by Mark Keating
Trouin relieved them of their oaths. ‘Leave him be! He will kill me and his men will kill you!’ They followed his eye-line to Peter Sam and Hugh, their muskets trained across the deck.
Devlin had told Trouin that they would act so but even he did not expect the shouts of a fight coming up from below until the aft companion hatch flew up and Dan Teague appeared with someone else’s blood on him. But he had promised Trouin no blood and he needed to gain control fast – Hugh and Dan would need to be muzzled.
‘To me, Peter Sam!’ he called, knowing the others would follow their quartermaster. Devlin edged along the gangway, keeping Trouin’s body facing the white coats. The marines’ control was vanishing fast as the other pirates came after Dan up the ladder. They had opened the weapon lockers and had their braces of pistols tucked about them or back around their necks on slings and found two men each to push to their knees and freed them of the terrible duty that their muskets gave them. It had taken less than a minute to change their world.
From La Françoise, Trouin’s sister ship, Captain Cassard patted away the traces of his fish sauce from the corners of his mouth and thought carefully on the word just given that boats were coming across from the pirate ship. The man standing in his cabin door waited for a more appropriate reaction other than Cassard’s re-examination of his breakfast plate.
‘Is the commodore with them?’ he asked at last.
‘No, Captain.’
‘Then perhaps it is an escort for me. I am ordered back.’ He stood and took up his hat reluctantly. ‘My abeyance is ended.’
He came out of the cabin to where his valet held out his coat. He shook it on, plucked his shirt cuffs free from the sleeves and squinted at the pair of boats slapping urgently through the water. He would castigate them for not maintaining a proper order.
‘Captain!’ The marine who had interrupted Cassard’s breakfast waved his arm toward the pirate ship. ‘She is underway!’
‘About time,’ Cassard sniffed, buttoning up half of his plate buttons. There were pirates aloft readying to drop sail. Supper in Brest he consoled himself. He ordered for similar action to be taken and stepped to the entry port to receive his men.
The men in the boats shouted now as they closed under the shade of the ship, some dropping oars to gesture frantically back to the pirate vessel. Only then did Cassard notice the absence of muskets that usually pointed skyward from those not rowing. That was certainly odd and out of sorts, but these had been strange days; nevertheless he called for his officers to attend.
He looked over the noisy boats to the ship beyond. The main and forecourse shimmied free. Could he hear the capstan from here? Not over the pleading of the boats below, every other word a confusing scrap of cursing and terror from excited peasants – but his breakfast shifted upwards as he saw the flash of an axe cut the pirate’s cable free and the hawser fall into the sea with a crash of white water.
And then the Shadow began to move, moved like a waking giant, and her gun ports heaved open and the black eyes stared along their freeboard and Cassard felt the touch of his father’s ghost on the back of his neck.
He did not watch the gallants fall or see the jibs run out, he was too busy yelling for stations, for powder and shot. Cassard prayed that La Patiente far off their stern quarter had also seen what had just occurred.
The marines clambered aboard. A salute. A piece of paper thrust into Cassard’s hand. He read once, twice, the concise and calm hand of René Duguay-Trouin, and then his own hands began to tremble and the paper to rip within his white grip.
Chapter Thirty-One
Cassard.
The pirate has taken back his ship. I and the remainder of officers to be held against reprisal from La Françoise and La Patiente. We are to be set free at the first fetter for Godwin sands. The captain and men from the captured tartane have returned to their ship and I order to escort them into Brest and report. We are unharmed.
I order to refrain from chase that will instigate our execution. I have given my word that you will obey. I will take any other action as mutiny.
Report to Brest then take us up tomorrow and know that I take the pirate captain’s word of honour as strongly as I measure my own. Do not allow me the occasion to measure it against yours, Cassard.
Duguay Trouin. Chef d’Escardre Marine Royale. September 2nd, 1720.
Trouin looked up from the deck of the tartane to the frigate birds that had swung off the departing Shadow and now preened themselves on his spars; their allegiance only to comfort, a trait shared with the peacocks of the new France that he did not fully understand.
And so Trouin had agreed with the pirate that he and his officers would descend to the tartane, and that there would be no rescue from the treacherous, shifting Godwin sands for the pirate was not sailing to the Kent coast.
Trouin would sail into Brest with the Breton fishermen and not have any wrong word presumptuously set against him. Meanwhile, the pirate would head north to Falmouth for his rendezvous. Any hunt east would miss him. The diamond was on the way to its destination and fate.
They had parted on a brief accord.
‘You will not fire on my men,’ Trouin had insisted before climbing down to the tartane. ‘And especially you will never return to my waters as long as you live.’ He held the pirate’s eyes with his own. ‘I will kill you if I hear of you again on my sea.’
Devlin steadied the man’s arm as he descended. ‘I would deserve it.’
Trouin held onto the forearm and Devlin felt the vice of thirty years of battle. ‘You promise that you will break them? That I will hear the sound?’
Devlin lowered him down. ‘With my last breath, Milord.’
