Pirates, Passion and Plunder

by Victoria Vale

  She would have liked a pair of boots, too, but could see none. She would keep her own sturdy shoes, or if they looked out of place, she would make do bare foot. The stolen clothing bundled in her arms, she hurried away from the house.

  Paulette found a secluded spot between a deserted forge and a warehouse. Sure that she would not be seen, she quickly removed her cloak and servant’s dress, and pulled on the breeches and shirt. She was glad they were freshly washed since they did not smell too bad at all, but her shoes looked quite wrong with her new outfit. She had no option but to remove them and leave them behind, rolled up with her discarded garments. It was a pity, but they would not fit in her satchel, so the matter could not be helped.

  She finished her disguise by bundling her hair up on the top of her head and dragging the wool cap over it. She tugged it down around her ears, patted the sides to make sure no stray tresses had escaped to betray her, and considered herself suitably transformed.

  Paulette the upstairs maid was now Paul, the deck hand.

  Back at the Raven’s Claw, Paulette waited close by. Night fell. Lanterns flickered into life up and down the shoreline and on the ships docked in the harbour. This served Paulette well. It would be easier to slip aboard undetected under the cover of darkness.

  Men passed where she loitered, for the most part barely sparing her a passing glance. Paulette stayed out of their way, watching where each group appeared to be headed. At last, a bunch of rowdy and clearly inebriated sailors halted at the foot of the gangplank leading onto the Raven’s Claw. Laughing and joking between themselves, they started to file unsteadily across the narrow bridge onto the rocking deck.

  Paulette dashed forward to insinuate herself at the back of the line and followed the men on board. They were all drunk, and it was pitch-dark, almost midnight. The sailor on watch greeted the returning crewmen, but no one noticed the slight figure of one extra hand who stepped lightly onto the deck then sidled off to disappear in the shadow of the main mast.

  “Who is that? I don’t recognise him.”

  Rafe Auvin, captain of the Raven’s Claw, known as Raven to his peers among the buccaneering fraternity in the Caribbean, or just ‘sir’ to his crew, leaned on the rail in front of the ship’s wheel to peruse the deck beneath him. The object of his curiosity, a skinny lad wearing a ridiculous large wool hat, knelt on the planks directly beneath. The youth bent forward, his nose almost in contact with the polished wood, and rubbed hard at some spot right in front of him. A bucket of water stood beside him, and from time to time the lad straightened, slopped his cloth into it, wrung it out, then started again.

  Raven’s second-in-command, Louis Vailvet, a stalwart sailor of indeterminate but probably French origin like his captain, came to lean on the rail alongside him. The man was known as Velvet to the crew, partly because they struggled to pronounce his true name, and partly an inverse reference to his far from soft and gentle nature. Velvet was Raven’s right-hand man. He understood the captain’s insistence upon rigid discipline, knew as well as Raven did that all their lives might well depend on the men’s ability to follow orders without question or hesitation, so he meted punishments out as necessary. He was also an experienced seaman and battle commander, he could navigate almost by sense of smell it seemed to Raven, and he could land a broadside right in the heart of a target vessel over two hundred yards away.

  Raven had a lot of respect for Velvet, and that regard was reciprocated.

  “I cannot say, mon capitaine,” came the reply. “I have not seen him before.”

  Raven slanted a puzzled glance at Velvet. “You did not hire him?”

  The man shook his head. “I have taken on no new crew since Nassau, monsieur.”

  “What is he doing? Surely that bit of the deck is clean by now. He’s been swabbing the same spot for the last twenty minutes.”

  “I can find him something more useful to do, I am certain.” Velvet flexed his jaw. “That rigging on the main mast needs tightening. He can be up and back down in a few minutes.”

  Raven nodded and returned to take the wheel. As usual, he left matters of detail to his first mate.

  Velvet took the steps down onto the main deck with two agile bounds and moments later stood over the diminutive crew member. Raven could not hear what was said from up on the wheel deck but saw Velvet point up into the main rigging. The lad got to his feet and peered up at the sail.

