Kate Bonnet/Chapter 33

HE great pirate Blackbeard, inactive and taking his ease, was seated on the quarter-deck of his fine vessel, on which he had lately done some sharp work off the harbour of Charles Town. He was now commanding a small fleet. Besides the ship on which he sailed, he had two other vessels, well manned and well laden with supplies from his recent captures. Satisfied with conquest, he was sailing northward to one of his favourite resorts on the North Carolina coast.

To this conquering hero now came Ben Greenway, the Scotchman, touching his hat.

"And what do you want?" cried the burly pirate. "Haven't they given you your prize-money yet, or isn't it enough?"

"Prize-money!" exclaimed Greenway. "I hae none o' it, nor will I hae any. What money I hae—an' it is but little—came to me fairly."

"Oho!" cried Blackbeard, "and you have money then, have you? Is it enough to make it worth my while to take it?"

"Ye can count it an' see, whenever ye like," said Ben. "But it isna money that I came to talk to ye about. I came to ask ye, at the first convenient season, to put me on board that ship out there, that I may be in my rightful place by the side o' Master Bonnet."

"And what good are you to him, or he to you," asked the pirate, with a fine long oath, "that I should put myself to that much trouble?"

"I have the responsibeelity o' his soul on my hands," said Ben, "an' since we left Charles Town I hae not seen him, he bein' on ane ship an' I on anither."

"And very well that is too," said Blackbeard, "for I like each of you better separate. And now look ye, me kirk bird, you have not done very well with your 'responsibeelities' so far, and you might as well make up your mind to stop trying to convert that sneak of a Nightcap and take up the business of converting me. I'm in great need of it, I can tell you."

"You!" cried Ben.

"I tell you, yes," shouted Blackbeard, "it is I, myself, that I am talking about. I want to be converted from the evil of my ways, and I have made up my mind that you shall do it. You are a good and a pious man, and it is not often that I get hold of one of that kind; or, if I do, I slice off his head before I discover his quality."

"I fear me," said the truthful Scotchman, "that the job is beyond my abeelity."

"Not a bit of it, not a bit of it," shouted the pirate. "I am fifty times easier to work upon than that Nightcap man of yours, and a hundred times better worth the trouble. I put no trust in that downfaced farmer. When he shouts loudest for the black flag he is most likely to go into priestly orders, and the better is he reformed the quicker is he to rob and murder. He is of the kind the devil wants, but it is of no use for any one to show him the way there, he is well able to find it for himself. But it is different with me, you canny Scotchman, it is different with me. I am an open-handed and an open-mouthed scoundrel, and I never pretended to be anything else. When you begin reforming me you will find your work half done."

The Scotchman shook his head. "I fear me—" he said.

"No, you don't fear yourself," cried Blackbeard, "and I won't have it; I don't want any of that lazy piety on board my vessel. If you don't reform me, and do it rightly, I'll slice off both your ears."

At this moment a man came aft, carrying a great tankard of mixed drink. Blackbeard took it and held it in his hand.

"Now then, you balking chaplain," he cried, "here's a chance for you to begin. What would you have me do? Drain off this great mug and go slashing among my crew, or hurl it, mug and all——"

"Nay, nay," cried Greenway, "but rather give half o' it to me; then will it no' disturb your brain, an' mine will be comforted."

"Heigho!" cried Blackbeard. "Truly you are a better chaplain than I thought you. Drain half this mug and then, by all the powers of heaven and hell, you shall convert me. Now, look ye," said the pirate, when the mug was empty, "and hear what a brave repentance I have already begun. I am tired, my gay gardener, of all these piracies; I have had enough of them. Even now, my spoils and prizes are greater than I can manage, and why should I strive to make them more? I told you of my young lieutenant, who ran away and who gave his carcass to the birds of prey rather than sail with me and marry my strapping daughter. I liked that fellow, Greenway, and if he had known what was well for him there might be some reason for me to keep on piling up goods and money, but there's cursed little reason for it now. I have merchandise of value at Belize and much more of it in these ships, besides money from Charles Town which ought to last an honest gentleman for the rest of his days."

"Ay," said Ben, "but an honest gentleman is sparing of his expenditures."

"And you think I am not that kind of a man, do you?" shouted the pirate. "But let me tell you this. I am sailing now for Topsail Inlet, on the North Carolina coast, and I am going to run in there, disperse this fleet, sell my goods, and——"

"Be hanged?" interpolated Greenway in surprise.

"Not a bit of it, you croaking crow!" roared the pirate. "Not a bit of it. Don't you know, you dull-head, that our good King George has issued a proclamation to the Brethren of the Coast to come in and behave themselves like honest citizens and receive their pardon? I have done that once, and so I know all about it; but I backslid, showing that my conversion was badly done."

"It must hae been a poor hand that did the job for ye," said Greenway, "for truly the conversion washed off in the first rain."

The pirate laughed a great laugh. "The fact is," he said, "I did the work myself, and knowing nothing about it made a bad botch of it, but this time it will be different. I am going to give the matter into your hands, and I shall expect you to do it well. If I become not an honest gentleman this time you shall pay for it, first with your ears and then with your head."

"An' ye're goin' to keep me by ye?" said Greenway, with an expression not of the best.

"Truly so," said Blackbeard. "I shall make you my clerk as long as I am a pirate, for I have much writing and figuring work to be done, and after that you shall be my chaplain. And whether or not your work will be easier than it is now, it is not for me to say."

The Scotchman was about to make an exclamation which might not have been complimentary, but he restrained himself.

"An' Master Bonnet?" he asked. "If ye go out o' piracy he may go too, and take the oath."

"Of course he may," cried the pirate, "and of course he shall; I will see to that myself. Then I will give him back his ship, for I don't want it, and let him become an honest merchant."

"Give him back his ship!" exclaimed Greenway, his countenance downcast. "That will be puttin' into his hands the means o' beginnin' again a life o' sin. I pray ye, don't do that."

Blackbeard leaned back and laughed. "I swear that I thought it would be one of the very first steps in conversion for me to give back to the fellow the ship which is his own and which I have taken from him. But fear not, my noble pirate's clerk; he is not the man that I am; he is a vile coward, and when he has taken the oath he will be afraid to break it. Moreover——"

"And if, with that ship," said Greenway, his eyes beginning to sparkle, "he become an honest merchant——"

"I don't trust him," said Blackbeard; "he is a knave and a sharper, and there is no truth in him. But when you have settled up my business, my clerk, and have gotten me well converted, I will send you away with him, and you shall take up again the responsibility of his soul."

The Scotchman clapped his horny hands together. "And once I get him back to Bridgetown, I will burn his cursed ship!"

"Heigho!" cried Blackbeard, "and that will be your way of converting him? You know your business, my royal chaplain, you know it well." And with that he gave Greenway a tremendous slap on the back which would have dashed to the deck an ordinary man, but Ben Greenway was a Scotchman, tough as a yew-tree.