## Chapter 104: Barbary Pirates Strike!
The Beagle, her bow cleaving the azure waves of the English Channel, sailed on, propelled by the wind.
Colonel Fitzroy, his monocle firmly in place, scanned the horizon through his telescope. “Hard to port! Take the windward position, don’t close the distance too quickly,” he commanded the helmsman.
Following his order, the Beagle swiftly turned, her hull now facing north.
“Gunners, musketeers, load your ammunition!” Fitzroy barked, his voice echoing across the deck. “Quartermaster, how many Congreve rockets did we bring this time?”
“Sir, we prepared two hundred for this sea training exercise!” the Quartermaster replied, his voice strained.
“Good! Don’t hold back, bring them all up! Rig the rocket boats, and if things go south, give them two rounds of cannon fire. At a distance of a hundred and fifty yards, unleash the rocket barrage! Two hundred rockets, all fired within eight minutes!”
“Aye, sir!”
As the Beagle maneuvered, two ships on the horizon seemed to have spotted her presence.
Through his telescope, Arthur noticed the red, white, and blue tricolour flying from their masts.
“French flag?” he muttered, a frown creasing his brow.
“What are you talking about, Arthur?” Eldred scoffed, correcting him. “The French flag is white! That’s a maritime signal flag, they’re requesting us to keep our distance.”
Before Eldred could finish, he heard Fitzroy’s booming order: “Signal them, we demand to speak.”
The Beagle, in response, raised a yellow and blue communication flag on her mainmast.
On the other ship, Fred stood with his hands on his hips, engaged in conversation with a man sporting a white turban, a bushy beard, and a curved dagger at his waist.
Spotting the flag on the Beagle, the First Mate of the Blackthorn rushed to Fred’s side and whispered a few words.
“Damn it, this bloody ship is so full of crap! Tell them to scram, I ain’t got time to deal with them,” Fred spat, tossing the straw he had been chewing.
“Mr. Fred, they’re flying the Royal Navy reserve flag. Isn’t it a bit rude to talk to them like that? Maybe they’re just providing escort.”
Fred’s eyes narrowed. “Just crossing the Dover Strait, and some pirates have the nerve to rob in the English Channel? Who do they think they are?”
Hearing this, the turbaned man, with a thick accent, questioned in broken English, “Mr. Fred, I think you may be a bit too hasty. After all, I’m standing right here.”
Fred burst into laughter, throwing an arm around the man’s shoulder.
“Brother, you’re different! You’re a special case! You know, you guys are unlucky, born in the wrong era. If it was the 16th century, when Barbarossa Hayreddin was alive, even a hundred Frenchmen wouldn’t dare destroy your base!
But the French got their comeuppance! That bastard Charles X destroyed Algiers, and a month later, the revolutionaries booted him out! So, Allah is watching over you guys after all. You’re just unlucky because He took a nap for a while.”
The man remained silent, then placed his hand on his chest and bowed slightly, sighing, “Inshallah, may we all have good luck in the future.”
Fred took a puff from his pipe. “But… brother, selling some slaves to you, no problem. But for me to take on your entire ship… that’s a bit… You know, I’m not exactly rolling in dough.”
The turbaned man instinctively reached for his dagger, but Fred’s voice stopped him.
“But you’re lucky this time. To be honest, I’m not staying in London. This Blackthorn is headed for America. I got some investments there a few years back. If you’re interested, come with me and make a fortune.
I got a bunch of desperate poor folks on this ship. Although they can’t be sold as white slaves like in the Ottoman Empire, they can still work for seven or eight years in America. Then we’ll add some black slaves.
Whether we set up a tobacco plantation or a cotton plantation in the West Indies, it’s a lucrative business! You can run some trade deals and smuggle goods during the planting season, and transport goods during the harvest.
Once you save up some money, you can start a legitimate business. That’s better than floating on the sea, right? To be frank, since the end of the Napoleonic Wars, the crackdown on pirates has intensified.
Even if you hadn’t brought this up, as old friends, I would have advised you.”
The man couldn’t help but ask, “You’re doing well in England, why quit?”
Fred grinned, revealing his gold tooth. “Brother, things are different for us than for you Barbary pirates. You just need to keep the Pasha of Algiers happy, and you’re golden.
But this shithole of Britain is different. You have to please Scotland Yard, the parishes, the magistrates, and a bunch of other private detectives and constables. If anything goes wrong in any of these areas, you’ll fall into a trap.
Brother, think about it. I’m just doing a bit of slave trading, selling stolen goods, smuggling, bribing judges, greasing palms… All year long, after deducting labor costs, expenses, and bribes, I’m left with a tiny profit.
I work my ass off all year, and sometimes I earn less than a few dozen looms in a textile factory. For this pittance, I have to hustle like this. It’s not easy, you know? Unlike you guys, you Barbary pirates can pull off a big heist, and come back to enjoy a few beautiful slave girls.
Sigh, I’m a workaholic for life! In this aspect, believing in Allah is better than believing in God.”
The turbaned man pursed his lips, finally unable to hold back. “Mr. Fred, Allah and God are actually the same.”
“Oh? Really?” Fred affectionately put his arm around the man. “No wonder you look like my brother, we believe in the same thing. Alright, tell me about the Quran during lunch, let’s have a good chat about this.”
Just as Fred and the pirate leader were deep in conversation, the First Mate interrupted again. “Sir, that ship is approaching us, their behavior seems off.”
“Off?” Fred snapped. “I’m more off than them! What, they want to rob me? I’m brothers with the real pirates, let them come closer and see what a charge from a cavalry lieutenant of the 18th Dragoon Guards looks like!”
The First Mate was speechless, completely dumbfounded by Fred’s lack of maritime knowledge.
At this moment, the pirate leader was the first to recognize the situation’s subtlety.
He pulled out his telescope and observed the Beagle for a while, before muttering,
“They’re signaling us to stop immediately and allow them to board for inspection.”
“Huh?” Fred was practically laughing. “They’re actually suicidal? Ahmed, brother, are you interested in one last score before we head to America?”
Ahmed surveyed the Beagle’s size, pondered for a moment, before nodding slowly. “We can do it, but we need to escape quickly afterwards. If this gets back to the Royal Navy, we won’t have ten lives to spare.”
Fred scoffed, “That’s exactly what I want! The Royal Navy? The ones who defeated Napoleon were the glorious army, those who experienced the cannon fire of Waterloo! My orders, let them in, I’ll show them what a charge from a cavalry lieutenant of the 18th Dragoon Guards looks like!”
(End of Chapter)