who had sworn to hang every mother's son of a pirate that
harried Carolina waters. And yet this godly youth was eager to lay hands
on Blackbeard's treasure so as to divide it among the pirates who had
been robbed of it. It was a twisted sense of justice, no doubt, and a
code of morals turned topsy-turvy, but you are entreated to think not
too harshly of such behavior. Master Cockrell had fallen into almighty
bad company but the friends he had made displayed fidelity and readiness
to serve him.

"How far will the chase lead us?" he inquired.

"Did you men come down this same creek in the pirogue?"

"Aye, in this very same mess o' pea soup and jungle," answered Bill
Saxby. "Two miles in from the coast, at a venture, was where we stumbled
on the canoe and tossed the Indians out of it. Beyond that the water
spreads o'er the swamp with no fairway for a boat."

Once more they paddled for a short stretch and then repeated the
stratagem of hauling into the dense growth of the mud-flat and pausing
until the cock-boat had steered beyond the next elbow of the stream. It
became more and more difficult to avoid the fallen trees and other
obstructions, but Blackbeard was threading his course like a pilot
acquainted with this dank and somber region. The pirogue ceased to lag
purposely but had to be urged in order to keep within striking distance.

Twice they were compelled to climb out and shove clear of sunken
entanglements or slimy shoals. But when they held themselves to listen,
they could still hear the measured thump of oars against the pins, like
the beat of a distant drum in the brooding silence of this melancholy
solitude. They had struggled on for perhaps a mile and a half, in all,
when Trimble Rogers ordered another halt. He was perplexed, like a hound
uncertain of the scent. From the left bank of the creek, a smaller
stream meandered blindly off into the swamp. Into which of these
watercourses had Blackbeard continued his secret voyage?

Again they listened, and more anxiously than ever. The tell-tale thump
of the oars had ceased. The only sounds in the bayou were the trickle of
water from the tidal pools, the wind in the tree-tops, the rat-tat-tat
of a woodpecker, and the scream of a bob-cat. With a foolish air of
chagrin, Trimble Rogers rubbed his hoary pate and exclaimed:

"Whilst Bill and me were a-paddlin' this hollow log down-stream, we took
no heed of a fork like this yonder. With the sun at our backs to guide