Captain Adam

by Chidsey, Donald Barr, 1902-1981

With it all, Everard van Bramm's most compelling feature was his eyes. They were the eyes of a snake.

  Adam's first thought was one of gladness that he'd refused to bring Maisie with him. She had pleaded to come, bring afraid for him. Well, Maisie had a strong stomach, and especially for a young woman seemingly so slight; but Adam doubted that she could have looked upon van Bramm without swooning.

  Resolved Forbes was keeping an eye on Maisie; and this need was regrettable, for Forbes had a great many other things to do today.

  "Sit ye down, Captain. Rum? Bumboo? Madeira?"

  "Thanks," said Adam, and flopped upon a cask and spread his legs, the sword hiked around to fall between them.

  Nobody mentioned the sword, but it was certain that they all saw it.

  For there were others in the room, four or five others, though van Bramm was the only one who counted. A man named Cark did a great deal of the talking, but he watched van Bramm's face all the while as might an interpreter.

  There was no palaver, as Adam had expected. They went right to the point.

  'Tou come armed. Captain—" with a waggle of his pipe to indicate the sword. "Are you a prisoner here or one of us?"

  Adam chuckled.

  "That's just what I was going to ask you."

  Van Bramm chuckled. He raised a blond eyebrow toward Cark, then returned to his pipe.

  "The late 'Major' Kellsen, so-called," Cark said sententiously, "had given us to believe that when you and your shipmates and your esteemed wife were captured. Captain, you expressed a willingness to go on the account. Did he get this straight?"

  "He did not. I expressed a willingness to go with them."

  "But there was nothing else you could do!"

  "That's right."

  "Kellsen reported that you had agreed to join us."

  "I said nothing about going on the account."

  "That was his understanding."

  "I can't help it what his understanding was. His understanding up till yesterday was that he knew how to fight with a cutlass, but it seems he was wrong there, too."

  Cark was deadly serious, but van Bramm here took the pipe out of his mouth and chuckled. Van Bramm looked appreciatively at Adam.

  "What about the others?" he asked Cark.

  "Sclden, Peterson and Waters will join. Gardner, Rellison, Bond and l-orbes will do whatever the skipper says."

  "So you see, Captain, how many lives you take when vou refuse to become a pirate."

  "I didn't say I refused to become a pirate."

  "You will join us then?"

  "I haven't made up my mind yet."

  "Bloody well time you did," somebody muttered.

  Now this was true. What Adam had been banking upon was the Providencers' clear propensity to let things slide, their slovenliness, laziness, lack of attention to details. The very phrase, "go on the account," meaning to become an out-and-out pirate, an avowed pariah, was an odd one—or was it ironic?—to apply to these men who couldn't keep anything straight, in their minds or on their books. What Adam had hoped was that he and his fellows from the Goodwill after a while would be taken for granted, more or less forgotten. Then when the right time came they could slip away. He wished to do everything he could to give the appearance of settling down, not talking about the outside world, never letting himself be seen to gaze wistfully at the Goodwill. However, being inconspicuous was difficult when you were paired with a woman like Maisie Treadway. And since the fight on Cucaracha he might as well resign himself to the fate of being a folk hero, a still-living myth.

  Van Bramm leaned toward him. There was never a moment when the man didn't smile.

  "We have your cargo, which we don't want. Captain. We have your vessel, which we do. We'd like to have you. What's your decision?"

  Adam paused.

  "After all. Captain, you're a man of sense. You have your fortune to make. Well, join up. The way they feel about you out there"—with a wave of the pipe toward the door—"you're sure to be elected captain of any enterprise you undertake. That's a double share."

  "If I get it."

  "I think you'd get it. I think you're the kind of man who would. And remember there's a war going on. We're free to roam the seas and nap anything we can nap."

  "And remember this, too, that the war ain't going to last forever. And once it's over they'll be looking around for people to hang—people they didn't have time to hang while they were fighting."

  "Afraid?"

