Book 5 - Chapter 20

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_ BOOK V

CHAPTER XX. WHEREIN MASTER TEACH, THE PIRATE, DIES BETTER THAN HE LIVED

It was nearing eleven o'clock in the morning when, after a hurried conference in the patio with the Viceroy and the others, Alvarado and de Tobar marched out with their fifty men. They had discarded all superfluous clothing; they were unarmored and carried no weapons but swords and pistols. In view of the hard climb before them and the haste that was required, they wished to be burdened as lightly as possible. Their horses were brought along in the train of the Viceroy's party which moved out upon the open road to the pass at the same time. These last went forward with great ostentation, the forlorn hope secretly, lest some from the buccaneers might be watching.

The fifty volunteers were to ascend the mountain with all speed, make their way along the crest as best they could, until they came within striking distance of the camp of the pirates. Then they were to conceal themselves in the woods there and when the Viceroy made a feigned attack with the main body of his troops from the other side of the mountain, they were to leave their hiding-place and fall furiously upon the rear of the party. Fortunately, they were not required to ascend such a path as that Alvarado had traversed on the other side, for there were not fifty men in all Venezuela who could have performed that tremendous feat of mountaineering. The way to the summit of the range and thence to the pass was difficult, but not impossible, and they succeeded after an hour or two of hard climbing in reaching their appointed station, where they concealed themselves in the woods, unobserved by Teach's men.

The Viceroy carried out his part of the programme with the promptness of a soldier. Alvarado's men had scarcely settled themselves in the thick undergrowth beneath the trees whence they could overlook the buccaneers in camp on the road below them, before a shot from the pirate sentry who had been posted toward Caracas called the fierce marauders to arms. They ran to the rude barricade they had erected covering the pass and made preparation for battle. Soon the wood was ringing with shouts and cries and the sound of musketry.

Although Teach was a natural soldier and L'Ollonois an experienced and prudent commander, they took no precaution whatever to cover their rear, for such a thing as an assault from that direction was not even dreamed of.

Alvarado and de Tobar, therefore, led their men forward without the slightest opposition. Even the noise they made crashing through the undergrowth was lost in the sound of the battle, and attracted no attention from the enemy. It was not until they burst out into the open road and charged forward, cheering madly, that the buccaneers realized their danger. Some of them faced about, only to be met by a murderous discharge from the pistols of the forlorn hope, and the next moment the Spaniards were upon them. The party holding the pass were the picked men, veterans, among the marauders. They met the onset with tremendous courage and crossed blades in the smoke like men, but at the same instant the advance guard of the main army sprang at the barricade and assaulted them vigorously from the other side. The odds were too much for the buccaneers, and after a wild melee in which they lost heavily, the survivors gave ground.

The road immediately below the pass opened on a little plateau, back of which rose a precipitous wall of rock. Thither such of the buccaneers as were left alive hastily retreated. There were perhaps a dozen men able to use their weapons; among them Teach was the only officer. L'Ollonois had been cut down by de Tobar in the first charge. The Spaniards burst through the pass and surrounded the buccaneers. The firearms on both sides had all been discharged, and in the excitement no one thought of reloading; indeed, with the cumbersome and complicated weapons then in vogue there was no time, and the Spaniards, who had paid dearly for their victory, so desperate had been the defence of the pirates, were fain to finish this detachment in short order.

"Yield!" cried Alvarado, as usual in the front ranks of his own men. "You are hopelessly overmatched," pointing with dripping blade to his own and the Viceroy's soldiers as he spoke.

"Shall we get good quarter?" called out Teach.

A splendid specimen he looked of an Englishman at bay, in spite of his wicked calling, standing with his back against the towering rock, his bare and bloody sword extended menacingly before him, the bright sunlight blazing upon his sunny hair, his blue eyes sparkling with battle-lust and determined courage. Quite the best of the pirates, he!

"You shall be hung like the dogs you are," answered Alvarado sternly.

"We'd rather die sword in hand, eh, lads?"

"Ay, ay."

"Come on, then, senors," laughed the Englishman gallantly, saluting with his sword, "and see how bravely we English can die when the game is played and we have lost."

Though his cause was bad and his life also, his courage was magnificent. Under other circumstances it would have evoked the appreciation of Alvarado and some consideration at his hands. Possibly he might even have granted life to the man, but memory of the sights of the night before in that devastated town six thousand feet below their feet, and the deadly peril of his sweetheart banished pity from his soul. This man had been the right hand of Morgan; he was, after the captain, the ablest man among the buccaneers. He must die, and it would be a mercy to kill him out of hand, anyway.

"Forward, gentlemen!" he cried, and instantly the whole mass closed in on the pirates. Such a fight as Teach and his men made was marvellous. For each life the Spaniards took the pirates exacted a high price, but the odds were too great for any human valor, however splendid, to withstand, and in a brief space the last of the buccaneers lay dying on the hill.

Teach was game to the last. Pierced with a dozen wounds, his sword broken to pieces, he lifted himself on his elbow, and with a smile of defiance gasped out the brave chorus of the song of the poet of London town:

"Though life now is pleasant and sweet to the sense,
We'll be damnably mouldy a hundred years hence."

"Tell Morgan," he faltered, "we did not betray--faithful to the end----"

And so he died as he had lived.

"A brave man!" exclaimed de Tobar with some feeling in his voice.

"But a black-hearted scoundrel, nevertheless," answered Alvarado sternly. "Had you seen him last night----"

"Ye have been successful, I see, gentlemen," cried the Viceroy, riding up with the main body. "Where is Alvarado?"

"I am here, your Excellency."

"You are yet alive, senor?"

"My work is not yet complete," answered the soldier, "and I can not die until--I--Donna Mer--"

"Bring up the led horses," interrupted the Viceroy curtly. "Mount these gentlemen. Let the chirurgeons look to the Spanish wounded."

"And if there be any buccaneers yet alive?" asked one of the officers.

"Toss them over the cliff," answered the Viceroy; "throw the bodies of all the carrion over, living or dead. They pollute the air. Form up, gentlemen! We have fully twenty-five miles between us and the town which we must reach at ten of the clock. 'Twill be hard riding. Alvarado, assemble your men and you and de Tobar lead the way, I will stay farther back and keep the main body from scattering. We have struck a brave blow first, and may God and St. Jago defend us further. Forward!" _

Read next: Book 5: Chapter 21

Read previous: Book 5: Chapter 19

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