  Then, he shook his head and backed off.

  What the fuck?

  Raven lashed the wheel in order to hold course, then strode over to the rail again. What is the lad thinking of, saying nay to Velvet?

  There was more gesturing towards the rigging from the first mate, and more determined head-shaking from the deck hand.

  “Get up there, now, or you shall feel the back of my hand, you idle chiot.” Velvet had raised his voice, and his words now carried clearly. Other crewmen were starting to take notice and ceasing their tasks in order to pay attention to the scene unfolding. A whipping was in the offing, and no one wanted to miss that.

  Raven would have much preferred his crew to occupy themselves with more productive matters. This distraction needed to be dealt with, and fast, if his plans to reach Santa Natalia on schedule were to come to fruition. He followed Velvet down onto the main deck, arriving just in time to witness his second-in-command’s beefy hand connect with the youngster’s jaw. The lad staggered backwards before collapsing on his back among some coils of rope.

  “What’s the matter here?” Raven demanded.

  “Insolent young pup will not climb into the rigging, mon capitaine. He says he is afraid of the high places, and the ship is swaying.”

  “He says what?” Raven was incredulous. What was the use of a deck hand who would not clamber up into the rigging at a moment’s notice, whatever the weather or however rough the sea?

  “He is afraid of heights. And he feels sick, he says.” The scorn in his first mate’s tone was obvious, and not lost on the lad sprawled across the coils of rope.

  The boy’s features were ashen, and already a bruise bloomed on his chin.

  Raven moved past Velvet to glare down at the boy. “What is your name?”

  “Paul, sir.” The lad’s voice was far from steady. He appeared to be close to tears.

  Raven wondered how old he might be, no more than thirteen or fourteen, he would guess. “Paul what?”

  “J-just Paul, sir.”

  “So, Just Paul, when did you come aboard, and who hired you to crew my ship? And how old are you anyway? Does your mother know you are out playing at pirates?”

  “My mother is dead, sir. I mean, Captain. I am nineteen years old, and I joined the ship in New Orleans. I… I don’t know the name of the man who recruited me.”

  Nineteen? Never!

  The lad was lying. No one but he or Velvet ever took on new hands. That made the lad little better than a stowaway, and every bit as expendable.

  “Get up, now,” Raven commanded.

  To his credit, the youth did as he was told. He scrambled to his feet, his hand cradling his injured jaw as he swung his nervous gaze from Raven to Velvet and back again. His features were pale with the combination of seasickness and, Raven supposed, terror.

  Small hands, Raven observed, Delicate, even. And he might well feel terrified. So he should. No one came aboard the Claw uninvited without facing the consequences.

  “This is your last chance, boy. Get up there, to the first cross mast, and secure those sheets. Charlie here will go with you, to see you do it right.” Raven summoned another youth, perhaps a year or two older than the one who cowered before him. Maybe the lad would be less timid if he was not up there alone.

  Charlie darted forward from among the group of men now assembling to watch the fun. He gave the smaller lad an amiable punch to his shoulder. “Come wi’ me, I’ll show ye how it be done.”

  Despite this offer, the youth stayed rooted to the spot when Charlie trotted over to the mast.

>   “You won’t climb it from there, lad,” Raven advised, narrowing his eyes at this continued defiance. He gestured with his thumb. “Get to it, or Velvet will be pleased enough teach you the consequences of disobedience on board my ship.”

  “P-please, sir, I cannot. I will do anything else, I am a hard worker, and—”

  “The rigging. Now.” Raven had no time for this. His patience was exhausted. “Get up there or take up the matter with Velvet. Your choice.”

  One final glance into Velvet’s terrifying countenance was apparently enough to convince the lad he should at least make an effort. He scurried to the foot of the mast and placed his hands around it. Charlie had scrambled up like a monkey and was already seated on the first cross mast, his bare feet dangling some fifteen feet above their heads.

