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BAHAMA BILL




Works of

T. JENKINS HAINS


[Illustration]

  The Windjammers              $1.50
  The Black Barque              1.50
  The Voyage of the Arrow       1.50
  Bahama Bill                   1.50

[Illustration]


  L.C. PAGE & COMPANY
  New England Building
  BOSTON      MASS.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: "_The giant black stood gazing out to sea"_

  (_See page 17_)]




  BAHAMA BILL

  Mate of the Wrecking Sloop
  _Sea-Horse_


  By
  T. Jenkins Hains

  Author of "The Black Barque," "The Voyage
  of the Arrow," "The Windjammers," etc.


  _With a frontispiece in colour by_
  H.R. Reuterdahl

  [Illustration]


  _Boston_: L.C. PAGE &
  COMPANY        _Mdccccviii_




  _Copyright, 1908_
  BY L.C. PAGE & COMPANY
  (INCORPORATED)

  _All rights reserved_


  First Impression, January, 1908


  _COLONIAL PRESS_
  _Electrotyped and Printed by C.H. Simonds & Co.
  Boston, U.S. A._




CONTENTS


                                                   PAGE
  I.    BENEATH THE "BULLDOG'S" BILGE                 1

  II.   THE WRECKER'S REWARD                         18

  III.  THE MATE OF THE "SEA-HORSE"                  35

  IV.   BARNEGAT MACREARY                            50

  V.    AT THE END OF THE REEF                       68

  VI.   THE SANCTIFIED MAN                           88

  VII.  WHEN THE LIGHT FAILED AT CARYSFORT          116

  VIII. THE TRIMMING OF MR. DUNN                    129

  IX.   THE SURVIVOR                                176

  X.    ON THE GREAT BAHAMA BANK                    196

  XI.   THE ICONOCLAST                              232

  XII.  JOURNEGAN'S GRAFT                           266

  XIII. SHANGHAING THE TONG                         296

  XIV.  THE EDGE OF THE RONCADOR                    323

  XV.   THE WRECKER                                 338

  XVI.  THE BARRATORS                               350




BAHAMA BILL




I

Beneath the "Bulldog's" Bilge


The brig lay in four fathoms of water on the edge of the Great Bahama
Bank. She had been a solid little vessel, built for the fruit trade,
and she was about two hundred tons register. Her master had tried to
sight the "Isaacs," but owing to the darkness and the drift of the
Gulf Stream, he had miscalculated his distance in trying for the New
Providence channel. A "<DW65>-head," a sharp, projecting point of
coral, had poked a hole about four feet in diameter through her bottom,
and she had gone down before they could run her into the shoal water on
the bank.

Down to the graveyard of good ships, Key West, the message was hurried,
and the wreckers of Florida Reef heard the news. A heavily built sloop
of thirty tons, manned by ten Spongers and Conchs, started up the
Florida channel and arrived upon the scene two days later.

The _Bulldog_ had settled evenly upon her keel, but as she was sharp,
she had listed until her masts were leaning well to starboard, dipping
her yardarms deep in the clear water. She was submerged as far up as
her topsail yards.

The captain of the wrecker was a Conch. His mate was a giant <DW64> of
the Keys; young, powerful, and the best diver on the Florida Reef.
His chest measured forty-eight inches in circumference over his
lean pectoral muscles, and he often bent iron bars of one-half inch
to show the set of his vise-like grip. He was almost black, with a
sinister-looking leer upon his broad face, his eyes red and watery like
most of the divers of the Bank. He could remain under four fathoms for
at least three and a half minutes, and work with amazing force, and
continue this terrific strain for six hours on a stretch, with but
five minutes between dives. Half fish or alligator, and half human,
he looked as he