“NoneO’Us ShouldBeAlone,” he hissed in my ear. “YouTwoWatchTheHouse. Don’tTrustNoOne.” Then he was gone, in pursuit of his matelot.
In all the joviality, it took me a moment to understand his concern; and then I did, and once again, I did not think much could drive the melancholy from my heart. I still could not believe any here would seek the bounty on our heads, though.
But then, as the household – except for Sarah and the Marquis – joined us, and we sat about with several bottles and the men began to regale us with tales of their smuggling, I began to consider each of them in turn.
Dickey’s character was surely beyond reproach. Becoming a buccaneer and then our Master of Sail’s matelot had erased all trace of the effete young man with whom I had sailed from England. His lanky body was now filled with hard-earned muscle that seemed to steady him, and his eyes were confident and happy. And even the boy I had known had proven to be stalwart and principled, a man of loyalty to his friends no matter the circumstances. And, even viewing the matter cynically, I did not see the Bard and Dickey severing their ties with the R&R Merchant Company to be in their best interests – unless they sought to establish their own.
Liam, our Scots musketeer, could not even possess the ulterior motive of a business venture. He had money and land, and all I knew that he had last yearned for was his deceased matelot: the death of whom still seemed to haunt him despite the fine spirits, such that he was not our principle tale-teller, as had ever been his wont. I could not gaze upon his sad pale blue eyes and crooked nose and think he would ever betray us: he carried the Way of the Coast in his heart like a cross and shield.
As did Julio the Maroon, in his fashion. Julio was ever a man of principle, and though not involved in our business venture, he did own land that we had helped him gain despite the dark hue of his skin. I did not see him as a man who would betray his fellow for gold, and we had surely never done a thing to earn his enmity.
The same – that we had done nothing to earn his enmity – could be said for his matelot, Davey, the stubborn goat of a sailor I had rescued from the slavery of being a pressed crewman on an English merchant vessel. However, I could see Davey doing a great many things for gold, and I questioned what loyalty he held for anyone. Some would say it was because he had been shat on throughout his life and learned nothing else; and perhaps it was even a thing I would say when under the sway of a kinder spirit; but this night, I was not so inclined to be generous.
Bones, our lanky and ever-indolent musketeer, was inclined to inspire and sop up generosity. I could not see him rousing himself to the level of industry required to hatch a plot, and I had seen nothing of his character to indicate he would do such a thing against those who treated him well.
His partner, Nickel – I could see nothing from their behavior to indicate they had at last truly become matelots – was likewise a good sort, and though there was depth to the former planter’s son that he hid behind pleasantries and genteel behavior, I did not sense that it ran contrary to what he revealed upon his face. He would have likely made a fine priest, as had been planned for him; but he had chosen to escape that destiny and sail for adventure. Young men were often inclined to acts of disaster in the name of establishing a name for themselves, but I saw none of that about him, either.
And that left Alonso: my former lover, two years my partner in crime and all manner of things in Florence; a Spanish noble not ready to accept the yoke of maturity. He eyed me even as I looked upon him, and fear rimed my gut with ice. Alonso needed money, though he did not profess it. He had left behind all he had in Panama, including a wife, his good name, and any standing with his family, when he had joined with us in Porto Bello. He had ever been a nobleman’s son, living as he saw fit to maintain the finery to which he was accustomed. I still could not believe the rough and crude life of a buccaneer appealed to him as he now claimed, when I had seen the care with which he had once selected his clothing and jewels. He had killed for money: killed men we had been acquainted with and who had no reason to fear us. And Gaston’s death was in his best interest, as he still sought to win me back.
I would have dismissed that last conceit if he were not still gazing upon me this night much as he had three months ago, when we returned from Porto Bello. He felt he loved me yet: the damn fool. I had hoped it would pass these last months, once he was clear of the damnably boring and frustrating existence he had led in Panama, and thus no longer in need of foolish romantic notions concerning a former lover. Now I saw clearly that, even if he knew nothing of a bounty on Gaston’s head, my matelot was still in danger.
