The Black Book

by George Shadow

  Chapter 18: Blackbeard

  “WE must get out of the water now,” Stephanie urged her older siblings. “We can’t stay here for long and it’s too salty.”

  “Look,” Matthew pointed out, using his head. “There’re bits of wood floating over there! That must be from our destroyed ship.”

  “We can cling on to them for support,” Nora said, gulping. Matthew tailed her as she swam as furiously as she could with all her might towards the floating logs, Stephanie clinging on to her for dear life. And as luck would have it, her foster brother spotted a nearby sizeable crosstree on which they yielded their weight with their last strength. “We are still far from land,” Nora observed with a sense of foreboding. “Perhaps the sails of a ship loom beyond the ocean’s unsteady horizon as we speak.”

  “Nora, you do speak strangely again,” her brother detected, breathing hard.

  “So do you,” Stephanie pointed out.

  Of course, the children now knew what that meant, but they didn’t know when the vessel would arrive, nor did they know its size. They even feared it was the Tempest out to recapture them, but they were wrong.

  Slowly, her gray sails appeared above the ocean’s unsteady horizon. Those spread out were full from the slight breeze that had started picking up again, and the rumbles of thunder and flashes of lightning marking out her massive shape now and then from the widening backdrop of ashen, cloudless sky increased as she neared the spot where the children still clung to the broken mast.

  She was huge. Her bow rose up high into the air and her stern could have easily been sixty feet away. She appeared to be as wide as could accommodate this length and as high as a four-story building. Her anchor was fearsomely held in place by heavy chains of wrought iron, and apart from her three gun decks, she also had cannons on her upper deck and six huge carronades lined up towards her stern. Like a lone island, her imposing gray form sat on the ocean’s undulating surface as if strong pillars extended down from her large hull to its lowest beds and deepest depths, while in fact, she was displacing her full weight and more in tons of water as she edged towards them.

  “Ahoy!” Matthew shouted, waving. “Over here!”

  “Help!” his adopted sisters chorused. “Help us!”

  “Ahoy!” the ship’s lookout man announced from her foretop when the children were spotted in the water. “Strangers to larboard! Strangers to larboard, ho!”

  The people who appeared on the ship’s deck in response to this call were as shabbily dressed as the children, themselves. Many boys one could consider Matthew’s age-mates were amongst these sailors and they were all very dirty and mean-looking.

  “They look like survivors of the Philanderer to me,” an old one-eyed seaman growled at his mates. “I will swear it is her flotsam all around them! And they must be holding on to her mainmast there.”

  “So where is her Jolly Roger?” a boy with a broken tooth demanded. He was helping three men to lower a rope ladder. “Cannot see it from here, can I?”

  “You cannot see it on the ocean floor from here, can you, fool?” the old man berated, smacking the boy on the head. “Help ‘em up, lads! They look tired ‘n’ hungry.”

  Stephanie caught the rope ladder and started climbing it, followed by the other two.

  “Don’t look down, Steph,” Matthew warned her and followed behind as she went up. Nora followed him and the four sailors above started hauling up the ladder. One by one, the children were brought into the midst of those on the ship’s deck and a torn fur cloth wrapped around each of them.

  These men and boys appeared even more menacing now that both sisters and their adopted brother were aboard the ship and surrounded by them. Vile-looking and dirty, some of them wore long, tattered military or sailor waistcoats and breeches, while others had on only sailcloth trousers and old leather shoes very like Matthew’s.

  There were no colors on these clothes, their bodies or the ship’s deck, except black and shades of gray. Even the lit lanterns inside the cabins couldn’t break this monotonous spread of desperate oneness accentuated by the misty environment that was created by the drizzling rain, and sadly, Matthew saw no difference in their own appearance.

  The one-eyed sailor looked him and his sisters over like a doctor, nodding his head observantly. Matthew thought the man to be very edgy, since his only eye was very restless and darted about at the slightest sound on deck, while his hands shook whenever they moved.

  On her part, Stephanie thought the man’s face too hideous for her viewing pleasure and covered her eyes with both hands to his viewing displeasure.

  “Nothing wrong here save for a little chill,” One-eyed Shifty grumbled, ignoring the little girl. “A little heat and hot coffee will certainly warm them up.” His breath smelled of rum.

  “Dogs of Carolina! Make way for a braver son,” a brawny fellow shouted, elbowing his way towards the ring formed around the children’s wet bodies. Bare-chested, he authoritatively emerged from this ragged lot with a look of concern on his face.

  “Lookout spotted them at larboard, sire,” One-eyed Shifty bellowed. “I reckon they’re from the Philanderer! Me thinks she was attacked by a ship of the line.”

  “I knew their parents, Dr. Brooks,” the new man coldly revealed. “The two lassies are sisters and the boy is the Jew’s son.”

  “Jolly old cook,” an alarmed seaman cried behind him. “Travelled many voyages with him, I did! Isaiah was a jolly seaman, but I’ve never seen a better cook in all of Virginia and Carolina, Mr. Hands. Could have easily cooked for King George, himself, if you ask me.”

  “We just escaped from the Tempest, sire,” Matthew brilliantly slipped in. “She sank our ship.”

  “We must revenge our dead friends,” Nora contributed.

