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Read Ebook: Wappin' Wharf: A Frightful Comedy of Pirates by Brooks Charles S Charles Stephen Hatfield Gordon Contributor Flory Julia McCune Illustrator
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Ebook has 686 lines and 23820 words, and 14 pages
PATCH: It 's grog beats off the melancholy. As soon as me pipes go dry, I gets homesick fer the ocean. Here we be, Duke, thrown up at last ter rot like driftwood on the shore. No more sailin' off to Trinidad! No tackin' 'round the Hebrides! We is ships as has sprung a leak. It was 'appy days when we sailed with ol' Flint on the Spanish Main.
DUKE: 'Appy days, Patch!
PATCH: Aye! The blessed, dear, ol' roarin' hulk. No better pirate ever lived than Flint. Smart with his cutlass. Quick at the trigger. Grog! A sloppin' pail o' it was jest a sip.
DUKE: I used ter tell him that his leg was holler.
PATCH: He was a vat, was Flint--jest a swishin' keg.
DUKE: Grog jest sizzled and disappeared, like when yer drops it on a red-hot seacoal.
PATCH: Fer twenty year and more me and you has seen ol' Flint march his wictims off the plank.
DUKE: "Step lively!" he 'd say. "Does n't yer hear Davy callin' to yer?" There was never a sailorman ever sat in the Port Light at Wappin' wharf which could drink with Flint.
PATCH: Wappin' wharf and gibbets is nothin' ter talk about. Funerals even is cheerfuller.
DUKE: There 's his parrot.
PATCH: She used ter cuss soft and gentle to herself--'appy all the day. She ain 't spoke since Flint was took. Peckin' at yer finger and broodin'.
DUKE: There 's his ol' clock.
PATCH: As hung in the cabin o' the Spittin' Devil.
DUKE: With the pendulum gettin' tangled in a storm. A 'ell of a clock fer a bouncin' ship.
PATCH: She was tickin' peaceful the day Flint was hanged. But she stopped--does yer remember it?--the very minute they pushed him off the ladder.
DUKE: She ain 't ticked since.
PATCH: It makes yer 'stitious. And she won 't never run agin--that 's what Flint alers said--till his death 's revenged.
DUKE: He told us never ter wind her--says she 'd start hisself without no windin' when the right time came.
PATCH: If I was ter look up and see that pendulum swingin'--Horrers! Yeller elephants would be nothin'!
DUKE: Pooh! I 'd give a month o' grog jest ter hear the ol' dear tickin', and ter know that Flint was restin' easy in his rotten coffin--swappin' stories with the pretty angels.
PATCH: I loved Flint like a brother. It was him knocked this out. But it was jest in the way o' business. We differed a leetle in the loot. He was very persuasive, was ol' Flint.
DUKE: Yer talks like a woman. They loves yer to cuff 'em. Them was 'appy days, Patch.
PATCH: Blast me gig what 's left, Duke, but me and you has seen a heap o' sights. I suppose I 've drowned meself a hundred men. It 's comfertin' when yer lays awake at night. I feels I ain 't wasted meself. I 've used me gifts. I ain 't been a foolish virgin and put me shinin' talent inside a bushel. But me and you is driftwood now, Duke.
DUKE: Aye. But it ain 't no use snifflin' about it, ol' crocodile. Darlin' is certainly handy at mixin' grog. And we 've a right smart cabin with winders on the sea. Since I stuffed yer ol' shirt in the roof it hardly leaks.
PATCH: My shirt! Next week is me week fer changin'. How could yer ha' done it? I 'm a kinder perticerler dresser. I likes ter wash now and then--if it ain 't too often.
DUKE: Darlin', me friend Patch is thirsty. And a drop meself. Yer a precious ol' lady, and I loves yer.
DARLIN': Yer spoils me, Duke.
DUKE: It 's foul tonight on the ocean. How the wind blows! It be spittin' up outside. The channel 's as riled as a wampire when yer scorns her. How she snorts!
PATCH: The devil hisself is hissin' through his teeth.
DUKE: There 'll be sailormen tonight what 's booked fer Davy Jones's locker. I 'm not kickin' much ter be ashore. I rots peaceful.
DUKE: Hi, there, for'ard! Batten yer hatch! Yer blowin' the gizzard out o' us.
PATCH: Poor Flint! He was took on jest such a night.
Dropped inter the Port Light fer somethin' wet and warmin'. Jest ter kinder say goodby. Ship all fitted out. He 'd got three new sailormen--fine fellers as had been sentenced ter be hanged fer cuttin' purses, but had been let go, as they had reformed and wanted ter be honest pirates.
DUKE: I remembers the night, ol' sea-nymph. It was rainin' ter put out the fires o' hell--with the leetle devils stoakin' in the sinners. It 's sinners, Patch, as is used fer kindlers, ter keep the devils in a healthy sweat.
PATCH: He was ter sail when the tide ran out. Lord a Goody! How the tide runs down the Thames, as if it were homesick fer the ocean!
DUKE: But someone squealed.
PATCH: Squealers is worse 'n hissin' reptiles. They ketched Flint and they strung him to a gibbet. Poor ol' dear! I never touches me patch, but I thinks o' Flint.
DUKE: This here life is snug and easy. We has retired from practice, like store-keepers does who has made a fortin. Ain 't we settin' here in style and comfert, and jest waitin' fer the treasure ships ter come ter us? We gets the plums without chawin' at the dough. We blows out the lighthouse, and we sets our lantern so as ter fool 'em on the course, and when they smashes on the rocks, well--all we does is stuff our pokes with the treasure that washes up. I prays meself fer fog and dirty weather. Now I lay me, says I, and will yer send it thick and oozy?
PATCH: I ain 't disputin' yer. And we robs landlubbers once in a while.
DUKE: Now yer talkin', ol' sea-lion. I 'm tellin' yer it were a good haul we made last night on Castle Crag.
PATCH: Who 's disputin' yer?
DUKE: I 'm tellin' yer. Silver candles! And spoons! Never seen such a heap o' spoons.
PATCH: What 's anyone want more 'n one spoon fer? Yer cleans it every bite agin the tongue.
DUKE: Yer disgusts me, Patch. Yer ain 't no manners. Fer meself I spears me food tidy on me knife.
DUKE: There 's jest one leetle thing I does n't understand. I asks yer. What 's the meaning o' this here loot we took at Castle Crag? I asks yer. Ain 't we been by that castle a hundred times? The Earl, he don 't wear clothes like this. None o' the arstocky does, 'cept when they struts on Piccadilly. I asks yer, Patch. I asks yer who wears a thing like that.
DARLIN': Yer looks like the Archbishop o' Canterbury.
PATCH: . His Grice takin' the air--pluckin' posies.
DUKE: Lookin' like a silly jackass.
PATCH: Yer hurts me feelin's, Duke.
DUKE: I does n't like it, Patch. I does n't understand it. And what I does n't understand, I does n't like.
PATCH: What?
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