I considered shooting Alonso then and there; but the others spoke fondly of him now. And I knew it would not sit well with them without reason, and my speculations would not yet be enough. I would need to watch him closely and seek my opportunity.
Their smuggling venture had apparently been quite lucrative, yielding a great deal of good Cuban tobacco, wool, and wheat in exchange for paper, shot, hardwood, and iron. They had been greeted warmly by all they encountered along the coasts of Cuba and Hispaniola, save a few local militias; and they had even managed to allay any concerns on two of those occasions with a little gold and rum. As for the rest, they had retreated rather than fight – even though they lost some cargo on one such adventure.
Alonso had been a fine asset, being the one able to slip into the towns to locate merchants willing to trade. He had often been accompanied by Julio posing as a slave, or Cudro posing as a Dutch merchant. This had led to several adventures of a different sort, which he and the others related with great relish. Apparently, small Spanish towns were just rife with wayward maidens and lads ripe for the plucking, along with the occasional lonely widow or soldier. That part of his new life I could see Alonso taking to quite well. He had never been as discerning about his lovers as he was his attire.
And there was a time when I had been much like him; but that life now seemed a dream, or rather a nightmare I was relieved I could not remember in its entirety.
Other than a good-natured pull or two, Gaston and I eschewed the rum and wine flowing about the tables, and listened with feigned good cheer – at least on my part. But, as my matelot’s grip upon my hand was fierce, I thought his ease with the situation also false.
Agnes happily sketched the men while Rucker plied them with questions. Christine sat in the shadows somewhat apart from the rest and listened to their tales with barely-concealed longing, in mockery of her dismissing her need for adventure as a girlish fancy.
Gaston at last decided he should look in on Sarah, as Striker and Pete had not yet returned. He kissed me and left, and I watched him walk to the stairs with a suddenly lonely heart. I was not long alone, though; Liam appeared at my side and motioned that we should retreat further from the others.
“You have seemed still in the grips of mourning this eve,” I said carefully when we were alone enough to be able to speak without fear of being overheard.
He nodded slowly. “Aye, it’s been right hard. It not be the same without him. Near twelve years and then… I feel like I be missin’ me shadow. An’ I see no end in sight. I thought the rovin’ would distract me some, ya know? But nay, it just made it worse.” He frowned and studied me speculatively. “I canna’ see takin’ on another.”
I nodded my understanding. From what he had told me at Otter’s death, his beloved Dutch matelot was the only man he had ever been with, and Liam did not feel he favored men so much as companionship.
“So what will you do?” I asked.
He sighed. “That be the thing o’ it. I been plannin’ on speakin’ with Striker ’bout my na’ goin’ rovin’ this time, but… the thought o’ goin’ to the Point alone is a dismal thing. An’…” He frowned at me again. “There be a thing we ’eard tell of. An’ it makes me think I should na’ abandon me friends.”
“What?” I breathed.
“There be some talk among the crew of a prize on yur matelot’s head. An Striker’s.” H
e studied me intently.
“Aye,” I sighed. I sighed again as I realized how very lucky Pete and Striker had been this autumn: if the men on the Queen had known of the bounty before they sailed, every buccaneer on the island had surely been apprised of the matter for months, and yet no attempt had been made on Striker. Perhaps it was not luck: perhaps no member of the Brethren would ever stoop to such a thing.
“We have only recently learned of it ourselves,” I said. “It is my father’s doing.”
He frowned at that. “We thought it might ’ave been the French. None on the Queen say they know the how or why o’ it, but I don’t trust the lot o’ ’em. Why would yur father do such a thing?”
“Because… He disapproves of my lack of discretion in taking a matelot, and he dislikes my sister’s choice of a groom.”
“Bloody Hell,” Liam said with a sad shake of his head. “Ya would think ya wronged ’im somehow.”
“He feels we have,” I sighed.
“That be a sad thing.” Then he sighed and shrugged. “Better this than the French, though. Men would be more likely to take money from one of their own to do a deed than from some damn… lord.” He gave me an apologetic grimace.
