jollywedding should be poured on the timbers to make them blaze. Let nonotions like that enter your mind, my boy. If she disobeys me, I willcook her and you shall eat her. Disobey me!" And he swore at such a ratethat he panted for fresh air and mounted to the deck.
It was not a time for Dickory to make remarks indicating his disapprovalof the proposed arrangement.
As the Revenge sailed on over sunny seas or under lowering clouds,Dickory was no stranger to the binnacle, and the compass always told himthat they were sailing eastward. He had once asked Blackbeard where theynow were by the chart, but that gracious gentleman of the midnight beardhad given him oaths for answers, and had told him that if the captainknew where the ship was on any particular hour or minute nobody else onthat ship need trouble his head about it. But at last the course of theRevenge was changed a little, and she sailed nort
hward. Then Dickoryspoke with one of the mildest of the mates upon the subject of theirprogress, and the man made known to him that they were now abouthalf-way through the Windward passage. Dickory started back. He knewsomething of the geography of those seas.
"Why, then," he cried, "we have passed Jamaica!"
"Of course we have," said the man, and if it had not been for Dickory'suniform he would have sworn at him.