Pittston Gazette

              hWtatDJI»hC»l 1830. I VOL.. XLVlU.Nn. 21 | Oldest Newspaper in the Wyoming Valley. PITTSTON, LUZERNE COUNTY, PA., FRIDAY, DECEHBER 31, 1897. A Weekly Local and Family Journal. ]«i on » \vfk C 1 in AtlvmU e. like to-night, fll take effectual means to have you hunted down and routed out of this. Let that suffice." ing but a low gabbling; 'but at last the voices began to grow higher, and I could pick up a word or two, mostly oaths, from the captain. lands like that? ami 1 uvea on rum, i tell you. It's been meat and drink, and man and wife, to me; and if I'm not to have uiy rum now I'm a poor old hulk on a lee shore, my blood'll be on you, Jim, and i hat doctor swab;" and he ran onagnin for awhile with curses. "Look, Jim, how my fingers fidges," he continued, in the pleading toue. "I can't keep 'em still, not I. I haven't had a drop this blessed day. That doctor's a fool, I tell you. If I don't have a drain o' rum, Jim. I'll have the horrors; I ?een some on 'em already. 1 seen old Flint in the corner there, behind you; as plain as prints, I seen him; and if 1 get the horrors, I'm a man that baa lived rough, and I'll raise Cain. Your doctor hisself said one glass wouldn't hurt me. I'll give you a golden guinea for a noggin, Jim." startled that 1 sirujrglect townnaraw; but the blind man pulled me close up to birn with a single action of his arm. for while ft was still raging, nnother sound camf from the top of the hill on the side of the hamlet—the tramp of horses galloping. Almost at the Fame time a pistol shot, ti.\sh and report, came from the hedge side. And that was plainly the last signal of danger; for the buccaneers turned at once and ran. separating in every direction, one seaward along the cove, one slant across the hill, and so on, so that in half a minute not a sign of them remained but Pew. Him they had deserted, whether in sheer panic or out of revenge for his ill words and blows, 1 know not; but there he remained behind, tapping up and down the road in a frenzy, and groping and calling for his comrades. Finally he took the wrong turn and ran a few steps past me, toward the hamlet, crying: | ROBERT LOUIS not a man would go along with us. All they would do was to give me u loaded pistol, lest we were attacked; and to promise to have horses ready saddled, in ease we were pursued on our re- ing downstairs, leaving'the candle by the empty chest; and the next we had opened the door and were in full retreat. We had not started a moment too soon. The fog was rapidly dispersing; already the moon shone quite clear on the high ground on either side; and it was only in the exact bottom of the dell and round the cabin door that a thin veil still hung unbroken to conceal the first steps of our escape. Far less than half-way to the hamlet, very little beyond the bottom of the hill, we must come forth into the moonlight. Nor was this all; for the sound of several footsteps running came already to our ears, and as we looked back in their direction, a light tossing to and fro, and still rapidly advancing, showed that one of the newcomers carried a Soon after Dr. Livesey's horse on me to the door, and he rode away; but the captain held his jicace that evening, and for many evenings to come. "Now, hoy," he said, "take me in to "No, no. no, no; and an end of it!" he cried once. And again: "If itcomes to swinging, swing all, say I." the captain." "Sir," said 1, "upon my word 1 dare not." turn; while one lad was to ride forward to the doctor's in search of armed Then all of a sudden there was a tremendous explosion of oaths and other □ oises—the chair and table went over in a lump, a clash of steel followed, and then aery of pain, and the next instant I saw Black Dog in full flight, and the captain hotly pursuing, both with drawn cutlasses, and the former streaming blood from the left shoulder. Just at fhe door, the captain aimed at the fugitive one last tremendous cut, which would certainly have split him to the chin had it not been intercepted by our big signboard of Admiral Benbow. You may see the notch on the lower side of the frame to this day. "Oh." he sneered, "that's it! Take me in straight, or I'll break your arm." Qe gave it, as be spoke, a wrench that m;iCle me cry out. assistance. CHAITER II. BLACK DOQ APPEARS AND DISAP- My heart was beating fiercely when we two set forth in the cold night upon this dangerous venture. A full moon was (beginning to rise and peered redly through the upper edges of the fog, and this increased our haste, for it was plain, before we came forth again, that all would be bright as day, and our departure exposed to the eyes of any watchers. We slipped along the hedges, noiseless and swift, nor did we see or hear anything to increase our terrors, till, to our huge relief, the door of the Admiral Benbow had closed behind us. PEARS. It was not long after this that there occurred the first of the mysterious events that rid us at last of the captain, though not, as you will see, of his affairs. It was a bitter, cold winter, with long, hard frosts and heavy gales; and it was plain from the first that my poor father was little likely to see the spring. lie sunk daily and my mother and I had all the inn upon our hands, aud were kept busy enough without paying much regard to our unpleasant guest. "Sir," said 1, "it is for yourself I mean. The captain is not what he used to be. He sits with a drawn cutlass. Another gentleman—" "Come, now, march," interrupted he; and I ne«er heard a voice so cruel, and cold, and ugly as that blind man's. It cowed me more than the pain; and I began to obey hini at once, walking straight In at the door and toward the parlor, where the sick old buccaneer was sitting, dazed with rum. The blind man clung close to me, holding me in with one iron fist, and leaning almost more of his weight on me than I could carry. "Lead die straight up to him, and when I'm in full view cry out: 'Uere's a friend for you. Bill.' If you don't, I'll do this;' and with that hegave me a twitch that I thought would have made me faint. Between this and that, 1 was so utterly terrified by the blind beggar that 1 fO%ot my terror of the captain, and, as 1 opened the parlor door, cried out the words be had ordered in a trembling voice. PART L pie worst of all. Dreadful stories they were; about hanging, aud walking the plank, and storms at sea, and the Dry Tortugas, and wild deeds and places on the Spanish main. By hlsown account, he must have lived bis life among some of the wickedest men that God ever allowed upon fhe sea; and the language In which he told these stories shocked our plain country people almost aa much as the crimes that he described. My father was always saying the inn would be ruined, tor people wouHIttoon cease coming there to be tyrannized over and put down, and sent shivering to their beds; but I really believe his presence did us good. People wer» frightened at the time, but on looking back they rather liked it; it was a fine excitement in a quiet country life; and there was even a party of the younger men who pretended to