He had waited almost two years for this. Two long years.
This was the way it was supposed to be.
As their naked bodies rubbed together and worked in unison, he knew he should have married her and never left Marcus Hook to go a-pirating. To his chagrin, his life had changed irrevocably. There was no turning back the clock and starting all over again. He couldn’t help but feel a sense of regret at the path he had chosen, despite the thrill of the chase and commanding men at arms, and the pure fun of being independent and rebelling against authority.
But what he felt most of all right now was love and passion amid a feeling of desperation that his time was running out. Despite their being apart for so long, he still felt a powerful connection, a sense of profound intimacy with her, and he knew that she felt it too. It was almost as if he had never left. But even more viscerally, it was like when he was a young first-mate sailing out of the port of Philadelphia and they frequently spent time together. He felt that same youthful passion, as if he were a young adolescent experimenting with sexuality for the first time, swept up in the adventure of pure discovery.
He dearly loved his Margaret of Marcus Hook.
Outside, along the banks of the Delaware, a light rain fell. Puffy gray cumulus clouds shrouded the river basin. The rainfall coming off the moisture-laden nebula was slowly picking up in intensity.
He pushed upward and their lips touched softly. He had wrapped his heavy beard in ribbons to keep it under control for their love-making. He felt desire flowing through his veins, but it was different than the last time they had made love before he had set out for the Florida wrecks. His head swam with euphoria, but also a sense of danger, knowing that he was an outlaw wanted by the authorities and this might be their very last moment on earth together.
“Oh, Edward,” she whispered in his ear.
He rolled her over so that he was on top. His tongue reached inside her mouth, softly, and she kissed him back. He felt a delightful shudder of excitement take hold of his body, but it was the emotional connection that truly gripped him. He knew he was tapping into something sacrosanct, something only true lovers felt. But he also knew that he didn’t deserve her. She could have had any number of promising men in Philadelphia and yet she chose to love and stand by him.
He kissed her mouth, nibbling her lips gently. They slowed down for a moment to a softer and gentler rhythm, and it felt like a perfect dream. Everything about it felt right, natural.
Then they again picked up the pace. As they began to move together in sync, he took more and more pleasure in her body, in her sweet kisses and caresses and thrusts. And her body was responding with a passion that resurrected glorious emotions from their younger years together when he was a simple merchant seaman and privateer—and not a wanted pirate.
I want you to feel what I’m feeling, Margaret my love.
She thrust back and forth knowingly, in a gentle rhythm. His hands squeezed her swelling nipples, and she gasped with delight.
For a moment, he wondered if it were possible to go insane with pleasure.
He kissed her on the lips tenderly and she slid her tongue deep into his mouth, clasping his tight buttocks and pulling him deeper inside her. She moaned softly between kisses and the sound of her voice excited him all the more.
As the pace quickened, the air filled with desperation. He felt himself about to let loose with his seed. He sensed that she, too, was about to let go.
“Look into my eyes,” she gasped, pulling him still deeper.
His eyes locked onto hers. “I’m looking, I’m looking!”
She stared at him mesmerically, her eyes as wide as pebbles as the climax came. They held each other’s gaze as their bodies shook fitfully and he felt his warmth flow inside her. Then suddenly tears streamed from her eyes.
“I dare say are you all right?” he asked worriedly. “Did I hurt you?”
“No,” she cried.
“Are you upset? What...what happened?”
“I’m overwhelmed, Edward. I’m overwhelmed with joy.”
***
Afterwards, they lay in bed—idly hugging, kissing, stroking—before she asked him what he had done with the Betty after seizing her off the Virginia capes. She had posed the question to him a half dozen times since he had made port late last night, but he had not yet answered it to her satisfaction. He had told her only brief snippets about his privateering and piratical adventures since sailing off for the Spanish wrecks almost two years ago. She was fully aware that he was an outlaw of the high seas now, and though she didn’t approve, she was interested to know the details, especially since he had named his ship after her. But he was determined to limit the flow of information, for fear that she would come to despise him for his villainy and end their relationship altogether. For he loved her dearly and didn’t want to lose her.
So instead of answering the question, he proceeded to tell her about his friend Sam Bellamy and his unusual philosophy of pirates as not “villains of all nations” as they were made out to be by the Crown and America’s foremost newspaper, the Boston News-Letter controlled by the British government, but rather as Robin Hood’s Merry Men of the high seas. He told her how he had sailed with Bellamy and that his friend was now regrettably deceased, killed in a shipwreck when a catastrophic storm drove him and his pirate ship onto the banks of Cape Cod. He told her how the “Prince of Pirates” had been attempting to return home to show off his newly acquired flagship, the formidable three-hundred-ton armed merchant galley Whydah, to his love Maria Hallett. He told her how nine of Bellamy’s shipmates had somehow survived, but had been captured and jailed in Boston, where they were about to be tried and would likely be convicted of piracy and hanged. And finally, he told her how the news had so outraged him and his crew that they vowed to wage a war of retribution against ships of New England. That was why he had returned to the Atlantic seaboard: to avenge Bellamy and take on the new mantle of Robin Hood and his Merry Men.