  "Not of hanging, no. But maybe I am a mite afraid of going into a business I've got no control over and can't say how it might end. If we had a guarantee that this war would last so-and-so-many years, that would 124

  be something else again. But we haven't. We didn't know when it was going to start, any more'n we knew why. And we won't know when it's going to end—not until they tell us it's all over—and we won't know why then either."

  "Meaning you think piracy's bad business?"

  "Well, there's a power of folks don't care for it."

  "When the pirate's small, yes. But look at Drake. He was the one said, 'Who ever heard of being a pirate for a million pounds?' "

  "Well, a million pounds, that's different," Adam conceded.

  "Did they hang Drake? No, they knighted him."

  "That was a long while ago."

  "Henry Morgan wasn't such a long while ago," one of the other men said. "And they knighted him, too."

  "They didn't knight Brandish. Or Kidd."

  "Kidd was a fool."

  "And what about Thomas Tew? Blown to bits. And Avery? Buried in a pauper's grave after they stole all his money from him and he didn't dare squawk. And Tom Hart? He hangs in my home town right now. Been hanging there two years. It hasn't done him any good."

  Van Bramm shook a reflective head.

  "Witness Tom Hart's turning-off, did ye. Captain?"

  "Aye. Did you know him?"

  "I was his sailing master. And Newport—never thought they'd get him there. We had a good agent in that town. Man name of Evans."

  For a moment Adam was too frightened to speak. He didn't dare let eagerness sound in his voice.

  "Zephary Evans?" he asked after a while, sounding casual, offhand.

  "Could be. Long lank man with a long thin nose. Looked like a crane —like he ought to be standing on one leg." He put the pipe aside and leaned forward. His earrings went back and forth, making a kaleidoscope on the top of each shoulder. "Well, Tom Hart swung, though he was a slick 'un, I'll grant you. Ask me, he was sold out by somebody—maybe your smug Mister Evans. But that's no porridge for this meal. What we want to know now is: Will you sign up?"

  Adam paused.

  There was a knock on the door. For a moment, startled, they ignored this; but the knocking continued. One of the men went to the door.

  "Captain Long's mate." He made the announcement to van Bramm. "Wants to speak to him."

  "Why not?" said van Bramm.

  Adam went to the door. Relief leapt into the eyes of Resolved Forbes, who stood there. Forbes had been sent by Maisie—Adam saw this right away—to make sure that he was alive.

  Behind Forbes, too, though a respectful distance behind, a worshipping crowd was pleased by the appearance of Adam. It was as though he were royalty. There was a glad bumble of greeting, even a few cheers.

  One of these men seemed vaguely familiar; but Adam did not permit himself to look at them; the last thing he wanted just then was cheers.

  "It's still tonight?" he whispered to Forbes.

  "Aye. Bond and the boy, too. You all right in there?"

  "I'll get through till dark—somehow."

  "Just one other thing—"

  "Yes?"

  "Man named Willis Beach wants to join up. Says he knows you."

  "Willis Beach?"

  "Says you saved him from a press gang. Wants to serve under you, the way they're allowed to pick their skippers here."

  "Oh. Well, sign him on. We sure need another hand. But keep him aboard. D
on't trust him ashore."

  "What about Lady Maisie, sir?"

  "She mustn't know, of course."

  There was a great deal of silence when Adam turned back into the dim room, closing the door behind him. They all looked at him. The talk about who'd hanged and who hadn't was all very well, but the issue was clear enough. Was he or wasn't he joining them?

  "Well?"

  "You have been patient, gentlemen, but I'm going to ask you to wait till tomorrow morning. I want to talk it over with my wife."

  They snarled at that, and moved toward him, reaching for their knives, for they supposed that he was jeering at them. But Everard van Bramm, the only one who mattered, raised a hand.

  "You others get out," he said.

  Soon these two, alone, faced one another.

  Van Bramm took the pipe out of his mouth.

  "Captain, you're planning to bolt tonight."

  A blow in the mouth couldn't have startled Adam more.

  Van Bramm still was smiling, even chuckling a little, down deep.

  "No, nobody's betrayed you. I just put two and two together. Captain. Fve been watching you. You didn't see me, but I was there. You don't want to join up. But you don't want to die either."

