344 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
[Feb. 26, 1910. 
The Pirate. 
I must leave my readers to form their own 
opinion as to the truth of this story. I had it 
first hand from Trant, who can have had no 
possible reason for inventing it. As to the 
ethics of the case, there again they have noth¬ 
ing to do with me. Trant—who, by the way, 
I do not know particularly well—is called among 
his intimates “The Bad Man,” which nom de 
guerre I believe he brought home from the 
Wild West, where he spent several unprofitable 
years cattle punching. He has also served be¬ 
fore the mast, both in the merchant service and 
in a foreign navy—the Chilian, if I remember 
rightly—besides having tried his hand at gold 
mining; and, in fact, most of the occupations 
which attract the rolling stones of civilization. 
Whenever I have run across him he has been 
in a chronic state of impecuniosity, but always 
full of wild schemes for making a fortune. 
Wherefore, when I found him in a smart 12- 
ton cutter in Dartmouth I concluded one of his 
schemes had turned up trumps. 
After inspecting and duly admiring his vessel 
I asked him where he had picked her up. 
“Picked her up!” he said, smiling. “Well, 
perhaps that sounds more respectable, but as a 
matter of fact I stole her.” 
“It sounds a tall order,” I suggested; how did 
you manage it?” 
“Well, little Sandford put me on to it,” he re¬ 
plied, “or rather,” he corrected himself, “some¬ 
thing he said did.” 
“You know Sandford?” he asked. “Well, he 
sails about those damned Essex flats in a little 
oddme-dod of a boat about the size of a hip 
bath and much the same shape, and talks of 
nothing but banks and buoys and mud.” 
I had suffered Sandford on several occasions 
and nodded sympathetically. 
“Well,” Trant continued, “it seems a curious 
thing had happened in one of his favorite mud 
holes, a place called West Mardon. Some fel¬ 
low had sailed in thereabout three months ago 
in a yacht called Avocet. He had moored her 
in one of, the creeks, rowed ashore, and never 
been seen or heard of since. It is a common 
thing for a yacht to be left for three or four 
weeks, but even then a local man is usually 
asked to keep his eye on her. But on this oc¬ 
casion no one appears to have seen the owner, 
and as the yacht was new and in no yacht list, 
nothing could be discovered about her owner. 
The local opinion was that he must be dead.” 
I could not help thinking about this after 
Sandford had left me. You see, if the fellow 
was dead, or had no further use for the boat 
she might be useful to me. The more I thought 
over it the more the idea pleased me, and by 
the week end I had made up my mind to try 
my luck as a pirate. 
About 5:30 on Saturday I was dumped out 
at West Mardon by the carrier who is the only 
connection between that doleful place and the 
outer world. 1 struggled down to the so-called 
hard—a mixture of mud and oyster shells, shells 
underneath and mud on top as a rule—and in¬ 
quired of an ancient salt if he could tell me 
where I should be likely to find my dinghy. 
“Wot’s the name o’ your yacht, sir?” he asked. 
“The Avocet,” I answered, as bold as brass. 
“Ho!” he ejaculated, “you’ve come back, ’ave 
yer? Well, John Welsh ’e took your dinghy 
into his shed, else she’d a rended all to bits 
in the sun; she would, an’ ’e’s moored the yacht 
’way up Tow Fleet out on the woi.” 
After a considerable delay John Welsh was 
unearthed. He “ ’oped as ’ow ’e done roight, 
but-,” and here he gave five or six rea¬ 
sons for everything he’d done, and almost broke 
down when he recounted the time and labor 
he had put in looking after things. Well, I 
patted John Welsh on the back, paid him the 
modest sum he asked for his labors, and he 
left me aboard the yacht with many good wishes 
as regards my health and the weather. 
The boat, in spite of Mr. Welsh’s labors, was 
in a frightful pickle, and in such a foul condi¬ 
tion under water that it was doubtful if she 
would handle at all. But I dare not wait to tidy 
up. Already the yacht had created so much stir 
in the place that her owner—or supposed owner 
—would have been an object of general interest. 
In spite of the time—it was just on sunset— 
I got under way at once and made for the open 
water. Once clear of the creeks I laid her to 
and had a hunt below for charts or something 
to guide me through the maze of banks which 
lie along this coast. 
No charts were to be found. The nearest I 
could come to one was a railway guide with a 
miserable map and a nautical almanac, which 
supplied the doleful news that it was high water 
at 9 p. m. This meant a falling tide until 3 
a. m., and the certainty of staying on any bank 
I happened to touch. 
I steered in a southeast direction, sounding 
continuously, and very soon got into three 
fathoms. I tried altering the course in both 
directions, but got no more water, and often 
considerably less. This went on for some time, 
and I was getting quite reconciled to two and 
a half and three fathoms when I suddenly ran 
into deep water. Now, at last, I thought I was 
in a deep channel, and if only I could keep in 
it until daylight I should be all right. 
I had not gone far when I got another three 
fathom sounding. I naturally steered for the 
open water at once and drove her hard and 
fast on a sand bank. This was about midnight 
and the tide falling like fury. There was a 
moon, and with this light, supplemented by the 
anchor light, I set to work as the tide left me 
to scrub and scrape the marine curiosities from 
the yacht’s bottom. 
She floated about 6 a. m. Away to the south 
and east I had seen steamers’ lights passing all 
night and could now see their smoke and masts. 
