“We’ll bind you out for five years of service,” he began. “Whoever takes you will pay us twenty pounds.” He tossed a purse into my lap. “There’s the money in good pieces of eight, Spanish gold. Never say Ned Teach of Bristol’s not a gentleman of honor.” I pressed him to know the cause of so much generosity; and I learned that the man I had killed in the fray was a desperate mutineer who threatened to overthrow the captaincy of Teach. “Now,” continued the buccaneer, “you’ve got some money, and if you don’t find a way to escape in less than six months you deserve to hang.” The approach of some of the crew prevented any further talk between us. The next day we ran into port. I was duly bound out to service in the capacity of what is called a redemptioner. This kind of service, I was told, received its name from the fact that the redemptioner, or bond-servant, could buy back his freedom by paying a certain sum of money at any time after five years of service. It was into this kind of bond that Ruth had intended to enter before I found her in Bristol. As I had given her but little ready money, I feared that fate had again laid its harsh hand on Ruth and me alike. The immediate effect upon me of my service, or imprisonment, for such it really was, was to undo what small tolerance towards the Roman church I had learned from Ruth. The buccaneers bound me out to a Catholic owner of plantations, and soon, upon an attempt to escape, he had me stripped and flogged at the public whipping post on a crowded market day. I was kept close after that and not allowed to stray from the spot of my labors. For some time, in memory of Ruth, I struggled hard against a change of heart. But little by little my bitter hatred came back to me, and the mere shadow of a Catholic was something to be trampled under foot and spat upon. I resolved to make my escape, come what would, and to this end I was alert to every accident that could be turned to my advantage. At that time the governments of Europe, and especially of England, were determined to put down the evil practices of the buccaneers. Orders were sent to all the American colonies to arrest the pirates wherever found. They were by this means driven from the larger ports and forced to frequent the smaller villages on the sea. Sometimes, nay, generally, their visits were connived at because of their liberal exchange in captured goods and of the cupidity of the merchants. It chanced, however, that an occasional honest magistrate made a rapid descent upon some unexpected place and captured a rover in an out of the way anchorage.