Argosy All-Story Weekly — "The Purple Limited" — page 189: what you’re looking at

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

TEACH: PIRATE DE LUXE. out of harm’s way for the-time being. Do you hear me? - I say, keep below.” “Tf you Cont let ihe Out, 1 shall stick, 4 hatpin into you.” \ {captain Jacob Smith grinned and moved. ‘‘ Oh, if you will be foolish, please come out on deck. I’m afraid you'l ‘see your friend Teach getting his gruel. It must be Teach in that little fruit-steamer with the green -flag, and here’s the old Jao’s one chance in her lifetime of going into action, and I’m not on board of her to take com- mand. ““ Maddening, isn’t it? Not that the news of it will ever get ashore to my admiralty.” “What’s happened? I don’t. grasp it yet.” “It’s clear enough. That funny little steamer—she’s a twenty-knot fruiter from the West Indies for a Carolina port—has been coming up to us down the shine of the sunset. Trusted to her speed. ‘‘ My fools of course have kept no proper lookout. She thought she was going to lay us alongside and carry us by boarding in the fine old style, and if she’s managed to touch sides, I don’t say but what she’d have brought it off. My fellows are a pretty slack lot when I’m not there to put ginger into them. As it is they’ve dropped on her just in time.” “But you’ve only two big guns firing.” “The other gun-house,” said Smith dry ly, “is a lady’s boudoir at the moment, and that would take some explaining if any- - body ashore got busy later on and asked questions. ‘But there’s going to be no trouble. Mr. Fruitboat’s sinking finely. Even my fools of gun-layers’ can’t miss a mark like that at three-hundred-yard range. That fruitboat’s bridge ‘gives the show away, _ doesn’t it? Take my glasses.” ‘““T can see better without, thanks. The bridge is sandbagged of course. But why not?” “My dear lady, what fruiter, if he was merely a fruiter, ever buflt himself a shot- proof conning-tower on his upper bridge with sand-bags? No, it’s your pal, Teach, all right. If one ’d any doubt about the matter there’s his infernal Irish Republican flag blowing out astern in full evidence. ™, f 755 “Well, thank the Lord I’m not messed up with the tangles of your British and American politics. pirate when they see one, and they’re not going to hold their shot when they get a mark like that. ‘By gad, look! That one’s into his boilers. She’s stopped. . Now they’ve got her!” “But, Captain Smith! Signal them o cease fire. You mustn’t let them shell a sinking ship that’s. surrendered.” ‘ The man’s a man,” said Captain Jacob Smith. “I do him a kindness to sink him with gunfire. tale. If I take Teach alive, my orders from my admiralty are to hang him out of hand. Now do you see?” Mary Arncliffe stared white-faced. The fruiter, with weigh lost, and steering- gear jammed, began to chase her tail in slow circles. She was sinking a foot a minute. The savage black and yellow gun- ners on the Jao Geraes fired into her as fast, as they could load their ancient pieces, and she made no retort. She had relied on her and the glare of the sunset to get aloffgside before she was sunk, and carry the war-ship by board- ing in the old Blackbeard style. It was a desperate chance, and—it had failed by just a narrow margin. Lower and lower the wounded ship set- tled in the evening sea, and shells still smashed into her. Mary shrank away from Captain Smith. | Here was where his blackness showed. A white man would: have—what? Picked up survivors? Yes, but for what?’ After all, was not shooting them all down the more merciful way of ending it? The sun snapped out with tropical sud- denness as the fruiter sank, and Mary and Captain Smith shivered at the sudden chill. The girl was unashamedly sobbing. The creole made no comment. He seemed to understand. Probably he was sympathetic. He led her down to his boat, and together they went back to the Jao Geraes. Captain Jacob Smith showed his guest My beauties know a We haven’t your lawyers or — your politicians out here to pitch a slippery ' (SCONANIIICCLO 6)(0)©) S (C(O) nn