I snorted. “I am no longer a lord. I am denouncing my inheritance in order to save my matelot. If my father’s concern is that I am dragging the title through the mud, then he should be less concerned if I have no title. Of course, my father can be a hateful and conniving man, prone to vengeance, and he might not care. And… we have learned the offer of the prize money came from several men about town. They have supposedly not told anyone the source of it.”
He sighed heavily. “What will ya do?”
“We plan to sail. We cannot cower like rabbits in a hole, and we feel the best tactic will be to lure our opponents out. And, we hope to be safer amongst the Brethren than here ashore, amongst bored planters’ sons and hired brigands.”
“Aye, aye,” he said with a somber nod. Then he sighed. “Ya be needin’ me ta sail, then.”
My gaze, which had been wandering as we spoke, passed over Agnes, and I frowned. All here would go save the women.
“Perhaps not,” I said quickly. “We are leaving much of value behind, and it would be a relief to have someone we can trust to watch over them.”
“Ah,” Liam said with surprise. “Yur sister, huh?”
“Aye, and my wife and child.”
He frowned.
I smiled. “Much has occurred in your absence.” And so I set about telling my own tales of our last weeks in Port Royal, leaving very little out save the circumstances of Gaston’s estrangement from his father.
When I finished, he was shaking his head and smiling with bemusement. “Bloody Hell, it be no wonder ya want to get back to sea. It be safer there. But what with Theodore, an’ your wife an’ babe, and yur sister an’ her babe, an’ all bein’ in danger even a little, I’m not sure I be man enough to do it; at least not without more hands an’ eyes than the Good Lord saw fit ta give me.”
“Do you know of any others we might trust who do not wish to sail, or at least do not express great exuberance for it?”
He frowned and nodded thoughtfully. “Aye, Julio an’ Davey. Playin’ a slave again wore hard on Julio, an’ ’e’s been speakin’ o’ settlin’ down an’ plantin’, and Davey loves him fierce and ’e’s a bit tired o’ the sea ’imself. An’ the damn diseases they got in Porto Bello ’ave left ’em wary. An’ then there’s Nickel an’ Bones. The rovin’ life o’ a buccaneer don’t suit Nickel, an’ he would learn another trade – though ’e don’t want ta go back ta Bermuda and join the clergy, neither. An’ Bones, well ’e would be right happy holdin’ up a wall wherever ya prop ’im.”
“The only one of that number I do not trust is Davey,” I sighed.
Liam shrugged. “Ya only see the worst o’ ’im ’cause that’s all ’e shows ya. Ya scare ’im, an’ he be filled with envy at all ’e thinks ya ’ave.”
I sighed. “Men in envy of my life often set out to ruin it.”
He thought on that and grinned. “Davey na’ be an ambitious man. An’ Julio can keep ’im in line. I’ll vouch fer ’im.”
“Then I leave it to you to make the offer. We can pay you all for your troubles.”
He made a disparaging noise and awarded me a chiding look before shrugging. “I don’t care. The others might, but damn ’em if they ask for more than they need.” He considered me speculatively. “What should I be tellin’ ’em?”
“Whatever you feel you must. I will trust your judgment.”
He took a deep breath and smiled grimly. I remembered well that he had often been concerned he was perceived as too much of a gossip to be trusted.
“Thank ya,” he said.
I considered those about the atrium again. I thought it likely what I had just set in motion would leave us with far fewer pawns than perhaps Pete had counted on in the field, but it gave me great confidence we would have something to return home to.
Gaston had not returned, and I looked about in time to spy Henrietta hurrying up the stairs with a steaming kettle.
“I believe Sarah has begun to birth,” I said.
“Truly?” Liam asked as if it were a horrific thing.
“Aye, someone should fetch Striker and Pete,” I said.
“I will,” Liam said. He stood and went to speak quietly with first Julio and then Nickel. Julio assured Davey he need not go, and the three of them headed to the door .
“Where ya off to?” Alonso called after them, in English that sounded suspiciously like Liam’s.
