by Jan Needle
“Do they know about the treasure?” Hugg snapped at Baines. “Did you tell them what we’re doing here, you little bastard!”
“No!” squeaked Rat. “Nothing, Mr Hugg! Despite they threatened me!”
“You’re a liar, Baines! By God, I’ll swing for you!”
“No, sir! On my mother’s womb! Treasure was never mentioned, not a word, they wants the fort, that’s all. They said they’d found a white maid, a fine lady needing ransom who was held a captive. They said that Mr Marlowe’s got her and they could get her back! It was a pardon they was seeking. Oh, sir” (to Captain Kaye) “they said they’d help you. They talked about a ransom, and their duty, and the coming war. They swore that they would aid you, sir!”
Kaye had his gaping in control, but not perhaps his mind. He took a step through the breaking water and grabbed Baines by the shoulder. Had he not been so drunk, it would have been a savage grip.
“Black Bob,” he said. “Did you say on a rope? Is he alive? Is he well and walking? On a rope! The devils!”
Baines twisted up his face in simulated agony.
“Ow, sir! You’re killing me! Aye, sir, I swear it. He’s on a rope, tied up like a poor sad monkey and they’re dragging him away. They can’t be very far, sir, but they are heavy armed and there’s dozens of them, scores. No, sir! Don’t go, sir! Sir, they’ll murder you!”
Kaye, like a man gone mad, was running up the sand towards the tree-line, towards the stockade, roaring.
“Lamont! You Scotch bastards! You traitors! Give me that boy, sirs! I command you! Give me that boy!”
The men were embarrassed, but they did not know what they could do. Kaye was drunk and fat, and the sand was soft, deep and fine, as easy to run in as solidified molasses. Before he had reached the outer wall he had lost a shoe and his wig was sliding down his sweating face. To cap off his crewmen’s consternation, a black man appeared from out the wood, and stood and watched him, unarmed and insolent.
Kaye gasped, “That boy, you villain. I want that boy. Tell those Scotch bastards I will have that boy.”
And the black man turned back into the trees and disappeared.
When his crew had helped and carried Dickie back to the boat, fearing that he might die of a seizure, he huddled on the bottomboards as they rowed out to the Jaqueline, and failed to get on board unaided. When he had sat for long enough on the quarterdeck, Jack Gunning roused out the crew to lift the boat on board, weigh anchor and set canvas.
Through his glass, as the ship rounded the headland and set course for Kingston, Kaye could see the shapes of men moving towards the fortress, now forsaken. Forsaken like Black Bob.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
The place the Worm had chosen to hover off the island was the best around the western tip to be noticed by Marlowe’s men, he said. It had been much used in pirate days to spot prizes making for Cuba or the straits, but they needed to stay close in to shore, which meant not far beyond the wave-break line. At night they sailed off farther and hove to to snatch some sleep.
It was not many hours into their first full day offshore that they were noticed, and not many hours after that that Worm spotted the watchers – when they decided, apparently, to be seen. The gig was then let fall offwind to cream in towards the shore, to show their good intent. Two whites, one black, and apparently unarmed. Will and Sam had blue jackets on, but took them off with ostentation when they were at their closest in. Before they went about to keep out of the surf they stood up in shirt-sleeves with their arms outstretched, and shouted, all three on a signal: “Marlowe! Parley! Peace!”
“Lee-oh,” said Will and put the tiller down. The unhandy little lug was dropped and dipped and raised the other side, and they gathered speed away from shore again. Three black men were watching now, conferred, and two of them moved back into the woods. The gig took but a short board, then swung back towards the beach to show they were not going anywhere, and they then plugged and plunged about and waited. It was heartening that one man remained to watch, but as the minutes dragged, then an hour, then another, their spirits began to sink. Except for the Worm’s. His deep-wrinkled face showed contentment, more so when he whipped his britches down and dropped turds neatly overside.
“Christ,” said Sam, in deepest admiration. “I wish I could do that, old one. I’ve just got bloody belly-ache!”
