am's pirates in the boat, and you couldn't run away,--I wonder,
honest, Joe, you didn't die of fright."

"What for? This is no trade for a nervous wight. And now for a bloody
frolic with Blackbeard's bullies."

"There is a share of his treasure for you, Joe, as soon as we can go
find it," gleefully announced Master Cockrell. "I have the chart drawn
all true with mine own hand. Let me get it."

While the two lads pored entranced over the map of the branching creek
and the pine-covered knoll, the crew of the _Royal James_ were
overhauling weapons and clearing the ship for action. It disappointed
them to lack the twenty men whom they had expected to find marooned but
this made them no less eager for battle. Concerning Ned Rackham, there
was no feud with him or grudge to square and he could go his way in the
little trading snow without fear of molestation from Stede Bonnet.

Under cover of night the _Royal James_ worked back to the sandy islands
and anchored in the channel. One of her boats had ventured within sight
of the Inlet for a stealthy reconnaissance and reported that the
_Revenge_ was still in the harbor. Captain Bonnet was considering his
plan of attack. He said nothing about it to Jack Cockrell and his chum,
the merman, and they greedily listened to the gossip of the petty
officers or thrashed out theories of their own.

To sail boldly into the harbor was a ticklish risk to run as there was
no pilot aboard who knew the inner channel and the depths of water. All
the gunners were in favor of attempting it because they yearned to
settle it with crashing broadsides. But the battered, hairy sea-dogs who
had fought it out in hand-to-hand conflicts on the Caribbean were for
leaving the brig in safe water and sending fifty men in boats to board
the _Revenge_ at the first break of day.

In the midst of the fo'castle argument, Captain Bonnet sent for Jack
Cockrell and told him:

"You are to keep out of harm's way, my young gamecock. I have undertaken
to deliver you to your esteemed uncle with arms and legs intact, and
your head on your shoulders."

"But I am lusty enough to poke about with a pike or serve at a gun
tackle," protested the unhappy Master Cockrell.

"I expect you to obey me," was the stern mandate. "You will have
company. This Joe Hawkridge is to stay with you."

"But he is a rare hand in a fight, Captain Bonnet. You should have seen
him in the _Plymouth Adventure_."

"The boy is weak and all unst