6 Grandpa's Tale

6. GRANDPA'S TALE Matilda had met Grandpa Rogers before, but he was older and more gnarly than she remembered. The dim candlelight cast shadows across his face, which cracked into a toothless grin at the sight of her. "ARRR... Matilda," Grandpa said. "I hear ye've got a pirate problem?" "I don't have a pirate problem, Mr. Rogers," said Matilda. "But Dull-on-Sea does have one."

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Matilda pulled the newspaper clippings from her satchel. Eyewitness Mervyn Wobley had helped the police put together a sketch of the pirate captain, which had been on the front page of all the papers a month before. Grandpa scratched his chin with his hook as he squinted at the clipping. "ARRR, just as I suspected.... If it ain't OI' Twirly!" "OI' Twirly?" asked Jim. "Aye, but he'd be Cap'n Twirlybeard to you, boy," Grandpa said, "or he'd be cuttin' out yer tongue and feedin' it to the fishes!

"Y'see, Jim Lad, in the good old days, Cap'n Twirlybeard and his crew were the scourge of the seas. Their ship, the Black Rat, was lightning fast and brimmin' with cannons. All feared OI' Twirly's flag, and many thought him invincible." Grandpa waved his hook in the air. "But one fateful day, he and his crew were ambushed ashore by His Majesty's Marines. 'Tis said they fought to the last, and OI' Twirly his'self was the last pirate standing. But even with his crew slain around him, he refused to surrender...." Grandpa smiled. "Y'know, I thinks I can remember a chantey that tells the tale. Would ye like to hear it?"

Matilda and Jim nodded excitedly. "Sing it, Grandpa!" Grandpa Rogers plucked a battered concertina from beside his chair. He cleared his throat with a hollow cough, and after gargling some grog, he began. "They say OI' Twirly's fought his last, paid the price for his piratin' past. The king's men took him on dry land, Ambushed for a final stand.

Outnumbered twenty men to one. Soon his crew were dead and gone. OI' Twirly clung to a clifftop tree, Blade in hand, his back to the sea. Muskets filled the air with sound, Blew OI' Twirly off the ground, Down and down from the cliff he fell, To his death, cursed to hell....