Captured in the Caribbean

by Sara Whitford

  “Good Lord, man!” Willis exclaimed. “The whole wide world is out lookin for you right now.”

  “What?” said Adam. “Who is?”

  “You look like hell,” Canady remarked.

  Adam rolled his eyes. “I feel like hell. Long story. Who’s out looking for me? And what are you boys doing here?”

  “Some chap showed up on the Gypsy yesterday, bringin a note demandin ransom. Said if we didn’t pay up, they’d kill you,” said Jones. “Cap’n Phillips had Martin and Charlie go get this Spanish fellow he knows to help out. Name’s Velasquez. Anyhow, he and this other man—English chap named Drake, I think—and Martin and Charlie, they all went chasin down the men who picked up the ransom this morning.”

  “Yep. They wanted to follow ’em back to their hideout to rescue you,” said Canady.

  “Y’all paid the ransom?” asked Adam.

  “Of course! Well, somebody did. I think it was actually that Spanish captain,” said Willis.

  “Captain Velasquez . . .” Adam thought hard. “Wasn’t he that Spanish captain from—what was it called? . . . Oh, I can’t remember the name of the ship. Anyway, I think he was in Beaufort last year, at Laney’s estate.”

  “I think they were sayin that’s him, yeah,” said Willis. “I hadn’t met him before, though.”

  Adam must have looked like he was about to collapse, because his three shipmates insisted he sit down and eat some of what they had been cooking. But he didn’t want to sit. He wanted to find his friends Martin and Charlie and those other two men. Still, he realized he hadn’t eaten anything since the meal he had at the outdoor café the day before. He’d given his piece of bread to the chained prisoner back at the compound.

  He decided to accept his friends’ invitation to eat so he could fortify himself. Then he’d lead the others to the camp where he had been held. He hated thinking his friends were putting themselves in harm’s way when he had already escaped. And as much as he still wanted answers, at this point he wished he had just listened to his mother and not bothered trying to find out anything about his father. It had brought him nothing but misfortune from the start. Maybe it just was not meant to be.

  AFTER SCARFING DOWN A QUICK meal, Adam stood from the broken piece of stone wall upon which he was sitting and said to his friends, “Alright, I’m done. Let’s go.”

  “Ya sure about that, mate?” asked Jones. “You ain’t slept all night. This is the first meal you’ve eaten since yesterday morning. Maybe you should rest here. Sketch us out a map and show us where to go.”

  “Yeah,” Willis agreed. “Why don’t you do that? You don’t seem like you’re in any condition to be going anywhere.”

  Adam didn’t bother answering either of them. He went over to the bags of gear that he’d learned were inside the tower and grabbed a .50 flintlock pistol and a leather satchel of gear. He also grabbed a machete and a holster for his belt.

  “What the devil are you doin, mate?” asked Jones.

  “What does it look like I’m doing?” Adam yelled in response as he purposefully strode back to the point in the river where he had crossed earlier. “Come with me or stay here, but I’m going back to that compound.”

  “What about the horses?” asked Willis.

  Adam stopped for a minute and turned back, realizing his shipmates planned to come along. “Forget about ’em. That place ain’t too far. We can get there easier on foot. Now hurry up if you’re comin!”

  Jones and Willis grabbed pistols and gear, and Canady agreed to go back to the Gypsy to let the captain know what was happening. In no time Adam, Jones, and Willis were fording the river and heading back towards the beach.

  Chapter Fourteen

  UPON ARRIVING AT THE GROVE of Kapok trees where he had come out of the woods hours earlier, Adam remembered the sounds of the men chasing after him, deafening gunshots cracking the silence. He thought about his friends and the danger they could be in, and he was struck with a surge of adrenaline.

  “Follow me, but keep quiet,” he told Willis and Jones. “We’re less than a mile away now, but they could still have men on the lookout.”

  The three of them moved quietly through the woods. When Adam heard voices in the distance, he held up his hand, motioning for the other two to stop.