“But the Betty wasn’t a New England vessel,” she pointed out. “So what did you do with her? Don’t tell me you killed anyone or sunk her to the bottom.”
“We didn’t harm anyone, that I promise you. That is not how I operate.”
“But you did sink her?”
“Aye. She continued to sail away when we called for her to yield. We put the captain and his crew in a longboat and made sure they were well-stocked with water and victuals. That’s better than they deserved after the fight they put up.”
“Did you fire upon them?”
“We fired two warning shots and tore up her mast and rigging, but we took the life of not a single man—and that’s all there is of it.”
“Oh, how generous of you. I suppose those poor seamen should have thanked you that they had the honor of meeting the big, bad Blackbeard himself.”
“That’s not funny. Are you trying to start a quarrel when I haven’t seen you in two nearly years?”
“As a matter of a fact, I am. Look at what you’ve become, Edward. You’re nothing but a common thief. I should have known it would come to this when you took off for those wrecks to seek your fortune.”
He sat up in bed, irked by her lecturing tone. “I don’t have to take this from you. I may be a low-down pirate, as you intimate so incisively, but some would call me but a true cock of the game and an old sportsman. Most importantly, I am a man that deserves a fair and honorable wage. And to do that, I will not bow to the likes of King George and allow thieving merchant tycoons to take all the pie, leave me with nothing, and drink toasts with their peers that they are better men than me when they have not a quarter of the smarts or courage of I.”
“Oh, aren’t you the high and mighty one.”
“I told you we are the same as Robin Hood’s men. Nothing more or less.”
“Oh, you fancy yourself Robin Hood, do you? Well then, in that case you are even more naïve than I thought. Your dead pirate friend Black Sam Bellamy has filled your head with childish
nonsense.”
“There’s nothing childish about such thoughts. We freebooters are no more lawless than the royals, slavers, and merchant men who steal from the common man every day. They press down upon him with their thumbs to keep him in line and sap him of everything until there’s nothing left of him but his grounded-down bones. We are after what is fair and that is all.”
“So you’re a rebel now, is that it? You—born of landed Jamaican gentry.”
“The devil himself may doubt it, but it takes a true devil to know one. I’ve seen the plantation world up close because I lived it in Spanish Town for more than a decade, and I’ve sailed with the Royal Navy and merchant service and seen those bastards in close action as well. I know what they take from and leave a hard-working man—and I don’t much think it’s fair. I understand that enslaved and indentured men and much-abused sailors are what have built up these colonies and made the Thache family of St. Jago de la Vega a wealthy one. But I don’t think one man owning another, or telling him what to do, on account of his father’s name or station in life is right by the laws of man. I have known that since I was a young pup, but it was Bellamy that brought it to the fore. The lad made me think upon what is right and wrong in this here world. Do we look at it from the top down, or the bottom up? Like Sam, I believe we are obligated as men to do both. And that’s the honest truth. Me and those that sail under me just want fairness, our own little sliver of the pie, Margaret. We’re not that complicated or greedy. We are, in fact, simple men with a simple purpose. We want but what is fair and right, damnit!”
The room fell silent. He hadn’t meant to sound so passionate, but he felt strongly about the subject, more strongly than he had ever felt before. Thankfully, he could tell by the expression on her face that his words had had an effect upon her. Her eyes were sincere and watery, and he suddenly wanted to take her in his arms and marry her. Was there any way he could be forgiven for his crimes of piracy and go on to live a normal life? Was it truly too late to start anew? Or was there a chance?
“Once again, you have surprised me, Edward, with the strength of your convictions. You are a good man—the truth of that could not be more obvious from the words you just spoke—but you’re still a bloody pirate. You’re still a wanted man, an outlaw, a villain of all nations as the newspapers have taken to calling you of late. And that is what worries me so because I love you very much.”
He touched her cheek. “I love you too,” he said.
“Yes, but it’s quite clear you love the sea more. Now what became of the Betty when you were through with her?”
“I told you we sunk her.”
“Put her down to Davy Jones’ Locker. Just like that.”
“Aye, just like that. We plundered her of her pipes of Madeira wine and other goods, merchandize, and personal valuables—and then we sank her and her remaining cargo.”
“You just wasted a perfectly good ship?”
“We didn’t waste anything. The captain resisted and that was his mistake. I ordered the destruction of the Betty and its unplundered cargo in retribution for the captain’s stubbornness. Sinking the ship sends a message to other vessels to the futility of resistance.”
She was eyeing him disapprovingly. “How did you sink her? Did you blow her up?”
“Nay, I had my quartermaster William Howard drill holes in the Betty’s hull and then sink her once I had secured the captain and crew aboard my flagship, the Revenge. We didn’t want to allow her to alert all of Virginia and Maryland to our presence in these coastal waters. That way I could come here to see you.”
“Oh, how generous of you.”
“It’s just the way I’ve chosen to make a living, Margaret. I’m no better or worse than Governor Keith or Governor Hunter,” he said of the governors of Pennsylvania and New York-New Jersey. “I just want a fair slice of the pie, and so do my men. That’s all.”
“How did your quartermaster get off the boat?”
