Frank Barrett - The Admirable Lady Biddy Fane

"So far so good," says Parsons; "but how is this to advance us? Are we to take for our share no more than what he chooses to give us as his officers?"

To this question Rodrigues made no reply. And this silence perplexing me, I cast my eyes sidelong to see if they had moved away. And then I perceived what it was had stopped his tongue.

The moon had shifted during their conversation (of which a great deal for the sake of brevity I have not set down), and whereas at the beginning it had shone full on my face, it now struck me somewhat on my left side. So that there down on the deck I spied my shadow revealed beside the great mast, and Rodrigues had spied it also. For before I could turn my head, I felt his long bony fingers upon my throat, and then the flash of his dagger in the moonlight caught my eye.

Now, I had not stirred a hair's breadth the whole time this Rodrigues and Ned Parsons were discussing their affairs; and thus I was standing, with my back against the great mast and my feet a couple of spans away from it, when Rodrigues takes me by the throat, flashing his steel before my eyes, as I have said, and, at the same time, Parsons, slipping his foot betwixt my legs and the mast, fetches me a trip which brings me plump down on my back. Then, in a twinkling he throws himself upon me, and had certainly done my business with his jack-knife (both having lugged out upon catching sight of my shadow), but that Rodrigues, catching his arm back, cries —

"Hold, Ned! Don't you see that this is none but our friend Benet Pengilly?"

"I see well enough who it is," answers Parsons; "but he is a spy for all that, and shall pay for stealing on us. Let go my arm, Rodrigues!"

But this Rodrigues would not, being just as quick to fore-see results as Parsons was to lose sight of them.

"Don't be a fool, Ned!" said he. "How could he have stolen on us, and we sitting with our eyes on the cabin? He was here from the first, and I do not blame him for picking up what we were careless to let fall. And what harm in that? He has but learnt what we intended to tell him. Would you ruin everything by spilling his blood, when his loss would draw suspicion on our heads, and set all our mates against us with mistrust? Had it been another he should have died, and I would not have left the business to you neither; but the moment I got my hand on his throat I saw it was our friend."

"That may be," says Parsons; "but, curse me! he shall give me some better assurance that he intends to stand by us in this matter ere I let him rise."

"Nay," says I, "you shall get nothing from me by force"; and, getting my hands under him, I flung him off like an old cloak, and sprang to my feet. "Now," says I, "what is it you want of me?"

All this passed as quick as the words will run, so that the whole business was not more than a minute or so in the doing.

"Well done, Pengilly!" cries Rodrigues. "I like you the better for this taste of your manhood. I never mistrusted a brave man yet, and here's a proof of it now," and with that he sticks his dagger in the deck, and seats himself on the chest, with empty hands, bidding Parsons, as he was a true man and not a born fool, to do the like, which he presently did, sticking his jack-knife in the deck, and sitting alongside of Rodrigues; and to show I feared neither, I seated myself betwixt them.

"Now, Ben," said Rodrigues, clapping me on the knee cheerfully; "what's it to be? You have heard our design. Do you stay in the Canaries, or go with us to the South Sea?"

"What to do?" I ask for this question did still perplex me.

"What to do? Why, to get gold, to be sure."

"I thought you had decided not to set foot ashore," said I.

"And so we have; for what Englishman has ever got gold that went out of his ship to get it? The fools have thrown more gold into Guiana than ever they have taken out of it, a hundredfold."

"Ay! And gold is not the only thing they have thrown away," says Parsons, "but many a good and honest Englishman's life as well."

"For every man that has come home," says Rodrigues, "a hundred have been left behind – slain by Indians, stung by serpents, dead of fevers, or slaves to the Spaniard."

"And them as do come home are none the better for having gone thither," chimes in t'other rascal, "as we do testify; for here am I short of one eye, and Rodrigues a sight to see."

"That there is gold in Guiana no one can doubt," says Rodrigues; "but the only men who can get it are the Indians, and their only masters are the Spaniards and Portugals."

"Then where did you get the treasure you brought to England?" I asked.

"Why, from the Spaniard, to be sure, and as fairly as he got it from the Indian."

"Ay! and fairer," says Parsons; "for we got it by straightforward and honest fighting."

"And if we were more lively in our attack," puts in Rodrigues, "'twas because their galleons were unwieldy with their weight of gold."

"I count we do 'em a service to ease them of their load," says Parsons, "for they have more than they can carry with comfort" (this with a laugh at his own joke).

"Ay! but our love doesn't end there; for, look you, Ben, which is the better – to let your uncle's ships and treasure be cast away in the Orinoco, to lead fourscore men to misery and death in those fearful winds, or to carry them back home, every man rich for life? To suffer the Spaniard to carry that gold into Spain for the encouragement of Papistry and devilish cruelty, and the furnishing out another Armada, or to take it away from them for the benefit of our country and the honor and glory of our king?"

And in this manner they carried on the argument a long while, one playing the part of marrowbone to the other's cleaver, while I sat in silence and lost in wonder, like one who should of a sudden see a strange new sun rise up in the sky. At length I found the sense to speak, and, say I —

"But how can we attack the Spaniard when we are at peace with Spain?"

"Why," says Rodrigues, "peace there may be in these waters, for that matter; but there is no peace below the line, as every one does know."

"Nay," says I, "'tis nothing but piracy you offer."

"You may call it what you like," says he, "but I think it no shame for any man to walk in the shoes of Drake and Candish."

"'Tis a hanging matter, for all that," says I, still objecting.

"A hanging matter for those who fail to take home gold, but a knighting matter for those who do, as witness Sir Francis and others less nice than he. But 'tis the same all the world over, whether a man undertake to find gold or to cure bunions. Raleigh gets his head cut off for failing, and Master Winter is made a peer. And quite right it be so, for it puts a check on men from hazarding foolishly, and encourages them to push their fortunes with zeal, when the chance is on their side."

"And this is the long and short of it," says Parsons, bluntly, for argument was not to his taste. "Are you with us, or are you not?"

"I am with you," says I, and upon that we joined hands – all three.

And in thus readily falling in with this villainous proposal I was moved, not so much by Rodrigues, or his subtle arguments, as by my own fierce and lawless spirit, and a certain brutal craving and lust of blood and treasure, which Lord forgive us, urges too many of us to cruel pursuits, no whit more justifiable in the eye of God than piracy.

We stayed at Fuerteventura nine days, and then made sail, being again in good condition and nothing lacking, and shaped our course for the West Indies. And as Parsons had foreseen, Rodrigues was appointed captain of the Adventurer , while Parsons took the place of master on board the Sure Hawk . This pleased the Adventurer's company vastly, for all looked upon Rodrigues with open admiration, backed up by secret hope; and, indeed, there was no man more proper for this post.