Chapter 1

Joshua Johnson, Stanly Bromly's father-in-law, had to return to San Francisco to attend the memorial service for an old and dear friend of the family. His wife, Elizabeth was going with him, but Elizabeth, Stanly's wife was not going because her consumption was acting up again.

The Johnsons and the Bromlys had moved to San Diego from San Francisco because of the younger Elizabeth's illness. The doctors she consulted felt that the drier and warmer climate of San Diego would be better for her health. So far, for the most part, they had been correct. Nevertheless, Elizabeth was coughing again, so Stanly didn't want to take the chance on her getting worse.

The Johnsons decided to take a ship to San Francisco as the only way they could hope to get there in time for the memorial service, since they could not possibly make the journey in time for the funeral. They sailed on a coastal schooner which regularly made the trip between Colombia and San Francisco, mostly carrying gold seekers, but carrying other passengers as well. The ship also carried a small quantity of high-value freight.

Word came about 2 weeks later that the ship had been boarded by pirates based on the channel islands just west and north of Los Angeles. The passengers were being held for ransom. Any that weren't ransomed within 4 more weeks would be sold as slaves in China. A contact for paying the ransom in Los Angeles was supplied. The prisoners were to be released as soon as the ransom was paid.

Stanly hastily gathered the money for the ransom and rushed to Los Angeles to beat the deadline. He made it with a few days to spare and escorted his in-laws home to San Diego. However, Stanly Bromly was not one to stand still for this kind of outrage. He got all of the details he could from Joshua Johnson and made ready to visit the pirates on San Christabel Island.

Of course, none of his family wanted him to go, but Stanly could not be dissuaded. He considered this to be an attack on his honor as a gentleman which he could not ignore. His wife finally gave in when she saw that argument was hopeless.

Stanly gathered his kit which he had used in his fight with the Sidney Ducks and added some additional items he thought would be helpful on this adventure. Foremost was a hand grenade with a contact fuse of his own invention. All he had to do was arm it and throw it to produce a very satisfactory explosion. It was rigged so that it would explode no matter what angle it made on contact with a solid object, and it was sensitive enough to explode from an impact equivalent to being dropped about 10 feet.

Stanly took the next schooner to Los Angeles, half in hope that they would be attacked by the same pirates as before. No such luck, so he disembarked in Los Angeles and arranged to journey to San Christabel on his own. He bought a skiff suitable for crossing the channel; he had learned to sail small boats as a child in Virginia.

The skiff was larger than the minimum necessary to make the trip, just in case he needed the extra capacity for his return trip. Stanly loaded the skiff with his kit, plus plenty of food and water, and left after dark. His skiff was painted dark blue and the sail was also dark blue, so, when he was wearing his black "working clothes," Stanly and the boat were virtually invisible to the casual glance.

He reached San Christabel before dawn and sailed into a grotto accessible only from the water. He was running out of the dim light provided by the moon and stars just as he ran aground on a small sandy beach inside the grotto. Satisfied that he wouldn't be seen from the ocean, Stanly anchored to the beach and went to sleep.

Stanly slept the day through. He woke up and ate a quick breakfast before donning his kit of weapons and sailing out of the grotto in search of a convenient way to reach the pirates' stronghold. Actually, more than one band of pirates lived on the island, and Stanly, in a fit of civic virtue, decided to eliminate all of them. The truth of the matter was that he had no way of knowing which band of pirates was the one that had captured the Johnsons, so he would solve that conundrum by eliminating all of them.

Stanly planned to spend the first night looking the place over, before formulating a plan of attack. He needed to know how many pirate bands were on the island and how they were distributed. He also needed to know how formidable were their strongholds. He doubted that he could accomplish much by a head-on attack; he planned to use guile instead if brute force.

The first pirate group he found appeared to be so inept that he almost pitied them. They were a group of five men living on a disreputable hulk of a boat that looked more like a pile of flotsam than a serviceable ocean-going vessel. Stanly wondered how they survived as pirates, since their vessel certainly wouldn't intimidate anybody. Stanly shook his head and marked them for destruction the first night of his attack, since he could take them out in only a few minutes, but, for now, he needed to continue reconnoitering.

He sailed around the coast of the island for less than two miles when he found a much more prosperous-looking band of cutthroats. This looked like at least 30 men and a very large boat, almost a ship, tied up to an impressively built wharf. There was an associated warehouse right on the dock and 2 more buildings farther up the beach. One building looked like a jail and the other appeared to be a fort. This looked like it was probably the gang who had captured the Johnsons.

It was hard not to stop here, but he convinced himself to keep going. Stanly had gone about 3 miles before he found another pirate gang. This one appeared to be prosperous enough, but nowhere near the previous group. There appeared to be about 10 men in this gang, and their boat was smart and sharp. Yes, this was a gang well worth revisiting, but not tonight. He kept going.

He was nearly back to his starting point when he found the fourth party, and party was the right word. They had a roaring fire going and half a dozen naked women were dancing around it as 8 men cheered them on. As Stanly watched, one of the dancers appeared to stumble from exhaustion and an onlooker stood up and swung a long whip at her. He caught her on her bare breasts and drew blood and a scream of raw pain. This was more than Stanly could stand!

Stanly immediately ran his skiff onto the beach and ran close to the merrymakers. He paused and drew one of his throwing knives. He released the knife as the man with the whip drew back for another swing. The knife caught him in the chest and buried itself to the hilt.

The man gurgled some intelligible words and fell over on his face. Those of the other men who happened to notice the fall of the man apparently attributed the fall to too much drink and continued to party. Stanly realized that he was now committed, so he preceded to take out the rest of the buccaneers. The men were so drunk that they were really no problem, so he drew his short sword and waded in to chop them to pieces.

The women saw Stanly and screamed as he deftly removed the head of the nearest pirate. Stanly didn't pause, or even slow down, as he attacked the next man in line. This one he stabbed in the gut hard enough to have the point come out of the man's back. Stanly twisted the sword as he pushed at the man with his foot to force him off the sword. Three down, and five to go.

Stanly suddenly noticed that the last man in line had struggled to his feet and was pointing a pistol in Stanly's direction. Stanly wasn't worried about being shot by the drunken man, but he didn't want the sound of a gun shot. This might attract the attention of additional pirates from this band who could show up at an inconvenient time. Therefore, Stanly paused long enough in his sword play to use another of his throwing knives. This one caught the man in the throat and stopped him in his tracks. He, too, gurgled a bit, but had nothing coherent to say as he died.

Meanwhile, the man nearest to Stanly had enough time to get to his feet and draw a wicked looking knife. It was not comparable to Stanly's short sword, but would be completely effective if he could get a chance to use it. Stanly backed off a half-step to move out of range of the other man's knife and flicked his wrist. This caused his blade to rip through the muscles on the man's thigh. The man now had no support for his right side and toppled over. On his way down, Stanly flicked his wrist again, cutting the man's throat and nearly removing his head. Two more down, and three to go.