admire him, calling luim a "true sea-dog," and a "real old salt," aud such like names, and saying there was the sort of man that made England terrible at sea. In one way, indeed, he bade fair to ruin us; for he kept on staying week after week, and at last month after month, so that all the money had been long exhausted, and still my father never plucked up the heart to insist on having more. If ever he mentioned it, the captain blew through his nose so loudly that you might say he roared, and stared my poor father out of the room. I have "seen him wringing his hands after such a rebuff, and I am sure the annoyance and the terror he lived in must have greatly "hastened his early and unhappy death. AH the time he lived with us the oaptain made no change whatever in has dress but to buy some stocking* from a bawloer. One of the cocks of his hat having fallen down, he let it hang from that day forth, tfbough it was a great THE OLD BUCCANEER. ] He was growing more and more excited, and this alarmed me, for my father was very low that day, and needed quiet; besides, 1 was reassured by 'he doctor's words, now quoted to me, and rather offended by the offer of lantern. CHAPTERL "My dear," said my mother, suddenly, "take the money and run on. I am going to faint." "Johnny, Black Dog, Dirk," and other names, "you won't leave old Few, mates—not old Pew!" THE OLD SEA-DOG AT THE ADMIRAL BEN BOW. That blow was the last of the battle. Once out upon the road. Black Dog, in spite of his wound, showed a wonderful clean pair of h*e!s. and disappeared over the edge of the hill in half a minute. The captain, for his part, stood staring at the signboard like a bewil- Squire Trelawney, Dr. Livesey and the rest ol these geBtlezueu having asked me to write tluwn the whole particulate about Treasure Island, from the begiuniug to the end, keeping nothing back but tDe the island, and that only because there is still treasure not yet lifted, 1 take up my pen in the year of grace 17—, and go back to the time when my father kept the Admiral Lenbow Inn, and the brown old seaman, with the saber cut, first took up his lodgings under our roof. It was one January morning, very early—a pinching, frosty morning— the oove all gray with hoar-frost, the ripple lapping softly on the stones, the sunstilllow, and only touching the hilltops and shining far to seaward. The captain had risen earlier than usual, and set out down the beach, his cutlass wringing under the broad skirts of the old blue coat, his brass telescope under his arm, his hat tilted back upon his head. I remember his breath hanging like smoke in his wake as he strode off, and the last sound I heard of him, as he turned the big rock, was a loud snort of indignation, as though bis mind was still running upon Dr. Live- I slipped the bolt at qnce, and we stood and panted for a moment in the dark, alone in the house with the dead captain's body. Then my mother got a candle in the bar. and. holding each other's hands, we advanced into the parlor. He lay as we had left him, on his back, with his eyes open, and one arm stretched out. This was certainly the end of both of us, I thought. How I cursed the cowardice of the neighbors; how I blamed my poor mother for her honesty and her greed, for her past foolhardiness and present weakness! We were just at the little bridge, by good fortune; and 1 helped her, tottering as she was, to the edge of the bank, where, sure enough, she gave a sigh and fell on my shoulder. I do not know how I found the strength to do it at all, and I am afraid it was roughly done, but I managed to drag her down the bank and a little way under the arch. Further I could not move her, for the the bridge was too 16w to let me do more than crawl below it. So there we had to stay—my mother almost entirely exposed, and both of us within earshot of the inn. Just then the noise of horses topped the rise, and four or live riders came in sight in the moonlight and swept at full gallop down the slope. a bribe. "I want none of your money,** said I, "but what you owe my father. I'll get you one glass, and no more." At this Pew saw his error, turned with a scream and ran straight for the ditch, into which he rolled. But he was on his feet again in a second, and made another dash, now utterly bewildered, right under the nearest of the coming horses. *ered man. Then he passed his hand over his eyes several times, and at last turned back into the house. When I brought it to him, hoseized It greedily, and drank it out. "Jim." says he, "rum;" and, as he spoke, he reeled a little, and caught himself with one hand against the wall. "Are you hurt ?" cried 1. • "Rum," be repeated. "I must get iwny from here. Hum! rum!" "Ay, ay," said he, "that's some better, sure enough. And now, matey, did that doctor say how long 1 was to lie here in this old berth?" "Draw down the blind, Jim." whispered my mother; "they might come and watch outside. And now," said she. when I had done so, "we have to get the key off that; and who's to touch it, I should like to know?"and she gave a kind of sob as she said the word's. The poor captain raised his eyes, and at one look the rum went out of him, and left him staring sober. The expression of his face was not so much of terror as of mortal sickness. He made a movement to rise, but I do not believe be had euough force left in his body. The rider tried to save Jiim, but in vain. Down went Pew with a cry that rang high into the night; and the four hoofs trampled and spurned him and passed by. He fell on his side, then gently collapsed upon his face, and moved no more. "A week at least," said L "Thunder!" he cried. "A week! I can't do that; they'd have a black spot on me by then. The lubbers is going about to get the wind of me this blessed moment; lubbers as couldn't keep what they got, and want to nail what is another's, la that seamanly behavior, now. I want to know? But I'm a saving soul. 1 never wasted good money of mine, nor lost it, neither; and I'll trick 'em again. I'm not afraid on'em. I'll shake out another reef, matey, and daddle 'em again." I remember him as if it was yesterday, as be came plodding to the inn I ran to fetch it; but I was quite unsteadied by all that had fallen out. and I broke one glass and fouled the tap. and while I was still getting in my own way. I heard a loud fall in the parlor, and, running in, beheld the captain lying full length upon the floor. At the tame instant my mother, alarmed by ♦lie cries and fighting, came running downstairs to help me. Between us we raised bis head. He wasbreathingvery loud and hard; but his eyes were closed, and his face a horrible color. door, his sea chest foUowing behind him in a hand-burrow; a tall, strong, heavy, nut-brown man; his tarry pigtail faUing over the shoulders of his soiled blue coat; his hands ragged and scarred, with black, broken nails, and the saber cut ucross one cheek, a dirty, I went down on my* knees at once. On the floor close to his hand there was a little round of paper, blackened on the one side. I could doubt that this was the black spot; and, taking it up. I