The Fatal Cord, and The Falcon Rover

“As to them other fellows there,” said the boatswain, “I never had much faith in them; but I didn’t think, leftenant, that you would ever desert us.”

“I am determined,” replied Bowsprit, “to live hereafter, and to die, an honest man.”

“And to get yourself hanged,” sneered the sailor.

“I had rather things should come to that,” said Bowsprit, “than ever to be a pirate again.”

“Come,” said Coe; “you must decide quickly. Do you surrender?”

“Never,” answered the boatswain. “We can hold out until old bully Afton comes from the cabin – confound him, he’s always after the gals and the rhino – we shall then be equal to you. Never say ‘die’ – heh, boys?”

The pirates answered him by cheers, mingled with oaths, swearing that they would rather die where they stood like men, than to be hanged like dogs.

“You need not expect help from Afton or his men,” said the resolute Coe, addressing the pirates; “I have them all bound in the cabin.”

“Mr Coe,” said Bowsprit, who did not like to take a part in consigning any of his old comrades to the gallows, “suppose we allow them to escape to the Falcon?” That question was never answered. The reference made by Bill Bowsprit to the brig caused most of the pirates, and the boatswain among the number, to turn their faces towards the vessel. What they saw determined them to immediate action. Most men come to a resolution very speedily when a sudden emergency leaves them but a brief time for doing so.

When the two cannon were fired by Captain Johnson and one of his mates at the very moment when the pirates boarded the Duchess, the effect of the rebound of the guns upon one vessel and of the striking of the shot upon the other had a violent tendency to drive the ship and the brig apart. The hold of the grappling-irons and other fastenings which kept the two vessels together was therefore, much weakened by the shock. The violent dashing against each other of the ship and the brig had not only carried away a considerable part of the upper-works, but threatened, if continued much longer, to dash in the very sides of the two vessels; of course, this ceaseless motion tended to weaken more and more the bonds which held the ship and the brig together.

At the very moment when the boatswain and others of the pirates looked towards the brig, these fastenings gave way, and the two vessels were about to part.

“Come, boys! quick!” cried the boatswain, rushing towards the guards of the ship. He was immediately followed by all of his men who were left alive, except the one who lay wounded upon the ship’s deck. The next instant they sprang from the broken guards of the Duchess towards the deck of the Falcon; in the confusion and hurry three of them missed the leap, fell into the sea and were drowned. At the same time the vessels parted.

When the boatswain gained the brig, he turned round to those whom he left on the deck of the ship, shook his fist, and exclaimed, in a voice that was heard above the sound of the wind and the sea:

“Look out for the Long Tom!”

“We should not have allowed them to escape,” said John Coe to Captain Johnson.

“It is better as it is,” said the captain. “We have escaped from a fate so terrible, that all minor perils are but as trifles in comparison. I know not who you are, young gentleman; but your appearance and action among us have been so wonderful that it almost seems as if you were an angel sent from heaven to rescue us.”

“You do me too much honour,” said the young man. “But I will explain to you everything when we have leisure. At present, there are the wounded to be attended to.”

“True,” replied the captain. Then turning to his men, he added, “Bring lights, some of you, and remove the wounded below.”

By this time the vessels were some twenty yards apart.

“See!” exclaimed Billy Bowsprit, “they are loading the cannon on board the Falcon.”

Only dimly through the night shadows could the deck of the brig be seen; for now the last vestige of daylight had departed.

Some of the men who belonged to the Duchess were enabled to assist in loading the two cannon; for Captain Johnson had expressed his determination that, if a shot was fired from the pirate-brig, he would, as before, return them two for one.

“The two shots which I fired at the moment of their boarding us,” he said to Coe, “made a good-sized hole in their hull just above the water-mark; and they must have taken in considerable water through it, during the tossing and pitching of the brig. I will make another hole in their timbers if they fire at me again.”

Even while he spoke a shot came from the Falcon. It was fired, probably, by the skilful hand of Seacome; for it again carried away a part of the guards. Fortunately, no one was injured.

Captain Johnson quickly responded with his two guns. His object was to strike the enemy’s hull, near where his last two shots had struck; and he probably did so, for, in a few moments afterwards – by the light of the lamps on board the Falcon– men were seen hurrying to and fro in apparently great excitement. Loud tones were also heard, seemingly giving orders.

All who were on the deck of the Duchess stood still, listening and watching.

“Your shot must have done them serious damage,” said Coe, at length, to Captain Johnson; “the excitement seems to increase.”

“It seems to me,” said Billy Bowsprit, who was watching things sharply, “the Falcon is settling in the water.”

Upon the background of the sky, the spectators on board the Duchess could see the masts of the brig slowly bend forward; still slowly for a while they moved onward in the same direction, sinking, sinking from the horizontal line in the sky which they had formerly touched; and then their motion was gradually accelerated.

“See!” exclaimed Bowsprit, “her bows are going under, as sure as my name is William.”