  “Just listen,” he said to them.

  The three were silent for a moment. Adam looked at Willis and Jones, who both shrugged, unable to make out much of what or who they were hearing.

  “How are we gonna do this?” Jones asked in a nervous whisper.

  “Very quietly,” said Adam. “We don’t even know if our men are in there. We need to scout the place out first.”

  “Go ahead, then,” whispered Willis. “We’ll follow behind you.”

  Adam nodded.

  They crept through the forest with stealth and speed. Soon the fortress was visible. Adam motioned for Willis and Jones to come near.

  “There it is, boys,” he said.

  “So what’s the plan, mate?” asked Jones.

  “Let me think for a minute,” said Adam. He looked back over towards the fortress, studying it carefully as best he could from a distance. It looked like there were armed men outside the hut that he was told belonged to the leader of the operation.

  He turned his attention back to his friends. “Our men could be here, but even if they’re not, the leader of this outfit must be, because there are guards posted outside his hut.”

  “Do you have a strategy in mind?” asked Willis.

  Adam sighed in exhaustion. He was tired, but he didn’t have time to think about that right now. “Yeah. I’m going to get closer to those buildings to see if I can figure out if Martin and the others are in there.”

  “And you think you can evade those armed guards?” Jones asked.

  “Lord willing,” said Adam. “If you can, just keep an eye out and signal to me if it looks like anyone is heading in my direction.”

  “You’re crazy,” Willis whispered sharply. “You’re goin to walk right into this armed compound? And then what? What if our fellas are in there? What kind of damage are just the three of us gonna be able to do?”

  “Well, we’ll just have to cross that bridge if and when we get to it.”

  “Listen, Fletcher, at least Jones and I have been in the militia,” said Willis. He motioned to the pistol Adam was carrying. “Have you ever even fired one of those?”

  “Of course I have,” insisted Adam. “But I expect I’ll do a lot better with this.” He clutched the hilt of the machete he had at his side.

  “You damn sure better hope so, mate,” said Jones. “Remind me again why we don’t just go to the Cuban authorities about this.”

  Adam narrowed his eyes in disbelief at Jones’s question. “The Cuban authorities? First of all, we just smuggled in hundreds of pounds’ worth of merchandise the day before yesterday. To make matters worse, you went and asked the high sheriff of this place for his recommendation on a place to drink—and he turned up there and ate with us!”

  Adam stepped back, exasperated, and ran his fingers through his hair while exhaling sharply. Jones stood there looking at him, waiting to see if he’d say any more.

  Adam continued: “Anyway, he already seemed suspicious, like he had his eye on us—and I reckon it’s probably because of whatever trouble y’all got into last time you were here!” He poked Jones in the chest. “The last thing we need to do now is run to him and tell him we’ve gotten into a mess like this. There’s no telling what might come out of that, and we sure don’t want him poking around in our shipping manifests and cockets.”

  “Say no more.” Jones threw his hands up in surrender to Adam’s argument. “I understand.” He looked at Willis and commented, “He sure does have a quick temper, this kid, eh?”

  Willis just raised his eyebrow and chuckled.

  “We’re going to have to work this out for ourselves, boys,” said Adam. “And if we don’
t do it right, we’re going to really make a mess of things.”

  Adam led Willis and Jones around the fortress to the other side so that he could approach from behind the leader’s hut. As far as he knew, there was only one door to the place, and the armed guards were standing in front of it.

  He figured there was no need to bother with going too near the common room. If Martin and the others had been there and not made it out again, chances were they were locked up in the prison hut. That would be the first place he would check.

  WILLIS AND JONES HID IN THE dense vegetation on the eastern edge of the fortress, but with a clear view to watch Adam as he crept into the compound.

  As he neared the prison hut, he hid behind a stone well that was just outside, and he listened. There were voices coming from inside. That has to be Martin and Charlie, Adam thought. He crept closer and looked through the logs that formed one of the walls. He was able to see inside. It was Martin and Charlie, but there was another man in there, too. From what he could tell, his accent was English, so he assumed it was the man they called Drake.