  Adam said nothing.

  "So you think to escape. You could probably do it alone, in a small boat. But you want to take your crew—those of 'em who want to go with you—you feel you owe it to them. And you want to cut out your own vessel. You love that schooner. Captain. I've watched you look at her. You just couldn't leave her behind. Well, tonight's the logical time. That 126

  mock trial ought to draw almost everybody in camp. You hope it'll draw Senac and Williamson from the fort, too, don't you?"

  He was guessing, but he guessed with an uncanny accuracy. Recovered from his first jolt of amazement, Adam was silent, watchful.

  Van Bramm waved his pipe stem.

  "Good, good. Why don't you escape then, tonight?"

  Adam might have looked puzzled. Was he being played with, cat-and-moused? Van Bramm shook a sleepy head.

  "I could have you killed, but—they like you too much." He waved the pipe stem to indicate the crowd outside, unseen but audible. "Today you are their hero. Tomorrow it may be different, but today is the day we live in, no? If I kill you now, I might have trouble with them. If I let you stay, I'm sure to have trouble. Kellsen was a fool. You're not. You'd be heading an uprising in no time at all."

  "I see," softly.

  "I'm sure you do. By all means, run away. I'll miss that bonnie boat of yours, but it's worth it to be rid of you. Captain. I'll even go so far as to promise that Williamson and Senac won't be out at the fort tonight— and if they're not there nobody else'll be. Oh, there might be a few shots from the beach, but only musket fire. You can clear the Point before the cannon's manned."

  "How do I know this ain't a trick to get me out there, sink me?"

  "You'll see Senac and Williamson at the trial. Besides, how can you lose? If you don't go, Captain, I'll have no other choice—I'll have to kill you.

  Adam nodded. It made sense, admittedly.

  "There's only one other thing. Captain. When I call Cark and the others back, I'll tell 'em you've agreed to go on the account. You don't have to take any oath! Simply hear me say that—and don't deny it. That will be my justification for calling in the gunners. If you're one of us, we don't have to watch you. The others, afterward, they might think I was too trusting—but they won't suppose I helped you to get away. Understand?"

  "I think I do."

  "It would seem to make you a traitor to the brotherhood—and you know what that means, if you should get caught—or if you should ever come back to Providence here. But I don't think you ever will, eh?"

  "It doesn't seem likely," said Adam Long.

  Atop a tun in the middle of the marketplace sat a tall man wrapped in a rich red robe trimmed with ermine—real ermine—and he wore three wigs, one above the other, through the topmost of which a sea gull's feather had been thrust. He walloped the tun with the flat of a hatchet, his gavel. He hiccupped.

  "Oyez, oyez!"

  Somebody emptied a jack of rum onto the wigs and it soaked through these to zigzag in erratic rivulets down the face of the fat man.

  "Order in the court!"

  A dumpy fellow with the pocked face of a frog now rose. An inverted thundermug was over his head. He wore the handle on the left.

  "If your honor please— If your honor please—"

  "I don't please! Sit down—before I order the sergeant-at-arms to knock you down!"

  This was very funny. There were roars of laughter. The torches spat and hissed, and smoke coiled out of them to hang in aerial hanks around the camp.

  Adam Long loosened his sword in its scabbard, his knife in its sheath. He sat quiet, but his eyes were busy. It looked as if almost everybody in the colony was here in the marketplace, excepting van Bramm himself, who never showed up at such affairs. Certainly the company's best gunners, Williamson and Senac, were there. All the same, Adam was uneasy.

  "If your honor please, we have a very serious case here tonight. A very serious case indeed. If your honor please, this is the very serious case of a man who is in love vdth his wife."

  "Oh, no! Not that!"

  The Brethren of the Coast, here assembled in all their tatterde-malionism, and for the most part drunk, thought a great deal about the law. When they were not defying it, they liked to deride it. This, now, was their way of celebrating some special occasion, their favorite form of amusement, a mock trial. They were hilarious.