found written on the other side, in a very good, clear hand, this short message: "You have till ten to-night." Well, mother was upstairs with father; and 1 was laying the breakfast table against the captain's return, when the parlor door opened, and a man stepped in on whom I had never set my eyes before. He was a pale, tallowy creature, wanting two fingers on the left hand; and. though he wore. 9 eutiasa, he did not look much like a fighter. I had always my eyes open for seafaring men, with one leg or two, and I remember this one puzzled me. lie was not sailorly, and yet he had a smack of the sea about him, too. I leaped to my feet and bailed the riders. They .were {pulling up, at any rate, horrified at the accident; and I soon saw what they were. One, tailing out behind the rest, was a lad that had gone from th« hamlet to Dr. Livesey's; the rest were revenue officers, whom he had met by the way, and with "Now, Bill, sit where you are," eaid the beggar. "If I can't see, I can hear a finger stirring. Business is business. Hold out your left band. Boy, take his left band by the wrist, and bring it near my right." CHAPTER V. THE LAST OF THE BLIND MAN. livid white. 1 remember him looking round the cove and whistling to him- "He had till ten, mother." said I; and, just as I said it, our old clock began striking. This sudden noise startled us shockingly; but the news was good, for it wag only six. My curiosity, in a sense, was stronger than my fear; for I could not remain where I was. but crept back to the bank again, whence, sheltering my head behind a bush of broom, I might command the road before the door. I was scarcely in position ere my enemies began to arrive, seven or eight of them, runninghard, their feet beating out of time along the road, and the man with the lantern some paces in front. Three men ran together, hand in hand, and I made out, even through the mist, that the middle man of this trio was the blind beggar. The next moment his voice showed me that I was right. self as he did so, and then breaking out in that old sea song that he sung so often afterward: We both obeyed him to the letter, and 1 saw him pass something from the hollow of the band that held his stick Into the palm of the captain's, which closed upon it Instantly. As he was thus speaking he had risen from bed with great difficulty, holding to my shoulder with a grip that almost made me cry, and moving his legs like so much dead weight. IIis words, spirited as they were in meaning, contrasted sadly with the weakness of the voice in which they were uttered. He paused when he had got into a sitting position on the edge. whom he had had the intelligence to return at once. Some news of the lugger in Kitt's Hole had found its way to Supervisor Dance, and sent him forth that night in our direction, and to that circumstance my mother and 1 owe our preservation from death. "Fifteen men on the dead man's chest— Yo-bo-ho, and a bottle of rum!" in the high, old tottering voice that seemed to have been tuned and broken at the capstan bars. Then he rapped on the door with a bit of of stick like a handspike that he carried, and when my father appeared called roughly for a glass of rum. This, when it was brought to him, he drank slowly, like a connoisseur, lingering on the taste, and still looking about him at the cliffc and up at our signboard. "Dear, deary me." cried my mother, "what, a disgrace upon the house! And your poor father sick!" "Jfow, Jim," she said, "that key." I felt in his pockets, one after another. A few small coins, a thimble and some thread and big needles, a piece of pigtail tobacco bitten away at the end, his gully with the crooked handle, a pocket compass and a tinderbox, were all that they contained, and I began to despair. In the meantime, we had no idea .vhat to do to help the captain, nor any other thought but that he had got hi* •!eath-hurt in "the scuffle with the stranger. I got the rum, to be sure, and tried to put it down bis throat; but his teeth were tirtitlv shut, and his jaws a« ■trong as iron. It wat a happy relief for us when the door opened and Dr. Lrivesey came in, on bis visit to my father."And now that's done," said the blind man; and at the words he suddenly left hold of me, and, with incredible accuracy and nimbleness, skipped out of the parlor and into the road, where, as 1 stood motionless, I could hear his stick go tap-tap-tapping into the distance.I asked him what was for his service, and be said he would take rum; but as I was going out of the room to fetch it he sat down upon a table and motioned to me to draw near. I paused where I was with my napkin in my hand. Pew was dead, stone dead. As for my mother, when we had carried her up to the hamlet, a little cold water and salts very soon brought her back again, and she was none the worse for her terror, though she still continued to deplore the balance of the money. In the meantime the supervisor rode on, as fast as he could, to Kitt's Bole; but his men had to dismount and grope down the dingle, leading, and sometimes supporting, their horses, and in continual fear of ambushes; so it was no great matter for surprise that when we got down to the Hole the lugger waa already under way, though still close in. He hailed her. A voice replied, telling him to keep out of the moonlight or he would get some lead in him, and at the same time a bullet whistled close by his arm. Soon after the lugger doubled the point and disappeared. Mr. Dance stood there, aa he Baid, "like a fish out of water," and all he could do was to dispatch a man to B—— to warn the cutter. "And that," said he, "is just about as good aa nothing. They've got off clean, and there's an end. Only," he added. "I'm glad 1 trod on Master Pew's corns;" fer by tfew *troe he had heard my story. "That doctor's done me," he murmured. "My ears is singing. Lay me "Perhaps it's round his neck," suggested my mother. "Come here, sonny," Bays he. "Come nearer here." 1 took a step nearer. back." It was some time before either I or Before I could do much to help him he had fallen back again to his former place, where he lay for awhile silent. thecaptain seemed to gather our senses; but at length, and about the same moment, 1 released his wrist, which I was stili holding, and he drew in his hand, and looked sharply into the palm. Overcoming a strong repugnance, I tore open his shirt at the neck, and "Down with the door!" he cried. "This is a handy cove," says he, at length; "and a pleasant sittyated grog-shop. Much company, mate?" "Is this here table for my mate Bill?" he asked, with a kind of leer. "Ay, ay, sir," answered two or three; and a rush was made upon the Admiral Benbow, the lantern bearer following; and then I could see them pause, and hear speeches passed in a lower key, as if they were surprised to find the door open. But the pause was brief, and the blind man again issued his commands. His voice sounded louder and higher, as if he were afire with eagerness and rage. "Oh, doctor,'* we cried, "what shall we do? Where is he wounded?" "Jim." he said, at length, "you saw that