For the next several months things were quiet. Anthony was able to keep the schooner Rascal after she was “bought in,” but the snow was sent to England. Pitts was left in command, but he knew it was only temporary. Anthony was able to sign on most of the snow’s surviving hands. He was a little concerned about how the crew would react to the islanders. He’d never had a Negro on board his ship before. However, his concerns were for naught. The crew accepted the blacks well enough. They had been divided into two groups—the larger on board Rascal, and the other smaller group on LeCroix.
Anthony had also divided his squadron of “terriers,” as the master was so fond of calling them, into two groups. LeFoxxe and LeCroix went out in pairs. That was, Pitts being less experienced, would be under Drakkar’s watchful eye. By dividing his command into pairs, he could maintain a degree of safety and still patrol a greater area than would be possible if Drakkar was a lone ship. The pickings had been slim, however. Anthony enjoyed his forays ashore with Lady Deborah, but felt a growing need to be at sea. Out there he could possibly meet up with the Reaper, and put an end to the devil’s reign of terror. During one patrol, Pitt’s crew had picked up a poor man who had survived by clinging to a hatch cover after his ship was destroyed. The fellow was about done in from thirst, and half cooked by the sun. In his delirium, the man spoke of a great black ship with matching stygian sails. The ship just came out of the dawn, he said. The poor soul cried when he described how the ship was looted. To make for a more sinister situation, the pirates carried two screaming lady passengers away. He explained that after taking everything of value, the devil ship cast off, and then fired a whole broadside, completely destroying the little merchant ship.
Commodore Gardner had told Anthony that messages continued to trickle in of lost or missing ships. The schooners had picked up a couple of smaller coastal vessels for piracy. Pitts, on the schooner Rascal, had made the last capture. But all in all their work was futile, creating a greater sense of urgency and frustration for Anthony.
“The season is upon us,” explained Commodore Gardner. “Nobody wants to be caught in a hurricane, be he merchant or rogue. Therefore, there should be a break in the devilment.”
Anthony’s little flotilla found out first hand what the commodore had meant in late August. They had just rendezvoused off the windward island of St. Vincent on the Caribbean side when the storm began. Suddenly, the sea had become a deadly foe, as much an enemy as the pirates they were trying to apprehend. The master cursed as he was summoned from the wardroom by a concerned watch. However, the curse died on his lips as the storm had turned into a full gale. A master’s mate was already lashing down one of the helmsmen so he wouldn’t be washed overboard.
The master hurried to help lash down the other helmsman. “Four men—we need four men at the wheel to keep control,” Peckham ordered his mate.
The wind whipped the waves as they came crashing down over the bow, sending rivers of water surging down the deck, tearing at everything in its path. No sooner had one watch been dismissed before all hands were called to shorten sail or take down torn canvas. Anthony remained on deck during the entire ordeal. He had on his oilskins but was drenched, and due to the wind, somewhat chilled. He couldn’t help but worry not only about Drakkar, but also of Gabe and the others on the more fragile schooners.
Buck had been helping to free a blocked tackle when he lost his footing and was knocked into the scuppers as the raging water sluiced down the larboard side. He found himself being hauled unceremoniously to his feet as huge hands grabbed the neck of his slicker and jerked him from the cascading torrent, setting him upright on deck.
McMorgan, the burly bosun, had been his rescuer. “Got ‘ya trained now, sir, so I don’t want to lose ‘ya and have to train another,” the big man had explained, smiling as he did so. Buck, bruised and half drowned, muttered, “Glad to hear you feel so, bosun. Glad I am to hear it.’
Anthony grew more concerned about the schooner. The seas were getting big and he was fearful of a rogue wave catching one of the fragile ships on one quarter and broaching her. The wind continued to increase and instead of coming from directly astern as it had been, it seemed to come from all directions.
“Can you see the schooners?” Peckham asked. The old master was unshaven and hollow-eyed. Even with his rotund belly he looked gaunt. Peering aft beyond the turbulent waves one of the schooners could he seen. But which one?
“She’s taken in everything but the foresail,” Buck yelled to make himself heard above the wind.
“Aye,” Peckham agreed. “And she looks like she may over reach us under bare sticks.”
The avalanche of water continued to crash against Drakkar’s bow, making the ship shudder and creating terror in the crew. They responded when called but fighting the storm sapped a man’s strength, making each maneuver a life or death struggle.
McMorgan could barely see, the wind stinging his eyes, as he reported to Anthony. “One of the forward cannons has tried to break away from its lashings, Cap’n, but we’s doubled up on ’em so’s she’s not likely to come adrift. There’s two feet or more o’ water in the well but I got crews on the pumps and the water don’t appear to be gaining. I’ve taken me mates and checked below the waterline and so far we’s not sprung a plank!”
The news was good but they were not out of trouble yet. On and on until it seemed like forever. Waves grew bigger and bigger.
“Looks to me like a mountain,” Bart had sworn, “I never seed such a storm.”
“It’s a hurricane,” Peckham exclaimed. “This ain’t no gale, it’s a hurricane.”
They had run all the way to Jamaica before the hurricane had veered northerly toward Cuba. The black sky began to turn gray then clear even more. The sharp rain that had pelted the watch like tiny daggers slowed then stopped. The surging sea that had tossed Drakkar around like a twig grew less angry and was now only fast rolling swells. Anxious men were now sterner, having survived more than they thought they could. They had been lucky, very lucky. Sails were torn. Rigging was damaged and cordage was everywhere. One of the ship’s boats had been smashed. All this was superficial. Drakkar was afloat. They had survived.
Bart had summed up Anthony’s feelings exactly in a comment he made to Silas. “Glad I am that’s over. I ain’t yet ready to cast me lot with old King Neptune. Not yet I ain’t.”