Trouin watched the Shadow shrink into the sun. Behind him the sailors of the tartane had already begun to return to their normal routine, the ship getting underway. Soon Cassard would be able to discern him and his men amongst them. La Françoise was already beginning to swing and come about.
If a pirate captain kept his word perhaps some of the worst of the nobles that had extracted the marrow of his country would feel the diamond cut them. Perhaps men would put faith in their own country again and not the whims of a golden handful.
When countries fall, the rich run but the poor must stay where they are, stay and make do. When the rich fall? He could only imagine and smile at the thought of the terror in their hearts.
‘If I have committed a crime, a treachery, it is not at the loss of my countrymen or my honour. That I have regained.’ The thought carried him down to the shoulders of his men. The boldest of them cleared his throat and removed his hat. Trouin nodded for him to speak.
‘We are to rejoin La Françoise, Commodore? Give chase again?’
Trouin waved a glove to the sailors of the tartane.
‘You see these men? The pirates harmed none of them. Each of them has a story to tell that will buy them wine for the rest of their days. We killed men who had surrendered.’
‘But our honour?’ he protested. ‘Our duty to France?’
Trouin patted the strong shoulder fondly. ‘Do you know Despreaux, young man? He says honour is like an island, rugged and without shores. Once we have left it, we can never return.’
It was Dandon’s turn to wake in the night and find a consort by his side.
‘How you doing?’ Devlin asked.
Dandon rolled his head to the voice. ‘I am alive?’
‘You may wish not to be. When you can stand we’ll take you to the cabin.’
Dandon tried to rise but the table seemed to pull him back. ‘Perhaps a small drink would encourage, Captain?’
Devlin shook his head. ‘No drink tonight. In honour of Bill.’ The body of their sailing master lay beyond the curtain, wrapped in the tarpaulin and bound with the cordage that he had looked after half his life. Tomorrow he would be back to the sea.
‘Just a huckleberry’s worth, Captain? Some laudanum then?’ He winced and pleaded. ‘Babes in arms take laudanum, I entr
eat you, Patrick!’
Devlin stood. ‘You are better than I thought. You will take broth.’
‘Broth? You are endeavouring to murder me!’
Dandon noticed then the swing of the lamp, the rattling of bottles. ‘We are moving?’ His sallow face fell with realisation of what that meant. ‘Perhaps I would be better to remain dead.’
‘We are free.’
Dandon coughed, his stitches forgotten, and lifted himself up. ‘In truth?’
‘Trouin found himself again. He remembered what he once was.’
Dandon sighed himself back down again. ‘I do not know what you mean but am soothed to hear it.’ Then his voice lowered as if talking only to himself. ‘I had a dream, Patrick. You were in Newgate gaol again. I was in desperate want of a silver key to free you for you had grown too big for your cell. This caused you great . . . pain.’
Devlin turned to leave, pulled the curtain aside and looked at the crowd around Bill’s wrapped body. ‘The body sweats bad dreams when it’s dying. Pay it no mind.’
‘I shan’t now I know we are free and slept through the danger and making of it. Your wound fares well, my swollen liver will not let me die, and we are back to the Caribbee.’
‘No. To England. We have the diamond still. A date to keep. I’ll get your broth.’ He closed the curtain. Dandon was suddenly afflicted with more than pain.
‘England!’ he hissed. ‘Bloody England? How many times shall I die for a drink!’ He called to the lank curtain hoping his captain could still hear. ‘At least I can pick up the damn new coat I have paid for!’
Chapter Thirty-Two
If ever there was a nation that had been twenty-three years ruining itself and recovered in a moment
This is the time.
If ever a government paid its debts without money and exchanged all the cash in the kingdom for bits of paper which had neither any body to pay them for or any intrinsic fund to pay themselves
This is the time.
If ever a credit was raised without a foundation and built up to a height that not only was likely to fall but indeed was impossible to stand
This is the time.
From ‘The Original Journal’. Author unknown.
Dec 1719.
London is a turbulent city both in noise and humour. Apart from the general populace, who seem to intermingle amiably enough, with silk and sackcloth brushing shoulders, there are the hawkers, the costers and tradesmen on the streets competing alongside the shopkeepers – competing with everything from sticks of lashed rabbits to ‘marking stones’ of red and black chalk for householders to mark their linen against thieves. Then there are the chairmen with their sedans dodging the wooden- and iron-wheeled carriages clattering along the granite setts and flat cobbles, forcing the new visitor to stand stock still until his sense returns after being knocked by the din. Meanwhile, the observant pickpocket takes advantage of the dumbstruck statue and the commotion all around.
None of this cacophony, however, could compete with the urgency and lustiness that emanated from Jonathan’s and the other dozen coffee houses and taverns that cramped Change Alley. Here the stock-jobbers met and teased out purses by more discrete means, and all within pleasing earshot of the Bank in Walbrook, South Sea House in Threadneedle and the East India offices in Leadenhall.
Walpole had been in Garraway’s until two, observing and lunching before taking a cab at Cornhill to his appointment with the prince at Leicester House. It was now Friday, September sixth. The midsummer madness had seen subscribers to the Company rise to over fourteen million, each one confident in the promise of a dividend come the end of the year. At the opening of their books in August the Company had declared its stock at over eight-hundred percent of its original value and so released yet more stock to meet the demand – backed by the Bank of England, naturally.