  “Grab on to the ropes,” Charlie shouted. “It’s not so hard.”

  The younger boy grimaced. Clearly not in agreement with this assessment, he grasped one of the ropes which snaked around the mast and tugged at it.

  “See. It’ll hold your puny weight.” Raven hardened his tone. “Now, go up there and do as you’ve been told, then you can come back down and tell me the truth. Who are you, and what are you really doing on board my ship?”

  Raven would not have believed the youth could have paled any more, but he did. He grabbed at another coil of rope and used that to pull himself up the first foot or so, then he scrambled with his grimy bare feet for some sort of purchase. He found it and clung on with his feet while he reached higher with his hands. The boy was perhaps five or six feet up the mast before Raven realised he had his eyes tight shut.

  “For fuck’s sake,” he muttered. “Do you want to get yourself killed? Open your eyes and look at what you’re doing.”

  The lad shook his head. His eyes remained screwed up tight.

  “So help me, open your fucking eyes or never mind Velvet, I shall take a whip to you myself.”

  Raven ground out the words through gritted teeth, but the threat seemed to have the desired effect. The youth cracked open his eyes and peered about him anxiously. The view did nothing for his confidence. He wrapped his arms and legs around the solid pole and whimpered.

  “Bloody hell, get him down,” Raven commanded. “He’s no use to us.” He turned on his heel to march back in the direction of the steps leading to the wheel deck. He spun back around at a shout from above his head.

  Spurred on perhaps by the contempt of those around him, and the looming consequences of failure, the skinny youth had made one final effort and had almost reached the cross mast when he lost his footing. He now swung by his fingers from the ropes dangling below the cross mast, his feet flailing uselessly as he tried to find something solid to latch on to. Even as Raven watched, he could see those slender, delicate fingers losing their grip on the rope.

  “Charlie, can you grab him?” Raven yelled, already sprinting back to the mast.

  The older lad swung around to hang upside down from the cross mast and reached for the boy below, but it was already too late. The youth lost his grip and plummeted towards the deck. The best Charlie could manage was to snatch at his hat, which came off in his hand.

  Both Velvet and Raven darted forward to catch the falling boy, but Raven was better positioned and got there first. He grabbed him out of the air and clutched him to his chest before lowering his legs to the planks under their feet.

  “Holy fuck,” Raven muttered as waves of ebony-coloured thick hair trailed across his arm. He turned the slender form he now held, and there was no mistaking the soft swell of breasts pressing against his torso.

  A wench. A bloody wench, playing at cabin boys on my ship.

  The girl barely reached his shoulder, so it was easy enough to glance over her head and meet Velvet’s equally astonished gaze. Moments later, Charlie landed on the deck beside them, the hat in his hand.

  “Er, here, this is yours,” he said, passing it back to the girl who took it from him with a weak smile.

  “Thank you,” she replied. “And thank you for catching me, Captain. I…I think I can manage for myself now.”

  “What’s a wench doin’ on the Claw?” the crewman closest to where they stood demanded.

  “Females are bad luck at sea. It’s an ill omen,” observed another.

  “She be bringing a curse down on all of us, you mark my words,” was the sage opinion of a third.

  Soon the men were all joining in, contributing their thoughts and sharing superstitions. The general gist of it all was that a female on board was very unwelcome, and the situation would be best dealt with by tossing the wench into the sea.

  Raven might have had some sympathy with that view, at least the latter part of it, but ultimately, he was not about to let his crew dictate who was and was not permitted on board his vessel. And apart from anything else, ‘Paul’ might have been an unprepossessing youth, but ‘he’ was a stunning beauty as a girl. It would be a waste to consign such a treasure to the deep.

  Still, the matter of her unexpected and unlooked for presence on board the Claw needed to be addressed, and Raven started to do so by the fairly simple expedient of securing his female captive’s wrists behind her back with a kerchief he tugged from around his own neck. He shoved her towards the coils of rope where she had fallen earlier, and this time suggested she sit down.

