Storm Warning

by Linda Sue Park

  "Amy-"

  "Put your hand over your mouth."

  Dan complied after a quick glance at the back of Nellie's head. "We were in the Bahamas for about eight hours. You spent more than half that time on a boat and the other half in a doctor's office. When did you have time to buy a book?"

  "I didn't buy it. I downloaded it in the Oceanus library. While you were at the water park. And I read it on the plane just now."

  "The whole thing?"

  "No, silly. Just the chapters about Anne Bonny and Jack Rackham. Anyway, the book was written by this guy named Captain Charles Johnson. But a lot of people think that was a pseudonym and that it was really written by Daniel Defoe--you know, the guy who wrote Robinson Crusoe."

  "Oh, yeah," he said. "I knew that. But not everybody has a library catalog for a brain like you do."

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  Amy ignored his last comment. She went on. "Anne Bonny joined Rackham's crew. She dressed up as a man and learned how to sail and sword fight and everything, and nobody on the ship except Calico Jack knew she was a woman."

  "Pretty cool," Dan said.

  "They had a baby in Cuba. But Anne wanted to keep being a pirate, so she left it there with a nanny. And then this new pirate joined them, and it turned out he was a woman, too--Mary Read."

  "No way," Dan said in disbelief. "You're telling me that a whole bunch of those old-time pirates were really women?"

  Amy shook her head. "No, hardly any. It was just like this big coincidence that they both ended up on the same ship. And supposedly they were just as good fighters as any of the men--sometimes better."

  She paused. They could have been pals with Nellie. ...

  "Calico Jack's ship got caught by the British Navy," Amy went on, "and the whole crew was put on trial. They were all found guilty and sentenced to death by hanging. But at the last minute, Anne and Mary told the court that they were pregnant. It was against the law to execute a pregnant woman, so they got sent to prison instead. And--"

  "Let me guess," Dan said. "The prison is in Kingston?"

  "No," Amy said, "it doesn't exist anymore."

  "Then what are we going to Kingston for? This is an awfully long drive!"

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  "The prison was in Spanish Town. That was the capital of Jamaica back then. But later they moved the capital and all the government records to Kingston. So that's why we're going there. To look up the records and see if there's anything that might help."

  "Okay, I get it," Dan said. "But aren't you forgetting something?"

  "What?"

  "This." He tapped his chest.

  Amy knew what "this" was. The bear claw. Dan was wearing the chain around his neck, and hopefully Nellie still didn't know about it.

  "We don't have any idea how it fits in," Dan said. "It would make sense that some pirates were Tomas, all that adventuring and sword-fighting and stuff. And we found this in a Tomas cave. But it's like a dead end, it doesn't lead to anything else."

  Amy sighed. "I've been worrying about that," she said. "We might end up having to go back to the Bahamas to hunt around some more. But the portrait with Anne Bonny's name on the back--that's a lead, too, and we know she was in Jamaica."

  Amy took the little portrait out of her backpack. Together she and Dan leaned over it and studied the face with its wide green eyes and snub nose.

  Hope.

  Both marveled again that the woman in the picture looked just like their mother, Hope Cahill.

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  CHAPTER 8

  * * *

  They were in the wrong place. Again.

  Nellie had parked at the Government Records Centre in Kingston. Within a few minutes, Dan and Amy learned from a clerk that they would have to backtrack to Spanish Town and go to the Jamaica Archives there. Fortunately, Spanish Town wasn't too far from Kingston.

  The main square in Spanish Town was very impressive--beautiful old colonial buildings and lots of tall palm trees. The Jamaica Archives was a more modern two-story, tan-brick building just behind the square.

  In the research room, Amy filled out the request form for the file she wanted to look at: the transcript for the trials of Jack Rackham, Anne Bonny, and Mary Read.

  She gave the form to the man at the request desk. He was a tall, well-built young man with a name tag that read LESTER.

  Lester stared at Nellie for a few moments; he seemed fascinated by her nose ring. She was busy untangling

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  the cord to her earbuds and didn't seem to notice.

