A Pirate Raid!

 You read the beginning, now for a bit gettin on toward the middle/end.  

Reading Sunday June 19th 4pm.  Falmouth Town Green/Library Lawn.  Arts Alive Festival. 

Free!  Check out the other stuff happening in the festival too!

An excerpt from, The Female Alcoholic, or Why the Gaspee burned.
by Amanda Weir 

Scene 5 Oh Shit, a Pirate Raid!

(The next night, Sabin’s (The Professor’s basement bar) Tavern.  Joe and the Professor drink some rum, then some more.)

Professor

So, how did it go?  How’s Mary? 

Joe

Oh Shit.  Some Rum.  Rum.

Professor

(The Prof pours.)  Once on shore Captain Lindsey went to find John Brown, knowing that he was one of the greatest adversaries of Lieutenant Dudingston. 

Joe

Oh Shit. 

Professor

Lindsay had skillfully outmaunevered the Gaspee from Newport through Naragansett Bay, missing the spit of sand off of Namquit Point where it left Dudingston and the Gaspee stranded upon the sandbar before the Pawtuxet River.

Joe

So Mary, so Mary, I think she might have lost her mind.

Professor

John reveled in the fact that Dudingston lay helpless just offshore.

Joe

Mary wants to get married. 

Professor

Having been stuck in that very same situation a year before when sailing to Philadelphia with his brother Moses, John knew that the Gaspee would stay immobile till morning.

Joe

Marry Mary.  Marry Mary.

Professor

John summoned the captains of all of his boats that lay in port, and a drummer boy to beat his drum up and down Towne Street to rally a raiding party.  For it would be a classic Pirates Raid!

Joe

I told her I would.  I told Mary, I’d marry her.  I didn’t know what was happening, it was like a scene in a movie.  As though I was outside of my body, watching what was happening. 

Professor

Distinguished men and common sailors crowded into raiding party headquarters, a tavern operated by James Sabin, as John Brown laid out his plan. 

Joe

Oh Shit.  I do love her.  I’m mad about Mary.  Oh shit.

Professor

They would row out in longboats, charge over the rail of the Gaspee and surprise the sleeping Brits, subduing them in hand to hand combat.  Abe Whipple was by John’s side.  Whipple had done this sort of thing before when capturing merchant ships in the Caribbean. 

Joe

I thought I was pursuing her, but no she got me. 

            (Joe and the Professor take a long drink of Rum.)

Professor

At 10pm the raiding party set out, having given the men enough time to imbibe their liquid courage, Rum. 

            (The Professor pours them both more Rum. They drink.)

Professor

So you’re going to marry Mary. 

Joe

That’s the plan I guess.

Professor

Oh Shit.

Joe

I know right. Shit.

Professor

You do love her, you think the world of her, she’s amazing and beautiful and all that.

Joe

Yup, and all that.  She wants two to three Oregonese children. 

Professor

Oregonian, you’re going to move then?

Joe

Yup, that’s the plan I guess.

Professor

Well, in times like these there’s only one thing to do. 

Joe

What’s that?

Professor

A Pirate Raid!

Joe

A pirate raid!

Professor

That’s right.  I, John Brown, dub you, Abe Whipple, the Sherriff of Kent.  (That’s the county just off Namquit Point.) 

Joe

Oh god.  A Pirate Raid.  We’re going to burn the Gaspee.

Professor

That’s right.  We’ll subdue that scurvy dog Dudingston and send those British seamen back where they belong. Drink up for courage, for it’s almost 10oclock and we must make our move. 

(They down their rum.  The Professor then hands Joe a tricorne hat of his own and they set off with fire in their eyes.)