"So ho! my lad," said he, seeing that Ben had recovered. "You have come back to your senses, eh? That's good. Now you can tell me all about this ship. Where was she bound for?"
"Plymouth," answered Ben. "From St. John's. Newfoundland." And then, in response to further questioning, the boy told the whole history of the voyage, omitting only such facts as he deemed too sacred to betray. And when he had come to the end of the story the pirate thanked him, said he was a good lad, and that he should now be rated as a junior quarter-deck officer. Ben did not demur to this, but while seeming to agree to the proposal, resolved in his mind still to do what lay in his power to retake the brig and bring her into an English port. And for the days that followed he performed such duties as were expected of him, always remembering that he was a servant of the King, and that the safety of the Aurora now depended solely upon his own life and his own integrity.
"You have come back to your senses, eh?"
As soon as he was at liberty to move unsuspected about the ship, he made his way to the little cabin where he had left Rachel Chiesley. She had not yet been discovered by Goff or his men. Ben conducted her to a yet safer hiding-place in the ship where she could remain secure from the pirates; and every morning the lad secretly brought her food and attended to her wants. On one occasion when he was with her she told him more of her history, and he learned that Rachel Chiesley was but the name of her girlhood, and that her title now was Lady Grange. Her husband was a notorious Jacobite, and it was because she had threatened to betray an evil plot which he was hatching that he had cruelly marooned her on the sea-girt rock of St. Kilda. This knowledge made Ben glad that he had chanced thus far to be of service to her, and for her sake, as well as for the sake of preserving the precious State documents that were in the cabin, he prayed that he might be able at last to save the ship.
He learned by degrees that it was Goff's intention to keep the brig beating about in the open sea until his crew of eleven men should have time so to disguise the vessel, by altering her rig and painting out her white stripe, that no one might recognise her again. This plan was helped by the fact that the brig was amply provisioned and was in good seaworthy trim. But the work progressed slowly, and ten days had gone by before Goff deemed it expedient to make a direct course and steer for the Orkneys.
Ben had been watching the crew day by day, little doubting that sooner or later the plague of which so many of his messmates had died would again assert itself. Already he observed that some of the men were beginning to move languidly and to look haggard and sick. On the twelfth day one of them took to his hammock. In the evening of the same day two others fell ill. Bold and careless of danger though these pirates were when it was a question of waylaying a merchant ship or engaging in an action with a vessel of war, they were one and all panic-stricken in contemplation of smallpox.
On the thirteenth day the Aurora was again within sight of the St. Kilda islands, giving them, however, a wide berth. Late in the evening Ben was in the watch on deck, when he espied a sail on the starboard bow. He did not report it, although it was the first that he had seen for many weeks. Instead, he strolled to the flag locker, took out a white ensign, and boldly ran it up, reversed, to the gaff peak. The signal of distress was answered by the approaching vessel. Then Ben hauled down his flag, lest Goff, coming up on deck, should see it and guess its meaning. So far, none but the man at the helm had observed this action, and he, as it chanced, was so far advanced in the sickness that he minded nothing. Ben glanced into his face.
"Y'are looking sick, Allen," said he. "Give me the tiller for a spell, and go you below."
The man relinquished it willingly enough, and Ben, now alone on deck, steered the brig down upon the on-coming stranger. He had a brace of loaded pistols in his belt, prepared to fire upon Goff if he should appear from below and interfere.