  Adam quickly considered whether he should get Willis and Jones to come over and help. He didn’t want to risk running out in the open again, so he opted to just motion to them and point to the building, hoping they could figure out that he was trying to tell them the others were inside.

  “Psst!” he whispered loudly through the crack in the wall. No one seemed to notice or hear him, so he picked up a pebble from the ground and flicked it through the crack as best he could. It hit Charlie on the cheek.

  “What in the world?” Charlie said, then looked up to see if whatever had just hit him could have come from the ceiling.

  Adam flicked another pebble, but this time Charlie looked in his direction, since he could apparently tell it had come from one of the cracks in the wall. Charlie, Martin, and Drake all scurried across the floor of the hut and peered between the logs.

  “Adam!” Martin exclaimed. “How’d you get here?”

  “Does it matter? Listen, Willis and Jones are here with me. Canady has gone back to the Gypsy to let the captain know where we are. We’re going to get y’all out.”

  “We’ll be fine, but you need to get out of here!” said Drake. “I’m Thomas Drake, by the way. Nice to meet you.”

  “Likewise,” said Adam. “What do you mean you’ll be fine? You’re locked in a prisoner’s hut in Middle-of-Nowhere, Cuba!”

  Martin answered before anyone else had a chance to say anything. “Because Captain Velasquez is here, and he’s in with the leader right now negotiatin for our release.” He shot a stern look at Charlie and Drake.

  Adam wrinkled his brow. “I saw that! You’re up to something. What is it?”

  “You might as well tell him,” said Drake. “He should know.”

  “Now’s not the time,” insisted Martin.

  “Now’s not the time for what?” said a frustrated Adam.

  “He’s rash and impatient and tends to go off half-cocked, so I’m tellin you: do not tell him!” Martin made a stern, insistent face.

  Drake rolled his eyes at Martin, then looked at Adam and said, “Fine, I’ll tell you.”

  Martin and Charlie both looked at Drake like they could kill him.

  “The thing is,” said Drake, “turns out that Santiago—I mean Captain Velasquez—knows the leader of this whole outfit. They’ve had a run-in before.”

  Martin and Charlie both let out a deep breath. Adam could tell that Drake had apparently only given him half of the story, but it did seem to change the dynamics of the situation a bit. Only he didn’t know how. Would it make things better or worse that Captain Velasquez knew the man in charge? Was Captain Velasquez even someone who could be trusted?”

  Suddenly, they could all hear someone call something out in Spanish from not far away.

  “They know you’re back,” said Drake. “You better run!”

  Adam looked towards the north end of the hut, and a man was running straight at him. He ran to the southern end in an effort to get away. He had barely turned the corner when another man came around it at the same time and caught him, grabbing him firmly by his shoulders.

  “¡Ya lo tengo!” the man cried out.

  Adam reached for his machete, but the other man—who clearly had much more experience with the blades—fearlessly snatched it away from him by grabbing the dull edge, then tossed it out of reach. Still, Adam was able to pull himself from the man’s grip and started to run again, but he didn’t make it far before he was tackled by two other men.

  Within moments they had taken his pistol and tossed him into the prison hut, along with the others.

  * * *

  “Where’s the fellow who was chained up?” asked Adam.

  “He’s gone,” said Drake.

  Adam’s eyes grew enormous. “What happened to him?”

  “We let him go when we got here this mornin,” said Martin.

  “And then we got caught,” said Charlie.

  “I can see that.” Adam rolled his eyes and quickly crossed the room and peeled back the floor mats to look for where he had dug the hole in the floor the night before.

  “What in the world are you doin, boy?” asked Martin.

  “Oh, that’s just great!” Adam threw the mat back down onto the floor. “They filled up the hole.”

  “You said Willis and Jones are with you. Where are they?” asked Charlie.

