Jaded Tides (The Razor's Adventures Pirate Tales)

by P. S. Bartlett

  Mick and I took the road back to town exactly as Master Green had carried us the day before. The heat was stifling, but the burning in my chest to find Fin and Francis was so hot I believed it would bore a hole straight through me until I found her and knew she was safe. My imagination ran wild with so many horrible ideas and scenarios of where they’d gone and what may have happened, that by the time the pungent odor of the port invaded my nostrils, I could barely recall the ride.

  We found a stable near one of the inns, and I instructed Mick to pay them and to water the horses as I stood and watched the people passing by me in the street. I swiped my hat from my head and wiped my brow with my scarf, before scooping handfuls of fresh water from a barrel and pouring what I didn’t drink over my face and head. After my last dousing, I spied a young boy who appeared to be casing the stands of the street market about ten yards ahead of me. I whistled and waved to Mick to follow me, and I stepped up behind the lad and touched him on the shoulder. He spun around and made a sour face. “What ye want?” he grumbled. “I ain’t done nothin’.”

  “A word is all I want, lad,” I said, holding out my hand with five shiny pennies in it.

  He reached to snatch them away, and I pulled back my hand so fast he barely saw it move. “Well?” he said, folding his arms across his chest. He appeared no more than thirteen and a bit small for that. However, he also had the look of a street child—of which I’d heard there were many here due to the whorehouses and general debauchery of the residents. Sadly, many children were lost to the streets, or simply left to fend for themselves, when they’d barely come out of their nappies. In his eyes, I saw a familiar spark, as well as a darkness I’d put behind me long ago.

  “I’m looking for a pretty young girl with long, dark hair and big, dark eyes as well. She’d be new here. You’d have never seen her before. She’d be with a young fella with reddish-blond hair. He’s a pirate and most likely wearing a red scarf tied about his neck.”

  “No. I have na’ seen ‘em. Do I still get the money?”

  “I’ll tell you what, I’ll give you ten times this if you find them for me. My horses are in that stable back there,” I said, pointing back from where we came.

  “Tomlin’s. I know it,” he nodded.

  “Yes, Tomlin’s. You find them, and you go straight there and wait with the horses for me to return. Here,” I said, handing him two of the pennies. “Don’t steal. Go and buy something to eat. You look like you could use a decent meal. Off with you, now. Find me those two.”

  “Now where we go?” Mick asked.

  “I suppose we start at the beginning of this street and keep going until we find them, or he finds them.” Mick continued to give me strange looks, and I did my best to ignore him. He obviously knew after seeing me running around in that skirt I wasn’t a man, and yet he obeyed me and followed me from tavern to brothel to inn, without so much as a sigh. I wondered why, and yet I didn’t question him until two hours into our search, when we reached one particular tavern and sat down for a quick mug of ale.

  It was named the Red Anchor, and for good reason. This tavern was adorned in red from wall to wall. Red draperies, red throw rugs, and even red picture frames surrounded us. However, the place was seedy and dark, and the tables and chairs were worn into discolor from years of use. As with most of these establishments, there were heavy-chested women, both young and not so young, as well as a rough and imposing man behind the bar serving up watered-down drinks with a scowl. The place was bustling and noisy with drunks. A three-piece band played peppy sea shanties, only serving to make the racket more unbearable. I pointed to a table off to the side for Mick to sit, and I ordered our drinks at the bar, as a young and eager little blond trollop danced around me like a harem girl.

  “So I suppose you’re asking yourself why I was dressed as I was this afternoon,” I said as I handed him his mug across the table and escaped the tart by bobbing and weaving my way around her swaying hips.

  “I did ask, but you no answer,” he responded, looking at me over the rim of the cup.

  “Why do you think I was dressed that way?” I leaned forward.

  “It is obvious that you are, in fact, not a man but a woman. What more can I say to this?”

  “And yet you obeyed me and came with me?” I squinted as I drew towards him, and the smoke from the small lantern between us curled around my face. He took another drink, and then another, looking up at me between each gulp. “Well?”