  The girl had the good sense to obey him. She perched among the coils, peering up at him as he paced the deck before her. Raven looked to Velvet for inspiration but found only exasperation and annoyance to match his own mood. No help there, then.

  “What the hell do you think you’re playing at? You might have been killed.”

  “I… I told you I was no good with heights.”

  “You also told me you were a deck hand named Paul, recruited by some nameless, faceless soul to serve aboard the Raven’s Claw.” He propped one booted foot on the coil next to her and rested his elbow on the raised knee to lean over his unwanted guest. “I do not appreciate lies, Miss whoever you are.”

  “I am Paulette. Paulette Vêrtine.”

  He’d spoke to her in English, and she’d answered in the same language, though he detected the merest trace of an accent. French, perhaps. The name would certainly suggest as much. “And why are you here, Mademoiselle Vêrtine? More to the point, why are you dressed as a boy, masquerading as one of my crew?”

  She had better produce a decent answer, otherwise, pretty wench or not, he might still feed her to the fishes.

  “I… I want to get to Santa Natalia. To Santa Laura. My brother is there.”

  “Are there not passenger ships making that voyage?”

  “I have no money, sir, with which to purchase my passage.”

  “Could your brother not pay?”

  “He would, sir, I am sure he would, but I have not seen him for some time so could not ask him, and I am not entirely certain that he is in Santa Laura at this precise moment.”

  “You risk your life to get to a brother who may or may not be in Santa Laura? What sort of a plan is that?”

  “A desperate one, but I had no choice. I… I lost my employment, sir, through no fault of mine, and I have no other relatives I can turn to. My brother’s ship sails out of Santa Laura. He will be there. Eventually.”

  “How long has it been since last you saw this brother?

  “Several years, Captain.”

  “Seafaring is a perilous business, Mademoiselle Vêrtine. Your brother may not even be alive still.”

  “He is. He must be. He will be there, and I shall find him. He…he is a pirate, like you. His name is Will. Do you know him?”

  “There are many by that name.” Raven lifted one eyebrow, an expression reserved for those he wished to intimidate. “What makes you think this to be a pirate vessel, Mademoiselle Vêrtine?”

  “You said as much, Captain. You accused me of playing pirates. And I… I heard some of your men talking, outside a tavern in New Orleans. That is how I know you were bound for Santa Nata
lia. I had already spent two days loitering at the docks and had not been able to find another ship making the same journey, so I needed to come with you. I dressed as a boy as I hoped not to attract attention and intended to work my passage.”

  “Ah, yes, the frantic deck scrubbing.”

  “I would have done my best to earn my keep, and I intended to leave you at Santa Laura and not burden you further. I… I still would like to do that, if you please, sir.”

  “I cannot have a female working as a deck hand on the Claw. It would be a distraction for my crew. Even if you were happy to also service them as they would clearly like, I fear it would not be good for morale.”

  “S-service them?”

  He was amused at the high-pitched squeal in her voice. At last, her situation was becoming evident to her. She was the sole female among dozens of rough men who would not see port again for weeks.

  “Yes. Service them. And there is also the matter of your subterfuge and deception. I cannot disregard your attempts to conceal your true identity. My crew expect there to be a reckoning, and I do not like to disappoint them. That, too, is bad for morale.”

  “What sort of a reckoning? I have explained my predicament and said I am sorry.”

  “Have you? I heard no apology.”

  “I am sorry. Of course I am. I would not have lied if I had any other choice. I told you, I was unfairly dismissed from my employment, wrongly accused of being a thief. I have to get to Santa Laura, there is nowhere else for me to go.”

  “A thief, eh? I see now why you felt a pirate vessel would suit you.”

  “I am no thief. I told you that. It was all lies. I simply want the chance to make an honest living.”

  “Among pirates? You will not meet men much inclined towards making an honest living on board this vessel, mademoiselle. I suggest you revise your strategy.”

  “Are you going to Santa Laura?” Her voice had dropped to a whisper now. “Will you drop me off there? Please?”