A strong emphasis was laid on the last word of the sentence.
“You young rascal!” exclaimed the commander. “And who is this Tom-fool of a companion?”
“It is my friend, and one of our company. He would not see me risking my life on the water while he stood on the shore. Would that we had many such ‘Tom-fools,’ with brave, strong hearts like his.”
As Blair spoke, he took off his official cap and left his noble young head bare. With another movement the precious coat was thrown over his arm, and the stripling stood in his school-boy dress before the English commander, who exclaimed, “A pretty pilot, you. Who sent you on this mad errand?”
“My father has been for thirty years the pilot of Fairport. He is now absent fighting for his country against her oppressors. I know the channel well. No one of our few remaining men would venture his life in such a sea for an unknown vessel, and so I came. I knew it would be certain death for you to try to enter that harbor without a pilot.”
“Then do your duty, young malapert. There is no time to be lost. We’ll run up the British flag, and go into port under fair colors.”
The commander gave the necessary orders to have the last suggestion carried out, and the sailors were prompt to do his bidding.
Blair stood perfectly still, while a look of stern determination sat on his young face. “I will never pilot enemies to the shores of our land. You can shoot me, but you cannot force me to act the traitor.”
The boy spoke resolutely. The English commander eyed him for a moment, and then said quickly,
“Shooting is too good for you, young dare-devil. That is quick work, soon over. There are other means of bringing you to terms.”
The commander held in his hand a thick pamphlet in which he had been reading. He made it into a firm scroll, and placed it upon the edge of the railing near which he was standing. Then turning to one of the sailors, he said, “Here, let me see you cut that through with your knife. Be quick.”
The man drew the long knife from his belt, and with one sweeping stroke severed the thick scroll. One part went fluttering through the air and dropped in the angry waters, while the other was firmly held by the commander.
“Put young master’s right-hand in the same place, and we will see it food for fishes. Or will he choose to do his duty, and keep his precious five fingers for future use?”
The words had hardly passed from the lips of the British officer, when Blair laid his hand calmly on the railing, and exclaimed, “Now, God helping me, you may tear me limb from limb, and I will be true to my country and my home.”
“It’s no use. He’ll keep his word. You can’t force ’im,” shouted Hal Hutchings, the tears coursing down his cheeks.
The wild winds swept through the rigging, and the storm came on with sudden violence.
This was no time for contention with such a spirit as Blair had displayed, and the captain at once gave orders to make for the open sea, where he might the more safely abide the approaching tempest. The Fairport channel had been strewn with too many wrecks to be ventured without a careful pilot, and of that the English captain had been fully warned.
Blair and Hal were hastily thrust below, while rapid preparations were made to meet the coming hour of danger.
CHAPTER VIII
The Storm
The place in which Blair and his companion found themselves was a small strongly built closet, used as a “lock-up” for refractory sailors. A single bull’s-eye admitted a mere glimmer of light for a while, but that soon died away in utter darkness as the night came rapidly on. It was well for the boys that they knew something of ocean’s rough rocking. A land-lubber would have had all the miseries of sea-sickness added to the horrors of that dreary dungeon.
A new exaltation of spirit had come over Blair. Difficulties and dangers seemed as nothing to him while in the path of duty. He feared neither the raging elements nor the power of angry enemies. He had the promise that those who trust in God shall never be moved, and in this strong refuge he was safe.
Not so with poor Hal. The dread of death had seized him, and absorbed all other thoughts. He could not but think of the horrors into which he should be plunged if he suddenly found a watery grave. Prayer seemed impossible for him, as in a kind of agonized waiting he met every plunge and reel of the storm-tossed ship.
Ah, the time of peril is not the best time to make one’s peace with God. When heart and flesh fail, the soul shrinks in dismay before its coming doom. Even the wild prayers for deliverance which may burst from the affrighted soul, what will they avail at the judgment? Are they the cries of the contrite heart mourning for its sins against a holy, loving, and beneficent heavenly Father? Are they not rather but as the shrieks of the criminal who sees no escape from his merited retribution? Alas for him who postpones his day of repentance till face to face with the king of terrors. It is he only who is strong in his great Deliverer who can see that icy beckoning hand, and amid the shrinking of human nature find himself calm in the strength which only God supplies. If the agonies or the stupor of the sick-bed unfit the soul to seek peace with God in the dying hour, even so does the anguish of such fear as now bowed poor Hal to the earth.
As the English lad crouched in his terror, Blair knelt at his side and prayed earnestly for him to that God who seemed to the young Christian but the more surely at hand, for the tokens of his power that made that mighty ship quiver like a leaf in the autumn wind.
Worn out with the excess of his own strong emotion, Hal at length sank into a deep slumber, and rolled and tossed with the vessel like a lifeless thing. Blair feared the poor boy had actually died of terror; but he soon convinced himself that there was yet motion in that heart which had throbbed so truly for him.