That instant, a wild, despairing and mingled cry arose from the deck of the Falcon; the next moment that gallant craft plunged head-foremost into the sea and disappeared.

“God have mercy on their souls!” exclaimed Captain Johnson. “The best among them can be but little prepared to enter the other world.”

The captain of the Duchess then ordered a thorough examination to be made of the damage done to his ship. For many feet along the larboard beam and larboard bow the guards were almost entirely torn away. From the fact that the ship was also leaking, it was evident that the planks had been started somewhat where the larboard side of the Duchess had been beaten against by the starboard of the Falcon; a single pump kept regularly at work easily balanced the effects of this leak. A part of this labour was performed by some of Billy Bowsprit’s men, all of whom – at the suggestion of Coe – reported themselves to Captain Johnson for duty as a part of his crew.

Afton and three of his men who were unwounded were put in irons and removed to safe keeping in the forward part of the ship; and the man whose arm had been broken by Ada Marston’s shot was placed with the rest of the wounded in the sailor’s quarters, where they were all made as comfortable as circumstances would allow. After these tasks had been attended to, Captain Johnson read the “funeral service at sea” over the bodies of the dead, which, enshrouded and with weights attached to them, were launched into the ocean. The decks were then scrubbed by the light of lanterns, the watch set for the night, and all made secure.

These duties being performed, Captain Johnson, Coe, and Bowsprit went down into the cabin, to look after the condition of things there. They found Louise recovered from her swoon, but still very pale and nervous. She sat beside the sofa, on which lay her father, very ill from the shock of his recent terrible excitement. The quadroon girl was crouched upon the floor at the feet of her mistress; she also was very pale, and her eyes still had a wild and alarmed look. Ada, too, sat upon the floor, at a little distance from the others, her head against the seat of a chair, and her face hidden in her hands. She had been upon deck and had seen the brig sink in the ocean. She had learned of her husband’s death; that she was weeping proved that she was a woman.

There was not much rest for Captain Johnson that night; the leaky condition of his ship, and the still strong gale and high-rolling waves kept him on the alert. Billy Bowsprit, who was a thorough seaman, insisted upon watching with the captain. Coe was assigned a berth in one of the state-rooms forward of the saloon. Knowing that he could be of no farther use, he consented to retire for the night. Being much fatigued, he soon fell asleep, in dreams to recall, in forms more or less distorted, all the incidents of the day; yet amid all the scenes which his memory presented to his imagination, bent over him the soft, appealing eyes, the pale and beautiful face of Louise Durocher.

Story 2-Chapter XIII.

Gathered Ends

Melting and mingling into one

Two kindred souls.

Anon.

And so his life was gently exhaled in peace.

Anon.

Hail, wedded love!

Paradise Lost.

That’s the very moral on’t.

Nym.

The gale continued blowing all that night, all the next day, and for two or three days following. The injured condition of the ship made it unsafe for her to contend against the force of so strong a wind; and she was, therefore, kept directly before it. While the Duchess was thus running before the wind, two of the wounded pirates and three of the wounded of the ship’s crew died, and were committed to the deep. The man whose arm had been broken by Ada’s pistol-shot, and the other two of the wounded men belonging to the ship’s company, recovered before the arrival of the vessel in port.

A consultation was held in Mr Durocher’s state-room, on the day after the fight, between Mr Durocher himself, Captain Johnson, and John Coe, to which Billy Bowsprit was also admitted, and in which it was determined that as soon as the gale should abate, the ship should be steered for the nearest port in the United States. This determination was formed, that the ship might receive the necessary repairs, and that the captured pirates might be surrendered to the Government whose citizens they were.

On the fourth day after the fight the wind from the west had so abated that the course of the ship was changed, and she was headed towards the west. On the fifth day a fresh wind from the north arose; and, impelled by it, the Duchess made good progress for the American coast.

Meanwhile, the gallant young Marylander had become intimately acquainted with Mr Durocher and his daughter. He told to them the singular history of his connection with the pirates, of which Ada had already given them some particulars. The warm-hearted old French gentleman became much attached to the brave fellow, upon whom he could not look, he said, without remembering the awful horror from which he had delivered his daughter and himself. Besides, he esteemed him as an impersonation of courage and genius, because, in circumstances in which, according to ordinary apprehension, it seemed impossible to avoid being forced to the commission of crime, he had not only overcome his enemies, saving the penitent, and destroying the hopelessly guilty, but had also escaped from all the difficulties which had surrounded him, with his own hands unstained by human blood.

The fair and gentle Louise, too, was not insensible to the merits of her deliverer; her fervid feelings recognised in him a personification of the knights of old; and, with the spirit of self-sacrifice which greatly influences the tender and amiable of her sex, she longed to devote the services of her life to him in requital for her salvation from a horrible doom.