  Then he glanced down at the form. "Oh, that file again," he said. "You Americans, you have a thing about pirates."

  Amy caught her breath. "Has someone else been in here asking for this file lately?"

  "Maybe not lately," he said. "Let's see--the record says it was last year sometime."

  Amy frowned. That would have been before Grace's death--before this frenzied hunt for Clues started. Still, it could have been a Cahill. ...

  "Oh, and you know those Pirates of the Caribbean films?" Lester said. "They sent a researcher here and he looked up all our pirate stuff."

  "Did they use anything they found?" Dan asked eagerly.

  "Yah, they did, young man," he said with a smile. Amy thought it was a very nice smile, one that filled his whole face. Not just his mouth, but his cheeks and eyes, too. "Calico Jack Rackham was hanged, and then his body was squeezed into a little iron cage. They hung the cage at the entrance to Kingston Harbour with his rotting corpse as a warning to other pirates."

  "Ewwww," Amy said.

  "Cool!" Dan said.

  Lester laughed. "In the movie, they changed it a little--they had pirates' corpses hanging from gallows instead of in a cage. But that's where they got the idea."

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  He got up and went into the stacks. A few minutes later, he returned with a file folder. Meanwhile, Nellie had wandered off toward an easy chair by the window. Lester stared at her again.

  "I'll need a driver's license or passport to hold until you return the file," he said.

  Dan went to Nellie and got her driver's license. Lester glanced at Nellie, then at the photo on the license, then back at Nellie again. Apparently satisfied, he put the license into a little numbered cubbyhole behind him and handed Amy the file.

  In the chair by the window, Nellie was already dozing off. Amy and Dan sat down at a table nearby, split up the papers in the file, and began skimming through them. Or rather, Amy began skimming. Dan was still stuck on the rotten corpse.

  "Do you think there were maggots?" he asked. "Probably. I mean, it's tropical here. He was probably crawling with them."

  Amy hardly heard him. "Dan, listen to this," she said. "There's this witness testifying against Anne Bonny and Mary Read, who said that they wore 'Men's Jackets and long Trouzers, and Handkerchiefs tied about their heads.' And that 'the Reason of knowing and believing them to be Women then was, by the largeness of their Breasts.'"

  "Um, that would do it," Dan said with a snicker. "But what happened to them? Were they in jail for the rest of their lives?"

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  "Mary Read died in prison," Amy said, "only a few months later. But nobody knows for sure what happened to Anne. Some people think that her father--he was a big shot in South Carolina--managed to spirit her out of prison, and she lived under another name for the rest of her life."

  Dan gave a little snort. "That sounds very Cahillesque," he said.

  "It's all pretty interesting," Amy said slowly, "but there's really nothing here that points to a clue." She nodded toward the papers she had given him. "What have you got there?"

  "I don't know," he said. "It's a really long list. I started trying to read it, but it's just all this stuff."

  Amy took the pages from him. Her heart skipped a beat. "Dan, do you realize what this is? It's the manifest of Rackham's ship!"

  "Cool!" Dan said. Then, "What's a manifest?"

  Amy was too excited even to roll her eyes at him. "It's like an invento
ry list of everything on board the ship when it was taken. Every ship had to have one by law."

  "Even pirate ships? You'd think they'd be a little looser about rules like that."

  "Actually, pirates were even stricter about it than some legitimate ships. The loot got divided up at the end of a trip, and of course every pirate wanted his fair share. So they kept really close track. When the quartermaster was making out the manifest, there had to be

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  witnesses and everything. It was part of the pirates' code, and they were really proud of it."

  The number and variety of things listed on the William's manifest were astounding. The ship had been carrying all the equipment needed to make a life at sea. There was food: dried fish and salted meat; ship's biscuits, dried beans, salt, rum, and wine, as well as live chickens and turtles for slaughtering along the way. There were wooden trenchers for plates and leather pouches for cups. There were tools and weapons: axes, chisels, mallets, shovels; nets and fishing tackle; knives, cutlasses, pistols and muskets; powder, shot, cannons and cannonballs; leather vests for protection and metal cuirasses for even more protection. There were hammocks, ropes, canvas, chains; navigating instruments, maps, parchment paper, lanterns, needles, buckets, rags, jugs, surgical supplies and medicines. There were musical instruments--fiddle, flute, a concertina; checkers and chess sets and boards, playing cards and dice.

