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Pieces of Eight, a novel by Richard Le Gallienne |
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Book 3 - Chapter 10 |
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_ BOOK III CHAPTER X The Hidden Creek.
As the light grew, I scanned the shore to see whether I could detect the entrance of the hidden creek; but, though I swept it up and down again and again, it continued to justify the "King's" boast. There was no sign of an opening anywhere. Nothing but a straight line of brush, with mangroves here and there stepping down in their fantastic way into the water. And yet we were but a hundred yards from the shore. Certainly "Blackbeard"--if the haunt had really been his--had known his business; for an enemy could have sought him all day along this coast and found no clue to his hiding-place. But, presently, as my eyes kept on seeking, a figure rose, tall and black near the water's edge, a little to our left, and shot up a long arm by way of signal. It was Samson; and evidently the mouth of the creek was right there in front of us--under our very noses, so to say--and yet it was impossible to make it out. However, at this signal, I stirred up the still-sleeping crew, and presently we had the anchors up, and the engine started at the slowest possible speed. The tide was beginning to run in, so we needed very little way on us. I pointed out Samson to the captain, and, following the "King's" instructions, told him to steer straight for the negro. He grumbled not a little. Of course, if I wanted to run aground, it was none of his affair--etc., etc. Then I stationed the sturdiest of the two deck-hands on the port bow with a long oar, while I took the starboard with another. Very slowly and cautiously we made in, pointing straight for a thick growth of mangrove bushes. Samson stood there and called: "All right, sar. Keep straight on. You'll see your way in a minute." And, sure enough, when we were barely fifty feet away from the shore, and there seemed nothing for it but to run dead aground, low down through the floating mangrove branches we caught sight of a narrow gleam starting inland, and in another moment or two our decks were swept with foliage as the _Flamingo_ rustled in, like a bird to cover, through an opening in the bushes barely twice her beam; and there before us, snaking through the brush, was a lane of water which immediately began to broaden between palmetto-fringed banks, and was evidently deep enough for a much larger vessel. "Plenty of water, sar," hallooed Samson from the bank, grinning a huge welcome. "Keep a-going after me," and he started trotting along the creek-side. As we pushed into the glassy channel, I standing at the bow, my eyes were arrested by a tremendous flashing commotion in the water to the right and left of us--like the fierce zigzagging of steel blades, or the ferocious play of submerged lightning. It was a select company of houndfish and sharks that we had disturbed, lying hellishly in wait there for the prey of the incoming tide. It was a curiously sinister sight, as though one had come upon a nest of water-devils in council, and the fancy jumped into my mind that here were the spirits of Teach and his crew once more evilly embodied and condemned to haunt for ever this gloomy scene of their crimes. Samson went trotting along the twisting banks, we cautiously feeling our way after him, for something like a quarter of a mile; and then, coming round a sudden bend, the creek opened out into a sort of basin. On the left bank stood two large palmetto shanties. Samson indicated that there was our anchorage; and then, as we were almost alongside of them, the cheery halloos of a well-known voice hailed us. It was the "King"; and, as I answered his welcome, the morning suddenly sang for me--for there too was Calypso, at his side. The water ran so deep at the creek's side that we were able to moor the _Flamingo_ right up against the bank, and, when I had jumped ashore and greeted my friends, and the "King" had executed a brief characteristic fantasia on the manifest advantages of having a hidden pirate's creek in the family, he unfolded his plans, or rather that portion of them that was necessary at the moment. The crew of the _Flamingo,_ he said, had better stay where they were for the present. If they were tired of sleeping aboard, there were his two palmetto palaces, with couches of down on which to stretch their limbs--and, for amusement--poor devils!--he swept his eyes whimsically around that dreariest of landscapes--they might exercise their imaginations by pretending, after the manner of John Teach, that they were on an excursion to Hades--this was the famous River Acheron--and so on. But, seriously, he ended, we would find some way of keeping them from committing hari-kari and, meanwhile, we would leave them in peace, and stroll along toward breakfast. At that moment, Sailor rubbed his head against my knee. "Ah!" said the "King," "the heroic canine! He, of course, must not be left behind. We may very well need you in our counsels, eh, old fellow?" and he made friends with Sailor in a moment, as only a man who loves dogs can. I believe I was second in Sailor's affection from that moment of his meeting the "King." But then, who wouldn't have been? So then, after a reassuring word or two with Tom and the Captain, we went our ways toward breakfast--the "King's" tongue and Sailor's wagging happily in concert every inch of the way. _ |
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