seafaring man to-day?" My father told him no, very little company, the more was the pity. I told him 1 did not know his mate Bill; and this was for a person who stayed in our house, whom we called the captain. "Wounded? A fiddlestick's endl" said the doctor. "No more wounded than you or L The man has bad a stroke, as I warned him. Now, Mrs. Hawkins, just you run upstairs to your husband, and tell him, if possible, nothing about it. For my part, I must do my best to aave this fellow's trebly worthless life; and Jim here will get me a basin." "Black Dog?" I asked "Ten o'clock!" he cried. "Six hours. We'll do them yet," and he sprung to his feet. "Well, then," said hej "this is the berth for me. Here you, matey," he cried to the man who trundled the barrow; "bring up alongside and help up my chest. I'll stay here a bit," he continued. "I'm a plain man; rum and bacon and eggs is what I want, and that bead up there for to watch ships oft. What you mought call me? You mought call me captain. Oh, I see what you're at—there;" and he threw down three or four gold pieces on the threshold. "You can tell me when I've worked through that." says he. looking as fierce as a commander. "Ah 1 Black Dog," says he. "He's a bad 'un; but there's worse that put him on. Now, if I can't get away nohow, and they tip me the black spot, mind you, it's my old sea-chest they're after. You get on a horse—you can, can't you? Well, then you get on a horse, and go to—well. yes. I will!—to that eternal doctor swab, and tell him to pipe all hands—magistrates and sicb —and he'll lay 'em aboard at the Admiral Benbow—ell old Flint's crew, man and boy. all on 'em that's left. 1 was first mate, I was, old Flint's first mate, and I'm the on'y one as knows the place. He gave it me to Savannah, when be lay a-dying. like as if 1 waa to now, you see. But you won't peach unless they get the black spot on me, or unless you see that Black Dog again, or a seafaring man with one leg, Jim —him above all." "Well," said he, "my mate Bill would be called the captain, as like as not. He has a cut on one cheek, and a mighty pleasant way with him. particularly in tlriuk, has my mate Bill. We'll put it, for argument like, that your captain has a cut on one cheek—and we'll put it. if you like, that that cheek's the right one. Ah, well! I told j'ou. Now, is my mate Bill in this here house?" Even as he did so, he reeled, put his hand to his throat, stood swaying for a moment, and then, with a peculiar sound, fell from his whole height face foremost to the floor. "In, in, in!" he shouted, and cursed them for their delay. 1 ran to him at once, calling my mother. But baste was all in vain. Ihe captain had been struck dead by thundering apoplexy. It is a curious thing to understand, for I had certainly never liked the man. though of late I bad begun to pity him, but as 6oon aa 1 saw that he was dead, I burst into a flood of tears. It was the second death I had known, and the sorrow of the first was still fresh in my heart. When I got back with the basin, (the doctor had already ripped up the captain's aleeve, and exposed his great sinewy arm. It was tattooed in Reveral places. "Here's luck," "A fair wind," and "Billy Bonea his fancy," were very neatly and clearly executed on the forearm; and up near the shonlder there was a sketch of a gallows and a man hanging from it—done, as 1 thought, with great spirit. Four or five of them obeyed at once, two remaining on the road with the formidable beggar. There was a pause, then a cry of surprise, and then a voirf shouting from the house: I told Lim he was out walking. "Which way, sonny? Which way is "Bill's dead." he gone?" But the blind man vwore at uiem again for their delay. And, indeed, bad as his clothes were, and coarsely as he spoke, he had none of the appearances of a man who sailed before the mast: but seemed like a mate or skipper, accustomed to be obeyed or to strike. The mau who came with the barrow told us the mail bad set him down the morning before at the Itoyal George; that he had inquired what inns there were along the coast, and hearing ours well spoken of, I suppose, and described as lonely, had chosen it from the others for his place of residence. And that was all we Cfould learn of our guest. And when I had pointed out the rock and told him how the captain was likely to return, and how soon, and anfcwered a few other questions, "Ah," Raid he, "this'll lD® as good as drink to my mate Bill." I keard a sound that brought my heart Into my mouth. "Search him, some of you shirking lubbers, and the rest of you aloft and get the chest," he cried. there, sure enough, hanging to a  tarry string, which I cut with hisowu gully, we found the key. At this triumph we were filled with hope, and hurried upstairs, without delay, to the little room where he had slept so long, and where his box had stood since the day of his arrival. "Prophetic," said the doctor, touching this picture with his finger. "And now. Master Billy Bones, if that be your name, we'll have a look at the color of your blood. Jim," he said, "are you afraid of blood?" CHAPTER IV. THE S1CA CHEST. I could hear their feet rattling-up our old stairs, 60 that the house must have shaken with it. Promptly afterward, fresh sounds of astonishment arose; the window of the captain's room was thrown open with a slam and a jingle of broken glass; and a man leaned out into the moonlight, bead and shoulders, and addressed the blind beggar on the road below him. I went back with him to the Admiral Benbow, and you cannot imagine a house in such a state of smash; the very clock had been thrown down by these fellows in their furious hunt after my mother and myself; and though, nothing had actually been taken away except the captain's money-bag and a little silver from the till, I could see at once that we were ruined. Mr. Dance could make nothing of the scene. I lost no time, of course, in telling my mother all thai I knew, and perhaps should have told ber long before, and we saw ourselves at once in a difficult and dangerous position. Some of the man's money—If he had any—was certainly due to us; but it was not likeiy that our captain's shipmates, above all the two specimens seen by me, Black- Dog and the blind beggar, would be inclined to give up their booty in payment of the dead man's debts. The captain's order to mount at once and ride for Dr. Livesey would have left my mother alone and unprotected, which was not to be thought of. Indeed, it seemed impossible for either of us to remain much longer in the house; the fall of coals in the kitchen grate, th& very ticking of the clock, filled us with alarms. The expression of his face as he said these words waa not at all pleasant, aud I had my own reasons for thinking that the stranger was mistaken. "But what is the black spot, captain?" I asked. Ha would look In at him through the curtainad "That's a summons, mate. I'll tell you if they getthat. But you keep your weather-eye open. Jim. and I'll share with you equals, upon my honor." annoyance when it blew. I remember the appearance of his coat, which he patched