  Adam was in a conspicuous place, necessarily. Nearby, Resolved Forbes said, as usual, nothing, seeing, as usual, everything. Jeth Gardner with his one leg, John Bond with his touch of fever, and the not-trusted Willis Beach, the Londoner, were aboard the schooner in the bay. Maisie of course was at Tarpaulin Hall, unguarded, alas, just for the moment.

  Peterson and Eb Waters, like Seth Selden, had outspokenly joined the pirates. Adam could see them now, laughing. Seth with his Adam's apple 128

  gleefully abounce. Adam wished he could see Seth apart, if only for a moment, to ask him about Zephary Evans' connection with the late Thomas Hart: but there'd be no time for that now.

  "Think of it, your honor," the man under the chamberpot was declaiming, "he is in love with his wife!"

  "Hang him," somebody shouted.

  "Bastinado him!"

  "Burn him in oil!"

  Adam glanced at Resolved Forbes, who slipped away unnoticed.

  "Order in the courtroom!" The judge used his hatchet. "This here is a very serious case, as the worthy prosecutor so worthily said. Prosecutor, produce the dastardly person who is accused of doing this dastardly deed. Order in the court! Oyez!"

  Adam Long rose with a reluctance he tried to conceal.

  "Let the prisoner be sworn in."

  "No swearing around here," cried the judge. "God damn it, I won't stand for it!"

  Adam was caused to place his right palm upon a bundle of stolen ships' papers, whilst his left hand was raised.

  "Do you solemnly swear that you will tell lies, the whole lies, and nothing but the lies, so help you the Devil?"

  "I do."

  "That's a lie! You don't at all!"

  Through the applause Adam kept a sheepish smirk fastened on his mouth, but his eyes were still busy. Yes, the entire population of Providence must be here. The beach, a scant half-mile away, no doubt was deserted. Likely enough all the ships were deserted, too. And the moon wouldn't rise for more than an hour.

  He hoped that Maisie was all right. Maybe it had been wrong of him to fail to tell her what he planned; but she'd have wanted to take this piece of goods and then that piece of goods, and skirts and stuffs, and more and more and more—and anyway he did think that the fewer as knew a secret the better.

  * "Prisoner at the bar, you have heard the heinous offense of which you stand accused. What say ye? Are you guilty or not guilty?"

 
; "Well, comes to that, I reckon I'm both, your dishonor."

  "Order in the court! The prisoner will please display some sense. God damn it, you can't be both guilty and not guilty!"

  "Why not? This is a free country, ain't it?"

  He was a success. Oh, he was the star performer! Conceivably, he thought with bitterness, I should have become a strolling player? Perhaps the stage lost a distinguished ornament when I took to trade?

  When at last he could make himself heard again, the judge asked Adam

  what he had to say for himself. Not only was he accused of loving his wife, but it began to look as though his wife loved him as well, which was a pretty state of affairs. Why else, asked the judge, pointing with the hatchet, should she have followed him into court?

  Adam wheeled.

  The Honorable Maisie de Lynn Treadway-Paul came toward him, murmuring apologies as she weaved in and out among the pirates, ignoring the black looks and fruity obscenities of the whores. Such of her hair as escaped from under a muslin cap showed a brighter red than ever in the red light of the torches. Her eyes were huge. She was smiling, though it was a mannered smile, a fixed, ceremonial one.

  "What have you got to say to that, prisoner at the bar?"

  "I've got this to say to it, your dishonor—"

  He drew. He ran toward her. Several of the men in that vicinity reached for their cutlasses, sensing a brabble, but Adam only used its flat to clear a space and capture a cask. He sheathed then, and made for the cask with Maisie, resisting furiously, in his arms. She had tried to say something to him in a low voice, but he was too angry to heed. He sat on the cask and threw her across his knees, face down.

  She kicked and screamed. She clawed at his legs, and even ti'ied to bite him, while the pirates roared with laughter.

  Adam laid it on hard, resoundingly. Eight, nine, ten times he whammed those buttocks with a big flat horny right hand. The crowd went wild.

  He rose, Maisie in his arms still struggling.

  "If your dishonor pleases, I've got other business—"

  "The court excuses the defendant temporarily and I only wish I could have some of that business myself," shouted the judge.