Adventure, January 20, 1922 — page 42: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

40 escaping inevitable fate by delivering up the Cadiz to the cruiser; the rest enjoyed the relish of anticipating a fight in which their own metal was as heavy as the foe’s, their own ship as fast or faster, and their numbers as nearly equal as to make small difference. s “Tf ye won’t clap a stopper to the dog’s tongue ye’ll have him cuttin’ yer throat yet, cap’n,” growled Steve Carr toward late afternoon. Kestral had carried out orders, and the guns that had been shifted to larboard to cant ship lay on that side still; but each was slung to a tackle high on the starboard side ready to be hauled over the moment the ship floated. Now Kestral sat on the heel of the bowsprit, surrounded by a crowd of attentive ruffians, holding forth upon a subject that seemed to grip attention in his audience. “°Tis his own weasand that’s likely -to be slit,” smiled Davies. He had regained his balance entirely, and even the anxiety of long waiting without news of the king’s ship failed again to ruffle him. “Let him chatter, Steve,’ Davies con- tinued. “If we win clear without a fight V’ll deal with him my own fashion soon’s we gain sea-room; if fight we must, then I’ll leave him to you and Goliath to see he don’t bite us in the rear. Hail Goliath for me now. Tell him to go aloft and use that vulture’s vision o’ his. I feel the lift o’ the tide underfoot already, and no cruiser’s . in sight.” The ship lifted gradually until most of her list had righted. Only the weight of the double battery of¢guns seemed to hold her down when Goliath hailed the deck from the maintruck. “Dar she comes, cap’n! De man-o’-war she standin’ in t’wards dem outer reefs. Golly! Dar’s a hull fleet ob ships ’way furder out to de eastward, sar, an’ dat warship he go about ag’in in chase!” . Davies had given the order to set the topsails and t’gallants’ls on Goliath’s first hail; now he bade the men wait. The negro shouted down presently: ‘Ah can’t make out dem ships, cappen. Dar’s ’bout five o’ dem, an’ dey sailin’ mighty slow, seems to me. Ho, yis, surely! Cappen, dat fight ship he put ’bout ag’in, an’ he standin’ dis way fo’ sho’ now! He not bodder wid dem odder ship jes’ yet. Ma Jumbo! Dat ship’s a comin’ dis time!” Adventure The negro slid down the backstay like a giant ape, while Davies rapidly calcu- lated distances and took keen cognizance of the rise of tide. At the elevation of the maintruck, with Goliath’s keen eyes, that strange fleet might be distinguished at a little more than twenty miles. The cruiser, farther inshore, was perhaps fifteen miles distant; and fifteen miles also repre- sented the radius of a circle, of which the Cadiz was the center, embracing close to its circumference all the dangerous rocky heads that side of the Cape. Obviously the war-ship would not venture close in. She would very likely have eyes as keen as the negro’s among her seasoned tars, and would stand in, using the lead, until she sighted the Cadiz, then back and fill outside the reefs until the quarry broke to sea. “Set every sail above the courses, and heave taut on the cables,” Davies ordered. Nell came from the cabin, belted and armed, and brought his own extra weapons with others for Carr. “What, art spoiling for fight, Nell?” laughed Davies. “Not I,” she replied quietly; “‘but I trust not the dog Kestral, and if fight there is I'll take care ’tis none of our own rascals I fall to. Steve Carr, once ye wanted to make me woman o’ yours. I’m no man’s woman, but I liked ye well. Take these arms, and if the pinch comes let’s see what manner o’ man thou art.” The great sails fell from the yards and were sheeted home. Their pressure bore down the ship until her ports were lipped by the sea. Immovable yet, her tacks and sheets, shrouds and stays cracked and squealed under the strain, until sheets were started perforce, and the pressure partly relieved. And darkness fell, and the tide came up; a sliver of moon in the west was all of the new moon they might see that night, and in the east the horizon lay black and for- bidding, hiding, they knew well, a bulldog with teeth to bite and heart to grip and hang on to the death. What Davies miscalculated, however, was the caliber of the warship’s commander. He was not unlike other pirates in that. Believing that no commander would dare to peril his ship among those wicked reefs, Davies had taken for granted a respite at least until he cleared the shoals himself. CORNICGLOOOKS (C@