himself upstairs in his room, and which, before the end, was nothing but patches. He never wrote or received a letter, and he never spoke with any but the neighbors, and with these, for the most part, only when drunk on rum. The great sea-chest none of us had ever seen open. "No. sir," said L It was like any other seaman's chest on the outside, the initial "B." burned on the top of it with a hot iron, and the corners somewhat smashed and broken as by long, rough usage. even supposing- he meant what he said. But it was no affair of mine, 1 thought; and, beside*, it was difficult to know what to do. The stranger kept hanging about just inaide the inner door, peering around th» corner like a cat waitingfora mouse. Oncel stepped out myself into the road, but he immediately called me back, and. as I did not obey quick enough for hia fancy, a most horrible change came over his tallowy lace, and he ordered me in, with an oath that made me jump. "Well, then." said he, "you hold the basin;" and with that he took hia lancet and opened a vein. He wandered a little longer, bis voice growing weaker; but soon after 1 had given him his medicine, which he took like « child, with the remark, "if ever a seaman wanted drugs, it's me," he fell at last into a heavy, swoon-like sleep in which I left him. What I should have done had all gone well I do not know. Probably I should have told the whole story to the doctor; for I was in mortal fear lest the captain should repent of bis confessions and make an end of me. But as things fell out, my poor father died quite suddenly that evening, which put all other matters on one side. Our natural distress, the visits of the neighbors, the arrangingof the funeral, and all the work of the inn to be carried on in the meanwhile, kept me so busy that I had scarcely time to think of the captain, far less to be afraid of him. A great deal of blood was taken before the captain opened bis eyes and looked mistily about him. First he recognized the doctor with an unmistakable frown; then his glance fell upon me, and he looked relieved. But suddenly Ms color changed, and he tried to raise himself, crying: "Pew," he cried, "they've been before us. Some one's turned the chest out alow and aloft." He was a very silent man by custom. All day he hung round the cove, or upon the cliffs, with a brass telescope; all evening he Bat in a corner of the parlor next the fire, and drank ram and water very strong. Mostly he would not speak when spoken to; only look up suddenly and fierce, and blow through his nose like a fog-horn; and we and the people who came about our house soon learned to let him be. Every day, when he came back from his stroll, he would ask if any seafaring men had gone by along the road? At first we thought it was the want of company of his kind that made him ask this question; but at last we began to see he was desirous to avoid them. When a seaman put up at the Admiral Ben bow (as now and then some did, making by the coast road for Bristol), he would look at him through the curtained door before he entered the parlor; and he was always sure to be as silent as a mouse when any such was present. For me. at least, there was no secret about the matter; for I was, in a way, a sharer in his alarms. "They got the money, you say? Well, then, Hawkins, what in fortune were they after? More money, I suppose?""Give me the key," 6aid my mother; and though the lock was very stiff she had turned it and thrown back the lid in a twinkling. "Is it there ?" roared Pew. "The money's there." The blind man cursed the rfioney. "Flint's fist, I mean," he cried. "We don't see it here nohow," returned the man. lie was only once crossed, and that was toward the end, when my poor father was far gone in a decline that took him off. Dr. Livesey came late one afternoon to see the patient, took a bit of dinner from my mother, and went into the parlor to smoke a pipe until his horse should come down from the hamlet, for we had no stabling at the old Benbow. I followed him in, and I remember observing the contrast the neat, bright doctor, with his powder as white as snow, and his bright, black eyes and pleasant manners, made with the coltish country folk. and. above all with that filthy, heavy, bleared scarecrow of a pirate of ours, sitting far gone in rum, with his arms on the table. Suddenly he—the captain, that is—began to pipe up hia eternal song: A strong smell of tobacco and tar rose from the interior, but nothing was to be seen on the top except a suit of very good clothes, carefully brushed and folded. They had never been worn my mother said. Under that, the miscellany began—a quadrant, a tin cani- Idn, several sticks of tobacco, two brace of very handsome pistols, a piece of bar silver, an old Spanish watch and some other trinkets of little value and mostly of foreign make, a pair of com passes mounted with brass, and five or six curious AYest Indian shells. Tt has often set me tbiniang since tnat ce should have carri:d about these shells with him in his wandering, guilty, hunted life. "No. sir; not money, I think." replied1 L "In fact, sir, 1 believe I have the thing in my breast-pocket; and. to tell you the truth, I should like to get It put in safety." ••Where's Black Dog?" "There is no Black Dog here," said the doctor, "except what you have on "Here, you below here, is it on Bill?" cried the blind man again. As soon as I was back again he returned to his former manner, half fawning, half sneering, patted me on the shoulder, told me I was a good boy, and he had taken quite a fancy to me. "1 have a son of my own," said he, "as like you as two blocks, and he's all the pride of my 'art. But the great thing for boys is discipline, sonny—discipline. Now, if you had sailed along of Bill, you wouldn't have stood there to be spoke to twice—not you. That wue never Bill's way, nor the way of such as sailed with him. And here, sure enough, is my mate Bill, with a spyglass under hia arm, bless his old 'art, to be sure. You and me'll just-go back into the parlor, sonny, and get behind the door, and we'll give Bill a little surprise—bless his 'art, I say again." "To be pure, boy; quite right," caid he. "I'll take it, if you like." • "I thought perhaps Dr. Livesey—" I began. At that another fellow, prpbably he who had remained below to search the The neighborhood, to our ears, seemed baunted by approaching footsteps; and what between the dead body of the captain on the parlor floor, and the thought of that detestable blind beggar hovering near at hand and ready to return, there were moments when, as the saying goes, 1 jumped in my skiu for terror. Something must speedily be resolved upon; and it occurred to us at last to go forth together and seek help in the neighboring baniiet. No sooner said than done. Bare-headed as we were, we ran out at once in the gathering evening and the frosty fog. captain's body, came to the door of the inn. "Bill's been overhauled a'ready," said he, "nothin' left." "Perfectly right," he interrupted, very cheerily, "perfectly rigfot—a gentleman and a magistrate. And. now I come