But those who knew that the ships were empty, who knew that America would sink beneath the waves if she carried the load expected of her, had sent a pirate on a task and that was now almost overdue. Already Walpole had noted that the stock had fallen over two hundred percent in the time since Devlin’s departure.
September eighth almost upon them. A Sunday. The prince would need to be reassured that all was still well. At least conspiracy had been easier with the king’s extended absence in Hanover, and Walpole smiled at the thought that he had at least one good word for the prince.
‘So where is he, Walpole?’ The prince stared out from his window over the throng in the square below. He was not formally dressed and anyone who was able to look up and discern him through the leaden windows would see a dishevelled man in a torn purple banyan and cap, with two days’ growth of beard, sinking wine and smoking like a poet.
Walpole sat in the same chair as he had in January, when the plan had been formed and when the pirate’s name had been first spoken – when it was clear that the company that had existed for barely a decade had careered out of control.
‘He is not late, Your Highness. My man in Falmouth will be expected by the end of the day. With or without him.’
The prince turned. ‘Without him?’
‘It was always more probable that he would fail. The consequence is what we should talk of now. I would expect to hear from Law as to our success or otherwise and I have heard no rumours of a calamity in Paris. But, as Sunday will fall before, I have arranged for what shall occur.’
‘Occur? Occur?’ The prince filled his glass. ‘Bankruptcy is what shall occur, so!’
Walpole nodded. ‘We should take the attitudes of the Danes and Dutch who say that bankruptcy has no shame but is a necessity to good business.’
‘It will be a shame to me!’
‘Quite. Although I hope Your Highness will remember that it was I who divested him of his shares and his own directorship of the Welch company’s bubble which is now set to burst. The king, however, still remains as appointed head of the South Sea. Your Highness’s own involvement has been absent for five years. No-one will remember that you were its honorary governor. But they will remember the patronage of the one who was when it fell.’
The prince cocked his head, his voice intrigued. ‘Explain, so?’
Walpole stretched, a beef luncheon beginning to sit heavily on him. ‘Your father agreed to accept the Company’s offer to take up the national debt, well aware that this would absolve his own debt along with it. As governor of the Company for the last two years it may be suggested that he may have had some culpability in that agreement.’
‘Did not your ministers also accept interests in the assurance of that act?’
Walpole snorted past the accusations. ‘They were not my ministers. They were Tories lining their coats like gypsies!’
The prince grinned as he poured more wine and Walpole, declining a glass continued. ‘My thoughts are that the king’s popularity will not benefit greatly if we are forced to drag him back from his beloved homeland to account for the actions leading to the ruination of his people.’ He shifted in his seat. ‘Whereas His Highness’s ascension will only flourish.’
The prince held his glass still, halfway to his lips. ‘And the pirate? If he brings us the diamond?’
‘That is all to the good. I have an affirmation that, once cut, over one hundred further pieces can be made worth ten-thousand apiece; and worth more once the diamond price rises when it is known that these diamonds are an asset of the South Sea and more set to come.’
‘More?’
‘We will attest that the diamonds are a product of the colonies, a sample even, a taste of promise.’
‘A lie?’
‘A canard. And I have recruited several ministers, from both sides, to attend the assembly on the eighth to wax lyrical about the success of the directors in their management.’
‘And why would they offer such praise?’
‘Enough of them would not wish it to be annotated, if the Company collapses, how much stock they have accepted in the past in order to ensure that the Comp
any’s petitions were granted.’
The prince’s command of English did not stretch to the expression of sarcasm and Walpole missed the innuendo as he saluted with his glass. ‘Then all will be right with the world.’
A scream from the square below brought them both to the window. A Germanic curse escaped the prince’s lips as he spilt his wine down his front, but he soon forgot his annoyance as they squeezed together at the window to watch as a black coach bowled rattling over the cobblestones towards the house from the top of the square.
People dove aside at the thunder and roar of the horses and wheels, honest carriages pulling up sharply as the runaway tore along the side of the avenue.
‘The man’s mad!’ the prince laughed. The coachman, cloaked in black, whipped his path through the crowds, pulling back the snorting white-eyed horses only as he came to the wall of the house. It was then that the prince and Walpole noticed the kerchief hiding his face but not his distinctive bald dome of a head.
The two soldiers at the gates ducked back from the hooves and the homicidal wheels, then remembered their muskets and raised them to their shoulders. The coach did not halt, slowed only enough for a door to fly open and two bodies to hit the road at the soldiers’ feet, booted out by an unseen occupant.
With the crack of whip and a bellow from the masked driver the coach ripped away, almost keeling over as it took the corner in a grating whine, the sentries finally shooting uselessly through thick dust into its disappearing back. From the floor above, the watchers saw past the dust to the black and white cloth nailed to the rear.
Walpole gripped the prince’s wrist at the sight of the grinning skull with two pistols crossed beneath, set in a compass rose, laughing its way out of the square.