  “As a man, you fight very well. You work as hard and…” He stopped, leaning towards me. I assumed it was because he didn’t want to be overheard. “I don’t know. I work with you for many months. I sail with you, and I wonder how such a boy can be so many things. I ask myself, can a woman be all of this and still be a woman? What woman wants to be a man? But here you are, and no matter what you are, you say Mick do this and do that, and I do it.”

  “What you’re telling me is, it doesn’t worry you that I’m not a man?”

  “Oh,” he laughed. “In my village, many women are more a man than the men, but you, Ivan, or whatever you call yourself, are more man than so many men I have known.” He lifted his mug to me in toast and took a long last drink. “I am curious of you, though. Why?”

  “It’s a very long story, which we do not have time to discuss. However, for your loyalty, I will disclose one very important fact to you which might cause you some concern.” His thick black eyebrows raised, and he swept his straight black hair back and away from his face. “I am the wife of your Captain.”

  “My Captain?” He laughed. “He is both our Captain.”

  Strangely, Rasmus hadn’t crossed my mind since I found out about Francis and Fin. Perhaps a better place to have started would have been the Jade. I didn’t know why I hadn’t thought of finding him first, and I became frustrated and full of self-doubt. I was also completely silent for I don’t know how long, as my mind bent around my own stupidity. Oh, why did I always have to fly off on my own inclinations and not once consider the man I loved?

  “Ivan, Ivan?” I heard Mick’s voice, at last, over my own screaming thoughts. “We should go back to the horses, no? To see if the boy has found them?”

  I snatched my hat from the table and slammed it on my head as I led him from the tavern and out into the crowded street of the evening. My head turned at every dark-haired woman I saw. I pulled on their shoulders to turn them to me and found myself making a few people angry as I went. Mick shoved off several of their escorts with threats as I tugged at their lady’s arm, but now, almost three hours into our search, we were no better off than when we’d arrived.

  “The sun sets. We must hurry,” Mick said as we rushed onward until we, at last, came upon the stable. I sighed with relief at the sight of the boy.

  “Well, boy?” I panted, catching my breath.

  A smile grew across his filthy freckled face, and he laid out his open hand to me for more coin.

  “Mick, ready the horses,” I said and snatched the boy by the arm and pulled him aside.

  “Wait a damn minute, mister! There ain’t no need ta rough me up!” he screeched at me, jerking away. “And ye don’t need them horses. They’s right there at the Windy.”

  “What?” I turned and looked across the street at the weather-beaten sign on the front of the building and read it in the setting sun. “You mean this inn? The Windy?” I asked, pointing at it.

  “Tha’s what I said, ain’t it?” he answered with a grimace, throwing his scrawny arms up. I looked over at Mick and watched as he tied the horses back off and checked his weapons.

  “How did you find them?” I asked, pulling him towards me.

  “Ha! How’s ‘bout the coin?”

  “How?” I growled down into his smug face, wrenching the front of his shirt into my fist.

  “The Windy always gets the new girls! E’rybody knows that. Now let me go, ye Devil!”

  Remembering Fin’s former activities, an infuriated calm came over me, and I sl
owly unclenched my fist and released him. “You’ve done well, lad. So, this Windy; tell me what you know.”

  “Full a’ fresh whores and pirates and their ilk. It’s fer the fancy ones like cap’ns and the like, with lots a money, cause them lassies is fresh off the boat. I heard ‘em say it all the time. ‘Let’s go see what the wind blew in.’ Hey, you’s pirates, too?” He asked, taking a step back. “I ain’t lookin’ fer no trouble with the likes a’ you. Just pay me, and I’ll be on me way.”

  “I’ll pay you, but you’ll have to wait until I get back to my ship. Wait here and watch these horses, and when we’re through, I’ll give you a dollar.”

  “A what? I knows you’s pirates fer sure, now. I shoulda known straight off and run fer me neck, but I was scared ye’d carve me up if’n ye found me.”

  I stepped slowly towards him and took his chin in my hand. “Are you an orphan, lad?”