It must be confessed that “the deliverer” was not unimpressible nor unimpressed. Fixed for ever in his memory was the image of that young and loving girl, as he first beheld her when she lay pale, senseless, and perfectly helpless in the power of the pirate. And when he saw her afterwards, fully awakened to life, and her intelligent and enthusiastic mind and kind and loving heart expressing themselves in every glance of her soft blue eyes, in every flush that tinged her fair cheeks, in every expression of her beautiful lips, and in every musical sentence that issued from between them, he could scarcely realise that the bright form, clad in white robes, expressive of purity, and the shining face, surrounded by a halo of golden hair, belonged not to an angelic presence.

Indeed, these two young hearts required but an uttered word to cause the fountain of mutual love, like the waters of Horeb brought forth by the touch of the prophet’s wand, to pour out for each other its treasures of tenderness. And that word was at length spoken, with the entire approbation of Mr Durocher, whose friendship and fatherly regard for the young man was almost as great as his daughter’s love.

The merchant’s health, already weak, had received a terrible shock from the agony which his heart experienced on the evening of the assault of the pirates, a shock from the effects of which he never recovered, and when the Duchess entered Charleston Harbour, three weeks after that dreadful evening, he had to be carried on a bed from the boat to the rooms engaged for his party at the hotel. To this house, Ada Marston and John Coe accompanied him.

Immediately on arriving at Charleston, John wrote to his parents, informing them of all the remarkable adventures which had befallen him, and mentioning the state of affairs between Louise and himself. In due course he received letters from his father and mother, stating the great happiness of all the family at hearing of his safety, and expressing the full and joyous consent of Mr and Mrs Coe to the engagement of their son with Miss Durocher.

These letters gave great satisfaction to Mr Durocher. He learned from them that his child was about to enter a family by whom she would be received and cherished as indeed a daughter and sister. As his health was rapidly failing, and he felt that death was near at hand, he expressed an earnest desire that the marriage ceremony between John and Louise should not be postponed; he wished, before his departure, to see his daughter in the lawful care of a protector in whose honourable character and sincere love for her he himself had perfect faith. His will was law under the circumstances; and, on the second day after the receipt of the letters from Millmont, John Alvan Coe and Louise Durocher were united for life, at the bedside of the bride’s dying father, by a minister of the church to which all the parties belonged.

Mr Durocher survived his daughter’s marriage but two weeks. His sick-bed was waited on by two attentive and affectionate children, and his last days were soothed by the knowledge that he had done all that could be done to secure for his beloved child a happy life.

A few days after the death of Mr Durocher, John Coe and his wife left Charleston, and arrived in due course of time at the young husband’s old home at Millmont – but a little more than two months after he had disappeared from the latter place in a manner apparently so mysterious.

In less than a year John realised the amount of his wife’s fortune, with a part of which a large estate was purchased in one of the upper counties of Maryland. Upon this estate a handsome building was erected, to which he removed his family in the second year of his marriage. His descendants, distinguished, like their ancestors, for intellect and energy, still occupy that mansion.

A few words must be allowed with regard to our other characters.

Afton and the four pirates taken prisoners with him, were tried, a few months after their capture, before one of the United States Courts, in Baltimore, to which port their vessel had belonged. They were all found guilty and sentenced to be hanged. Two of them died in prison before the day appointed for their execution, the other three – of whom the ruffian Afton was one – suffered the extreme penalty of the law.

John Coe kept his promise to Billy Bowsprit and the five repentant pirates. His father’s influence, and that of all his father’s friends, was used to obtain their pardon; and when it was made clearly apparent that but for their help the result of the fight between the Duchess and the Falcon would have been entirely different, that pardon was readily granted.

Perhaps the reader has some desire to know what was the future fortune of Ada.

She accompanied Coe and his wife from Charleston to Maryland. Here a fresh grief awaited her. Her father, in alarm at hearing of the safety and early return of young Coe, and in dread of the consequences of the exposure which must ensue, had hastily and rashly taken his own life.

By the death of her father without a will, she became heir to one half of his wealth, there being but one other child of Mr Ashleigh, a grown son, to divide his property with her. She thus became an heiress; and several young gentlemen in the neighbourhood of Drum Point and elsewhere were quite willing, on account of her riches and her great beauty, to forget that she was the daughter of a receiver of smuggled goods and the widow of a pirate, and made her a tender of their hands. Ada, however, politely declined all these disinterested offers. About a year and a half after the death of her first husband she was married to Billy Bowsprit. Billy had been the only person on board the brig who had invariably treated her with kindness and respect; he had been her champion on all occasions, and she knew that he was devoted to her. Moreover, he could not upbraid her for having been the wife of a pirate.

Mr and Mrs Brown (to give them their right title) wished to be away from the neighbourhood of those who were acquainted with their antecedents. The lady’s portion of her father’s estate was, therefore, soon after her marriage, converted into funds, with which a large plantation was purchased in Mississippi. To this they removed, where they prospered, and some of their descendants still flourish in that State.

The End