to think of it, I might as well ride round there myself and report to him or squire. Master Pew's dead. when, all's done; not that I-regret it, but he's dead, you see, and people will make it out against an officer of his majesty's revenue, if make it out they can. Now, ril tell you, Hawkins, if you like, I'll take you along." "It's these people of the inn—it's that boy. I wish I had put his eyes out!" cried the blind man. Pew. "They i were here no time ago—they had the door bolted when I tried i). Scatter, lads, and find 'em." He got downstairs next morning, to be sure, and had his meals as usual, though he eat little, and had more, J am afraid, than his usual supply of rum, for he helped himself out of the bar. scowling and blowing through his rose, and no one dared to cross him. On the night before the funeral he was as drunk as ever; and it wws shocking, in that house of mourning, to bear him singing away his ugly' old sea-song; but, weak as he was, we were all in fear of death for him. and the doctor was suddenly taken up with a case many miles away, and was never near the bouse after my father's death. 1 have said the captain was weak; and indeed he seemed rather to grow weaker than regain his strength, fie clambered up and downstairs, and went from the parlor to the bar and back again, and sometimes put his nose out-of-doors to smell the sea, holding on to the walls as he went for support, and breathing hard and fast like a man on a steep mountain. He never particularly addressed me, and it is my belief he had as good as forgotten his confidences; but his tempei was more flighty, and. allowing for his lDodily weakness, more violent than ever. He haDd an alarming way now when he was drunk of drawing his cutlass and laying it bare before him on the table. But, with all that, he minded people less, and seemed shut up in his own thoughts and rather wandering. Once, for instance, to our extreme wonder, he piped up to a different air, a kind of country love-song, that he must have learned in his youth before he had begun to follow the sea. "Sure enough, they left their glim here," said the fellow from Usie window. "Scatter and find 'eml Rout the house out!" reiterated Pew, striking with his stick upon the road. Then there followed a great to-do through all our old inn. heavy feet pounding to and fro, furniture all thrown over, doors kicked in, until the very rocks reechoed, and the men came out again, one after another, on the road, and declared that we were nowhere to be found. And just then the same whistle that had alarmed my mother and myself over the dead captain's money was once more clearly , audible through the night, but this time twice repeated. I had thought it to be the blind man's trumpet, so to speak, summoning his crew to the assault; but I now found that it was a signal from the hill-side toward the hamlet, and, from its effect upon the buccaneers, a signal to warn them of approaching danger. In the meantime, we had found nothing of any value but the silver and the trinkets, and neither of these were in our way. Underneath there was an old boat-cloak whitened with sea-salt on many a harbor-bar. My mother pulled it up with impatience, and there lay before us, the last fhings in the chest, a bundle tied up in oil-cloth, and looking like papers, and a canvas bag, that gave forth, at a touch, the jingle of gold. "Fifteen men on the dead man's chest— I thanked him heartily for the offer. and we walked back to the hamlet where the horses were. By the time I had told mother of my purpose they were all in the saddle. Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum! Drink arid the devil had done for the rest— ro-ho-ho. and a bottle of rum!" " TB»» doctor don* me." be murmured. The hamlet lay not many hundred yards away, though out of view, on the other side of the next cove; and, what greatly encouraged me, it was in an opposite direction from that whence the blind man bad made his appearance, and whitber he had presumably returned. We were not many minutes on the road, though we sometimes stopped to lay hold of each other and hearken. But there was no unusual sound—nothing but the HDvv wash of the ripple and the croaking of the crows in the wood. He had taken me aside one day. and promised me a silver fourpenny on the first of every mouth if I would only keep my "weather-eye open for a seaflariug man with one leg," and let hian know the moment be appeared. Often enough, when the first of the month came round, and I applied to him for my wage, he would only blow thrdugb his nose at me. ami stare me down, but before the week was cut he was sure to think better of it, bring me my fourpenny piece, and repeat his orders to look out for "the seafaring man with one leg." At first 1 bad supposed "the dead man's chest" to be that identical big box of his upstairs In the front room, and the thought bad been mingled in my nightmares with that of the onelegged seafaring man. But by this time we had all long ceased to pay any particular notice to the song; it was new, that night, to nobody but Dr. Livesey, and on him I observed that it did not produce an agreeable effect, for he looked up for a moment quite angrily before he went on with his talk to old Taylor, the gardener, on a new cure for rheumatics. In the meantime the captain gradually brightened up at his own music, and at last flapped his hand upon the table before him in a way we all knew to mean—silence. The voices •topped at once, all but Dr. Livesey's; he went on as before, speaking clear end kind, and drawing briskly at hia pipe between every word or two. The captain glared at him for awhile, flapped his hand again, glared still harder, and at last broke out with a villainous, low oath: "Silence, there between decks!" So saying the stranger backed along with me into the parlor, and put me behind him in the corner, so that we were both hidden by the open door. I was very uneasy and alarmed, as you may fancy, and it rather added to my fears to observe that the stranger was certainly frightened himself. He cleared the hilt of his cutlass and loosened the blade in the sheath; and all the time we were kept waiting there he kept swallowing as if he felt what we used to call a lump in the throat. your own back. You have been drinking rum; you have had a stroke, precisely as I told you; and I have just, very much against my own will, dragged you headforemost out of the grave. Now, Mr. Bones—" "Dogger," said Mr. Dance, "you have a good horse; take up this lad behind you." As soon as I was mounted, holding on to Dogger's belt, the supervisor pave the word, and the party struck out at a bouncing trot on the road to Dr. Liveeey's house. "That's not my name," inter- 'T'll show those rogues that I'm an honest woman," said my mother. "I'll have my dues, and not a farthing over. Hold Mrs. Crossley's bag." And she began to count over the amount of the captain's score from the sailor's bag into the one that I was holding. rupted. "Much I care," returned the doctor. "It's the name of a buccaneer of my acquaintance; and I call you by it for the sake of shortness, and what I have to say to you is this: one glass of rum won't kill you, but if you take one you'll take another and another, and I stake my wig if you don't break off short, you'll die—do you understand that?