Shortly after this event, as they were reaching on a parallel with the sands, Worm made a noise of warning from the bow and pointed at the crag that rose out from the surf ahead of them. They saw a craft come nosing round it, under oar or paddle power, more African than English, but not a lot like either, truth be told. There were six or eight men in it, bending to their task with power.
“Shit,” said Sam. “Best break those guns out now. Though God knows, if they want our blood no one and nothing’s going to stop them, is it?”
“Leave the guns,” said Will. “We hid ’em to show willing, now we’ll live on hope. What is that, Sam? It looks like some old ship’s skiff that’s been botched up by apprentices. Hang on. I’ll go about. Claw off the surf a little, in case we have to drift. Ready? Lee-oh.”
By the time they were settled on the other tack the boat-canoe had drawn much closer. Will looked once more, and gasped, and said to Sam: “It’s Deb. Oh Sam. She’s sitting there. Oh Christ.”
“Watch your luff,” said Sam. “Don’t go in irons, mister. That’s no way to show off to a lady!”
“Take her!” said Will, and almost stumbled from the tiller. His face was white beneath his sun and weather tan and he was panting. Sam took his place and filled the sail again, and looked at the young woman. She was sitting rigid in the skiff, and although Sam could not make her features out, he could see that she was beautiful. He eased the tiller up a little way, then eased and eased his sheet until their forward way was almost stilled. The skiff-canoe altered its course to meet them in parallel and in half a minute was abeam of them, but distant fifty feet. Bentley stood, arms stretched out sideways as before, and shouted: “No weapons! We have come in peace! Oh Deborah!”
He’s in a sorry state, thought Holt, somehow surprised by it. I wonder how I’d feel myself, if I saw Felicity. Good God, poor William.
The gig was moving astern now, and Sam reversed the helm to bring her further off the wind, and sheeted in a trifle. He said to Will: “Let’s drop the sail. Worm! Bring it down, will you? Then hold her on two oars.”
“Will,” said Deb, across the water. “Mr Bentley.”
That was all, but as Worm and Holt got down the canvas, stowed it in a bundle and shipped two oars, the lovers seemed to drink and eat each other across the sparkling green. Will got out of the way like an automaton, moving forward rather than aft, and Worm settled to his task of keeping her head to sea while Sam sat at the tiller and assessed what the other boat might do.
The black man in the stern sheets stood, and his height was regal, and impressive.
“My name is Marlowe,” he said. “You Captain Bentley, of England Royal Navy? Yes?”
Will fought hard to win back his gravitas. He also stood, as it seemed that protocol demanded it.
“I am Lieutenant Bentley. This is Lieutenant Holt. Our man here is called… Worm.”
To him that sounded vile; but the Worm smiled happily, and touched his forehead with his right oarloom.
“We are seeking Miss Tomelty. She is being hunted by some planters from near Kingston and their men. It is a… it is a great misunderstanding.”
The boats were exactly parallel, heading the seas, not moving through the water. The canoe kept station perfectly, but came no closer. Will could barely take his eyes from Deb. He had a dying ache to touch her, to touch her skin. This was the Spithead Nymph, the Portsmouth Harlot, the Black Man’s Whore. His mind whirled with vivid, violent images. She was a slut, a murderess, a traitor. She was great with Tsingi’s child. She was Deb Tomelty, whom he had lain with first in Surrey, then in a London gayhouse, and whom he loved. He loved h
er still, and all the stories were of no moment at all, even if they were true, which they were not. He gazed with hunger at her face, to him so lovely, so unbearable, and all the fears and doubts were gone. He loved her still, and wanted her, to touch.
Marlowe was assessing him. He stared coolly at Will, his face without a flicker of emotion. Will felt that he would be a pitiless opponent, if it should come to that.
“We have warning for you also, sir,” he said. “You and Miss Tomelty, and her Mildred. You responsible for a massacre. Two plantations. We believe – we know – it neither you nor them women. But an army come west soon and you will be attacked.”