“Ta go fetch our damn captains and more rum,” Liam said with forced cheer. “Striker’s wife be birthin’.”
This brought a round of cheers and a startled look to Agnes. She closed her sketch book and scurried up the stairs.
I stepped from the shadows and called after her, “Come and fetch me if I am needed.”
She nodded as she hurried across the balcony, and then she was gone into Sarah’s room.
There was movement beside me, and Alonso threw a heavy arm across my shoulders. I did not attempt to shrug him off.
“And how are you?” I asked without turning to regard him.
“Fine, truly fine,” he breathed, turning the air redolent with rum. “And how have you been?”
“Truly fine,” I said, and pulled away to return to the seat beneath the balcony I had occupied while speaking with Liam.
He followed, and took the other chair, stretching his long booted legs before him and leaning his wide shoulders against the wall. His months roving on a Brethren vessel had stripped away the paunch his indolent life as a Spanish colonist had begun to give him. And he was shorn now, his great curling mane of mahogany hair reduced to a thick wavy carpet of velvet upon his skull. It suited him. He looked as handsome as he had when first I laid eyes upon him.
“You do not look fine,” he noted in Castilian. “You forget how well I know you.”
“You forget how little you knew of me when we professed to know one another well,” I said with a grin.
He appeared pained. “Si, of certain things, perhaps; but I do know you, Uly.”
I sighed. “Then you should know me well enough to not call me by a name I have long discarded. I am no longer a hapless wayfarer in search of my home – heroic or not – so Ulysses no longer suits me.”
“You will always be Uly to me,” he said. “In my dreams.”
I shook my head in bemusement. “It truly pains me that you feel I am so fickle that you might actually succeed with your suit: you a man not prone to foolish fancies.”
“Ah,” he said with a knowing smile. “But you are ever a man of such things. You are prone to romance; and it is true, it is a thing sorely lacking in my life. Why should I not seek to address its absence?”
I sighed. “You should seek to address its absence elsewhere.”
“But is not my troth romantic?” he asked with a grin.
“In the manner
of fools everywhere, perhaps.”
“And how is your matelot?” he asked.
“Well enough.”
“I have learned more of the customs here in these West Indies,” he sighed. “I understand that men do not dally and tryst as we did in Florence: they hold only to one man. At first I thought it boring, but now, I see where it might possess other possibilities.”
I smiled and shook my head, not sure if I wished to see where he was going with this line of thought and not truly caring. “It allows for a great many possibilities; jealousy such as you cannot comprehend being one of them.”
He shrugged. “I believe we have already witnessed that between you and your man, have we not?”
I was minded of the eyes upon us on our voyage home from Porto Bello. Rumors of my duel with Gaston, and the cause of it, had spread among the fleet in variations too numerous to count; so all thought they knew our business, when of course none had any understanding at all. And then I was minded of dueling with Christine this day. I was not fit to seriously spar with Alonso any more than I had been to engage her, even though the wine had since drained from my head.
“You have glimpsed but a shadow on the wall; silhouettes seen through the gauze of a curtain: no more than that,” I sighed. “One of the possibilities of matelotage is the privacy of intimacy. I will not discuss it with you. You, of course, will think what you will. I have larger concerns.”
He frowned. “Such as?”
I decided that though I did not wish to spar, aiming a pistol at his head and telling him to back away was very much within my abilities.
“My father has threatened our very lives,” I said, and turned to regard him.
His brow tightened; and though he attempted to appear confused, he knew of what I spoke. I did know him as well as he thought he knew me.
“He has offered a prize for the death of my brother-in-law and my matelot,” I continued. “I have not yet been able to tell him I am willing to renounce my title in order to end the matter, and he does not yet know that Gaston is no longer estranged from his father, and now holds a title of his own. I fear either that information will reach him after an attempt is made upon us, or it will fall on deaf ears when it does. And it is no matter if it reaches him or not, truly, as once such a thing is offered, it is very hard to rescind it.”
Treasure Page 49