—die, and go to your own place, like -the man in the Bible. Come, now, make an effort. I'll help you to your bed for once." CHAPTER VI. THE CAPTAIN'S PAPEKS. We rode hard all the way, till we drew up before Dr. Livesey's door. The house was all dark in front. At last in strode the captain, slammed the door behind him, without looking to the right or left, and marched straight across the room to where his breakfast awaited him. It was already candle-light when reached the hamlet, and I shall never forget how much 1 was cheered to see the yellow shine in doors and windows; riut that, as it proved, was the best if the help we were likely to get in 'hat quarter. For—you would have 'hought men would have been ashamed Df themselves—no soul would consent o return with us to the Admiral Hen- It was a long, difficult business, for the coins were of all countries and sizes—doubloons, and louls-d'ors, and guineas, and pieces of eight, and I know not what besides, all shaken together at random. The guineas, too. were about the scarcest, andift was with these only that my mother knew how to make her count. How that person ape haunted my dreams. I nwd scarcely tell you. On stormy niphts, when the wind shook the four corners of the house, and the surf roared along the cove and up the cliffs. I would see him in a thousand forms. an* with a thousand diabolical expressions. Now the leg would be cut off at the knee, now at the hip; now he was a monstrous kind of a .creature who had never had but the one leg, and that in the middle of his body. To *ee him leap and run and pursue nve over hedge and ditch, was the worst of nightmares. And altogether I paid pretty Ciear for my monthly fourpenny Mr. Dance told me to jump down and knock, and Dogger gave me a stirrup to descend by. The door was opened almost at once bv the maid. "There's Dirk again," said one. "Twice! We'll have to budge, mates." "Bill," said the atranger, in a voice that I thought ho had tried to make bold and big. "Budge, yon skulk!" cried Pew. "Dirk was a fool and a coward from the first—you wouldn't mind him. They must be close by; they can't be far; you have your handson it. Scatter and look for them, dogs. Oh, shiver my soul," he cried, "if I had ev-es!" "Is Dr. Livesey in?" I asked No, she said; he had come borne in the afternoon, but had gone up to the hall to dine and pass the evening with the squire. The captain spun round on his heel and fronted us; all the brown had gone out of his face, and even his nose was blue; he had the look of a man who sees a ghost, or the evil one, or something worse, If anything can be; and, upon my word, I felt sorry to see him, all in a moment, turn so old and sick. Between us, with much trouble, we manug«d to hoist him upstairs, and laid him on his bed, where his head tell back on the pillow, as if he were almost fainting.When we were about half-way through, I suddenly put my hand upon her arm, for I had beard in the silent, frosty air n sound that brought mv heart into my month—the tap-tapping of the blind man's stick upon the frozen road. It drew nearer and nearer, while we sat holding our breath. Then it struck sharp on the inn door, and then we could hear the handle being turned and the bolt rattling as the wretched being tried to enter; and then there was a long tame of silence both within, and without. At last the tapping recommenced, and to our indescribable joy and gratitude died slowly away again until it ceased to be heard. bow. The more we told of our troubles, the more—man, woman and child —Ihey ciung to the shelter of their houses. The name of Capt. Flint, though it was strange to me, was well enough known to sqme there, and carried a great weight of terror. Some of the men who had been to field-work on the far side of the Admiral Benbow remembered, besides, to have seen several strangers on the road, and, taking them to be smugglers, to have bolted away; and one at least had seen a little lugger In what we called liitt's Ilole. For that matter, anyone who was a comrade of the captain's was enough to frighten them to death. And the short and the long of the matter was, that while we could get several who were willing enough to ride to Dr. Livesey's, which lay in another direction, not one would help us to de- j fend the inn. "So there we go. boys." said Mr. Dance. "Now, mind you," said the doctor, "I clear my conscience—the name of rum for you is death." This appeal seemed to»produce some effect, for two of the fellows began to look here and there among the lumber, but half heartedly, I thought, and with half an eye to their own danger all the time, while the rest stood irresolute on the road. This time, as the distance was short, I did not mount, but ran with Dogger's stirrup-leather to the lodge gates, and up the long, leafless, moonlit avenue to where the white Line of the Hall buildings looked on either hand on great old gardens. Here Mr. Dance dismounted, and, taking me along with him, was admitted at ft wnrrlinto hmjise "Were you addressing me, sir?" say* the doctor; and when the ruffian had told him, with another oath, that this was so, "I have only one thing to say to you, sir," replies the doctor, "that if you keep on drinking rum the world will soon be quit of a very dirty scoundrel!""Come, Bill, you know me; you know an old shipmate. Bill, surely," said the And with that he went off to see my father, taking me with him by the arm. piece in the shape of these abominable fancies. stranger. "This is nothing," he said, as soon as he bad closed the door. "I have drawn blood enough to keep bim quiet awhile; he should lie for a week where he is— that is the best thing for him and you; but another stroke would settle him." So things passed until, the day after the funeral, and about three o'clock of a bitter, foggy, frosty afternoon, I was standing at the door for a moment, full of sad thoughts about my father, when I saw some one drawing slowly near along the road. He was plainly blind, for he tapped before him with a Brtick, and wore a great green shade over his eyes and nose; and he was hunched, as }f with age or weakness, and wore a huge old tattered with a hood that made him appear positively deformed. I never saw in my life a more dreadful-looking -figure. lie stopped a little from the inn. and raising his voice In an odd sing-song, addressed the air in front of him: The captain made a sort of gasp. "Black Dog!" saui he. But though I was so terrified by the idea of the seafaring man with one leg, 1 was far less afraid of the captain himself than anybody else who knew him. There were nights when he took a deal more rum and water than bis head would carry; and then he would sometimes sit and sing his wicked, old, wild sea songs, minding nobody; but sometimes he would call for glasses round, and force all the trembling company to listen to his stories or bear