Pirate Gold | Page 4

ship of which McMurtagh had been speaking), and Mr.
James made bold to turn the key upon the counting-room and go to join
his father. Here he was standing, side by side with him, swaying his
body, with his thumbs in his waistcoat pocket, in some unconscious
imitation of ownership, when his father caught sight of him and ordered

him sharply back. "Yes, sir," said Mr. James, and moved to the other
angle of the wharf, for he had caught the word "pirates;" and now, for
some reason, the ship had cast her anchor, a hundred yards outside the
dock, while to it from her side a double-manned yawl was rowing. And
amid the blue jackets, above a dark mass of men that seemed to be
bound together by an iron chain, was some strange rippling of long
yellow hair, that the young man had been first to see. Yet not quite the
first, for Jamie McMurtagh was beside him.
Then word was passed rapidly down the pier how this ship of pirates
had been captured, red-handed, her own captain still on board,--the
good ship Alarm having seen a redness in the sky, and heard some
firing in the night before; and how Captain How had put it to his crew,
Would they fight or not? And they had fought, rushing in before the
pirate's long-range guns could get to work, in the early dawn, and
boarding; so now there was talk of prize money.
Young James Bowdoin and McMurtagh were all eyes. The boat rowed
up to the slippery wharf steps; in the bow were the two ringleaders and
the ship's captain, in the waist of the boat the rowers, and in the stern
the rank and file of the pirates, some eight or ten ill-looking fellows
chained together. (The rest of them, the captain remarked casually, had
been shot or lost in the battle; and not much was said about it.)
The boat was made fast, and the two leaders got up, with Captain How.
The pirate captain, as Mr. James remarked, was a splendid-looking
fellow. Captain How said something to him as the boat stopped, and he
looked up and caught Mr. James's eye; and Bowdoin had time to
remark that it was blue and very keen to look upon. Young Bowdoin
and McMurtagh were standing on the very verge of the wharf, and the
crowd around had made a little space for them, as the owners of the
ship; Mr. James Bowdoin was standing farther back with the captain of
a file of soldiers. But the second of the pirates was a swarthy Spaniard,
with as evil-flashing eyes as you would care to see. And it was he who
held in his arms a little girl, almost a baby, whose long yellow hair had
made that note of color in the boat.
They were marched up the steps matted with seaweed; for it was low

tide, and only the barnacles made footing for them. And as the pirate
captain passed young Bowdoin he said, in very good English, "You
look like a gentleman," and rapidly drew from his breast, and placed in
Bowdoin's hands, the bag of gold. So quickly was this done that the
captain had passed and was closely surrounded by the file of soldiers
before Bowdoin could reply; nor had he sought to do so, for, on
looking to McMurtagh for advice, he saw him holding, and in awkward
yet tender manner trying to caress and soothe, the little lady with the
yellow hair. The second pirate had sought to hand her, too, to Bowdoin,
but some caprice had made the little maiden shy, and she had run and
buried her face in the arms of the young-old clerk.

V.
While young Bowdoin's father, with the file of soldiers, marched up
State Street to a magistrate's office, Mr. James and clerk McMurtagh
retired with their spoils to the counting-room. Here these novel
consignments to the old house of James Bowdoin's Sons were safely
deposited on the floor; and the clerk and the young master, eased of
their burdens, but not disembarrassed, looked at one another. The old
clock ticked with unruffled composure; the bag of gold lay gaping on
the wooden floor, where young Bowdoin had untied its mouth to see;
and the little maid had climbed upon McMurtagh's stool, and was
playing with the leaves of the big ledger familiarly, as if pirates' maids
and pirates' treasure were entered on the debit side of every page.
"What shall I do with the money?" asked Bowdoin.
"Count it," said McMurtagh, with a gasp, as if the words were wrung
from him by force of habit.
"And when counted?"
"Enter it in the ledger, Mr. James," said McMurtagh, with another gasp.
"To whose account?"

"For account--of