  There was the ship's flag: Calico Jack's famous skull-and-crossbones. There was a cat, to keep the rats and mice at bay--and a parrot!

  "What about doubloons?" Dan asked. "I thought pirate ships were always full of gold doubloons."

  Amy flipped through the pages and found what she was looking for: the list of the booty taken from other ships.

  "There's some gold here," she said, running her

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  finger down the page. "Not a whole lot. They were sailing in a sloop, which was fast and easy to maneuver but couldn't carry as much cargo as a bigger, heavier ship."

  Even so, the list was impressive. 24 Bolts Silk

  15 Bolts Cotton, Madras & Calico

  6 Silver Chargers

  6 Silver Goblets

  2 Doz. Silver Spoons

  4 Pewter Flasks

  8 Silver Bowls

  1 Silver Tea Service

  1 Pewter Coffee Service

  4 Bags Silver Coins

  2 Bags Gold Coins

  1 Leather Pouch Containing 98 Pearls

  2 Gold Bands, plain

  1 Gold Band, carved

  7 Gold Chains

  1 Pendant, Lion Head, ruby eyes

  1 Silver Moon pendant

  1 Cameo Brooch, Carved, Onyx Stone

  1 Gold Cross, carved

  2 Silver Crosses, plain

  1 Serpent Medallion, Carved, Green Stone

  1 Floral Medallion, Gold, Sapphires

  3 Brooches, Gold

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  2 Brooches, Gold & Gems

  3 Brooches, Silver, Carved

  3 Snuffboxes, Silver

  2 Snuffboxes, Silver Inlaid

  2 Silver-handled Mirrors

  2 Ivory Combs

  4 Tortoise-Shell Combs

  1 Ivory-handled Mirror

  2 Silver Hair-Pins with Pearls

  1 Gold Hair-Pin, Plain

  10 Crates Tobacco

  10 Barrels Sugar

  3 Sacks Pepper Corns

  2 Sacks Nutmegs

  1 Sack Mace

  14 Deer Hides

  6 Buffalo Hides

  1 Crate Beaver Furs

  3 Gilded Talons, Panther, Bear, Eagle

  1 Ivory Whale-Tusk, Carved Antlers of Large Deer

  Animal Jawbones With Teeth, Buffalo, Bearcat, Wolf

  2 Doz. Pea-Cock Feathers

  8 Ostrich Plumes

  26 Turkey Quills

  6 Large Conch Shells

  1 Silver Chest, Small, Carved

  3 Wooden Chests, Large, Brass-Trimmed

  4 Doz. Tobacco Pipes, Clay

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  Almost without her realizing it, Amy's finger went back up the list and stopped; it was as if she were developing invisible antennae for anything connected to the hunt for Clues. "Dan, listen," she said. "Three Gilded Talons, Panther, Bear, Eagle.'"

  Dan grinned and patted his chest, where the bear claw hung safely beneath his shirt. "Yup," he said. "Proves that Calico Jack and Anne whatshername really knew about this."

  But Amy was already focused on the manifest again. Another listing had caught her eye.

  '"Animal Jawbones With Teeth, Buffalo, Bearcat, Wolf,'" she read aloud. She looked up in excitement. "Wolf, Dan! The Janus symbol!"

  Dan looked dubious. "Uh, don't you think that might be stretching it a little? I mean, 'bearcat' would maybe make sense, too. Bear for Tomas, and maybe Hamilton was saying 'cat' after all. Is there such a thing as a calico bearcat?"

  Amy snorted. "If there is, I've never heard of it."

  A wolf jawbone as a Janus hint? Dan was probably right--maybe that was stretching it; it was enough to have found proof that the bear claw really was something associated with Anne Bonny.

  "Wait," Dan said, staring at the page. "I think I just changed my mind."