There was no sleep for Blair during that long wild night. In the intensity of his excitement, his thoughts flew through his mind with a vividness and a swiftness that made him almost feel that he was tasting a new and higher kind of existence. Spiritual things were as real to him as his own identity, and the God in whom he trusted seemed at his side as a familiar friend. Of his mother too he could think without a tear. He was sure that if left childless, she would be comforted and sustained and gently led along her lonely pathway. Had he not been fulfilling her oft-repeated counsel, to fear nothing but sin? Had he not vindicated that love of his native land, which she had taught him should be next to his allegiance to God? She might never know his fate. Yet she would mourn for him as for one who died in his effort to fulfil the duties of his absent father, and risked his own life to save the human freight of a ship from wreck and sure destruction.
Daylight brought but a feeble glimmer to Blair’s dark prison-house, yet he welcomed it as the assurance of dawn—dawn which is ever welcome to the watcher, though it may usher in a day of double danger.
CHAPTER IX
A Reward
Hal was still in the deep sleep into which he had fallen, when the bolts of their place of confinement were withdrawn. Blair’s clear bright eyes looked full in the face of the English commander, who now stood before him.
“Give me your hand, my boy,” said the captain. “I can respect bravery wherever I find it. I honor you for your determined courage. Tell me, who taught you so to love your country?”
Blair’s hand still hung at his side as he answered, “My mother, sir; the best of mothers. She would rather have me die in the right cause, than live a traitor.”
“You will not give me your hand? Perhaps I do not deserve it; but it was not cruelty which prompted me to act as I did last evening. I felt our danger, and scrupled not to use any means which should bring you to terms. Your constancy triumphed. I knew that no threats could force such a spirit. You shall not lose your reward, in the knowledge of the service you have done your home and your kindred. My orders were to get into the harbor of Fairport, to take possession of the naval stores there belonging to privateersmen, and then to reduce the town to ashes.”
For the first time Blair’s eyes f
illed with tears, and his chest swelled with strong emotion as he exclaimed, “Thank God, I have been able to be useful to my country and my home. This will fill my mother’s heart with joy. To her I owe all in me that is worthy of praise.”
“I believe I can trust you, my lad,” said the captain. “I would not willingly have my name go out as one who would maim and torture a brave lad. My desperation is my excuse for my expedient of last evening. I want you to promise to keep that scene a secret. You may perchance some day have your own sins to cover. I have been reckoned brave and honorable, and I would not have my fair name tarnished. Will you promise?”
“I forgive you from my heart. I promise,” said Blair, frankly extending his hand.
“Such a mother as yours can be trusted,” said the English commander, warmly grasping the offered hand. “She must know how her son did her honor in his hour of danger. Tell her the story, but let her keep it to herself. The true patriot, my boy, is willing to suffer for his country, though he win no glory from his sufferings. Are you equal to such a sacrifice?”
“I own I should like to be known as one who had done something for his native land,” said Blair; “but it will do me good, and make me the purer patriot, I trust, to have only my mother’s praise, if we ever meet again.”
“You shall be released at the earliest opportunity; but this your companion must stay with us. I wish he was of the stuff that you are. We would make a British tar of him, who would do us honor. His tongue tells the story of his birth, even if we could doubt the witness of his Saxon eyes and hair.”
“He chose to be an American. He worked his way to a home with us, and to us he ought to belong,” said Blair boldly.
“He is English, unnaturalized of course, as he is under age. He belongs to us by all law. I wish he were a better prey,” said the captain.
“You do Hal Hutchings injustice. A truer heart never throbbed. Timid as he is, he ventured with me in the boat because he would not see me go alone. Let him once love his duty as he loves me, and there will be no post of danger from which he will shrink.”
Blair’s eyes flashed and his cheek glowed as he spoke.
“He shall be kindly cared for. We will make the best of what is in him. You are both free to go your way on board the ship. There is no chance of escape where we now are. You will see how our good vessel has suffered by the storm. Yet she weathered it bravely. You shall have food here presently, and then you are at large, prisoners on parole.”
With these words the captain took his leave.
Blair’s first impulse, when left alone, was to throw himself on his knees beside his sleeping companion. From the depths of his heart he thanked God for enabling him to be firm to his duty; and earnestly he prayed that he might be made humble in the midst of the honor which had been allowed him. For his dear mother too rose a fervent prayer that she might be kept in the hollow of her Maker’s hand during the absence of her son, whom she had striven to train as a Christian patriot, whose watchwords are ever, “God and my native land.”
CHAPTER X
A New Deck
The British vessel had indeed suffered much damage in the fearful storm. The crashing and wrenching that had so overwhelmed poor Hal with terror, had been the destruction of mast and yard and bulwark. Yet, though sorely dismantled, the good ship was able to keep bravely on her way.
She had been several days heading for the distant shores of England, alone on the wide ocean, which like a sulky child bore the marks of its late outburst of passion long after the sky above was all smiles and sunshine.
The appearance of three sails along the far horizon caught the captain’s wary eye. That they were Americans he did not doubt—privateers, against which singly he could have won an easy victory; but disabled as his vessel now was, he could not dare to cope with such a trio.
They gained rapidly upon him. His resolution was taken at once. He wrote a few lines hastily, sealed them, and summoned Blair to his side. “My boy,” he said, “I want to send you on a dangerous mission. Dare you trust yourself in your boat upon the sea, chafing as it still is from the late storm? I want a messenger to send to yonder craft so swiftly nearing us. Dare you go? Your courage shall set you free.”