a chorus to his singing. Often I have heard the house shaking with "Yo-ho-bo, and a bottle of rum;" all the neighbors joining in for dear life, with the fear of death upon them, and each singing louder than the other, to avoid remark. For in these ffts be was the most overriding companion ever known; ha would slap his hand on the table for silence all round; he would fly up in a passion of anger at a question, or sometimes because none was put and so he judged the company was not following his story. Nor would he allow anyone to leave the inn till he had drunk himself sleepy and reeled off to bed. "And who else?" returned the other, •getting more at his Base. "Mack Dog as ever was, come for to see his old shipmate, Billy, at the Admiral Benbow Inn. Ah, Bill, Bill, we have seen a sight of times, us two, since I lost them two talons," holding up his mutilated hand. "You have your handson thousands, you fools, and you hang a leg! You'd be as rich as kings if you could find It, and you know it's here, and you stand there malingering. There wasn't one of you dared face Bill, and I did it—a blind man! And I'm to lose my chance for you! I'm to be n poor, crawling beggar, sponging for rum, when "1 might be rolling in a coach! If yon had the pluck of a weevil in a biscuit, you would catch them still." Continued on page fDur The old fellow's fury was awful. He sprung to his feet, drew and opened a sailor's clasp knife, and, balancing it open on the palm of his hand, threatened to pin the doctor to the wall. of Globe for  | RHEUMATISM,! NEUEALGIA and similar Complaints, J and prepared nnder the stringent MEDICAL IWS.M prescribed by eminent physicians |m DR. RICHTER'S WM »va [PAIN EXPELLERl I World renowned! Remarkably successful! ■ ■Only genuine with Trade Mark " Anchor, ■ id. Bichter 'Co., 215 Pearl St., New York. ■ 31 HIGHEST AWARDS. ■ 13 Branch Houses. Own Glassworks, fl 60c. Endorsed & recommended t'y JB Farrer & Peck. 30 .Luzerne Avenue. a. C. Glick, 50 North Main St H Honck, 4 North Main S' Pitttston. Pa. DR. RICHrCR'8 I "ANCHOR" STOMACHAL bC*t for I P Stomach | CHAPTER HI. THE BLACK SPOT. About noon I stopped at the captain's door with some cooling drinks and medicines. He was lying very much as we had left him, only a little higher, and he seemed both week and excited. "Mother," said 1, "take the whole and let's be going;" for 1 was sure the bolted door must have seemed suspicious, and would bring the whole hornet's nest about our ears, though how thankful I was that. I had bolted it none The doctor never so much as moved. He spoke to him, as before, over his shoulder, and in the same tone of voice; "Xow. look here." said the captain; "you've run me down; here I am; well, then, speak up; what is it?" rather high, so that all the room might hear, but perfectly calm and steady: "That's you, Billy," returned Black Dog, "you're in the right of it, Billy. I'll have « glass of rum from this dear child here, a« I've took such a liking to; and we'll sit down, if you please, and talk square, like old shipmates." "Jim," he «aid, "you're the only one here that's worth anything; and you know I've been always good to you. Never a month but I've given you a silver fourpenny for yourself. And now you see, mate, I'm pretty low, and deserted by all; and Jim, youMl brifig me one noggin of rum, now won't you. could tell who had never met this terrible blind man. "ITang it. Pew, we've got the doubloons!" grumbled one. "If you don't put that knife this instant into your pocket, I promise, upon my honor, you shall hang at the next assizes." They say cowardice is infectious; but then argument is, on the other hand, u great emboldener; and so when each had his say, my mother made them a Bpeech. She would not, she declared, lose money that belonged to her fatherless boy; "if none of the rest of you dare," she said, "Jim and 1 dare. Back we will go, the way we came, and small thanks to you big, hulking, chickenhearted men. We'll have that chest open, if we die for it. And I'll thank you for that bag, Mrs. Crossley, to bring back our lawful money in." But my mother, frightened as she was, would not consent to take a fraction more than was due to her, and was obstinately unwillingto be content with less. It was not yet seven, sne said, by a long way; she knew her rights and she would have them; and she was still arguing with me, whpa a little low whistle sounded a good way off among the hills. That was enough, and more than enough, for both of us. "They might have hid the blessed thing." said another. "Take the Georges, Pew. and don't stand here squalling." "Will any kind friend inform a poor blind man. who has losrt the preaious sight of his eyes in the gracious defense of his native country, England, and God bless King George!—where or in what part of this country he may now be?" Then followed a battle of looks between them; but the captain soon knuckled under, put up his weapon, and resumed his seat, grumbling likeabeat- When I returned with the rum, they were already seated on either side of the captain's breakfast-table — Black Dog next to t'he door, and sitting sideways, so as to have one eye on his old shipmate, and one, as I thought, on Bis retreat. Squalling was tne word tor it. Pew s anger rose so high at these objections, till at last, his passion completely taking the upper hand, he 6truck afthem right and left in his blindness, and his stick sounded heavily on more than one. matey?" "The doctor—" I began en dog. But he broke in cursing the doctor, in a feeble voice, but heartily. "Doctors is all swabs," he said; "and that doctor there, why, what do he know about seafaring mea? I been in places hot us pitch, and mates dropping round with Yellow Jack, and the blessed land a-heaving like the sea with earth- what do the doctors know of "Yon are at the Admiral Benbow Black Hill Cove, my good man." said I "And now, sir," continued the doctor, "since I know there's such a fellow in my district, you may count I'll have an eye on you day and night. I'm not a doctor, only; I'm a magistrate; and if I catch a breath of complaint against woo. if it's onlv for a niece of incivility He bade me go. and leave the door wide open. "Xone of your key-holes forme, sonny," he said; and Ilefltthem together, and retired into the bar. "I hear a voice," said he, "a young voice. Will you give me your hand, my kind young friend, and lead me in?" "I'll take what I have," she said, jumping to her feet. Those, in their turn, cursed back at the blind miscreant, threatened him in horrid terms, and tried in vain to catch the stick and wrest it from his grasp. "And I'll take this to square the count," said I, picking up the oilskin packet. His stories were whet frightened peo- For a long time, though I certainly did my best to listen, I could beer Both- I held out my hand, and the horrible, ■oft-spoken, eyeless creature gripped it in a moment like a vise. 1 was so much Of course. 1 said 1 would go with my mother; and of course they all criecl out at our foolhardiness; but even Neit moment we were both grop- This quarrel was the saving of us;