Marlowe was balanced on the rolling, heaving boat-canoe as easy as a seaman. It was a long time before he answered. Will’s eyes strayed to Deborah again. Her eyes were fixed on him.
She was in a simple cotton dress, and her arms and legs were bare. Her hair was still in massy curls, but the face framed by them was now dark brown, berry-like, she was a Jamaica country-girl. It was thinner too, he thought, perhaps she’d suffered much, and the longing to reach out for her was drowning him. He did not care what she had been forced to until now, he did not fear she was no longer his, he had an ache to touch her, that was all. An ache to kiss her mouth.
“Do you have muskets?” Marlowe asked, and Holt glanced at Will, a warning. But Will said, “Yes. They are not for use. They are wrapped in canvas, in the bottom here.”
Marlowe said something in a foreign tongue, addressed at Worm, and sharp. The Worm acknowledged with a cheerful wave, then bent from off his thwart and re-emerged hugging a sausage of dun canvas, loosely lashed. He put his hand inside and exposed the muzzle of a gun.
“I will have them,” Marlowe said.
Will sighed.
“What can I say, sir? We will not fight you for them, and if we did we would lose them anyway. But if I give them, I will probably get hanged. They are the King’s.”
Amazingly, Marlowe’s face of sculpted ebony split into a smile.
“If you swear not turn them onto me,” he said, “then keep. Miss Debbeerah say to trust you. But why have you travel so far, two men against many? I can kill you. Tell about this army.”
For a short while the two craft rolled in the easy swell. The sun was very hot, but it was rather pleasant still. There was a long silence.
Will looked at Deb, from fifteen feet or less. She looked at him, both tried to speak their deepest thoughts and feelings through their eyes. To him, she was smaller, thinner, darker, just the same. To her he was harder, older, lined with care and weather, still beloved.
“Can I go with him?” she said. “Mr Marlowe, I want to go with Lieutenant Bentley. Please.”
“Talk of army,” Marlowe repeated. “How long before they come?”
“William,” said Sam, quietly. “Don’t get us hanged as spies, friend. Don’t get us hanged as traitors.”
Marlowe had heard.
“I can go torture you,” he said, and Deb gave a tiny cry. Marlowe touched her lightly on the head. “But I learn nothing then. We scapegoats for the bakra men, because the Windward turncoats kill the bakra ladies. And they kill them because the planter-bloodhounds kill Maroon-chief son, call Tsingi. See, I know all. But what can you give to make me safe? How can you stop this army kill me? What you offer to win this woman back again?”
Will was sickened by awareness. He had nothing to offer, nothing at all.
“I can take you hostage,” Marlowe said. “That some bargaining, two King Georgie’s officers and one old skinny slave man, what you think? But you would fight me, and go die, and dead officer no good to me in any kind. You would fight me, yes?”
Holt did not give Will the chance to speak.
“Surely,” he said. “We would fight like tigers, and surely we would die. Unfortunately, Mr Marlowe, that is our duty. There’s no avoiding it.”
Deb, across the water, was weeping.
Marlowe said: “I say this, Mr Lieutenant Bentley: I think Debbeerah was spy, she come to lead the men to us and get herself away. Now I believe her, like Mildred say I should. Debbeerah not spy. She your lover-maid. Debbeerah good woman.”
Will’s eyes had etched the new Deb – face and body, hair and soul – into his brain. Every inch of her was pleading to be with him.
“She will be safe,” said Marlowe. “So long as we be safe. Best for her and everyone you tell white man we not to blame. You do that, maybe you save my life, and Debbeerah’s. And Mildred’s. And everyone’s. If they come we still not die though, maybe. Spirits look after us, maybe. Maybe we fight with demons in our soul. You try stop them, eh? That way the best.”
Deb cried: “Please let me go, sir! Please let me go!” And Will said – “Deb.”
Marlowe made a gesture, and the canoe-boat turned away from the gig and plunged across the waves towards the headland like a gull. The Worm pulled the musket-muzzle back into sight and made a sign at it to Holt.