“I will go. God will watch over me, and bring me safe to my mother,” said Blair promptly.
A few words of affectionate parting with Hal, and then Blair was again a free boy, the sky above and the friendly waters below. Friendly they seemed to him as he sped over the waves towards the flag of his native land. He did not look behind him to see that the Stars and Stripes were waving above the British vessel, run up when she was called on to show her colors. He did not note the fact that the deck on which he had lately stood was fast passing from sight while he hasted on his errand.
Two of the privateers kept up their chase of the suspicious craft, while the other hove to, to receive the message which had been signalized as in the hands of the boy in the fast approaching boat.
Blair stepped freely and gladly when he was once more among his own dear countrymen, and it was with a beaming face that he presented his sealed note to the captain of the “Molly.”
The note was as follows: “We send you herewith an American boy, by chance our prisoner. We trust that the gaining of such an addition to your crew will make amends for the loss of the British property which this delay gives us a chance to carry off in safety.”
The captain of the Molly read these few words at a glance; then stamping his foot, he exclaimed, “You young villain! American or no American, you shall suffer for this sneaking trick. We’ll send you back again out of the mouth of our guns, or half-way at least. It is not worth our while to follow that miserable cheat. Those good ships will take him before many hours are over. Yankees know a British hull if American colors are flying over her.”
Blair looked with astonishment where, far over the waters, the British man-of-war was fading from sight.
“It is a shabby trick, but I was no party to it,” he exclaimed. “I would sooner lose my right hand than lift one finger against my countrymen. I am an American. I am the son of old Joe Robertson, the pilot of Fairport. Perhaps you know him. If you do, you will be sure that one of his blood would never do dishonor to the Stars and Stripes.”
Captain Knox of the privateer Molly had never heard of Joe Robertson; but his knowledge of the world made him see truth and innocence in the face of the boy. Blair’s words came too quickly, and his voice was pitched too high for English birth, and that the blunt captain marked at once.
“No matter who you are or where you came from, if you are all right as to the Stars and Stripes,” said Captain Knox. “We don’t ask too many questions here as to what folks have been before they come aboard the Molly. If you can obey orders and handle a rope, this is the place for you to make your fortune. Go aft, and Derry Duck our first-mate will find something for you to do in short order. He knows how to take the stiffness out of a fellow’s bones.”
Thus dismissed, Blair mingled among the sailors at the other end of the vessel, by no means a welcome guest. Muttered curses fell on his ears, and more than one voice was heard to say, “He ought to be sunk forty fathoms in salt water, with a hundred weight of lead at his heels.”
CHAPTER XI
“Mum”
Captain Knox did not set off in pursuit of the British vessel from which Blair had so unexpectedly escaped. Our young sailor soon learned that the “Molly” was on the look-out for richer prey, in the shape of an East Indiaman, whose costly cargo was expected to prove a gold mine for captain and crew.
The love of adventure and the lust for gold seemed uppermost in the minds of Blair’s new companions. The Fairport boy was not long in discovering that there was about as little Christian patriotism on board the Molly, as there is verdure in Sahara. In the freedom of the mess-table, the late achievements of the crew were the occasion of many a “yarn,” and of many a fierce discussion as to who had been the boldest and most reckless in the excitement
of attack and victory. It was plain that the crew of the Molly were little better than a den of thieves, their whole thought being of plunder, their whole ambition the winning of gold. Blair blushed for the honor of his country, to find such men among her avowed defenders. Oaths and obscenity made even more hateful the rough narratives in which each strove to prove himself more hardened and abandoned than the last speaker. Blair’s soul recoiled with horror from the taint of such companionship; yet for him there was no escape. Among these coarse rovers he was forced to eat and sleep, to live and labor, while many weeks went by.
The youngest on board, he was at the beck and call of these rough men, who made his body as weary of doing their bidding as his soul of their words of wickedness. A deep, hearty hatred of the crew of the Molly took possession of Blair Robertson. He wondered that a benevolent Providence should have placed a Christian boy in the midst of the pollution of such associates, and subject to the martyrdom of hearing their daily talk. A cold and haughty silence was Blair’s defence against their scolding and their railing. With a feeling of conscious superiority he moved among them, desiring their praise even less than their persecution.
The names of the crew of the Molly were as unattractive as their appearance and manners. These soubriquets spoke not of pious parents who had given their children to God, with a Christian name which they trusted would be registered in heaven. They told rather of lawless lives, and a past which must be buried in oblivion or acknowledged with shame and perhaps fear. “Fighting-cock,” “Torpedo,” “Brimstone,” and “the Slasher,” were among the leaders who dubbed Blair with the title of “Mum,” and so saluted him on all occasions. Blair had a very considerable sense of his own dignity, and was by no means pleased with this style of address. Yet he showed his resentment by increased taciturnity rather than by words. Captain Knox and Derry Duck soon found out that Blair Robertson was no useless addition to the crew, and promptly gave him his share in the watch and in other duties which his strength would permit.
The Edward S. Ellis Megapack Page 145