“As the Betty sank, Mr. Howard and his men climbed aboard a longboat and returned aboard the Revenge.”
“So the Betty was a wine ship?”
“Lucky for us, eh? Her captain said she sailed regularly from Virginia to Madeira. That be an archipelago in the North Atlantic southwest of Portugal. But she won’t be sailing there anymore. The captain shouldn’t have resisted.”
She sat up in bed. “You know perfectly well, Edward Thache, that one day you’ll be doing a fine dance at the end of a rope if you keep up this line of work. Surely, I can’t be the first person to tell you that.”
“You’re right, you’re not. And I’m sure you won’t be the last one either.”
“I don’t approve of what you’re doing.”
“I believe you’ve made that abundantly clear.”
“You may share my bed and I may cook you up fine Swedish meals because we’ve shared some memorable times together, but I don’t like this new world of yours. It scares me and eventually it’s going to get you a date with the hangman. Just like poor Captain Kidd.”
“That will never happen. Me and my crew will blow up our ship with our powder stores before we let them take us alive.”
“How can you even talk like that? Do realize how you sound at this moment?”
He felt his blood about to boil over, but told himself to remain calm. “Upon my honor, I do. But this is the path I have chosen, Margaret. I will not let them capture me. If they corner me, I plan to go out with a loud bang not a whimper.”
She drew closer to him, draping her leg over his thigh. “That’s not funny, you know. I don’t like you talking like that. It’s so dark.”
“I’m just telling you the truth. You deserve that much. That’s why I can only promise you one more thing.”
“And what would that be?”
“If my time comes, I promise I won’t go out like Kidd. That’s no way for even an outlaw to meet his Maker. No way at all.”
CHAPTER 24
PHILADELPHIA, PENNSYLVANIA
OCTOBER 10, 1717
THE NEXT MORNING, the two young lovers strolled down High Street arm in arm, enjoying the pleasant fall weather before he and the other crew members had to return to the Revenge and Margaret. The sky was an untrammeled blue and the two- and three-story brick buildings lining the cobblestone street were bathed in luxurious sunlight creeping over the Delaware River to the east. There wasn’t much breeze, but what little there was blew refreshingly on their faces as they made their way down the central east-west thoroughfare of the city to the tolling of Sunday church bells.
Philadelphia. When Thache had sailed as a first-mate out of the Quaker port city beginning shortly after the war and for two years afterwards, he had divided his time as a merchant officer between the town founded by William Penn and Port Royal. He was at ease in the burgeoning colonial city, and its townspeople were equally comfortable with him. The bustling streets and docks of Philadelphia were an awe-inspiring sight for young sailors, and Edward Thache of Jamaica had quickly come under the city’s magnetic spell.
It was a big town, one of the New World’s biggest. He enjoyed seeing the endless masts sprouting up from the river and the clouds of luffing sails and standards drying in the light air as dozens of ships lay at anchor, bobbing up and down along with periaugers, barges, and canoes. He enjoyed hearing the staccato of clomping horse hooves and clatter of drays, carriages, and carts grinding up the cobblestone and dirt streets. He enjoyed standing at the wharves and watching the cargo ships loading and unloading merchandise from all around the world: stacks of animal skins, lumber, carpentry tools, and munitions; kegs of gunpowder, grain, and seed; rounds of cheese, cases of books, and other sundries; casks of salted beef, fish, and pork and wet goods of wine, beer, and spirits, rolling this way and that. And he enjoyed smoking his pipe, drinking an ale, and sharing the latest news with the arriving and departing sailors loitering about the wharves, taverns, and ordinaries.
He liked this City of Brotherly Love. It was a part of him
—and so was his beloved Margaret.
He gently squeezed her hand, smiled at her, and gave her a warm kiss on the lips. She looked up at him with surprise.
“What was that for?”
“Because I am quite fond of you. You didn’t have to wait for me, though.”
“I didn’t wait for you. I just haven’t found anyone that can hold a candle to you yet.”
“And I haven’t met anyone that can hold a quarter of a candle to you, my dear.”
“None of those dark-eyed West Indian girls struck your fancy?”
“Not above the waistline, they didn’t.”
She shoved him hard in the chest. “You bastard!”
“Avast!” he shrieked with laughter. “Curse me with everlasting torments, I was just pulling your leg!”
“I don’t believe you, Edward Thache.”
“Well, you’d better because I speak the truth.”
“If you truly loved me you wouldn’t leave me to go off a-pirating.”
“I humbly disagree. The love a seamen possesses for his woman ashore is the strongest love of all. It never dies, because whenever he returns it’s just like falling in love all over again. Landlubbers don’t understand that, but that be the truth of it.”
“Distance is just a matter of space, but hearts are connected by love, is that it?”
“Now you’re getting the gist of it, m’lady”
She leaned into him, her flowing blonde hair fluttering in the gentle wind. “You make it sound so romantic.”
“It is romantic—and I am a romantic myself, as you well know. The bond betwixt a sea captain and his true love, even when they are apart, is greater than any love a pair of landlubbers feel. It is the power of the sea and the distance between the pair that sets them apart from most mortals.”
Blackbeard- The Birth of America Page 19