  “I ain’t no damn orphan. I don’t need nobody, and I sure as hell won’t once ye pay me that dollar.”

  “How’d you like to be a sailor on a ship?”

  “What do ye take me fer, a fool?” He shook free of my hand and backed away again. “I ain’t tryin’ ta have no dirty pirate use me fer some filthy cabin boy. I heard all about that sort, and I ain’t ‘avin’ no shitty pirate scum stickin’ his cock in my ass!”

  “Good God, you bloody little shit, shut your hole. Nobody’s going to stick anything anywhere. Just stay here and mind these horses until we return.” I waved Mick on, and we walked to the front of the inn and stepped inside.

  The lobby was well decorated, yet like the Red Anchor, everything was old and worn. Fancy velvet sofas and floral lampshades on round end tables adorned the lobby, and to our left, behind a dark wood counter, stood a finely dressed innkeeper writing in a register. We could hear people moving above us upstairs but there was no one else in the lobby. When Mick closed the door, a bell rattled, drawing the man’s eyes to us from his work.

  “May I assist you gentlemen?” he asked over a tight-lipped smile. “Welcome to the Windy Inn.” His black eyebrows appeared to be oiled, as did his silver mustache. The ends were swept neatly into upturned points, and his silver hair was combed cleanly back over his long ears.

  “How many girls do you have working here?” I asked, leaning my forearm on the counter and tapping my fingers. I stared with a hardened gaze into his pale blue eyes and watched as his pupils began to grow.

  “We have many fine young ladies, sir. Are you looking for someone in particular?” he asked, resting his hands on the edge of the counter in front of him. Again, he smiled.

  “I saw a fellow bringing a fine looking young woman in here earlier; dark hair, big dark eyes. Know her?” I asked, never breaking my gaze. It became an amusement for me to watch every twitch of his cheek and quiver of his lips as he spoke.

  “Ah, yes. A gentleman did arrive this morning with a very lovely dark-haired lass, but she isn’t available for visitors yet.” I watched as his right hand slid slowly beneath the counter.

  I reached into the front pocket of my vest and pulled my razor out slowly, flipping it open. “That fellow is a friend of mine, Mister…?”

  “My name really isn’t important, sir. I only work here.” The words breezed from his velvet tongue just as he produced a pistol from behind the counter. Before he could even point it in my direction, I lunged and laid open his throat with my razor, snatching the gun from his hand. He fell forward, slumping over the counter and holding on for his last moments alive, as the red river of his life drained into a puddle beneath his head, and his dead body’s weight pulled him backwards to the floor.

  “You see?” Mick said as he turned away, shrugging his shoulders and shaking his head.

  I reached out and turned the register around and searched it for the name of anyone who’d signed it that day. “Here it is.” I stepped behind the counter and snatched the ring of keys from the dead man’s pocket and said, “When Diablo smiles at you, Mick, you don’t stand around and wait for him to skewer you with his pitchfork. Let’s go.”

  “I thought you said you did not speak Spanish.”

  TWENTY-ONE

  ALL THINGS DONE IN THE DARKNESS

  “I don’t speak Spanish, Mick. What did Valentina shout at me as we were leaving?” I asked him as we crept up the stairs to the landing where the rooms were.

  “You mean the part about the Captain?” he answered in a whisper.

  “Yes, yes. What did she say?”

  “She said he’s going to be very angry with you.”

  Upon hearing laughter and chatter, I stopped and fell back against the wall. “Angry with me? Why? I’m only doing what he would do given the same circumstances.”

  “But do you know if he was given these circumstances as well?” Mick looked at me and reset his hat. Again, his raised dark brows gave me that look of knowing something I didn’t.

  “If you’re trying to tell me something, you’d better spit it out now before you end up like that old pigeon-livered toad downstairs,” I growled at him through my teeth.

  “You cannot kill me, Ivan. You will be left to this alone. But to answer your question, you do not think this Valentina would not tell him, as she told you?”

  “Sink me! That no good wench!” I ripped the hat from my soaked head and slapped it against my thigh so hard it stung like a swarm of wasps. “Damn her. Damn her big ass to hell.”