  He pointed to a line on the manifest:

  1 Serpent Medallion, Carved, Green Stone

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  "Serpent?" Amy said. "As in, snakes, for Lucian?

  "Nope," he said.

  "How can you be so sure?"

  "Because"--he cocked his head smugly--"we've already got this one."

  Amy looked at him, completely at a loss. He tortured her with silence for a few moments longer, then said, "In fact, I believe you're wearing it as we speak."

  Her mouth fell open as her hand flew to her neck.

  Grace's necklace!

  She took it off so they could examine it. The medallion was shaped like a rectangle with rounded corners. The dragon was carved in full relief on one side of the jade; the reverse side was plain except for its smooth beveled edges.

  Dan was grinning. "Serpent--dragon. Green stone--green jade. Carved medallion--carved medallion. Am I right or am I right?" he said.

  Amy closed her eyes to focus on the thought that was forming in her mind.

  "Okay," she said slowly. "Suppose Anne Bonny was a Cahill. That's not so far-fetched. To start with, she was born in Ireland, where the original Cahills lived. And then there's the portrait." She didn't need to elaborate further; Dan would know she was thinking about Anne's uncanny resemblance to their mother.

  "She lived during a time when women were really restricted. Most of them weren't allowed to do a lot of the things that men could. Like travel. So she finds out

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  about the clues, and she disguises herself as a man and becomes a pirate because she figures it'll be the best way to hunt for clues."

  She opened her eyes to see Dan listening intently.

  "Or hide them," he said. "Dragon medallion, bear claw--that's why I think you might be right after all, about the wolf."

  Amy began scanning the manifest again. "But there's nothing here about snakes," she said, disappointed.

  Dan seemed unfazed. "That doesn't matter. She might not have found a snake thing yet. Or she found it already and hid it somewhere." Then he frowned. "But we still have the same problem. We've got an Ekat symbol and a Tomas symbol. What are they for? And what do we do now?"

  "That's easy. We keep following Anne Bonny's trail," Amy said. She wished she felt as confident as she sounded; in truth, it was the only thing she could think of. "The prison is gone now, but I thought we'd look around anyway. It was right here in Spanish Town. Maybe there's a memorial or something there."

  They copied down the entire manifest. Then they gave the file back to Lester, who returned Nellie's license to them.

  As they went to wake Nellie, both of them fingered their neckpieces.

  Amy, the jade dragon. Dan, the gilded bear claw.

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  CHAPTER 9

&nbs
p; * * *

  Nellie had the feeling that someone was following her.

  They were walking through the parking lot of the Archives building. She glanced over her shoulder.

  She was right but relaxed immediately. It was only that guy Lester.

  "Please, young lady," he said to Nellie, "will you come with me?"

  Nellie stopped, turned, looked him over. She'd been so tired from all the driving that she hadn't taken much notice of him earlier.

  Tall, muscular, in a short-sleeved shirt that fit him very nicely. And that Jamaican accent, so cool. Pretty fine, Nellie thought.

  "I'm busy at the moment," she said, and nodded toward Dan and Amy. "But"--she smiled, tilted her head, and blinked slowly--"maybe later?"

  Standing off to the side with Amy, Dan mimed putting a finger down his throat.

  "I'm afraid it has to be now," he said firmly.

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  Nellie frowned. "I said later, but I think I'm changing my mind."

  He held up his hands and took a step back. "Hey, ease up, sister. You just need to come with me because somebody wants to talk to you."

  Nellie frowned. Who could that possibly be? If it were McIntyre or--or the other guy, they would just call or e-mail, they wouldn't send a message through someone else. ...

  She tried to disguise her puzzlement by talking tough. "If they want to talk to me, they can talk to me right here, like you are," she said. "I'm not going with someone I don't know to talk to someone else I don't know when I don't know where I'm going or--most important-- why."

  Lester was silent for a moment. Then he said, "Yah, I get that you're nervous. How about this. I'll take you to the street. You can check it out. There are people all around, you can see that it's safe. You stand outside the house and she'll come out to talk to you. She's old, but that much she can do. Okay?"