Then, too, Seth had been knocked down, and his was not a forgiving nature. He might grin to Adam's face, and outwardly, about his work, seem the same, but Adam caught dark glances now and then, and from all that Seth said privately poison dripped.
What's more, they were heading back for Newport where Seth did not dare go now. How grave had been his crimes and how much of them had been uncovered by the Queen's collector, Adam did not know; but the charges could hardly have been trivial if they caused Seth to sneak out of Blake's the night before the sailing and stow away aboard the schooner of which—though he didn't know this—he had just been elected captain. Had he planned to jump ship and refrained from doing so in Kingston only because of the press gangs? Or perhaps he hoped to fit the schooner up with guns and take her "on the account"? Could that be why he had been so eager to get the captaincy?
True, they were going to put in at New York first, but even New York might be too near home for the fugitive Seth Selden, decidedly a man to be watched.
All of this, however, Adam did not impart to Maisie when they had their hushed loving quarrels about his departure. Each night for four nights he returned to deck promptly; but on the fifth night he capitulated.
No man who is in love is wholly sane; but there are degrees of daze. Adam Long wasted no time when he saw that sloop.
She was fast. Water creamed sweetly at her bows, and she had everything conceivable cracked on—even studdingsails—everything but a sprit-sail, for she was going too fast and dipping too much for that. Her wake fanned out all turbulent behind her.
She was not much larger than Goodwill, but her hull was disproportionately high, especially forward: it looked even in this light as though false bulwarks had been built there in order to conceal something —or somebody.
There was no one in sight. The sloop might have been sailing itself, as until a moment ago Goodwill had been, a ghost ship. She showed no colors. She was dark.
Resolved Forbes was the first to tumble out, but Jeth Gardner was not with him, as once he would have been, nor was John Bond going to be of much use, with his left wrist still out of joint. Nevertheless the men moved fast. They did not need to be told how serious was their situation. All they had to do was glance astern.
"How in thunderation she ever get so close?" asked the mate.
Adam Long did not answer.
They had been running almost directly before the wind, making up the middle of the Old Bahama Channel, with the islands to starboard, Cuba to larboard, neither in sight. The moon would soon be down, but dawn was coming: there was no risk of going aground somewhere. Adam ignored the course, the compass and chart, and put her sharply about, yawing.
He looked back. The sloop had changed course as quickly and easily as though she ran in a greased groove and was being towed by Goodwill to Men. Her studdingsails had to come in, of course: Adam had counted on that. On the other hand, Goodwill, with her jury boom, found the tacking laborious.
The vessels, then, stayed about the same distance apart. It was a bit more than gunshot.
Adam tried half a dozen tricks, changing course, shifting rig. In ordinary circumstances he knew Goodwill's sailing qualities perfectly—knew what he could expect of her, just when she'd start to strain, when he ought to drive her. It was different now. An outside skipper, miraculously placed in command of Goodwill at this stage of the chase, would not have been so greatly troubled as Adam Long was, and wouldn't have felt the need to try so many sailing points. It was precisely because Adam did know this schooner so well, having assisted at her birth, having sailed her lovingly all the years of her life, that he found it difficult to adjust himself to the way she handled with that short foremast boom, the less-than-half foresail, the heavy coarse storm jibs. It was as if a man knew his wife completely, or thought he did, and understood and loved her, but then she got taken sick and fell into a fever and started raving, yammering things he should never have overheard. And what could that man do? He could only bear with her, tut-tutting and pooh-poohing her, not permitting himself to be drawn into a quarrel, and praying all the while that they'd pull her through. That man would love his wife the same way when she'd got well again, and try to forget the things she'd shrieked in delirium. But while she was feverish he'd have a hell of a time. It would be harder on him than it could ever be on an outsider.
This was the way it was with Adam Long and the Goodwill to Men.
He looked back.
The sloop was having no trouble with spar or canvas. Her sails were white—not notably clean, but still white, refusing to be pearled by the dawn. There was never a furrow in them. Adam reckoned he had never seen sails like that. Linen all right. He wondered where they came from. The Low Countries"? Folks who had been to New York told him that the Dutchers have the best canvas in the world.
For the rest, the sloop wasn't anything remarkable. She was a Bermudian, sure enough fast, with a raking mast, very tall, carrying a lot of topsail, precious little jib. The most remarkable thing about her were those high bulwarks forward, and the fact that no hands were in sight. Adam Long wondered if the men aboard of her truly thought that they were fooling anybody.
She was well handled. She came about and fell away as neatly and quickly as Goodwill herself: it was as though the two vessels were doing a well-rehearsed drill.
She was a trifle closer now.
Lady Maisie came halfway out of her cabin, the upper half of her. She awarded Adam a smile that was carefully polite—after all there were hands everywhere—but he thought that she was blushing a little; and his heart stopped.
"Get below," he said.
In the spreading light the faint sweep of freckles across her nose looked burnished. When she glanced astern her eyes were enormous, lighted a little with fear. Then she looked forward.
"Why are they throwing water on the sails. Captain?"
"Make 'em wet."
"But why should they be wet?"
"Speed."
"How can wet sails make a boat go faster?"
"I don't know, ma'am. But they do. Now—go below!"
He was satisfied that she had not been seen from the sloop.
It was afternoon before she addressed him again, and then it was in a quiet voice, from the depths of her cabin, while Adam stood on deck near the partly opened hatch.
"Is it truthfully pirates?" in a whisper.
"Aye."
"How do you know?"
"I know."
"Will they catch us?"
"Reckon so. Keep away till sundown, we might have a chance. But I don't guess we can."
"What's that rumbling sound I hear?"
"Hands hauling the cargo out of the hold. Hogsheads of molasses from your cousin's plantation."
"What're they doing that for?"
"Pitch 'em overboard."
"Oh— Isn't it rather a shame to lose the cargo?"
"If that's all we lose," muttered Adam, "we're lucky."
The sun in fact was large and low and just beginning to turn tawny when the following vessel, sure of herself, at last spoke. A flag was run to her top, a flag unequivocally black, without design or device. The false covering of a gunport, a piece of painted canvas at the starboard bow, was yanked aside, and a chunky brass culverin run out. At the same moment the false bulwarks were pulled down, and men rose to their feet all around the deck of the sloop, yelling, brandishing blades. Fifty or sixty of them by Adam's first count, but later he estimated there were nearer a hundred. The wonder was that such a small vessel could hold them all. Obviously she couldn't have taken them far. They were variously dressed, most of them gay, all of them dirty. They shouted and screamed, waving their weapons wildly. The plan seemed to be to show as much steel as possible, with a barbaric abruptness, in the hope of scaring the quarry into surrender. Most of the weapons were cutlasses, but there were also some pikes and harpoons, a few daggers, a smattering of muskets. Some men even had two weapons, one in each hand.