  “Shhh. It did appear she was trying to tell you something.” He placed his forefinger to his lips and nodded up the stairs in an attempt to remind me where we were and what we were doing there.

  “I told you, I don’t speak Spanish.”

  “Well, I speak English well enough to know I hear a voice that sounds very much like the young lady named Francis.”

  I leaned against the wall and continued climbing the stairs, taking careful steps so as not to cause a creak. When we reached the landing, I glanced right and left in search of room 202. Upon figuring out it was the first room to my right, I nodded to Mick and continued creeping until we stood just outside the door. I pressed my ear against it and listened.

  “I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. I know what I’m doing. You can leave any time you choose!” I heard Francis shout at whoever was in the room with her.

  “Ye don’t know what you’re doing, and the least ye can do after all we done for ye is give Valentina a chance.” I gasped and fell back against the wall to the right of the door. This was Rasmus’s voice. He was in there, trying to talk sense into her.

  “What does it matter to you, anyway? I wasn’t taken away in chains from Virginia. Ha! I went willingly. I know the others didn’t, but I damn sure did. They promised me fine clothes, jewelry, and a good position in Port Royal at one of the best places on that island. Then you and your damn pirates had to come along and ruin it.”

  “Ruin it? Lass, they held ye against your will. They kept ye in that dirty cell for weeks. Do ye really believe it will be better in Port Royal than that? If ye do, you’re as naive as a babe.”

  “I only stayed in there with those little half-wits because I felt sorry for them; especially Edwina. They don’t belong here. Now why don’t you get back on your horse and tend to them, and leave me be.”

  “Ye don’t mean that, lass.”

  “Don’t mean it? Oh, I mean it as much as I’ve ever meant anything in my life. This is all I’m good for now. Hell, it’s all I’ve ever been good for, and I’ll prove it to you.”

  During their exchange, I’d moved back and pressed my ear so hard against the door that sweat pooled around it and ran down my neck. The room fell silent but for what sounded like someone standing from a creaky old bed.

  “Lass, you stay right where ye are, and don’t ye dare take that off, or I’ll turn ye over my knee.” Hearing Rasmus’s words, my mind whirled with thoughts of Francis trying to seduce my husband. The next thing I knew I was inside the room with my hands wrapped tightly around her neck, pinning
her to the floor.

  “Ivory, no!” Rasmus shouted at me, snatching me by one arm as he ordered Mick to take the other. Together, they pulled my hands free of her neck and yanked me to my feet. Francis hacked and coughed, rolling on the blue and white flowered rug at the foot of the bed, as Rasmus tied me up in his arms, holding me firm.

  “You traitorous tart! I’ll kill you for this,” I shouted at her as Mick helped her to the bed.

  “Ivory, calm down. I was taking care of this,” Rasmus said, turning me to face him. He clutched me tightly by my arms and shook me until I stopped struggling against him. “I warned ye, lass. We can’t save them all.”

  I stopped and lowered my head, resting my brow against his chest. I nodded and took a deep breath. “You’re right. I’m sorry, Razz. I didn’t know you were looking for them. Valentina was shouting at me in Spanish, and it wasn’t until Mick explained to me what she said did it make sense to me that you’d, of course, be looking for them.”

  “I wasn’t looking for them for me, Ivory. I was looking for them for you. Remember back in Port Royal when we told ye some of the girls had run off in the night? We don’t chase them. We save the ones who want to be saved, and the rest…well, take a good a look, because that there is the other side of this business.”

  “I’m sorry, Francis,’ I said, turning around to see her pulling her clothes back together.

  “You should be sorry, you mixed-up hellcat. You had no right to put your hands on me again. Now my neck will be all bruised.” She stepped to the mirror on the dresser and examined the red marks I’d left on her.

  “Oh, I’m not sorry for that. I’m sorry you’re who you are. You could have at least tried to go home. You could have at least given us all a chance.” The warmth of Rasmus’s hand when he rested it on my shoulder radiated through me, and I welcomed it like a calm sea.