“He’s tall enough and stiff enough, sir,” he said. “You like I take a shot at him?”
“What for?” said Sam. “To make a bloody mess much worse? Give over with your jokes, old man.”
He turned a helpless glance on Will, then took the tailback of the halyard in hand.
“Come on Will, let’s get this mains’ll set,” he said. “Fair wind for Kingston, what it’s worth. Aye, for what it’s fucking worth.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Captain Daniel Swift had buried himself in Jamaica high society like a teredo worm. His shock and horror at the Misses Siddleham’s fate had not been feigned, nor had his determination to achieve revenge, and that a fast and bloody one. While Kaye was still away, though, and while Mather and his fellow gentlemen were raising their “great force,” Swift went about the business of getting to know the place and its important people. The money in his pocket, and that of Kaye’s father back in Hertfordshire, was in the forefront of his mind, and the more he saw of this benighted sugar island, the more convinced he was that they could make a killing. The time was ripe. The money pod was bursting.
The thing he realised most quickly about this new found land was that anyone with tuppence in his pocket was a gentleman. Men and their ladies not fit to shine his shoes in England had houses with two dozen rooms, wine cellars full of France’s best – and this in time of warfare, note – and enough servants for a private army. Granted most of them were slaves, but that seemed admirable. The cost of their liveries alone would have seen him bankrupt in a month had Navy pay been his sole fortune, so the thought of paying them as well was anathema. Get men for nothing, and you will be rich. Swift was determined to buy in.
Although the “tone” was low by England standards, the trappings of plantation life were exactly to his taste. Men rode to hounds, and drank, and had night-time societies to assuage the darker appetites of life, while the women stayed in their cool mansions, or were taken out in covered carriages to share tea and sympathy with other coddled dames in darkened rooms. Their health was tenuous, they suffered heat and all the vilenesses of tropic life, and very frequently they were shipped off to spend a month or two in England. The sexes met at dinner not infrequently, and the younger wives would be visited at night for at least some months – or until the pleasure palled or a baby came along to knock such new-wed filth out of the picture. Unhappy the woman whose first child was a female, not an heir. Unhappy the woman whose husband was a beast insatiable, or preferred married flesh to black and bouncing younger meat.
Even the bound necessities that some planter men resented sounded rather good to Swift. To play a part in government would be a godsend to a man like him. As Justice of the Peace, as Colonel of Militia, as general hunter-down and punisher of wickedness he felt his talents would at last be properly appreciated. Ship captains, it was held by island thinkers, had the running of society in their very blood, and most agreed that Jamaica society was on a modern downward path. Softness had ruined the lower orders, softness had turned the slaves fr
om happy subservients into sullen malcontents. When Swift expounded his view of discipline, of bringing “proper punishment” back, his companions cheered. It occurred to none of them, apparently, that compared with what they used already on the island, Navy practice was the stuff of nursemaids. Swift’s vision seemed the longed-for panacea.
With the Siddlehams in particular his clear sight struck a mighty chord. At first it had been his sympathy and interest that had appealed to them, and in the aftermath of the appalling massacre he had become indispensable. A small, hard-set man in dark blue and white, his shoulders back, his nose like a rake into the sky, he gave them strength and encouragement, he became their moral backbone. It was he who pulled them from despair, he who told them of his ideas and strategy for hunting down Marlowe and his murdermen, he who talked about the value of plantation life now that their normalcy was gone.
“We have lost everything, that is the devil of it,” Jeremy told him one day, as they stood on a hillside looking down towards the house. “First Papa, and that was hard enough. But now Mama, and all our sisters. It hardly seems worth living any more. Well, living here, at any rate.”
Swift, who prided himself on his subtle timing, adjudged it right to ask about profit and loss if they should quit. Was it not, he suggested delicately, a bad time to think of selling, given the war and depressed profits and higher insurances and all the other things?
Jeremy professed astonishment at Swift’s knowledge, despite he was neither an island man nor immersed in commerce.