As I had no idea how the banks lay I took 
the bull by the horns and made a bee-line for 
the steamers. Several times I stuck, but only 
for a few minutes, and by high water I had 
made the Swin middle light vessel. From here 
into the Thames I dragged slowly against the 
tide. I was now in waters which I knew a 
little about, and I had no difficulty in making 
S'heerness. On the evening flood I crawled up 
the Medway and hid in a small creek on the 
port side. Here I refitted the yacht, painted her 
black—she was white when I took her—and al¬ 
tered her name to Privateer. When I had fin¬ 
ished with her I would have defied anyone to 
recognize her. 
“And do you mean to say you have never 
heard anything of her owner?” I asked. 
“Wait a minute—I’m coming to that.” 
“Well, I sailed her about and had almost for¬ 
gotten about the real owner. I took her over 
to Holland and messed about over there for 
about a month. Then I decided to go west and 
got held up at Dover with everlasting west and 
southwest winds. A crowd of small craft were 
copped up with me in the dock there, waiting 
for a fair wind. It was a wretched job. I spent 
most of my time lying on deck, smoking and 
yarning to the fellows on the other boats. 
I was tied up near a great pile of timber 
stacked on the quay and one afternoon while I 
was drawing on deck I noticed a fellow dodg¬ 
ing about round the timber and obviously taking 
the greatest interest in either myself or the 
yacht. 
This did not look healthy, but I pretended not 
to notice him. However, he came and stood 
right against the yacht and said, “You’ve got a 
nice able little ship there.” 
“Yes,” I answered, “she’s a good boat for 
her size. 
“I’m sure she is,” he said, “and plenty of room 
below, I expect.” 
“Oh, fair,” I replied. 
“It’s a pity you altered the color,” he said, 
stooping down and speaking in a low tone. I 
liked her better white.” 
I saw it was all up, so I asked him to come 
aboard. By the way he swung himself on to 
the deck by the shrouds I saw at once that he 
was used to boats. 
“Come below,” was all he said as he went 
down the companion. It was with very mixed 
feelings that I followed him. 
He sat down on the starboard side and I on 
the port, and we stared at each other in silence 
for some time. Then he said: 
“I suppose you stole her from West Mardon?” 
“Yes,” I answered, “about six weeks ago.” 
“Well,” he said, "you’ve got a cheek and no 
mistake. My name is Brown,” he added, “and 
yours ?” 
“Trant.” 
“What, Herbert Trant?” 
I nodded. 
“Oh,” you’re Trant, are you? I’ve heard of 
you before,” and he stared hard at me again. 
“Well, now you have turned up,” I said, “I 
suppose I’d better hand the boat over, but as 
you did not seem to have any use for her I 
thought I might as well borrow her. You’ll find 
her in perfect order.” 
“How do you like her?” he asked suddenly 
in quite a friendly tone. 
“Oh, very much,” I replied. “She’s just what 
I should have built if I could afford it.” 
“I wonder if you’re to be trusted?” he said, 
looking hard at me. 
“Not by people who leave yachts lying about 
for months" together,” I answered, laughing. 
“No; I would not trust .you myself in a case 
like that,” he said, smiling, “but,” he added, 
looking seriously at me, “suppose a fellow was 
in a bit of a hole, would you lend him a hand?” 
“I’ve been in several holes myself,” .1 an¬ 
swered. 
“Seen the paper to-day?” he asked suddenly. 
“No,” I said. 
“When can we get out of the dock?” 
“About five,” I replied. 
“Well, look here,” he said. “If you’ll take 
me over to the other side, and drop me on the 
Belgian coast, you can have the damned boat. 
I’m in a bit of a muddle over here. I only 
make one condition; that is, that you don’t go 
ashore again or have anyone else aboard, and 
I would rather you say nothing about our trip 
for a week or two.” 
Well, to cut a long story short, I got out of 
the dock at five and landed the late owner just 
to the west of Nieuport as the day was break¬ 
ing. “Who do you think he was?” 
“I’ve no idea,” I answered. 
“Why, A-G-.” 
“Great Scott!” I exclaimed as he gave the 
name of the man the papers had been full of 
for weeks in connection with the biggest bank 
fraud of recent years. 
“Yes,” Trant said. “He told me all about it 
as we sailed across. The whole thing had been 
planned for months. This boat was built par¬ 
ticularly for the job. She was left at West 
Mardon for him to make his escape in. The 
week after he left her there he should have 
been back with the “swag,” but the robbery had 
to be put off. The week-end before the fraud 
was carried out he went to West Mardon to 
get the boat ready and found her gone. He 
had arrived in Dover to try the mail boats, but 
the cat was out of the bag, and they were on 
the lookout for him. He was done, when he 
happened to spot the yacht. If you remember 
the case he was tracked to Dover, and there all 
sign of him disappeared. 
“How would you stand if the authorities found 
out you had taken him over?” I asked. 
“I don’t know,” Trant replied, adding laugh¬ 
ingly, “and I’m not going to try and find out.”— 
Fores’ Sporting Sketches. 
* Yachts Change Hands. 
The following transfer of yachts are reported 
through the Hollis Burgess yacht agency: 
Cruising yawl Friendship, sold by Horatio 
Gilber, Boston Y. C., to Francis A. Gunivan, 
Beverly, Mass. 
Twenty-two-foot sloop Marie L., sold by 
George Lee, of Boston, to a member of the 
Boston Y. C., who will use her in eastern waters 
next summer. 
Twenty-one-foot raceabout Tunipoo, sold by 
Charles A. Cooley, of Brookline, to Fred C. 
Fish, of Winchester, Mass. 
The Forest and Stream may be obtained from any 
newsdealer on order. Ask your dealer to supply you 
regularly. 