  “Revenge, I’ll say,” the pirate before them growled. “Revenge for our dead comrades and a curse on the British fleet.”

  “Huzzah!” his men chorused. “Huzzah! Huzzah!”

  Loud thunder clapped out above the pirates and they quickly fell silent. This preceded a series of heavy rumbles and flashes of lightning, and while the misty drizzle kept up, the wind turned up one notch.

  “Curse the British fleet! Bah!” the reason for their sudden eerie silence vented. “Curse you too, Bill! Why, I’ll cripple you for life if you repeat that mutinous roar again on my bloody ship, even if it is not the Queen Ann’s Revenge!”

  A low hubbub broke out amongst the men on deck and Nora stretched her neck to try and see this new entity. Matthew was not so lucky. “Who is the new man?” he asked his sister.

  “Could be the captain,” she whispered back.

  A path had been made for this heavily bearded man and he came down towards them without a word. His black waistcoat looked like a naval officer’s, with a broad stretch of gold lace on its sleeves and silvery buttons decorating its front. His breeches were also clean and the shoes on his feet lavishly polished.

  He had a strong nose, his eyes were narrow and his eyebrows were deep. They appeared to have been carved out of the broad forehead with a chisel or a rough-looking tool. However, what was so intriguing about his face was the way his long beard was braided. The individual threads reminded one of the small snakes on Medusa’s head!

  When he stopped before the man the pirates called Mr. Hands, he drew his pistol and fired a shot in-between the other man’s legs. A small hole burst out on deck followed by a fearful scream from below and he grinned wickedly. “Crippled, you hear,” he said aloud for all to hear. “I will never think twice before blowing any devil who denies me peace into Davy Jones’s locker, you hear?”

  Mr. Hands still looked down at the hole on the plank he stood on. The shot must have killed an innocent crewmate below deck.

  The captain turned to One-eyed Shifty, who seemed to be the ship’s doctor, pointing at Matthew and his two companions. “Give them food and hot coffee, Dr. Brooks, and be quick about it.” He walked away. “Full sails! Haul ship! Be on the lookout for the T
empest, Mr. Hands,” he threw back at the first mate. “Follow your instincts!”

  The men and boys started running around. Dr. Brooks hurried to obey his captain. Many wandering eyes followed Matthew and his foster sisters as they made their way towards the quarterdeck and the kitchen. Many mustered the courage to block their path when their curiosity blinded them, only to be forcefully pulled aside by the strong old man leading the way. Nora was the objective of those trying to reach them with idle hands, and she did her best to stay very close to the doctor.

  “Hussy for an able seaman,” one ruffled lad cried out and the doctor glared at him. “Hussy for the captain,” he yelled and quickly went about his work. He received a hard knock on the head when the doctor passed him.

  “Welcome to the Magnifique,” the pirate doctor growled, swinging open the doors to the common mess hall. “I guess the captain didn’t have the bloody time to welcome you properly, but that’s understandable! He’s full of grief for your dead folks and feels he must revenge these deaths as soon as possible! Besides, this is not his flagship and he is very eager to get to Virginia, where the Queen Ann’s Revenge awaits him.”

  “When are we to eat?” Stephanie asked him.

  “Coming up, young lady! Trouble me not.”

  The pirate left and it started raining heavily. The Quentins sat down around one of the wooden tables bolted to the deck. The ship’s rhythmic sway was one for gymnasts and none of them could claim that occupation at present.

  “I hate to think of Owen with that book,” Nora aired, having reverted to modern English. “He could have left us behind for all we know.”

  “I don’t . . . think so,” Matthew assured her. “Said he’s got nothing to fall back on, remember?”

  “We must get back that book and save Barbara before it’s too late,” she stressed, to his heartwarming surprise. “She mustn’t suffer for what you did.”

  “But Matthew suffered for what Barbara did in school,” Stephanie objected. “Barbara knew what she was doing then, but Matthew doesn’t now, so stop blaming him, Nora.”

  “What are you saying?” Matthew asked his younger sister.

  “Barbara was spreading tales about you in school,” Stephanie replied. “She did this with Mary Ann’s help! Everyone in my class knew that she was doing this! I couldn’t tell you ‘cause I knew you won’t believe me, and I don’t think you would now, either.”

  The door swung open before Matthew could challenge her story and the ship’s cook alongside his kitchen help came in with their food. Lamb chop, three cooked eggs, wheat bread and three hot cups of coffee.

  They delved in with gusto.

  “Glad you like it,” the dirty one-eyed doctor snarled, standing behind the cabin’s open door. “The captain sent me to confirm that.”

  “We do appreciate his kindness, sir,” Matthew said in-between mouthfuls. “Pray tell us his good name . . . that we may properly offer our thanks when next we meet him.”

  This catapulted the old pirate into loud laughter for a long time and in a hard, guttural manner. “Why, Blackbeard it is,” he angrily growled afterwards. “Curse you and your dead folks! He’s as popular as the king in these waters and beyond: I’ll swear.” And he went away, grumbling about ill-mannered nephews and young cousins.

  The two younger children turned beseechingly to Nora.

  “What?” she shrugged, munching away; and when they refused to turn back to their own plates: “I don’t know him, okay?”