  “In those woods over there,” said Adam, motioning to the forest across the field from the western side of the hut. “That is, unless they saw what happened and took off.”

  “Ah, I very much doubt they’d do that,” said Drake. “I believe those boys both said last night they were trained in the militia. I don’t believe either of them is the type who’d cut and run.”

  “Well, what can a militia of two do?” asked Adam.

  “If they’re clever, you’d be surprised,” Drake answered.

  The four of them stood in silence for a moment, contemplating the situation. Finally, Martin asked Adam, “You got that knife of yours with you?”

  He thought for a second, then squatted down, but just before he was about to reach into his boot to pull it out, the door to the prison hut was flung open, and two guards came inside, along with Hector, the man who had originally kidnapped Adam the day before.

  “You,” he said, pointing at Adam, “and you”—he pointed at Drake. “The comandante is wanting to seeing you in his salón.”

  “Why does he want to see you?” Martin asked Drake.

  Drake shrugged. “I’ve no idea. Just be glad he does.”

  ADAM’S AND DRAKE’S HANDS WERE bound in front of them, and they were marched into the leader’s hut.

  Upon seeing them enter the room, Santiago exclaimed, “¡Gracias a Dios!”

  Adam gave a quizzical look at Drake. He had no idea what the Spanish captain was saying, other than that he was saying thank you about something. Then he realized the mustachioed man sitting at the desk in the hut, the comandante, was the same man he had met at the Taberna El Trobador, the high sheriff.

  “What is this? Are we under arrest or something?” he asked, too stunned to say anything else.

  Drake looked around the room and appeared to be taking stock of the situation. He looked at Santiago, who told him something in Spanish, which caused Drake to roll his eyes and exhale sharply in exasperation.

  “Que bueno. Finally, we are all here together.” The sheriff sat back in his chair with a smug look on his face and not one ounce of sincerity.

  Santiago said something to the man that Adam could not understand, but he appeared to be very emotional.

  “Don’t beg the rotten bastard,” said Drake. “The others will be here soon, and he’ll be the one begging us for mercy.”

  “You are Adam?” Santiago said, looking right at him.

  “Yeah,” he nodded. “That’s me.”

  Santiago’s expr
ession demonstrated both his relief and his fear. “Thank God you are fine,” he said, then turned his attention back to the mustachioed man. “Let him go. This has nothing to do with him.”

  “What do you mean, this has nothing to do with me? Why would any of this have anything to do with me?” asked Adam.

  The sheriff reached into a box on his desk and took out a cigar. He ran it under his nose to inhale the fragrance, then grabbed a little blade from under a stack of papers on his desk and cut the end. After using his thumb to dust away any loose tobacco from the cut end, he moistened it in his mouth. Next he grabbed a thin piece of wood from his desk and lit it using the flame from a little lamp that was there. He brought the lit piece of wood up to the tip of the cigar and twisted it in his mouth as he puffed to get it going.

  “I have wondered if this day would come for more than eighteen years.” He took a draw from his cigar and held it in his mouth for a couple of seconds before he exhaled. Then he lowered the cigar and said, “I had hoped circumstances would never come to this, but here we are.”

  Now Adam was really confused. He looked at Drake for some explanation.

  Drake looked at Santiago with a worried look in his eyes. “Santiago . . . You should—”

  “I reckon this means you’re not really the high sheriff like you said you were, huh?” Adam asked.

  “Yes, he is,” said Santiago.

  The mustachioed man puffed on his cigar. He appeared to be relishing the confusion.

  “What’s going on here?” said Adam. “What kind of sheriff kidnaps somebody for ransom?”

  The sheriff laughed. “Do you think that is really what this is about?”

  Adam stood there expressionless and said nothing.

  “This is not about ransom,” said the man. “This was only . . . a distraction, you could say. If my stupid nephew here had not involved himself, and if you had only stayed in the cell until the ransom was collected and we delivered you back to your vessel, you would already be on your way back to your young lady in North Carolina.”